32: The History of the Hallmark Channel & Why They Are Marketing GENIUSES

Hey besties, UHM CHRISTMAS TIME (yes) enjoy another fun lil vid. Their history goes from 1905-Present and it's a slow start but it's juicy PROMISE. merry holidays or whatever you guys do. k love you.

Chapters
0:00 hey besties
1:50 | 1905-1950's (humble beginnings, store set on fire lol & venture into new-age advertising)
8:53 | Hallmark Starts getting in CHRISTMAS (the channels connection to religious & family values)
14:30 | 2009- Present Hallmarks exponential growth & dabble into diversity (uh oh)

Transcript

Hey guys!!! It's the holiday season.... you guys know what that means? Wow Reese! Jesus? NO. Hallmark movies :) Let's talk about how Hallmark are branding GENIUSES okay? They were at the forefront of all this branding and advertising nonsense they really paved the way and made a blueprint for everyone to follow on Reese Grey Analyzes we look at creations and experiences in art media music and even video games to explore exactly why we think the way we think question what we believe and learn something new :) And so I I'm pretty much addicted to learning something new right so you know those restless nights and you're just lying in bed and you have to Wikipedia something okay so that's kind of what I did for today's video I know nothing about the lore of Hallmark no boy are you guys in for a treat okay even if you don't watch Hallmark movies every everybody knows what I'm talking about the cheesy very brightly lit Small Town Girl In a Small Town World meets a rich fella in New York who whisks her away with the power of Christmas magic and whatever I'm a sucker for it I love it and you know why it's not because it's good it's not because it's good content it's the same reason people watch Like Love is Blind or too hot to handle is it good no it's just entertaining and everyone has their little vices and mine is unfortunately Hallmark movies I am just a sucker for them so let's break down the lore of Hallmark a Hallmark lore speedrun if you will first of all the biggest shock of of my life is that Hallmark the Hallmark Channel it was actually started by the hall family okay this is an entire family so it starts out with one teenage with a dream so in 1908 our little 16-year-old boy Joyce Hall started a postcard company in their local town and he got his two older Brothers Raleigh and William to invest in this like postcard company right Kansas City Missouri Missouri right so they were on like a train a train town so everyone in 1908 is trying to send letters back to their family postcards back to their family let them know they're safe let them know how they're doing on their travels and so you know they took advantage of that and sold beautiful postcards which I think is a really really wholesome start to like Hallmark cuz you know Hallmark cards in general right are like cheesy sappy um lovely Hallmark cards so they like stuck true basically to that theme for almost a century now and I love the start too cuz it's like really wholesome like it's Shark Tank friendly right it's like at 16 and I imported postcards and sold them at the train station like oh they eat that up they love that he'd get invested in I'd invest so anyway in 1910 2 years later after they started this company Joyce would be 18 but he actually dropped out of high school because his postcard company was going that well and so remember at this point you know he's a import man he's not creating original content yet you know he's importing cards and then selling them to stores at a market price so he can make some mmons and so apparently he's doing pretty well that his older brothers join him in Kansas City so they can all sell cards together and then 5 years later the brothers came they made a store and everything and it got set on fire like not arson or something but like it burned down all of their stock all of everything everything that they had burned to the ground so these three brothers have to start from scratch what do you do when you have no stationary right January 11th 1915 they start making original content it only took them seven years right so they bought you know you don't have freaking printers right so they bought an engraving press so they could press cards for their shop original cards and they pull out a loan for this and this is the mark of the very first haul all Mark cards ever in 1915 and you know how those like annoying people are always like oh everything happens for a reason like there's a season and a reason for everything but like honestly if his store wouldn't have gotten burned down maybe they wouldn't be pushed to be making original content and that's really annoying to say and I regret it but you know it pushed them to do something awesome and cool so hey take a positive out from a negative they're store freak burned down can you believe that I'd be so upset but it makes for a good story though it makes for a really good origin story and he could have went villain with it but he went sappy postcards with it so they engrave their cards and make them for 6 years now and now it's 1921 and they finally scrape together what they have and it's the Roaring 20s you know and they create their first like uh brand the Hallmark Brothers incorporation so that's their like first solid branding thing right so they had their company and then Joyce the original Hallmark member he starts saying well now we should brand every card like the back of it you know how on the back of every Hallmark card it says like a Hallmark card they're like why would we do that that's like really stupid way to like use ink in our technology why would you do that and he's like no like we should do it trust me and of course as we all know nowadays The Branding worked Hallmark built their brand they were known for their like sappy emotional cards their heartfelt cards that were branded in the bag another thing that was super weird remember it's 1920 and he was all like you know along with branding we should also advertise and they're like why why would we advertise our cards when we can just you know take some cards under our arm go to local uh Piggly Wiggly or whatever and then sell you know our cards why would we spend money to let people know that we exist you know like advertising that's weird in 1920 and they did advertise and then it worked a lot later about 18 years later comes their first sponsorship so they sponsored a radio show which is super fun so this radio show was called Tony W's radio scrapbook where people would write in letters to the show and they would write in letters in their Hallmark cards to this show which then just solidified their branding more to like this heartfelt love type of type of vibe you know for their brand genius so after Tony Juan's scrapbook you know radio scrapbook we we move on into like the 50s is you know like things move slowly now like nothing was at a rocket Pace right because technology also developed slowly so in 19 1938 we had a radio show in the 50s television they started sponsoring TV shows and you know how Hallmark is known for their like boring TV shows like nowadays well they started out sponsoring boring TV so the hallmar Hall of Fame was dedicated to televised dramatizations of classic plays like Hamlet and Romeo and Juliet other things that I can't remember that I have written down in case there's any like drama Buffs in the building we have like Richard II The Taming of the Shrew MC Beth 12th night in the Tempest and you're like wow that's so boring but you know maybe a few people like them no a lot of people like them this was extremely popular it won numerous Awards and the Hallmark Hall of Fame from the 1950s to the 1980s 30 years is the US's longest running Anthology series period ever and it's just like what yeah so people loved it ate it up Yum Yum Yum Yum Yum theater theater but also during the same time 1950s where they Venture into television 1950s is when they start associating themselves Hallmark starts associating themselves with Christmas finally 40 years after Joyce put his postcards in a shoe box and sold them at a train station at Kansas City Missouri we finally get Christmas themed Hallmark stuff so 1950 Hallmark Christmas this is due to the Hallmark Hall of Fame things there's a show called amal's Christmas special which is like award-winning it's basically an opera it's an opera about Christmas okay and people yum yum yum yum yum love that right and they loved this and they love Hallmark a Mall's Christmas Opera special was their first Christmas special and this was 36 years before they acquire what will become known as the Hallmark Channel later so the Hallmark Channel originally of course was not the Hallmark Channel it was a religious live show channel so we all know that Hallmark aligns itself a lot with like family values so Christianity Family Values um not all family values we know that's what they're known for but originally this sermon network ran for 16 hours a day cuz TV wasn't always 24 hours a day so for 16 hours a day it would be like sermons like even Muslim sermons Christian Catholic Protestant everything under the sun on this channel for actually 65 different religions I could not name 65 different religions and that's pretty OB awesome so for 18 hours a day that's what the original Hallmark Channel did and then Hallmark Channel always invested in this channel because you know that's where they would run their Hallmark Hall of Fame programs on and so they acquired more and more stake in the channel investing more and more eventually in the 1980s that's when they rebranded as the family values Channel and started pivoting more towards familyfriendly content and not strictly religious content but it had obviously a huge huge backing in religion and a huge religious following for Hallmark cards because of the Christmas specials so then we're left with like you know the 50s to the 80s they were doing television and slowly acquired the Hallmark Channel so between the 50s and the 80s Hallmark does a lot of marketing genius stuff like in the 60s and 70s they start partnering with familyfriendly Brands and TV shows like peanuts uh Hallmark had peanuts the characters and snoy all of those like all over Hallmark C peanuts and Hallmark became synonymous with each other peanuts is so perfect for that family-friendly Vibe like what do they do that's offensive what if what is offensive about Snoopy such marketing prowess there so another thing with these peanuts lines they started the Ambassador cards line lines with all of these characters and stuff trying to make cards affordable and accessible for everybody which is hilarious because my parents never let us buy cards cuz they're not going to spend even $2 on a piece of paper they're like you have crayons and find a paper at home make a card for your friend like they weren't buying us cards ever so if your parents bought you cards let me know in the description because no one I know's parents like bought cards and until Thomas's family like sent us really fancy like Hallmark popup cards I was like oh my God there is a market for these people like oh wow I guess Thomas family is like single-handedly like the freaking upholding the Hallmark name so during the Hallmark boom uh they also acquire like a jigsaw puzzle Factory as well and start selling like Puzzles at their Hallmark stores too so we all know that Hall mark is really into like crafts and like family like heirloom stuff too that like you keep in your family for like decades this brings me to Hallmark ornaments guys the marketing with these Hallmark ornaments is insane amidst the Hallmark boom from the 50s to the 80s right so in the midst of they're like them sponsoring a bunch of TV shows and stuff in 1973 they launch Hallmark's Keepsake ornaments I'm sure you guys have seen them they're all over Walmart and Target and everything and they've been collector's items since the' 70s and some are worth hundreds of dollars with the turn of the century they always had these these cards they always had these ornaments you know but it's it's tough it's tough because because you know what Christmas you know is one season of the year birthdays here and there you know people don't spend too much money on it do you know the term Christmas in July did you guys know that that was Hallmark marketing Hallmark marketing did Christmas in July they would run their Christmas specials and stuff in July and aggressively sell their Keepsake ornaments in July so you'd be like ready for December I had no idea a term Christmas in July was so intertwined in our culture I had no idea where came from and then you know cards get boring people only care about peanuts so much and I'm sure the licensing deals you know they got a little expensive for poor little Hallmark you know Hallmark needs to like you know make make some more money so what do they do you know at the turn of the century 2009 cute characters we can make a cute character you know what they do hoops and yo-yo isn't hoops and yo-yo the cutest things ever I remember seeing these in the car in the card stores and stuff and like they would play music so like the 2000s and stuff like 2005 I don't know when the first musical card came out but they started coming out when I was like 10 11 12 or something card started playing music okay that's huge that was huge for me and I would stand in the card section and like just open the cards and listen to the cute little like 30 seconds of music or whatever I remember there was like a Back Street Boys one and it was like happy birthday and it was like the back street boys and you open it and it's just like it's going to be me and it's just dumb but I loved it okay and so they start making cards with music they start doing hoops and yo-yo cards you start being able to record messages in your cards to Insanity we love it Hallmark are geniuses and like you know the 50s through the 80s things go really fast so 2009 we had talking cards recording cards hoops and yo-yo Christmas in July or Jingle All The Way special right and then we also have the countdown to Christmas start in 2009 2009 whoever was in charge that's a big deal man because every single day a new Christmas movie in December until Christmas like tell me that's not the most genius thing ever okay and so do we feel good do we feel good about Hallmark today do we feel like Hallmark represents us do we feel like Hallmark is a part of our family I guess I do I like it I like the cards but they start to dabble you know there's this intersection of like capitalism family values and then diversity and the complexity of the American household right so we have all these parts and then Hallmark's like hm we are a family channel we want to sell to everybody we want to make money off of everybody so we should probably start being like diverse like on ing diversity or or something like that and then the execs were like oh yeah yeah like that's totally cool like we should totally do that and and they don't really start really getting spicy until like 2019 okay so they decide to be diverse in 2019 right so we had for Hallmark standards absolute Insanity we had two women kissing on a Zola commercial which is wild for Hallmark we all everybody knows that two girls kiss sometimes and love each other and like can marry each other but this was horrible for Hallmark viewers and they despised it and they pulled it from the air so in 2019 most of the Hallmark viewers were were not feeling this this diversity and inclusion type of uh Vibes here so when that got pulled and Hallmark apologized but like they have to keep that audience right now if you're trying to be diverse and then you double down it just makes you look worse it makes you look worse so but that's what they did but then they apologized for pulling the ad and it was just like a bunch of back and forth it was it was messy all right I will say that Hallmark are marketing Geniuses but when you throw diversity into it it gets tougher okay it gets tougher for everybody so they try again they're all like okay girls can't kiss on the Hallmark Channel what can we do it takes them 3 years to figure it out we go from 2019 girls kissing commercial to 2022 and we have the release of Hallmark first movie Under mahogany Brands they used both the term black and africanamerican audience to try and get them to like their movies and they have their first mahogany Brands movie called unthinkably good things now this is on my watch list this is on my watch list uh I haven't watched it yet I actually just found out I didn't even know that Hallmark had like their diverse line of cards um literally until like looking this up so obviously as a Hallmark lover like they really they have it in there but I feel like they like hit it or something why haven't I seen it am I did I just like not notice I don't know that's weird to me so you guys let me know what you think about this intersection of uh diversity and capitalism how how that makes you guys feel but it just strikes me as weird I guess they just have like black people in a regular Hallmark movie I don't know maybe I'm wrong about that so let me know I mean I don't think other than Brenda Song Brenda Song was definitely in some Hallmark Christmas movies I'm pretty sure or at least like on some Christmas movies on freee but other than that I don't think I've seen like a Asian person in hmark movie but that would be really cool if they wanted to do that um sometime I mean I'll do it I'll do it for free I'll be I'll be in your Hallmark movie Hallmark like can someone like I know we don't use Twitter or X anymore but we use uh blue sky can can someone Blue Sky um the um Hallmark execs for me and like let them know that if they want to dabble into it like they can call me so what's our big takeaway what is our big takeaway and our lesson that we get from this resr analyzes cuz there's always a really really deep important

lesson Hallmark movies aren't just about Romance Christmas miracles are rekindling Old Flames they're a perfectly crafted blend of Storytelling and marketing designed to make you feel warm and fuzzy and spend your money and while the channel claims to stay out of politics their shift towards a more inclusive content has stirred controversy and conversations about diversity and representation in media so the next time you curl up with a cup of cocoa and a Hallmark movie just remember behind that snow covered small town and heartfelt romance there's a lot more at play and thus I unwrapped the present that you didn't even know you wanted the lore of Hallmark movies and why the execs are marketing Geniuses this was really fun I hope you guys found it fun and light-hearted and had a good time um because this was really fun for me and just light so we'll see how it doesn't post sorry editors well it's been a while per usual and but you know what hasn't changed I love you guys okay love you guys bye