Ruud de Wild and Olcay Gulsen will go down in history as one of the worst-grossing TV duos ever. They manage to drop even the country’s largest channel from the top 25.
Broadcasting prime time on NPO 1, but not ending up in the daily top 25 of most watched programmes: it is almost impossible. Ruud de Wild and Olcay Gulsen nevertheless manage it with their real life soap Ruud & Olcay. 348 thousand people (8 percent market share) watched it yesterday: an unmitigated disaster.
Lowest score ever
How does viewing figure specialist Tina Nijkamp interpret this score? She writes on her channel Life of Tina: “The viewer has made the final judgement. Ruud and Olcay is a ratings disgrace. And a nightmare for Ruud de Wild and Olcay Gulsen. Their docusoap is not even in the top 25 and only has 348 thousand viewers. This is really unprecedentedly low for NPO 1.”
She continues: “I don’t think NPO 1 has ever scored lower than this at 9:30 p.m. in TV history. Lower figures than RTL 4, NPO 2, SBS 6, RTL 7, but even than RTL 5 with 112 Today. What a drama for Ruud and
Olcay, also because of serious image damage. Also disastrous for the program table of NPO 1.”
Failing top
The NPO top has really failed with this, says Tina. “How could this program have been programmed there? And what now? Off the schedule or still plodding on for another three weeks? Probably the last but it will be three very annoying weeks.”
Astonishingly enough, NPO’s TV boss Remco van Westerloo pretends to be satisfied with the figures. “I think Ruud & Olcay is a disarming program that is well made. We will therefore continue to broadcast the series. We are satisfied with this program and also with the total reach,” he told ANP.
Middle finger
In other words: Remco sticks his middle finger hard at the viewer, who massively rejects this title. Mezen Dannawi, manager of NPO Start, says that it does score online: “After broadcasting, about 300,000 viewers are added every week. That is the total of delayed viewing via the various providers and NPO Start, where Ruud En Olcay is an outright hit.”
How does Tina view this? “The online card is always drawn when the linear ratings are not good. If it is such a big hit on NPO Start, then the wrong programming decision has been made: then it would have had an NPO Startonly series should be. It is clear that the linear viewer is unfortunately not waiting for it.”
“This linear drama could have been prevented with an NPO Start-only programming. And thus had not caused any damage to Ruud and Olcay. The target group of the program therefore appears to have been misjudged.”
Viewing figures
The viewing figures of Wednesday, May 10, 2023 (SKO):
Top 15 | Market shares (18-24h, 6+) |
|---|---|
| 01. Journal 20:00 (NPO1) 1,685,000 | 01. RTL4 / 19.3% |
| 02. Half past seven news (RTL4) 1,153,000 | 02. NPO1 / 18.8% |
| 03. Journal 18:00 (NPO1) 1,024,000 | 03. SBS6 / 12.7% |
| 04. Today Inside (SBS6) 890,000 | 04. NPO2 / 8.7% |
| 05. The Perfect Picture while traveling (RTL4) 870,000 | 05. RTL7 / 8.6% |
| 06. EenVandaag (NPO1) 857,000 | 06. RTL5 / 5.5% |
| 07. Day and night (NPO1) 748,000 | 07.NET5 / 3.9% |
| 08. Good Times Bad Times (RTL4) 735,000 | 08. NPO3 / 2.9% |
| 09. AC Milan – Inter Milan (RTL7) 695,000 | 09. RTL8 / 2.9% |
| 10. RTL Boulevard (RTL4) 690,000 | 10. Vero / 2.4% |
| 11. Edition NL (RTL4) 647,000 | 11. BBC / 1.2% |
| 12. Inside Out (NPO2) 634,000 | 12. FOX / 0.9% |
| 13. Op1 (NPO1) 613,000 | 13. Discov / 0.8% |
| 14. Heart of the Netherlands (SBS6) 606,000 | 14. Comedy / 0.8% |
| 15. Jinek (RTL4) 591,000 | 15. SBS9 / 0.8% |
Market shares per channel group (18-24h, 6+) | More viewing figures at: |
| 01. RTL Netherlands 37.4% |  |
| 02. Public Broadcasting 30.4% | |
| 03. Talpa TV 19.8% |
Programs that did not make the top 15 include Time for MAX (556 thousand), About Life (497 thousand), Nieuwsuur (492 thousand), Nadia (445 thousand), Shoownieuws (418 thousand), De Worste Chauffeur (368 thousand) .