The Playful Channel

The Playful Channel is an American pay television network it is run by Wrapper Media through its Playful Group subsidiary. The channel launched on May 15, 1998. The channel primarily targets kids ages 8 to 13 years old. it’s programming consists of original shows, co-productions and other third-party programming as of June 2016, The Playful Channel is available to approximately 2000 million pay television households in the United States.
== Development ==
The development of The Playful Channel began on March 26, 1994, when Wrapper Media announced the launch of a new channel as a pay television service and that it was big plans. Later on, May 30, 1994, the company announced that it was a new play television children's channel. which would compete with other subscription channels targeted primarily at children. In January 1996, Wrapper Media announced that the network would be known as The Playful Channel this was soon followed two months later with the announcement that The Playful Channel would launch on May 15, 1998, but would be tested on April 9, 1997, and launch as a VOD Service on December 2, 1997.
== Goals ==
The launched channel would compete against established children television services at the time, the network was planned to target children aged 7-15 but decided to do all ages instead.
== Commercial Programming ==
The Children Television Act (CTA) in the United States limits the commercial time during children's programming and prohibits television broadcasters from airing advertisements for products associated with a program during or in time slots adjacent to the show itself Playful was to broadcast six minutes of advertisements per hour, below 12 minutes per hour on weekdays, and 10.5 minutes per hour on weekends as mandated by the CTA. Additionally, it was planning to broadcast 10.5 minutes of advertisements per hour the rest of the day throughout the week. The channel was planning to sell its advertising inventories to toy companies other than Fisher Price; as reported by Advertising Age in May 1997, Playful was even in talks with Hasbro Mattel and Lego.
There have been reported concerns that the channel would be exploited by WrapperMedia as a platform to plug it’s products. Ahead of the channel's launch as Dojo, Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood (CCFC) called the whole project an "infomercial" and stated that they would be monitoring the channel. CCFC founder Susan Linn said "It will make a mockery of existing ad limits and the current prohibition of product placement in children's television" at the 1994 announcement of the of the network. Loesch stated that The Network's goal was to be "vibrant" and "diverse" in its programming, and that the channel would not purely be a marketing vehicle for products.
== Launch and Later Years ==
On May 15, 1998, The Playful Channel finally launched with Rocket Flash being the first original show to air on the network. 
On October 16, 1998, the "playfulchannel.com" website was launched.
The Playful Channel later launched Tomb Explorer on July 14, 2000, which later became one of the channel's most successful series.
Homestar Runner premiered on January 1 of that year to. in 2002 Max and Ruby would debut being the last show to air under the branding.
On September 20, 2007, Playful received yet another rebrand. A new slogan, using both the “Next Generation of TV” slogan with the new “Let’s Play” slogan 
On March 30, 2009, The “Let’s Play Slogan” was phased out with Oh Hi, Beeni being the last show to use it. 
On April 2, 2009, the “Next Generation of TV” slogan changed to Infinite Possibilities. 
The Toons in Command block a Saturday Morning Premiere Block debuted on May 3, 2009.
at 6:00 a.m. ET, On March 2, 2011, The Playful Channel received a new rebrand produced by Trokia. Jessica DiCicco and Cam Brainard became the network's announcer, while some shows were pulled from the lineup; most of them would return later that year, while the former could still be seen on the channel's website at the time. 
At this point, programming began to be hosted by characters from Playful shows. The channel also began incorporating programming promotions and short features on that date; seven months later, on October 1, 2011, it started airing limited traditional advertising (for companies such as Dave and Busters, Toys R Us, ABCMouse, Kmart, Chuck E. Cheese's, Nabi, Clorox, Walmart, Lysol, Leapfrog and Playskool) in the form of underwriter sponsorships airing in-between shows, whereas its parent network airs longer traditional advertising. 
On January 15, 2013, it was announced that the Vyond Network, as part of a new rebranding strategy would be folded into The Playful Channel. Vyond Network ended its run as a network on February 16, 2013, and it was folded into Playful starting the next day. A few of Vyond Network programs moved over to Playful to carry future episodes of their respective series (the case with Caillou Gets Grounded) while others were moved to Wrapper+
On May 2, 2017, the channel refreshed their imaging with new interstitial pieces and updated up next notices, and now being branded as "You Play in Your World Play in Ours."
On September 5, 2023, the channel rebranded again using new bumpers and banners and the new slogan being “Here We Come!”
== The Playful Group ==
The Playful Group is an American children's entertainment company owned by WrapperMedia that oversees Cable TV including its flagship service The Playful Channel and It’s In House Animation Studio.
The Playful Animation Studio
The Playful Animation Studio is an American animation studio owned by The Playful Group/WrapperMedia founded in 1998. It produces many shows for the Playful Channel. The Playful Animation Studio serves as the producing brand for Playful first-party shows.
== List of Programming ==
=== First Party Programming ===
===== Animated Series =====
Title 	Premiere Date
Homestar Runner 	January 1, 2000
Battle for Dream Island	January 1, 2010
Ribbon 	February 21, 2011
Inanimate Insanity 	April 1, 2011
Caillou Gets Grounded 	February 17, 2013
Roy’s Bedoys 	February 11, 2019
===== Repeats of Ended Shows =====
Title 	Premiere Date 	End Date 	Date Reran
Tomb Explorer	June 14, 2000 	June 20, 2019	June 21, 2019 - October 2, 2020; May 5, 2021 - Present
Funnel Vision	August 24, 2009	May 15, 2017 	May 16, 2017 - Present
Category:Kids & Family
Category:Kids Channels
Category:Children's television networks in the United States
Category:1997
Category:1998