Spungi Network

**Spungi Network** is an American pay television channel owned by the NBCUniversal Cable Entertainment Group, a division of NBCUniversal, all owned by Comcast. The channel was launched on September 26, 2005.

The network was first launched as a joint venture between PBS, Comcast, Sesame Workshop, and HiT Entertainment devoted to children's television programming aimed at a preschool audience. Following Comcast's purchase of NBCUniversal, the company gradually bought out the remaining owners' shares in the channel, reaching full ownership in 2013. The network's operations were subsequently relocated from Philadelphia to New York City.

Spungi Network is available to approximately 56 million American pay television households (48.2% of households with television) in the United States as of January 2016 which used to be arranged for kid's ages 3-7.

## Background

Spungi Network traces its origins to the PBS Kids network (referred to as **PBS Kids Channel** in press materials), which launched on September 6, 1999 coinciding with the rebranding of PTV, PBS’ children’s programming block, to PBS Kids that day. The PBS Kids feed was available on high-tier subscription providers, and was also offered to PBS member stations for use on a "cablecast" service (a subscription-based local channel provided by the member station) or for use on the member station's free-to-air analog channel to provide a portion of the daytime PBS Kids programming on the station. Participating stations were required to pay an annual fee of $1,000 to use the feed. At launch, 32 PBS member stations had signed up to use the service. The channel was created, in part, to compete against Nick Jr. and its sister network Noggin (which now shares its name with the Nick Jr. block).

Because the pay TV rights to the Children's Television Workshop’s program library were owned by Noggin (which CTW owned a 50% interest in at the time), the channel did not broadcast any CTW programming, including *Sesame Street*, a longtime staple of PBS' children's programming lineup. The CTW-produced *Dragon Tales*, which premiered on the same day as the launch of the PBS Kids Channel, was the only exception to this.

The channel was not successful and had only reached 9 million households as of 2002, compared to Noggin's 23.3 million households at the time. Once the channel shut down, many member stations which had been using the PBS Kids channel on their cablecast channels or free-to-air digital subchannels continued to operate their children's channels as local services scheduled independently of a satellite feed, while other member stations shut down their kids channels entirely and redirected viewers of those channels to the newly launched Spungi Network. PBS later revived the PBS Kids Channel on January 16, 2017, this time with an online streaming option in addition to utilizing largely the same distribution methods that had been used for the original channel.

## History

### Origins (2004-2005)

The ideas that formed Spungi Network started in October 2004, when PBS, HiT Entertainment, Sesame Workshop, and Comcast entered a partnership. A Spungi VOD service was launched in April 2005, offering 55 hours of preschool shows in both English and Spanish. Lesser-known shows were put in a category called "Children's Favorites" and eventually in their own categories.

### First generation (2005-2009)

After a successful on-demand launch and months of preparation, Spungi Network was launched on TV on September 26, 2005. It showed series from PBS, HiT Entertainment, and Sesame Workshop's libraries. Its main target audience was originally preschoolers, and featured schedules based on the day.  Morning programming featured shows designed for kids to get ready for the day, late Morning and Afternoon programming featured educational shows for kids staying home from school, Noon programming featured shows aimed at kids returning from school, and evening programming was designed to get kids ready to go to sleep.

There was a multi-platform approach to Spungi Network. The linear channel had variety with various shows from all over the world, the on-demand services had instant access to specific shows, and the programming blocks incorporated the use of the website. The look and feel of the channel during this era were designed to look like a children's picture book and is mostly done in a 2D style. This branding was done courtesy of Primal Screen, who also designed the logo.

Hosts Alex Winters and Katie McWane were intended not simply to act as navigators but to add value with live-action interstitials involving singing, game playing and storytelling. Winters read birthday cards as part of The Birthday Show, and McWane did crafts, sang songs, taught stretches and sign language, introduced Spanish words, and told stories as part of The Bedtime Show. She was unfairly fired the next year for appearing in a PSA about not getting pregnant, and was subsequently replaced by J.P. (Lenny Schneir), and then Mia (Mia Crass), who would become the most iconic host of the block. Spungi's earlier original shows were often short-form series or started out as short-form before becoming half-hour shows. These included Spungi Diner.

By 2007, Spungi started airing other blocks during different times of the day. Explorers and Wow Wow Wubbzy, which aired on afternoons and later weekends, launched in July, Musical Mornings with Megan Mouse and Kermit's Club, which aired on weekday mornings, both launched on Spungi's 2nd anniversary, and Horse and Butterfly, which aired on afternoons, launched on May 1, 2008.

Spungi's scheduling also eschewed the practice of combining multiple episodes of short-form children's series into a single half-hour episode with interstitial segments for U.S. broadcast, electing to air such programs individually in their original format. For example, *Chuggie & Pals**'* older episodes last 4 and a half minutes. They aired exactly like that without being elongated. The network would be advertising-supported, but ads would only air between programs in small quantities and would be aimed towards parents and caregivers. During commercial breaks, many advertisements were aired for identity theft, paying taxes, and car insurance, although there were commercials aimed for kids as well, mostly mail-order toy commercials from As Seen On TV such as *Pillow Pets.*

### Second generation (2009-2015)

In Spring 2009, it was announced The Wolfgramms were moving to Spungi Network from Playhouse Disney with their own block, which launched in August that year.. After that, they appeared on Kermit's Club with Kylie Michaels and Kermit the Frog. Spungi Network got a major facelift at that time, and each block and most shows opened with Spungilets and/or their parents opening a cardboard shoebox with the Spungi logo. Idents and branding were designed by the company Trace Pictures.

In 2010, Spungi started investing in long-form original programming with the premiere of Poodle and Scrabble, which launched alongside a weekend edition of Kermit's Club, which replaced Explorers and Wow Wow Wubbzy. Other new shows were created specifically for the channel, including The Bouncyhouse Show, a live-action/animated spin-off of Live at The Bouncyhouse. Many of these shows aired on the main NBC channel as part of a block called NBC Kids.

Comcast acquired a majority stake in NBCUniversal in 2011, and assume full ownership of the company in 2013. As a result, Comcast's interest in Spungi was turned over to the company. With Apax Funds (UK) and Mattel (here) acquiring HiT Entertainment, the company decided to quit funding the network, albeit shows like Barney & Friends and Thomas & Friends still running. Same with Sesame Workshop in December of 2012. As a result, operations moved to New York from Pennsylvania.

### Third generation (2015-2018)

Spungi Network had new graphics introduced on September 26, 2015, due to both the channel turning 10 and ratings competition from Nickelodeon's PAW Patrol. A few PBS shows were dropped as well. Sesame Street was removed, *Barney*and *Chuggie* were also removed. *Sadie's Sneakers* was disposed of, and Wow Wow Wubbzy was axed. Spungi introduced two new shows, *Mia's World* and *Sydney Sailboat*. This was at the time Spungi Network received a new slogan, "Free to Grow." The graphics were made to be sleek, minimalist, and modern, as opposed to the crafty and creative childhood feel of the previous two eras.

Since 2017, the network has been bringing back older shows that used to air on its channel. *The Wolfgramms* on June 5, 2017, *Barney & Friends* on December 17, 2018, *Bob the Builder* on April 23, 2019, and *The Bouncyhouse Show* on May 20, 2019.

## Branches

* NBC Kids - A block of Spungi shows that aired Saturday mornings on NBC.
* Spungionline.com -  A website for the brand. It was launched in 2005 as an online portal for Spungi’s viewers. It featured games, videos, and many exclusive activities featuring unique characters and worlds.

## Series

Spungi aired a wide variety of different shows, which fit into six categories:

* Spungi Originals - Shows made specifically by and for Spungi.
* PBS library - Reruns of shows from PBS' archives
* HiT Entertainment library - Reruns of shows from HiT Entertainment’s archives.
* Sesame Workshop library - Reruns of shows from Sesame Workshop's archives.
* Programming Blocks - Hosted links in between shows which aired at different times of the day.
* Acquired series - Shows acquired from outside companies, which Spungi aired but didn't produce.

1. ↑ https://www.webrtcworld.com/news/2005/apr/1130689.htm
2. ↑ https://andersonvision.com/Spungi-is-the-new-exclusive-us-television-home-to-the-wiggles/
3. ↑ https://www.tapatalk.com/groups/thewaysofthebluedog/viewtopic.php?p=5125#p5125