Discovery Kids To Relaunch As Hasbro Channel
2010 Date Set For Kids TV Station To Make Transition
Jul 8, 2009
For better or worse, the Discovery Channel's popular Discovery Kids channel will be relaunched in 2010. Seen in 60-million homes across the United States, the channel will shift a bit further away from its educational foundation.
While the network's existing series like Bindi the Jungle Girl will stay, much of the new scripted, reality, and game show programming will be based on Hasbro's brands-think Scrabble, Cranium, and G.I. Joe. Existing series like Transformers: Animated will stay on their current channels, the channel would only create new content.
Discovery says that the move is an effort to remain "relevant". The channel was never terribly popular, despite efforts to promote it since its 1996 launch. Promotions included having select programs air on NBC Saturday mornings, from 2002 to 2006.
The unnamed channel will aim to take on Disney Channel, Nickelodeon, and Cartoon Network, the current power players of American kids television.
Hasbro's Past Kid-TV Efforts Mixed
In the mid-1980s, Hasbro took their first leap into kids TV. Their more memorable attempts included My Little Pony, G.I. Joe, and Transformers, the last of which became a cult classic leading to continuous spin-offs and recently a high-grossing movie. Less enduring were titles like The Charmkins, Robotix, Bigfoot and the Muscle Machines, InHumanoids, The Littlest Pet Shop, and The Potato Head Kids Interestingly, the company owns the rights to the early show Romper Room, and distributed Nickelodeon animated series during the early-1990s.
Just A Big Toy Ad?
Critics are panning this effort, calling it all just a big toy ad.
In a statement, non-profit organization Commercial Alert commented that "the Hasbro-Discovery Channel joint venture sounds like nothing more than a scheme to deliver program-length advertisements to children over television and advertisements disguised as interactive games over the Internet."
Discovery's take: "This criticism is unfounded and presumptuous. We just announced news of this network today. Great stories and characters will drive the programming on the new network. Overly commercialized content is not what viewers want and not a good business plan... once parents and children see the actual focus of the new network in the fall of 2010, we are confident it will meet their expectations for quality and family friendly programming."
Commercial Alert has urged the Federal Communications Communications to reanalyize its regulations of children's television. Currently, its rules only prevents commercials for products related to the show airing; shows based on toy brands are allowed.
The Business-Side
So what's the business side of the deal? Fifty percent of the channel was purchased by the toymaker for $30 million. The deal doesn't include the international Discovery Kids networks.
Hasbro will be taking care of all of the programming, and Discovery will only handle things like operating the network and selling ads. Any merchandising and licensing revenue based on the shows themselves will be split between both companies, and Discovery will get a minority stake in Hasbro.com.
Discovery has been on a channel-changing rampage recently. Discovery Home became Planet Green, Discovery Health became The Oprah Winfrey Network, and Discovery Times changed to Investigation Discovery after The New York Times tired of their partnership.
The three main Discovery-owned channels (Discovery Channel, Animal Planet, and TLC) generate 50% of the company's revenue; the other 10 stations earn the other half.
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