Ever wonder why so many magazines-326 by one recent count-contain “house” or “home” in the title?
There’s clearly an interest in home and gardening, with the latter being one of the three most popular leisure activities. (Walking and swimming are the others.)
So why does only one cable channel, Scripps-Howard Broadcasting’s Home & Garden Television, operate on this theme? It’s been operating less than a year, while Better Homes & Gardens magazine has been around since 1922.
Such a venture “I guess, was just too obvious,” says Ken Lowe, a Scripps-Howard Broadcasting vice president, now based in Knoxville as president of this new cable channel. Programming ranges from gardening to landscaping to building and remodeling.
Lowe, who has extensive TV and radio broadcasting experience, admits it was his wife Mary who pushed him into getting this cable channel launched.
The Lowes had built six homes in various markets, and had a conversation three years ago about where there might be TV programming geared to the home and garden. “Why don’t you do something about it?” His wife asked him, Lowe recalled.
The result: a cable channel with 6.5 million subscribers that has contractual agreements to increase to 10 million next year.
But despite this launch, which includes 200 national advertisers, Lowe doesn’t expect this cable channel to be profitable for another three years. He says Home & Garden Television (HGTV) will need 20 million subscribers to be profitable.
HGTV as yet doesn’t have a Chicago-area presence, but this will change in October when the Post-Newsweek cable system will air it in some northern suburbs.
Another cable operator in this area also can be expected to carry the channel later this year, says Lowe, who was in Chicago this week for the National Hardware Show at McCormick Place. A crew filmed at the show for a Sept. 15 one-hour prime-time special.
HGTV got good news Thursday as DIRECTV Inc., the leading direct broadcast satellite service with over 700,000 subscribers, announced the cable channel had been added to its programming lineup.
Latest data from Nielsen Media Research shows that cable has 65 percent penetration of the 95.9 million TV homes in the U.S., including Alaska and Hawaii.
BBDO Chicago chief: Tonise Paul, who in April was elevated to president of BBDO Chicago, now also becomes the agency’s chief executive officer following the resignation of Steve LaGattuta. Paul, a 12-year veteran of BBDO Chicago, has been the agency’s key management contact with principal client Wm. Wrigley Jr. Co. LaGattuta, who joined BBDO Chicago in March 1993, also had been chairman, but that post won’t be filled at this time. LaGattuta, who leaves the agency Friday, said he resigned the post several weeks ago. “This is not your typical `to pursue other interest’ resignation,” he said. “There are other things I want to do.” He’s evaluating two opportunities, one of them advertising related. BBDO Chicago is expected to have 1996 billing of $190 million.
– Whitman Corp.’s Midas International unit added Goodby Silverstein & Partners-San Francisco to the list of finalists for its $23 million national advertising account, the others being J. Walter Thompson USA and DDB Needham, both Chicago, and Fallon McElligott Minneapolis.
On the move: Angel Lopez became VP-marketing at Sacred Heart Hospital. . . . William “Reggie” Riley promoted to an account supervisor at Hal Riney & Partners/Heartland (Chicago).
Strictly Personal: Birthday greetings to Robin Lampert, Sharon Elliott Lowe, Lisa Radaj, Joyce Saxon, Chuck Loebbaka, B. B. Solis and James P. Herlihy.
– Peggy Dyer, recently a marketing executive with Quaker Oats Beverages, is joining Sara Lee Corp.’s Champion Products unit in Winston-Salem, N.C. as senior VP-marketing. Champion is a marketer of athletic team uniform replicas and T-shirt lines.
