With Hallmark+, Feel-Good Brand Attempts What No Other Media Company Has Tried

In recent years, one belief across the entertainment business that has been nearly universally excepted as truth is that traditional television is dying (if not already dead), and that streaming is the only way forward for the industry. This has led many major media companies to disinvest from their broadcast and cable networks, shifting money and high-profile titles to streaming services. However, not everyone in the industry has followed suit. Despite the waves of change flowing toward a streaming future, Hallmark has seemingly swam upstream to impressive results. The Hallmark channel finished 2023 as the most-watched entertainment cable network across multiple key demographics according to Nielsen.

The network known for low-stakes, sentimental rom-coms has steadily increased production of its signature holiday films over the years, premiering 40 original holiday movies across its platforms last year, with the vast majority of those titles debuting on the Hallmark Channel. While the cozy brand launched the streaming service Hallmark Movies Now in 2017 (after it had been running since 2007 as SpiritClips and then as Feeln since 2014), the company’s primary focus had never been about funneling series and movies away from traditional TV to the subscription video-on-demand (SVOD) service as so many of its entertainment competitors had done. Instead, Hallmark focused almost exclusively on ramping up the number of titles it released on linear, using HMN primarily as a place for fans to watch cable series the next day, older films, and a few streaming originals.

However, on Tuesday, Hallmark refreshed and rebranded Hallmark Movies Now as Hallmark+, aligning the platform with the now-standard streaming industry nomenclature. But unlike how other entertainment players approached the transition into streaming, Hallmark has no plans to deemphasize its three linear networks — Hallmark Channel, Hallmark Mystery, and Hallmark Family. Instead, the cable channels and streaming service will have a supportive and reciprocal relationship.

Hallmark Movies Now had primarily been used as an archive for older Hallmark movies, were fans could go to relive some of their favorite feel-good films. While there was the occasional streaming premiere, the vast majority of the streamer’s library was made up of films that debuted on Hallmark’s linear channels at least six to nine months prior. While this windowing strategy will mostly remain in place with the transition to Hallmark+, the company’s EVP of programming Lisa Hamilton Daly told The Streamable that the “+” in the platform’s new name is about far more than just a catchy rebrand.

“The plus is the new kinds of content that we’re going to be bringing to the viewer, especially our unscripted content,” she said. “I feel like we’ve taken sort of the elements of the Hallmark brand and experience that everyone loves, and we’ve mixed them up in new ways … there are just all of these different elements that we think take our very beloved linear experience and ‘pluses it out’ even more.”

Keeping the familiarity and good feelings that are at the core of what Hallmark does is important to Daly as the company moves into this new era of streaming. That is why the streamer is relaunching with unscripted series that put some of the network’s most beloved stars at the center of series that reflect who they are as individuals as well as reflect their place in the larger Hallmark universe.

“Our fans love our talent, that is such a draw for us,” Daly said. “We’re almost like an old-fashioned movie studio where we bring the same people back over and over and over again … Part of it is that television stars are very human-sized, right? We find that big [film] stars do not translate well into our movies and into our shows because I think you want to have that sense of familiarity; like it’s someone who’s been in your home, someone who feels very human scale.”

With nearly four decades on screens large and small, and nearly 40 Hallmark movies on her resume, Lacey Chabert is unquestionably one of Hallmark’s most beloved stars. Following the defection of Candance Cameron Bure to upstart faith and family network Great American Family in 2022, in many ways, Chabert became the face of Hallmark. The “Mean Girls” star has done 11 movies for Hallmark, not accounting for her inevitable presence in this year’s Countdown to Christmas festivities, just since the start of 2022.

So it is no surprise that Chabert is featured prominently in the launch of Hallmark+. Her unscripted series “Celebrations With Lacey Chabert” is one of the series available at launch, with others starring Hallmark favorites coming soon, including “Finding Mr. Christmas” hosted by Jonathan Bennett, “Ready, Set, Glow!” led by Wes Brown, “Small Town Setup” hosted by Ashley Williams, and “Home is Where the Heart Is” featuring Luke Macfarlane.

In addition to the new unscripted series coming to Hallmark+, there will also be scripted shows, starting with “The Chicken Sisters” starring Lea Thompson, Wendie Malick, Schuyler Fisk, and Genevieve Angelson. The premiere episode is available to stream now with the launch of Hallmark+. Also coming to the platform will be Hallmark’s first holiday series “Holidazed” featuring Dennis Haysbert, John C. McGinley, Virginia Madsen, Loretta Devine, Erin Cahill, Ian Harding, and more; as well as “Mistletoe Murders” starring Sarah Drew, which is based on an Audible podcast of the same name.

While Hallmark is investing heavily in creating new content for its refreshed streamer, as most media companies have done, Hallmark is taking a different approach than many of its entertainment brethren. Rather than shifting focus away from the cable channels that built the brand’s devoted following, Hallmark is committed to continuing to provide its fans who still watch the movies and series on traditional TV with the best possible viewing experience.

“We still are protecting that linear experience for our linear-first customers and giving them something that feels exclusive,” Daly said. “We hope that everyone signs up for SVOD, but that may not be possible for everyone, so we want to still be sure that that experience is protected and special for them.”

A significant part of protecting the experience for linear viewers has been how long Hallmark has kept new films off of Hallmark Movies Now. Traditionally, it takes films anywhere from six to nine months to arrive on HMN, a practice that will continue following the transition to Hallmark+. However, this decision is less about gatekeeping Hallmark’s newest releases for a certain segment of its audience, and simply about making sure that the company can generate enough revenue to make releasing over 100 films annually worthwhile.

“It really has been that we need to monetize the linear movies on the linear channel,” Daly said.

Hallmark released 104 new films across its platforms in 2023, and has released or confirmed dates for a total of 58 so far in 2024, with the full announcement for the brand’s robust holiday plans still to come. Fifty-one of the 2024 films have premiered on Hallmark linear channels.

Related: Hallmark+ Launches Today! Everything You Need to Know About Hallmark’s Refreshed Streamer

However, with a renewed emphasis on streaming, the programming exec did confirm that there will be a select handful of Hallmark Channel and Hallmark Mysteries films that will be available on Hallmark+ the day after they premiere on the cable channels; Hallmark Channel original series “When Calls the Heart” and “The Way Home” already appear on streaming the next day after episodes air.

However, the company is not focused exclusively on linear, as it will also work to protect the streaming experience for SVOD customers. While some streaming originals will eventually appear on Hallmark cable networks — as Hallmark Movies Now originals have in the past — it won’t be right away; they will remain “exclusive to our streaming service for a period of time,” Daly said.

Despite the company’s focus on linear, there are other ways for Hallmark fans to watch their favorite films without subscribing to a cable or live TV streaming service without having to wait for months. In November 2022, Hallmark announced a partnership with NBCUniversal streaming service Peacock that includes both a live and on-demand component. All three of Hallmark’s linear channels are available to stream live on Peacock around the clock and films and series are available to stream there as well. At launch, Hallmark’s original films were available for 72 hours following their linear premiere, but, that has changed recently, with new movies remaining on Peacock for 30 days.

That experiment is currently expected to continue through the end of October or early November; perhaps coincidentally, Hallmark’s annual Countdown to Christmas programming has recently begun in late October. Daly was unable to confirm whether or not this month-long streaming window would be extended into the holiday season, but it does seem like it is a possibility.

“We haven’t decided [when the practice will end],” she said. “It’s kind of an experiment and we’ll see if it keeps going.”

While the length of holiday films’ runs on Peacock is still to be determined, Hallmark is taking some of the lessons learned from that streaming partnership and applying them to the rollout of Hallmark+. Daly said that the flexibility of streaming will allow the company to tell different types of stories, find new stars, and even experiment with run times because the audience is inherently different on streaming than it is via linear channels.

“We saw with Peacock [data that] shows that our average-age viewer is younger and more diverse [on streaming],” Daly said. “So [on Hallmark+], we anticipate that the audience might be a little different, maybe a little younger, a little more diverse because it’s streaming … So having different stars and different stories over on SVOD is certainly not going to hurt us.”

Hallmark’s programming has evolved tremendously over the years, both in terms of quality and the variety of stories being told. Regular viewers of Hallmark titles have seen a marked improvement in production quality in recent years, especially since Daly joined the company from Netflix. While Hallmark’s tried-and-true tropes — reunited high school sweethearts, the pleasures of small-town living, the possibility that the local general store owner is actually Santa Claus — remain at the center of the network’s stories, how those stories are told has changed, and, perhaps more importantly, so has what actors have been allowed to tell them.

While Great American Family has openly refused to embrace diversity in the way that Hallmark has, especially when it comes to same-sex couples, Hallmark is continuing to expand its stable of stars in an effort to meet long-time and new audiences where they are at. However, these necessary and welcome changes have not impacted what is most important to Hallmark; telling heart-warming stories with actors who the audience has a deep emotional connection with.

“We’re always staying in our space in terms of what that core brand looks like,” Daly said, “but I think we have continued that trend to try to find more stories, different stories because there’s only so many ways you can tell that core story.”

The launch of Hallmark+ marks a new era in the history of Hallmark and the type of programming that its brand represents. Many other outlets, large and small, have attempted to copy the formula perfected by the network to varying degrees of success. But by adding a streaming service that will serve not as an afterthought repository for older movies, but as another platform for fans to connect with the stars and content that bring them joy, Hallmark is attempting to do what no one else has truly ever attempted in this new age of entertainment; continue to build upon linear success while also investing in growing and expanding a streaming presence.