Insight

Last month, Amazon Prime Video launched the second series of Clarkson’s Farm, its documentary series about Jeremy Clarkson’s attempt to run a farm in the Cotswolds.

Its viewing figures have outstripped one of its other notable titles, Lord of The Rings: The Rings of Power, purportedly one of the most expensive shows ever made. In the first 28 days since it launched on February 10th, Clarkson’s Farm series two has reached* just under 7.6 million individuals aged 4+ across the eight episodes, making it the most-watched show on the service this year.

Chart 1: Viewing profiles for Clarkson’s Farm series two and The Grand Tour series five
Source: Barb, all individuals 4+. Clarkson’s Farm series 2 viewers 1-28 day viewing Feb 10th – March 10th 2023. The Grand Tour series 5 viewers 1-28 day viewing Sept 16th – Oct 13th 2022.

Looking at the demographics of viewing to Clarkson’s Farm series 2 in chart 1, we can see that viewing splits relatively evenly by age and skews male at 57%. Compared to The Grand Tour series 5, it has a more balanced age and gender profile.

Chart 2 shows the audience profile for the 40 top-performing shows on Amazon Prime Video this year. We can see that whilst the service’s content appeals to a wide variety of people, Clarkson’s Farm sits in the centre of the content spread, meaning it appeals to the broad subscriber base of Amazon Prime Video.

This chart also reflects the volume of viewing (indicated by the size of bubble), showing that Clarkson’s Farm has dominated viewing on Amazon Prime Video this year, despite other programmes having many more episodes available to watch.

Chart 2: Amazon Franchises 2023
Size of the bubble represents cumulative viewing to multiple series, axes represent age and gender profile
Source: Barb, Jan 1st – Mar 10th 2023, all individuals 4+. Amazon franchises are defined as programmes with more than one series.

While the level of viewing to Clarkson’s Farm indicates it has been successful for Amazon Prime Video, people who watched it have not just been watching it and other programming on the service. We can look at what viewers of Clarkson’s Farm have been watching on other channels and services.

Chart 3: Top 20 most-watched sub-genres across all channels and services by Clarkson’s Farm S2 viewers

Table 1: Highest reaching programmes across all channels and services by Clarkson’s Farm S2 viewers
Source: Barb, Feb 10th – Mar 10th 2023, Clarkson’s Farm Series 2 viewers 1-28 Day Viewing. Programme information on channel totals (inc stagger)

Chart 3 shows the most-watched sub-genres across all channels and services by Clarkson’s Farm series two viewers based on the volume of viewing. Table 1 shows the highest reaching programmes by Clarkson’s Farm series two viewers, demonstrating where else Clarkson’s Farm viewers can be found.

We can see that pre-school children’s programming accounted for 10% of viewing, encompassing shows such as Nick Jr’s Peppa Pig, Bluey on CBeebies and Disney+, and Hey Duggee on CBeebies. This indicates that Clarkson’s Farm viewers with young children are also watching television with them – so while Clarkson’s Farm viewers as a whole don’t watch lots of pre-school programming, those that do watch it in high volumes.

Crime and Legal viewing (8%) comes from shows such as BBC1’s The Gold, Death in Paradise and Beyond Paradise, as well as from ITV’s Vera. Sitcom viewing (7%) is dominated by Netflix’s Friends, while popular quiz, panel and game shows (6%) for this audience include ITV1’s The Chase and Celebrity Catchphrase and BBC1’s Pointless.

This illustrates that it’s possible to reach SVOD viewers by tracking where and what else they watch. While Jeremy Clarkson may not be the most successful of farmers as yet, he is certainly harvesting the viewers for Amazon Prime Video, and Barb clients can find and target these people’s viewing elsewhere too.

Neil Jones, Head of Insight, Barb

* Reach is defined as at least three minutes of continuous viewing.