Incentives for the creatives

Times are obviously tough at ITV. The company has cut staff at its ITV Digital arm and is struggling to hold on to subscribers despite the efforts of its heroic Monkey.

Now the company is getting desperate. The Diary has heard that ITV employees have been told, via an e-mail, that their biscuit and flower budgets must be cut.

While a cut in the flower budget may not be the most devastating news, the biscuit announcement is a bit of a bombshell. How else will employees get the sugar-rush needed to create more lame shows?

Strangely, ITV doesn’t seem too concerned about its advertising budget – it has just splashed out on a poster campaign to promote its coverage of the Brit Awards. Hobnob, anyone?