Nick Jr. is a children's pay television channel in the United Kingdom and Ireland owned and operated by Paramount Networks UK & Australia. Aimed at preschoolers, it launched as the first full-day preschool-oriented television channel in the United Kingdom and all of Europe on 1 September 1999.
History
Early history (1993–1999) Nick Jr. launched as a morning block with Nickelodeon on 1 September 1993. The block aired during the daytime hours from 9 a.m. to 12 p.m. on weekdays though these hours varied over time, particularly when Nick Jr. aired in a breakfast slot in the school holidays (mostly summer time). Its programming was a mix of shows from the American version of Nick Jr. and other imported shows. Later in the block's existence, syndicated British children's programmes would be a main focus of the channel as well. By the late 1990s, it was mostly broadcast between 10 a.m. to 2:30 p.m.
Launch as a full channel (1999–2005) On 10 June 1999, Nickelodeon UK announced that Nick Jr. would be spun off as a standalone channel, and that its new branding was being finalised.Kids’ TV Thursday 10 June 1999 Newspaper: Aberdeen Press and Journal P9 The channel officially launched on 1 September alongside Nickelodeon timeshift service Nick Replay, becoming the world's first digital television network dedicated to pre-school programming. Programming broadcast on the channel was a mixture of British shows and the rest from the United States and other countries, with programmes at launch including the UK pay television premiere of Bob the Builder and a localised version of Nick Jr. series Blue's Clues hosted by Kevin Duala, alongside a selection of classic programmes such as Thomas the Tank Engine, The Wombles and Paddington Bear. The channel launched on Sky Digital and on the Astra 1B satellite of Sky's analogue satellite service, where on the former the channel ran from 6 a.m. to 7 p.m. while on the latter it was broadcast on a transponder that was shared with Sky Sports 3, where Nick Jr. would air from 6 a.m. to 10 a.m. which would sometimes be altered if sports were being covered in the early morning.
In October 1999, Nickelodeon UK announced plans to expand Nick Jr.'s slot to include a spinoff of the American Noggin channel, but this never materialised outside of the initial announcement.
The Nick Jr. block on Nickelodeon continued until July 2000, before it was closed due to the high uptake of Sky Digital. On 31 August 2000, Nick Jr shut down on analogue satellite.
Beginning on 20 April 2001, MTV Dance started broadcasting during Nick Jr's off-air hours after it was spun off from MTV Extra.
On 4 February 2002, the channel was given its first rebrand with a new look and set of idents. Three programmes premiered on the channel on that day, fellow US programme Dora the Explorer, acquired Jim Henson series The Hoobs, and the channel's first locally-produced series You Do Too. On 19 July, the channel moved its EPG slot on Sky in order for the Nicktoons channel to air on the slot. On 13 August, MTV Dance acquired its own separate channel. By December, Nick Jr. had gained another hour at the end of the broadcasting day, now operating from 6 a.m. to 8 p.m.
On 31 May 2004, Nick Jr. extended its runtime to end at 10 p.m. The additional two hours of broadcast became home to a new retro children's television block named Noggin. This allowed the main network to focus more on newer shows, like Peppa Pig which was co-commissioned by Nick Jr. and Channel 5.
Rebrands and expansions (2005–2010) On 5 September 2005, Nick Jr. was given another rebrand, which saw the addition of the then-US mascot Piper O'Possum within continuity links. The Backyardigans premiered on linear UK on the same day of the rebrand. The rebrand also saw the renaming of the Noggin block to Nick Jr. Classics.
On 30 January 2006, Nick Jr. expanded its offerings with the launch of a daytime block under the Noggin brand on TMF from 7 am to 9 am. It used the same branding as the Noggin channel in the US, and aired many Nick Jr. programmes, most of them airing on UK terrestrial television for the first time. Around the same time, an Irish feed of the channel was launched, which shares the same schedule as the UK but features Irish advertising. On 24 April 2006, Nick Jr. 2 was launched as a one-hour timeshift service of the main network, before becoming a standalone sister channel with a separate schedule. On 25 September, the Noggin block was renamed as Nick Jr on TMF.
On 4 January 2009, Nick Jr. Classics was removed from the main Nick Jr., becoming exclusive to Nick Jr. 2. The block would continue on the network until July 2010, with classic British children's series being removed around this time. In early 2009, TMF reverted its Nick Jr block back to Noggin, and it broadcast until March 2010, before it was shut down permanently, at which point VIVA had replaced TMF.
24/7 channel (2010–2013) In February 2010, Nickelodeon UK announced that it would adopt the worldwide rebrand, with Nick Jr. and Nick Jr. 2 gaining the new look during the second half of the year alongside Nicktoons and Nicktoons Replay. This would be the first time the British network would share the same graphics and ident package as the United States. On 2 August 2010, Nick Jr. began broadcasting 24/7, with many older shows from the 2000s being re-added to fill the schedule.
In July 2011, Nick Jr. 2 briefly shifted its sign-on time to 5 a.m., but this was reverted to 6 a.m. a month later.
A 1-hour timeshift named Nick Jr. +1 launched on 2 October 2012, replacing Nicktoons Replay.
By July 2013, Nick Jr. 2 had begun broadcasting 21 hours from 3 a.m. to 12 a.m., with teleshopping off the air.
Recent years (2014–present) On 3 November 2014, Nick Jr. 2 was renamed Nick Jr. Too, and it began broadcasting 24/7.
On 5 July 2016, Nick Jr. HD launched on Sky, replacing MTV Live HD's Sky slot.NickALive! Post Retrieved 16 Apr 2022
On 31 October 2022, Sky sold its stake in Nickelodeon UK, including Nick Jr., to Paramount.
Identity
Between the launch of the block in 1993 and the launch of the channel in 1999, Nick Jr UK's branding largely mirrored that of the American feed and used the American version's idents. The UK input (branded as either Banana Sandwich or Nick Jr in the schedules) was presented by Dave Benson Phillips between 1994 and 1996, where Dave was joined by two puppet mascots called Bugsy and Herbie on location around England before the two puppet characters eventually went onto present the block by themselves for the whole of 1996, still on location for a while whilst sometimes presenting in a colourful animated studio, joined by some guest presenters occasionally until they were replaced by Face. Face ran from February 1997 until September 2005 and was dubbed into British English by David Holt. Bugsy and Herbie went on to have their own series of mini-episodes aired on Nick Jr. during the advert breaks in the late 1990s until early 2000s, by which point the puppets were removed completely.
Upon the channel's launch in 1999, it launched its own package featuring live-action children playing in a brightly painted studio or holding posters on which clips of programmes appeared. From the channel's launch, Face's hosting job would be shared by the Early Worms, the titular characters of the Early Worms show, Arnie and Barnie. Due to the abundance of British-produced content along with the channel's status as the first dedicated for preschoolers in the UK, the channel positioned itself in a special British image in its early years. Starting in September 2000, just before signing off for the night, it would air a bedtime segment and song hosted by Kevin Duala (host of the British version of Blue's Clues), titled Bedtime Business.
In 2001, the channel transitioned into using Nick Jr. US's ident package, first with up-next bumpers, and combinations of the 1999 idents with idents from the US.
On 4 February 2002, Nick Jr. fully rebrand into the new package, which had a specific jingle and song played in idents. These idents usually consisted of children playing around or dancing, this time in the outdoors, and the logo appeared (either being mushrooms, the stereotypical parent and child, squirrels, dogs, whales, chickens, butterflies, elephants or flowers) in a white circle on a plain brightly-coloured background at the end. On some occasions, they would broadcast atmospheric idents which included babies. Sometimes these idents would air on most of the ad breaks, or sometimes they appeared in split-screen graphics and next bumpers. Promo endboards were added as well.
Dora the Explorer and The Hoobs premiered on the same day of the rebrand. Before signing off at 7 p.m. (8 p.m. after fall 2002), it would air the Bedtime Business segment, followed by a short closedown bumper featuring some characters from Nick Jr. shows and an announcement telling viewers to resume watching at 6 a.m., before cutting to a static yellow screen with the characters and the broadcast times until 6 a.m. the next morning. In fall 2002, they updated their DOG to a much cleaner, organised and less opaque state.
Just before Noggin signed on, an ident showing the logo as two caterpillars played during the last advertisement break at 8 p.m. Then in 2005, this was supplemented with a sting ident of the Nick Jr logo (as two snails) and the Noggin logo spining around. After Noggin signed off, it would play an ident of a UFO flying away, and cut to a dark blue version of the 2002 signoff screen, just telling viewers to resume watching at 6 a.m.
In July 2004, some in-vision morning presenters were introduced to the network. Neal Wright (Zak) and Jennifer Johnston (Jen) presented and hosted this block simply called "The Garden." Alongside them, there was a puppet plant called Bud, and a blue ball of light/firefly named Izzy.
Also, around this period in 2004, Nick Jr. started to use the 2D American animal idents originally introduced there in 2003, which were eventually removed at some point. At the same time, Nick Jr. began airing the new look of Face to their channel introduced in America the year prior, usually referred to as "Modern Face". He was still voiced by David Holt. Nick Jr. made the unusual decision to not replace the original Face, leaving Modern Face and Face's old look broadcasting simultaneously.
In the spring of 2005, a new animated presenter, Piper O'Possum, appeared on the channel alongside Face at the time, O'Possum presented the UK input of Nick Jr. until its rebrand on 30 April 2010. She was redubbed by Alex Kelly and lasted longer on the UK feed than in the US by three years. Between this time and 4 September 2005, a mix of Old Face, Modern Face, Piper, The Garden, The Early Worms and The Baby Bumpers hosted the channel.
During the significant rebrand of 5 September 2005, Face was removed entirely, The Garden remained but only until October of the same year, and the Early Worms continued to present in the morning. Although Piper became the main presenter for most of the day, in the late afternoons the bumpers with O'Possum were not shown for the rest of the remaining hours and her segments of announcing shows were usually replaced with normal next bumpers. In addition, Noggin was renamed to Nick Jr. Classics and the ident package that had been used since 2002 was removed, as the international versions of Nick Jr. launched a 2D-3D animated pop-up-book-style ident package, with two animals (a parent and a child) forming the Nick Jr. logo, very similar to the package of Nick Jr. on CBS from 2004 to 2006.