Vanguard Award for Programmers

As Ken Lowe and his wife moved around the country in the 1970s and 1980s through a succession of radio and then TV jobs, the couple built or remodeled a number of homes. “Ever since college, when I thought about studying architecture, I’ve always been interested in homes and do-it-yourself projects,” he said.

Then, in the late 1980s and 1990s, as Lowe watched the cable industry develop, he began to think about translating that hobby into a cable network that covers homes, gardens, and do-it-yourself projects. “For several years, I would write down ideas on post-it notes for the network and put them in my dream box, which was really a cardboard box,” Lowe said.

Out of that dream box eventually came HGTV, launched in 1994 by The E.W. Scripps Co., laying the foundation for a thriving portfolio of cable programming and Internet life-style brands at the company.

Over the last decade, that success propelled Lowe to president and CEO of E.W. Scripps in 2000. It has also transformed Scripps and the cable industry, demonstrating the popularity of lifestyle programming, and making Lowe a richly deserving recipient of a Vanguard award this year.

“I’ve been lucky to be able to realize a dream and blessed to have a team of people that have turned that dream into reality,” Lowe said.

Early on, Lowe’s dreams revolved around radio and building a career in the entertainment industry. Growing up in rural North Carolina, “one of my great interests was listening to distant radio stations at night,” he said. “It was my window to the world.”

At 10 years old, Lowe was so infatuated with radio that he built a small pirate radio station which had a reach of two or three miles and assembled a group of kids who broadcast top-40 records.

Then, in high school and college, he worked in commercial radio as a DJ. “Radio was really how I made my living and worked my way through college,” he said.

While his college roommate went on to become a successful radio personality, Lowe was more attracted to the management side of the business. Armed with a bachelor’s degree in radio, television and motion pictures at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, he landed his first management job at Southern Broadcasting in 1969.

In 1980, he joined Scripps as the general manager of the company’s radio properties and in 1988, he became vice president of programming, promotion and marketing for the company’s nine network-affiliated TV stations.

In the early 1990s, though Scripps owned cable systems and had a small investment in Food TV, Lowe doubted it would make the huge investment needed to back a fledgling cable network. “Doing a start-up, where you lost money didn’t seem to be in our DNA,” he said.

The 1992 Cable Act, however, allowed broadcast stations to either take must-carry status or ask for retransmission consent fees. Operators were refusing to give cash, but Lowe saw other broadcasters asking for carriage for new networks. That tactic allowed ABC to launch ESPN2 and News Corp. to get carriage for FX, he recalled.

“So I said, 'Let’s take the leverage our television station group has with retransmission consent and use that to get some distribution for these cable networks,’ ” Lowe said.

Scripps agreed to fund the start-up with $25 million, surprising Lowe and a lot of others in the industry.

“There was a lot of skepticism about the project,” Lowe said. “We were a company with no cable network experience. A lot of people thought we were going after too small a niche. The late Fred Dressler [former head of programming at Time Warner Cable] did an interview a few years ago where he said he only gave us carriage because he didn’t think we’d ever launch it.”

But when Lowe’s brainchild, HGTV, launched at the end of 1994, it quickly took off. Within two-and-a-half years, it reached 30 million homes and became profitable by 1998, two years ahead of the business plan.

That success allowed Lowe to convince the Scripps’ board to buy a majority stake in Food Network in 1997 and continue expanding its cable network portfolio, launching DIY Network in 1999, Fine Living in 2002 and buying CAG in 2004.

“By 2000, we were producing $100 million in profits,” Lowe said.

After moving to corporate as president and CEO in 2000, Lowe continued to reinvent the company, expanding its online and interactive efforts.

When HGTV launched, Lowe and his team wanted to create a brand that would transcend television and allow viewers to interact with its content.

“In my presentation for HGTV, I kept telling people that I didn’t want us to think just in terms of being a cable network,” Lowe said. “I wanted us to be a category buster and compete with the shelter magazines that had been around for 100 years.”

To build that bond with viewers, HGTV programs encouraged people to call the network, or send faxes and post cards with any questions or comments they might have about possible home improvement projects. Lowe even established a call center to handle the queries.

Then the company invested heavily in building up its Web sites. “Today the Food Web site is the No. 1 food-related site in the world,” Lowe said. “And, it all goes back to making those early connections with viewers by encouraging them to contact us, first with the call center and then the Web.”

Over time, the success of the cable networks and online operations have also transformed Scripps and become its fastest growing businesses. That has led to the decision to split the company. In July, the cable networks and interactive assets will become part of Scripps Networks Interactive, while E.W. Scripps will own the newspaper and TV stations. Lowe will be chairman, president and CEO of Scripps Networks Interactive.

“Splitting up a great company like Scripps has been difficult but we believe it is the best way to focus on the different assets and maximize their growth potential,” Lowe said.

Lowe continues to find time for a number of outside associations and charities. But he says Habitat for Humanity is perhaps closest to his heart. “There is nothing better than working shoulder to shoulder with someone to build a house and then hand them the keys to a home they never thought in their wildest dreams they would be able to have,” he said.