When HGTV decided to cease production of my show, I wasn't at all surprised. The writing had been on the wall for some time. In the beginning, my show aired in prime time, then it was moved to weekends only, then it was moved to the wee hours of the morning on Satuday and Sunday, and it's now on at the crack of dawn on Sunday only. Along the way, my ratings began to slide, in part because it seems fewer and fewer gardeners actually took the time to watch television, although I can't help wondering whether the lousy time slots had something to do with the ratings issue as well.
When I got word my contract wouldn't be renewed, I pretty much decided that my television career was over. However, my business manager insisted that I should explore the possibility of taking my show (or an entirely new show) to another network. After all, I had a loyal and sizeable following of deeply commited and sometimes fanatical fans. So he contacted virtually every cable network to gauge their interest, and the response was unanimous: Not one of them was interested. In fact, one of the networks to whom we pitched a new show idea said our proposal was brilliant. They then asked if we had anything along the lines of "Amazing Race!"
I still believe there's a market for good-old "How-To" programming. That's why I launched GGTV as part of my website, wherein I present gardening tips that I believe can be of benefit to all gardeners, regardless of their level of expertise. It cost a fair amount of money to produce the webisodes, but my hope is that as the website grows in popularity, advertising revenue will offset those costs.
So spread the word. Tell your friends and fellow gardeners to go to www.gardenerguy.com. And as allows, let me know what you think.
Peace,
Paul
I followed your show through the time slot maze with my good old VCR. Not sure many folks have those anymore. I knew something was up when I had trouble finding GBTY and it had moved to 6:30 AM here. My opinion of HGTV has sunk way down over the years. Wreck and remodel shows aren't my thing. Don't get me wrong I like building stuff but everything they do is the same. There is no G in HGTV. I always enjoyed the neat ideas and gardens you visited.
Posted by: Dave | 08/10/2009 at 08:48 AM
Yeah, it's hard to make a living off anything related to gardening, that's for sure! I have only basic-basic cable and don't get HGTV. I had a friend record GBTY but the changing timeslots got her confused... It's a bummer all the way around.
Posted by: Monica the Garden Faerie | 08/10/2009 at 09:22 AM
Paul, television is dramatically transforming because of the Internet & other technologies which enable inexpensive content & delivery. Just ask TV peronality, broadcaster, & author, Leo Laporte. He's said many times that he's able to produce & deliver content for a mere fraction of what it use to cost. He even built his own network, twit.tv, on a very small budget.
The point is, TV & TV networks are becoming irrelevant. It's all about the shows & content, & the smaller but devoted audiences they attract.
Leo, much like you, is a "niche-celebrity"--someone who is very recognizable within a certain industry. And this is an amazing opportunity for people in your situation!
Why? Because in the past it was only economically feasible to service large, broad markets with a few large networks. Then cable TV rocked the traditional TV networks by introducing a variety of specialty channels (like HGTV, CNN, HBO, & ESPN). Cable could only do this because the cost of production & distribution fell significantly. Today, these costs are nearly insignificant. It is the personalities & content that are truly most important, not the network.
This transition is a win-win for everyone (except the networks). The content providers benefit because they retain a large portion of the revenue that was traditionally held by the network. Niche businesses benefit by having an economical & more powerful means to reach consumers. And consumers win by receiving the information & entertainment they desire.
Paul, you're in a particularly great position at a particularly great time because there's few gardening celebrities & few gardening sites/blogs/podcasts/etc. that service this HUGE market.
So start your own Internet show. Or gather your contacts or partner-up with small but interesting content providers (like gardeninggonewild.com, gardenrant.com, & growingthehomegarden.com) & start your own network! Team-up with nurseries & manufacturers or start your own line of plants & gardening gear. Give some of the content you create to newspapers & radio stations, even DIY or HGTV! Just keep marketing your brand & the gardening segment is wide open for your taking, Paul.
Best of luck & continued success!
Posted by: stewie | 08/10/2009 at 11:05 AM
I completely agree with Stewie. On one hand, it's unfortunate gardening programs have almost completely disappeared from television, but, on the other hand, the Internet is actually a much better medium for niche content. Stewie nicely laid out many of the reasons. But, I will add a couple more:
1) Creative freedom. Paul, you obviously had pretty good creative freedom with GBTY, but you can enjoy complete freedom with GGTV, including the freedom to produce and distribute content according to your own schedule.
2) The opportunity to speak more directly to your core audience. With television, you have to reach a wide audience for the network to profit from your show. But, with the Internet, costs are so low, you can be profitable with a fairly small audience. You can focus on the gardening concepts which you are most passionate about without worrying about speaking to a more general gardening audience. Niche websites, blogs and television shows often do very well because they develop a small by devoted following. And, that's enough to do pretty darn well financially. Sometimes more general content doesn't draw as much attention on the Internet, because there is so much content available. But, if you find your niche and entertain and inform that niche, your base of followers will steadily increase. We are never going to convince everyone to stop using chemical warfare in their gardens or stop tilling the day after a heavy rain (I can't even get my family members to stop doing that). But, by speaking the truth about such things not only will nature-loving gardeners flock to your website, you will hopefully bring in a few converts. As this happens, you will actually be growing your niche.
New Internet productions take a long time to get going. Followers trickle in at first. But, if you provide good content, your following increases exponentially. Good Internet marketing helps, but the content is by far the most important factor. Provide good content on the Internet, and people will find you. I honestly believe you will be quite successful with your Internet venture. In fact, I think you are better off doing this than a cable show in the long run.
Posted by: Brandon Gay | 08/10/2009 at 12:29 PM
Paul - I've just found your site today and wanted to let you know that I am very glad you decided to put your efforts into the website. I myself enjoy reading and writing how-to documents more than stories or watching TV stories... Thank for for putting all these resources on the web for us!
Posted by: Todd | 08/10/2009 at 02:42 PM
Put the GGTV episodes in their own RSS feed, I'll subscribe immediately. I know I'm a tiny percentage of web users, but I do all my reading via RSS feeds. If the GGTV episodes get their own RSS feed, I'll be a regular and instant watcher. :D
Posted by: Curmudgeon Geographer | 08/10/2009 at 05:55 PM
I did my best to keep up with the programming of your show, but HGTV wore me down with their tactics and I finally gave up. I think it's a great idea for you to make your content available via this site and an RSS feed. I don't know what the corporate culture was like at HGTV (based on the shell-game they played with your scheduling and the final axing, I can only imagine) but I suspect controlling your own content and putting out your vision would be more fulfilling then dealing with a bunch of paint-chip loving talking-heads.
Good luck. I'm behind you all the way!
Posted by: Shelle T | 08/10/2009 at 08:09 PM
I'm on your side, and will look for your postings online! You're a big part of our lives, and we all love you! Can't wait to see where you go from here, because I have such trust no matter what you do it will be great. That's who you are!
Thanks!!!!
Posted by: Kat | 08/10/2009 at 09:41 PM
Just so you know, for the past seveal years (ever since I got cable), I made a point of watching your show early Sunday morning. I've enjoyed it immensely and am looking forward to your GGTV!
Posted by: Nancy | 08/11/2009 at 05:45 AM
Paul,
I agree wholeheartedly with the above comments. Make more webisodes! I, and I'm sure many people would pay to see them! I used to try and wake up on the weekends at the ass crack of dawn to watch your show, but when I got a DVR it made my mornings a little sweeter. Now as my wife and I go through the early stages of parenthood with our 3 month old baby boy who thinks the entire world (or just mom and dad) should wake up at 6 am every morning, I watch your show again in its slot. That is all irrelevant now though, but seriously, I agree you should sell your "Gardener Guy" brand out there. People know who you are, they trust you and would buy your products and watch your web shows. Go for it man! I'm sure its not a small financial venture, but it could be a very successful one.
Best,
Seth Paridon
Posted by: Seth Paridon | 08/11/2009 at 07:54 AM
I watched you for several years and then two things happened, they started moving your program and second, Comcast, for some unexplained reason carried a schedule for HGTV that was totally unrelated to what was on the screen. All the garden shows started to disappear. If anyone ever said it was lack of viewers it was because the viewers, in this part of the country anyway, had no clue were any of our favorite garden shows were.
One has to wonder if HGTV cares that I, and I am sure others, simply don't watch that channel anymore.
Posted by: Seasons | 08/11/2009 at 06:18 PM
I watched your program for years on HGTV, but then they started moving the gardening programs around to the early morning hours. Well, I'm not a early morning person. I really enjoyed your program and a few others, but having them on at 7:30am was not good for me (I'm a 2nd shift person). I enjoy learning the different 'tricks of the trade'. I also enjoy learning about different plants for the gardens. I enjoy seeing different gardens, not from the rich and famous, but gardens from the every day gardener. I just don't see this on HGTV anymore. They really should drop the 'G' from their name.
Starting a new website and getting a good following takes time. To me, the gardening forum here is important. Get people to the gardening forums here and they'll check out the other parts like the webshows.
Good luck Paul! You're the best Gardening Guy around! I've been passing the word around about your website.
Posted by: Kat | 08/12/2009 at 02:25 AM
I agree. There is no more garden in HGTV. It should be renamed HPTV for Home and Pergola TV. If I have to see one more pergola being built and will vomit.
Posted by: Judi Duclos Ramsdill | 08/12/2009 at 12:39 PM
I have followed your show religiously for years, even searching the internet for time and channels to make sure I can watch. I was excited to see your website and blog and how you continue providing the type of programming and material that you want to deliver on a schedule that works best for you.
You have a very large fan base and we are all behind you in your new adventures.
Posted by: Chad | 08/12/2009 at 04:41 PM
I set my alarm clock just to get up to watch your show on Friday and Sunday mornings. I watch little else on HGTV anymore. I am so glad you have a website so I can still get good gardening info. not just "landscaping". Beth L.
Posted by: Beth Lynch | 08/12/2009 at 07:20 PM
countless surveys state that gardening is the #1 hobby in our country so i guess you're right, paul, when you say that gardeners must not watch tv! thank you for the website; gotta love the gardener guy!!!
Posted by: maggiejoe | 08/13/2009 at 02:39 PM
HGTV is really missing the mark. It's suppose to be Home and Garden t.v.! There are so few shows left that educate the home gardener. With the state of the economy more people are trying home gardening now more than ever. Who is going to help us? Paul, I think we need a DVD set of the show!
Posted by: Fran Casey | 08/14/2009 at 10:00 AM
We all hope you are successful with this website and no doubt you will be.
Like others here and members of the HGTV Gardening message boards who regularly complain to HGTV management, we will miss you on TV once they stop airing. I'm sure this will take a while since they are still showing other gardener's shows that stopped filming several years ago.
But you are SO GOOD at getting word of new stuff--plants, products, methods, places to visit!
If my DVR wasn't set to record you whenever you are on (currently Friday and Sunday am's)
it would be a chore to find myself in front of the TV with all your time changes.
Thanks so much for all those years sitting with my fellow gardener MIL watching your show over late breakfast on Saturday and the reruns on Sunday. You made us both laugh so hard and we learned a lot!
Looking forward to those webisodes, rants, blogs...all of it!
Posted by: June | 08/14/2009 at 01:26 PM
I started gardening a few years ago after watching your show. Till then, I had done nothing more than potted herbs in my kitchen...but your enthusiasm inspired me to venture into my yard and start my first bed. Absolutely love your show and hate to see it go - will follow you to the internet to get my Paul James fix from now on.
No more HGTV for me. My husband (an architect) can't stand the 'H' shows anyway - and with no 'G' shows - nothing but plain ole TV left! Who needs that?
Posted by: G | 08/16/2009 at 07:50 AM
We haven't had cable/sat tv for well over 4 years and don't miss it. With so many shows via the internet I just don't see the point. So you can add my voice to the growing numbers who will continue to watch now that you have total control over your show.
Can't wait to see what you come up with.
Posted by: Mark | 08/16/2009 at 07:12 PM
Gardening on TV has become as hard to cultivate as a blue Himalayan poppy in the middle of the Mojave desert. Joe Lamp'l's "Fresh From the Garden" was a series I discovered recently and loved as it went over basics of veggie gardening you can't quite pick up from books - especially since I picked up veggie again gardening with renewed passion. I have watched your show for years and I always find something new to learn despite having devoured info from several dozens of garden books myself. "Victory Garden" used to always have a vegetable/fruit gardening segment, but the new format with new host leaves me hungry for more information intensive content on how-to, not so much lookie-lookie. It is sad to learn you have not been renewed. If they can have a golf channel, why can't they have a gardening channel? It seems the TV exec wonks think they know better than their own viewers - remind you of politicians knowing what's best for us?
Perhaps they think that anyone over 40 has already learned all there is from gardening shows already and those under 40 don't have the patience to sit through an episode and merely download content off the web. Hopefully in time there will be a renaissance of gardening shows on TV.
Posted by: Elizabeth Stump | 08/18/2009 at 07:18 PM
I have been taping/DVRing your show for years... I started watching several years ago when I lived in Arizona and was jealous of the way you could just stick a shovel in the ground and the shovel would actually go in the ground! and believe or not.. I moved to Tulsa! to be honest, I didn't know your show was based there until after I moved.. and I really took to the soil there... my first house.. I completely revamped the back yard with an incredible two tiered garden then we built a new house and I put in a great garden..
then I was transfered back here to AZ.. where I love a different style of gardening. I have to say that YOUR show gave me the addiction that I have to plants and just being outdoors and watching what I have created transform.
Thanks Paul.
Unfortunately, I think that HGTV needs to change the name to Design TV or something like that. Although I can't bash them too much, I think I still watch HOuse Hunters and love it.
But sincere thanks for having you on and I will look forward to whatever you do next!
Posted by: chris bates | 08/22/2009 at 12:22 AM
on and take back your name from HGTV and get on Facebook! :)
Posted by: chris bates | 08/22/2009 at 12:25 AM
I recorded all the GBTY shows. I feel the problem with most new gardening shows is their lack of reality and their inability to provide good sound advice. Your show provided me with many helpful hints and was entertaining as well! Boo to HGTV. I no longer watch that channel.
I am spreading the word about your web site.
Judy
Posted by: jstab | 08/24/2009 at 10:49 AM
Just how many of the HGTV shows have jnothing to do with gardening?? How many "sell your house" shows do we need??
Some of us want to garden and sustain our families right where we are planted and are not interested in "buying up" or "going bigger".
I'll miss you on my tv and I'll definitely be keeping you bookmarked on my computer!
Posted by: frizzle | 08/28/2009 at 01:06 PM