Home & Garden Television
Where Everything's
Coming Up Roses

The headquarters for HGTV and Scripps Productions is on a 17-acre campus 22 miles east of downtown Knoxville. The facility has undergone two major construction projects the past five years. The first doubled the existing space; the second, begun Aug. 17, 1998, again doubled existing space and created a three-story parking garage. There's room now for the current HGTV and Scripps Productions staffs of nearly 500 employees and space for 200 more as the need arises.

Address: 9701 Madison Ave., Knoxville, Tenn. 37932
Mailing Address: P.O. Box 50970, Knoxville, Tenn. 37950
Phone: 423-694-2700
FAX: 423-531-8933
URL: www.hgtv.com

Five years ago, Ken Lowe was appointed president of his own creation: a brand-new cable network devoted to the scores of do-it-yourselfers who were convinced that, with proper guidance, they could build their own deck, create a lush garden paradise or sew curtains that look professionally made.

Now, after four and a half years on the air, Home & Garden Television is helping viewers achieve their home and garden dreams in record numbers. With 55 million subscribers, HGTV is the nation's fastest-growing cable television network. In 1998, the network showed its first profit after fewer than four full years on the air and cash operating losses of only about $50 million.

In the fourth quarter of '98, HGTV boosted its primetime ratings 35 percent compared with a year earlier. It also launched Home & Garden Village in 1998 as part of hgtv.com, and saw Web site traffic increase by 770 percent in one year.

HGTV is part of The E.W. Scripps Company's category television division known as Scripps Networks.

At a Glance

Location: HGTV is headquartered in Knoxville, Tenn., with offices in New York, Los Angeles, Chicago and Detroit.

Subscribers: Home & Garden Television can now be seen in more than 55 million homes. The network added more than 2 million homes to its subscriber list in January alone. HGTV will continue to see robust subscriber growth in 1999, according to the latest Beta Research 1998 Cable Operator Study on Channel Carriage.

Penetration: HGTV can be viewed in all 50 states. Internationally, HGTV owns 33 percent of HGTV Canada and provides much of the Canadian network's daily programming. HGTV's branded programming can also be seen on networks in Japan and Australia.

Typical viewer: The largest segment of viewers is 25-54 years old and slightly more women than men regularly tune in. As compared to the average U.S. adult, the adults who watch HGTV are 46 percent more likely to have a household income of $75,000 or more, are 23 percent more likely to be college graduates, are 40 percent more likely to be in professional occupations and are 21 percent more likely to own a home. Advertisers: 1,000

Online presence: Home & Garden Village is a part of hgtv.com. At the time it was launched in September 1998, hgtv.com enjoyed 5.2 million page views per month. Five months later, hgtv.com had exactly doubled its traffic to 10.4 million page views. The village sees about 20 percent of the traffic to the site, and HGTV by mid-year had 14 lease-holding sponsors in the village ­ GE, Amazon.com, Patagonia, Garden.com, Improvenet, Home Portfolio, Energy.com, Garden Supply Catalog, Etera, Furniturepoint, and others. HGTV currently does not do transactional business at its store, but many of the companies represented on the site do. There are more than 65 features in the village every month, including some two dozen multimedia features (streaming video, streaming audio, slide shows and more) on everything from quilt-making to table-setting to fixing your water heater. HGTV does three weekly chats, the most popular of which was a week of afternoon chats with Carol Duvall that averaged 1,000 chat visitors a day. HGTV has an interactive tour of this year's Dream Home, radio clips from HG Radio, a full news, weather and information service, and a library of home and garden information packed with references, resources and step-by-step information.

Feedback: The call center received 25,688 mail, e-mail and telephone inquiries during the month of January, which is a high-volume month. Content-related calls were up considerably, totaling 5,730. The Tournament of Roses coverage generated 392 e-mail comments, of which 99 percent were positive.

Programming: With more than 35 shows, HGTV has put the know-how in the how-to of home repair. Twenty-four hours a day, enthusiasts can learn to build a deck, knock out a wall, design a kitchen, or take a garden from lackluster to luscious. The network features almost exclusively first-run programming during primetime, with a long list of great picks from categories like building and remodeling, decorating and interior design, gardening and landscaping, crafts and hobbies and special interests.

Personnel

Employees: Home & Garden Television has more than 400 full-time and part-time employees.

Milestones

• Aug. 16, 1993 -- Scripps Howard Broadcasting Company announced plans to launch a new cable network.

• Dec. 31, 1994 -- Home & Garden Television began broadcasting its 24-hour national cable network.

• April 1995 -- HGTV completed and opened its new headquarters building in Knoxville, Tenn.

• April 15, 1996 -- The premiere issue of "HGTV Ideas," a bi-monthly consumer magazine, was released.

• May 1, 1996 -- HGTV launched its highly successful Web site at http://www.hgtv.com.

• Sept. 5, 1996 -- The Canadian government granted permission to HGTV and its Canadian partner to establish HGTV Canada as a stand-alone cable network.

• Feb. 1, 1997 -- HGTV began distributing its programs to the NBC Europe Channel.

• April 1, 1997 -- HGTV began distributing its programs to The Home Channel in Japan.

• 1998 -- HGTV becomes profitable well ahead of schedule.

• Jan. 12, 1998 -- Plans to launch a new network, the Do-It-Yourself (DIY) digital cable network were announced by Scripps in response to strong viewer and advertiser demand for more detailed, step-by-step programming.

• September 1998 -- Home & Garden Village launched as part of the Web site.

• Feb. 1, 1999 -- HGTV breaks the 50-million subscriber mark within 50 months of its launch. The network added more than 12 million new subscribers in 1998 alone.

Awards and Distinctions

• HGTV is listed as the number-one network cable operators are most interested in adding to their systems on basic/expanded basic by the end of 1999, according to Beta Research's 1999 "Cable Operator Study On Channel Carriage." HGTV held the number-two spot in the category in 1998.

• HGTV's one-hour Cabrini Greens special won a 1997 Clarion Award and a gold medal at the New Festival in the community portraits category. The program also won a certificate of merit from The Gabriel Awards.

• African Design/American Homes, a one-hour special, won a 1998 NAMIC Vision Award.

• HGTV and Cinetel Studios won two gold CTAM Mark Awards for their 1997 holiday card and 1997 public relations holiday programming mailing.

• HGTV logged the largest promotion in cable TV history with 2,512,300 entries in its 1998 Dream Home Sweepstakes.

Community Service

• HGTV-Cinetel received the Knox County Volunteer Award for auctioning off props. Proceeds went to Big Brothers/Big Sisters.

• The network's facility won a 1998 Knoxville Beautification Award.

Viewer Responses

The phone lines and the mailbag at HGTV are full of positive feedback from viewers. Here's a sampling:

• "I love HGTV soooo much that my friends and I have started a 12-step program to aid us in withdrawal symptoms."

• "HGTV has such creative and inspiring programming ... you make me want to go out and get busy!"

• "I love the shows. My garden is finally starting to look good thanks to HGTV."

• "HGTV has saved my life. After my husband died, I lost my purpose. One day I turned on HGTV and I've been a faithful watcher ever since. My new purpose has become gardening ... through that I've gained a new sense of self..."