Home improvement world's first couple expands their empire

HGTV

Chip and Jo Gaines have their own TV network now.

She's not Oprah, but Joanna Gaines is approaching that status as the queen of home improvement and the casual Americana style that has been her trademark.

Last we last wrote of Jo Gaines in 2020, we were saying goodbye in the belief that she and her husband Chip were going to retire from the remarkably popularl Fixer Upper HGTV show, and her hectic life as a home improvement and lifestyle guru. We were so wrong.

Instead of retiring to their ranch in Waco, Texas, the Gaines were busy planning the expansion of their home improvement and media empire centered on their shopping mall, a Disneyland for her

The Gaines’ have slowly built a home improvement conglomerate, complete with a new digital and now linear network coming to your TV.

On January 5, of this year the DIY Network became part of the Gaines' Magnolia Network. The channel will include Magnolia Original content including the first seasons of the Gaines’ new show Fixer Upper: Welcome Home, Magnolia Table with Joanna Gaines, plus new series Growing Floret, The Lost Kitchen, Homegrown, Family Dinner and Restoration Road with Clint Harp, along with the complete Fixer Upper library that made the Texas couple household names. 

“It wasn’t long ago that watching TV meant time together as a family. It was a place where people of all ages could gather and be informed, entertained, and inspired by the kind of honest, authentic programming that brings people closer,” Chip and Joanna Gaines said in a press release. 

This linear launch comes after Magnolia Network’s digital debut last summer, with Magnolia content making its way to the Discovery+ lineup. Additionally, the Gaines launched the Magnolia app which includes original series and over 150 hours of unscripted content about home, food, gardening, design, entrepreneurship and the arts.

The amiable couple have built up a huge following attracted to their obvious chemistry onscreen: he with the corny jokes and she with the deadpan delivery and "are-you- kidding-me?" looks. Hey, it works.  

Although both attended Baylor University, they didn't meet each other until after college where Jo  majored in communications and Chip graduated from Baylor University’s Hankamer School of Business with a marketing degree.

The couple wed in 2003 and later began their career in remodeling and flipping homes. 

"I knew when I married Chip in 2003 that our life would be an adventure, but through all of the ups and downs I would never have imagined we’d land here," Joanna said in her book "The Magnolia Story."

The Gaines have meticulously expanded their presence in the home improvement and lifestyle world with nary a ripple of controversy. There have been accusations of an  conservatism and an apparent lack of people of color on their shows and questions raised about their membership in a church whose pastor believes in conversion therapy. Those rumors gets Jo riled up to the point she responds, "That really eats my lunch because that's so far from what we are," she said in a TV interview.

They fended off that slice of negativity with donations to Black Lives Matter and one of their shows is hosted by a gay man. The rumors and accusations apparently have not hurt their homespun image.

Although the never really avoided the topic of race, (they just didn't bring it up) only after they established their huge following numbering in the millions, making their shows one of most watched shows on HGTV did Jo give us peek into her Korean American lineage.

Instagram

A past photo shows Joanna Grimes with her mother, left, and  the new media mogul today.

Jo previously spoke out about growing up in a half-Korean household last November, when her book, "The World Needs Who You Were Made to Be"
 — which is all about celebrating who you are and embracing your gifts — hit the bookstores.

"My mom is full Korean and my dad is Caucasian. Kids in kindergarten would make fun of me for being Asian, and when you're that age you don't know really how to process that; the way you take that is, 'Who I am isn't good enough,'" she said 

Jo, whose mother is of Korean descent, wrote on Instagram a memory of the behavior her mom encountered when Gaines was a child and her own hopes for the future.

"I remember as a little girl being out with my mom and seeing how in a moment, a person's harsh look or an underhanded comment would attempt to belittle her rich story and her beautiful culture," she wrote. She included two photos: a throwback pictures of her and her mom, and a photo of her second children's book, "The World Needs Who You Were Made to Be," which was translated into Korean.

"We can't take lightly the power that our words and actions carry. The world needs who we were ALL made to be and all the amazing and beautiful differences we each bring with us," she continued in the social media post. "Maybe if we say it enough, it will ring true and become the message that softens even the hardest of hearts."

"Fast forward to today and my Korean heritage is one of the things I'm most proud of. I'm trying to make up for that lost time – the culture is just so beautiful. I think discovering who you are and what you were made to do is a lifelong journey," she continued.

The Gaines have expanded their single Waco store into a Disneyland for do-it-yourselfers and the Gaines army of fans. Magnolia employs hundreds of workers and is one of Waco's chief tourist attractions.

“That’s what we’ve set out to build with Magnolia Network, and we’ve been amazed by the stories and storytellers we’ve found, people whose lives are living proof that our world is full of beauty, hope, courage, and curiosity. We can’t wait to see these stories brought to life on cable this January, and we’re hopeful about the impact it might have—to help reclaim the best of what television can be.”

In the Magnolia Manifesto, the couple writes:  “We believe in human kindness, knowing we are made better when we work together.” Now, how can you argue against that?

EDITOR'S NOTE: For additional commentary, new, views and tips from an AAPI perspective, follow me on Twitter @DioknoEd.