There seems to be no such thing as too much Oprah Winfrey, and soon there will be lots more.
Daytime TV's top talk show host is joining up with Discovery Communications to create the Oprah Winfrey Network, OWN for short, which will debut in late 2009 in what the two parties hope to become the ultimate electronic destination for those seeking direction in their personal, spiritual and professional lives.
With OWN, Winfrey will reach beyond the largely female audience her show attracts to appeal to entire families, which makes sense as the queen of daytime works to expand her already vast media universe, which includes her syndicated show, “The Oprah Winfrey Show,” which is produced by her Harpo and distributed by CBS; her magazine, O, the Oprah magazine, a 50-50 venture with Hearst; a web site; and a satellite radio show, "Oprah & Friends," on XM, as well as her book club. And she has a new reality show, "Oprah’s Big Give,” debuting on this spring on ABC.
OWN will morph out of Discovery Health, which has never really caught on, and be a 50-50 venture, with Winfrey serving as chairman and its leading creative force.
Winfrey will have complete creative control, under the terms of the joint-venture agreement, something she insists upon in all of her ventures.
For Discovery, the deal comes as it struggles to revamp its lesser networks operating under the Discovery umbrella. The Health channel is available in 70 million homes. Discovery CEO David Zaslav approached Winfrey with the idea of an Oprah network just a few months ago.
The new network will launch without Winfrey's syndicated talk show, which is locked up through the 2010-'11 season, though it could move over at some point.
Just what OWN will air is vague at this point but presumably it will consist of shows delving into relationships, self-empowerment and spiritual issues, the three main themes of her syndicated show and the cause of her massive following across Middle America. With her success so far, it's hard to imagine that Winfrey will have a struggle on her hands creating entire shows around those themes.
Creating shows that appeal to men and entire families could be a major challenge, however. That's not something Winfrey has done in the past.
OWN will also have a challenge as a newcomer entering a market--women's television-- that's already fiercely competitive and bound to get more so as new media options become available. She will be competing with Lifetime, the oldest women's channel, but also Oxygen, in which she was an early investor, WE, and all the other cable channels that heavily target women, such as HGTV.
But Winfrey will have one tremendous advantage: her existing show, which she will be able to use as a platform to promote OWN and its shows, as well as featuring as guests the personalities she hires to host them.
As a nurturer of talent, Winfrey has been especially successful in recent years, advancing the careers of Dr. Phil and Rachael Ray, among others.
Her syndicated show, though off some in viewers, still averages a strong 5.6 household rating. Winfrey will also have her magazine as a promotional platform. That title has a circulation of 2.4 million.
