Scripps Network Launches New Division For Digital, Branded Content

Scripps Network Interactive is investing more effort into digital content production. The cable television company has launched the Scripps Lifestyle Studios to produce branded content for distribution across digital platforms.

Scripps Lifestyle Studios will work to produce millennial-focused branded and editorial videos, photos, and articles which can then be spread across Scripps’ own digital outlets, as well as on platforms like Snapchat, YouTube, Facebook, Instagram, Verizon’s go90 service, and the Apple News app. On December 11, for example, Scripps Lifestyle Studios will use Facebook’s new live-streaming feature to broadcast a live “cookie party” onto the official pages of Scripps’ owned properties The Food Network and HGTV.

The idea for Scripps Lifestyle Studios came after The Food Network started posting 14 stories a day to its Discover channel on Snapchat. Vikki Neil, SVP and GM of Scripps Lifestyle Studios, told AdAge the Snapchat content “pushed us beyond our comfort zones.” “For me it was a watershed moment when we started that much content so quickly within a day and for a different audience,” Neil explained. “It was largely an impetus to how we wanted to go to market with the studio.”

Scripps Lifestyle Studios will work with its parent network to help complement Scripps’ TV projects. Scripps talent will also cross over into content for Lifestyle Studios, like how the Food Network chef Bobby Flay

recently appeared in a series of videos for the network’s Snapchat channel. “The amount of that content creation really requires a dedicated effort as opposed to asking the people who create linear programming for us to also create that,” said Scripps Networks Chief Revenue Officer Steve Gigliotti. “It’s becoming too big a need and too big an opportunity.”

Part of the Lifestyle Studios’ task is to also create branded and advertising opportunities for marketing partners. “Advertisers turn to us because of our unmatched ability to deliver high-quality audiences who want ideas, information and inspiration about home, food and travel,” said Neil in a release. “With the Scripps Lifestyle Studios, we’re going to be able to reach even more people with high quality original content designed specifically for the platform on which it is delivered.”

The new Scripps Lifestyle Studios already boast 100 employees, split between Knoxville and New York City. In each city respectively, the team members are able to use both HGTV’s studio and the Food Network Kitchen to work on future content for the Lifestyle Studios.

You can learn more about Scripps Lifestyle Studios by visiting the company’s official website.