If you happen to be accosted by a well-groomed stranger the next time you’re at Home Depot, think twice before you reject his offer to repair your home.
In October, The Idea Factory, a Sacramento-based broadcast and broadband company, will launch House Crashers, just one among a hundred shows the company has produced for DIY Network and HGTV. The premise is similar to that of its three-season-old partner show, Yard Crashers: Send the shows’ hosts to big-box home improvement centers to offer home and garden assistance to customers. If the shopper takes the bait, they’ll end up with more than they bargained for.
“They think some whack job is going to come fix a sprinkler head, and they end up with a $10,000 overhaul,” says Peter Holmes, who co-owns Idea Factory with Bill Swan. The two met years ago working at KCRA in Sacramento.
The DIY Network has the “most upscale” cable audience of all networks nationwide — it ranks No. 1 among viewers ages 25 to 54 with household incomes of $75,000, according to Nielsen Media Research. In 2008, DIY Network grew its prime time audience by 31 percent from 2007. During that time, Yard Crashers averaged 21 percent higher than the overall 2008 prime time viewing average and 58 percent above the 2007 prime time viewing average, according to the DIY Network.
“There were folks who said we could never do this out of Sacramento. ‘You have to be in L.A. or New York.’ But what made it work was our dedication to quality,” Holmes says. “Maybe we’ve had to push a little harder than our L.A. contemporaries, but I think the results have shown that we can do this well and cost-efficiently.”
For the national shows, such as Yard Crashers, production costs run between $40,000 and $70,000 per episode; there are typically 13 episodes in a series. The budget covers about 15 hours of filming that gets boiled down to 20 minutes of content.
“All the money comes from the network. They have to buy into the talent and the concept. They fund the pilot, and if they like it, they’ll fund a series or a miniseries,” Holmes says. “The bad news is that we don’t own a thing. We work for hire and they own every last legal right, so we really only get the production money. If they start selling Yard Crasher T-shirts, we’re out of luck.”
The network won’t release ratings for Yard Crashers, but it has garnered enough support for the spinoff, House Crashers. But it’s not as if success hasn’t been reached in the Capital Region’s media markets before.
El Dorado resident Todd Stanley, a producer for Discovery Channel’s “Deadliest Catch” series won the 2008 Emmy for Best Cinematography after three years of nominations as a producer and cinematographer. Stanley is currently working on a magazine-style TV show called “Experience El Dorado,” which highlights recreation and tourism in the county.
Redwood Palms Pictures, a Folsom-based media financing company launched by locals Michael DiManno and Scott Reid, has invested in, produced or distributed 11 films — with total film production budgets in excess of $35 million — since its inception in 2006. It currently has three new projects with production budgets totaling more than $40 million slated for finance and production in 2009.
“Sacramento hasn’t been pillaged in the way that the Bay Area has and L.A. has. You bring out a camera in Sacramento, and you’re going to get a real reaction. We’re doing reality TV, and real people exist in Sacramento,” says Yard Crashers host Ahmad Hassan, a landscaper who grew up in Yolo County. “Plus, you can travel five or 10 miles and get a different look or demographic. We can shoot in Antelope, Arden or Woodland.”
Amid faltering media outlets, fickle consumers and ever-changing technologies, Idea Factory has maintained a steady growth path that Holmes says is largely due to the company’s adaptability and diversification. In addition to TV shows, Idea Factory focuses production on broadband Web videos — a mix Holmes anticipates will keep his company going well into the future.
“At some point, with the YouTube generation, we should think our jobs will be in jeopardy,” Holmes says. “The high-definition thing has helped us a lot because it might breathe four or five more years into what we’re doing. It ups the ante, and we have the means to keep up.”
Due to the technical requirements for creating and delivering high-definition TV products, its not a readily accessible technology, but it’s in high demand. Broadband service from the cable industry, meanwhile, is available to 92 percent of U.S. households according to the National Cable & Telecommunications Association. Together, those elements help keep Idea Factory thriving.
“TV versus Internet still looks good from our end too,” Holmes says. “The proliferation of all this stuff online is amazing. Thankfully we have a strong reputation going into this: We provide expertise and know how to tell a story, and that’s important.”
As Holmes and his 10-man team have grown in their capabilities, Idea Factory’s bottom line has followed suit.
Revenue for the company’s first year (1997 to 1998) was $200,000, “enough to cover Bill and I and make some payments on our boat-anchor computer system,” Holmes says. “We covered ourselves just barely, but since then, year-over-year growth has averaged between 50 and 100 percent. Though there were a couple of off years — we lost a couple of dot-com clients and a substantial amount of money.”
The impact of the dot-com bust wasn’t detrimental. The Idea Factory rebounded and grossed $1.6 million last year.
“I almost hate to say this because I’m knocking on wood, but we are absolutely rocking right now. It could all go to hell in a handbasket, but we are having our best year ever,” Holmes says. “It might have a little to do with our line of work. When we do a contract, it’s locked in. It takes a year or longer to get these contracts into place, so who knows what will happen in 2009.”
