Time to pay tribute to New Tricks, which ended its most recent run on BBC1 this Monday. The penultimate episode had 8.9 million viewers, which meant that more people watched it that night than Coronation Street. It has a good claim to be the most popular programme on television.
All of this brings much satisfaction. For one thing, New Tricks is everything a TV marketing man hates. It is about older people. It probably appeals to older people. Marketing men have a set of beliefs which are quite as irrational as any cult religion. One is that only young people are worth advertising to, since they are crazed neo-philiacs and can be persuaded to switch brands, whether of cars, cook-in sauce or toilet cleansers. By contrast, old people are set in their ways and no amount of advertising will shift their buying habits. This is piffle — the over-40s are every bit as likely to experiment as anyone else, and generally have more money too.
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