Unforgotten season 6 maker enjoys bumper year ahead of popular ITV show’s return
The television studio owned by ITV behind the latest series of popular detective drama Unforgotten enjoyed a bumper 2023 with its revenue rising to its highest level for eight years.
Mainstreet Pictures, which is based in London, has reported a revenue of £1.9m for last year, a rise from the £1.6m it posted for 2022.
According to newly-filed documents with Companies House, the firm’s pre-tax profits also increased from £509,344 to £644,203.
The studio’s revenue is the highest it has been since it reported a total of £3.5m in 2015.
Mainstreet Pictures started filming on the sixth season of Unforgotten in March and has also been behind its previous series.
The studio has also made Gold Digger, Age Before Beauty, Him and I Want My Wife Back.
Mainstreet Pictures is led by managing directors Sally Haynes and Laura Mackie who were previously at ITV before setting the company up.
The business is one of around 50 subsidiaries of ITV Studios which is part of the wider ITV group.
In March, TV reported a drop in overall sales for 2023 despite an uptick in digital revenue and a record performance from ITV Studios.
In a year in which the company repositioned itself for “higher sustainable growth,” ITV recorded a two per cent decline in total revenue, but a four per cent jump in sales at its Studios business, pushing revenue at this arm to a record.
Earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortisation (EBITDA) dropped 32 per cent to £489m for the year as a whole.
The decline reflected a “decline in linear advertising” as well as extra investment in the group’s digital streaming platform ITVX.
The group reported a 19 per cent growth in digital revenue, which offset a 15 per cent in linear advertising, a result of the “challenging advertising market.”