Tess Daly's very different career away from Strictly as she hints at reason for quitting
Tess Daly's very different career away from Strictly as she hints at reason for quitting
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Tess Daly's very different career away from Strictly as she hints at reason for quitting

Samantha Masters 🕒︎ 2025-10-28

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Tess Daly's very different career away from Strictly as she hints at reason for quitting

Earlier this week, Strictly Come Dancing presenter Tess Daly announced that the current series of the show will be her last after "21 wonderfully joyful years". The 56-year-old has been fronting the competition since its inception in 2004, firstly co-hosting with Bruce Forsyth followed by Claudia Winkleman. In a video with her co-star on Wednesday, Tess said it was time to "pass the baton on" to two new presenters, as she and Claudia step away. With a rumoured salary of £150,000 for Tess' role on Strictly, many fans have been left wondering why she made such a decision. What some may not know is the presenter has a very different job away from the cameras that "consumes a lot" of her time. Launched in 2021, Tess co-owns the swimwear range, Naia Beach, with her best Gayle Lawton. Recently opening up about her four-year-old venture, she said: "That's my other baby, the business, and that requires me [to work] hours and hours a day, first thing in the morning and last thing at night. "It doesn't sleep and it's growing. And [what is] really exciting [is] getting to be creative, you know, I love building a business with my best friend. "But, it does consume a lot of my time. So I'm usually doing that, it's wonderful," she added, in a discussion with Giovanna Fletcher on the Happy Mum, Happy Baby podcast. Gushing further, Tess went on to say: "It's enjoyable, you know, its really fulfilling but that takes up most of my time." As well as being a presenter and businesswoman, the Strictly star is also a mum to daughters; Phoebe, 21, and Amber, 15. Tess shares her children with her long-term husband Vernon Kay, who fronts the mid-morning show on BBC Radio 2. The presenter's family life has very much been a part of her time on Strictly Come Dancing . Just six weeks after the birth of the pair's first born, Tess threw herself back into work for the second series of the show. "Six weeks to the day since I'd given birth, I went back. That was no mean feat because I was a new mother. I'd had a caesarean," she shared. "Timing-wise, it worked out really well because you can work six weeks after having a caesarean, which is a pretty major operation. "But it was pretty daunting — in the six weeks since giving birth, becoming a new mum, not knowing what I was doing, not sleeping very much." Since announcing her exit, odds suggest that Tess could sign up for her first ever reality show, Celebrity Traitors. Both she and Vernon were rumoured to be joining the line-up of Claudia's show last year, however Tess later said this was never the case. Speaking to The Metro newspaper recently, she said: "She [Claudia] knows I'd be able to read her mind at this point. I'd be terrible at doing a poker face and being a traitor." Previously insisting this was true, Vernon said on Good Morning Britain : "Tess always laughs when she tells a fib, whereas I'm terrible. "It's not convincing. I think it would be an interesting psychological experience, The Traitors ." Strictly Come Dancing: The Results airs tonight at 7.15pm on BBC One.

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