Twenty-six years ago, Oprah Winfrey
opened Harpo Studios in Chicago, Illinois. The company controlled
Winfrey’s media and entertainment properties like her iconic "The Oprah
Winfrey Show", but in March 2015 Winfrey announced that Harpo Studios would be closing by the end of 2015.
Here is a look at the company, and what the future holds for the queen of media's entertainment ventures.
Harpo’s Humble Beginnings
Oprah started out as a rookie Baltimore journalist; however, her
career began to take flight when she was recruited by a television
station in Chicago to host a morning show. Her career quickly took off,
and Winfrey debuted the syndicated "The Oprah Winfrey Show" in 1986, to
an audience of about 10 million people. By the end of the first year,
the show had grossed
an estimated $125 million. Winfrey was soon awarded ownership of the
show by ABC, at the same time that she launched Harpo Productions.
Fun fact: Harpo was the name of Winfrey’s character’s husband in the
film "The Color Purple," and it’s also the name Oprah spelled backward.
In 1988, when Harpo Productions took over ownership and production
responsibilities for Winfrey’s daytime talk show. This was a historic
move and made Oprah first woman
in history to own and produce her own talk show and the third woman in
history to own and produce her own show. Harpo also made her the first African-American (man or woman) to own an entertainment production company.
As Winfrey’s fame grew, she ventured into new platforms, including TV
movies, miniseries, feature films, books, and publishing. Winfrey
served as the chairperson while Jeffrey Jacobs served as the company’s COO.
By 1987, “The Oprah Winfrey Show” had become the top syndicated talk
show in the country, taking over the top spot from "Donahue," which had
led the pack for years.
The success of Winfrey’s show (and of Harpo) continued throughout the
decade. It received multiple Emmy awards and stayed in the number one
talk show spot for 12 seasons in a row. In total, the show earned 32
Emmy awards. In 1988, Winfrey was honored with the International Radio
and Television Society's Broadcaster of the Year Award. She was the
youngest person (and the fifth woman) to receive the award.
With Winfrey’s name fast becoming a powerful brand, the company spent
$20 million renovating a 100,000-square-foot TV and film production
facility in downtown Chicago. That’s where "The Oprah Winfrey Show" and
most other Harpo Entertainment productions were produced. The studio
transformed the Chicago neighborhood where it was located. As
The Huffington Post
explained, “Winfrey is often given credit for transforming the
once-gritty industrial enclave to a neighborhood filled with families
pushing strollers and walking their dogs. Former Mayor Richard M. Daley
even named a nearby street for the talk show queen before he retired.”
The company continued to expand, and Winfrey created a new division
called Harpo Films. Harpo Films and ABC announced a three-year agreement
in the mid-1990s in which Harpo would create six made-for-television
movies for ABC under the "Oprah Winfrey Presents" banner. Total revenues in 1997 at Harpo were a reported $150 million, which was a 7.1% increase from the year prior.
A few years later, in April 2000, Harpo teamed up with the Hearst Corporation to publish the very first issue of
O, The Oprah Magazine, which
is still a successful women’s lifestyle magazine. At the start of 2008,
Winfrey made a huge announcement with OWN, her network, and
multi-platform media company. Winfrey was to serve as Chairman of The
Oprah Winfrey Network, LLC, and the venture would be equally owned by
Discovery Communications Inc. (DISCA) and Harpo in a 50/50 split.
OWN had struggled for a few years before the cable channel started to turn real profits. In 2013, Discovery announced that in the second quarter of that year, “OWN was cash-flow positive for the first time.” In 2014, OWN was called,
“one of the biggest comeback stories in cable history.”
However, as OWN
became more successful, it became time to shutter Harpo. In the spring
of 2015, Winfrey announced that all productions would be moving to the
OWN headquarters in Los Angeles, and it is estimated that approximately 200 employees at Harpo’s Chicago office will be laid off.
"The time had come to downsize this part of the business and to move forward,” Winfrey told
The Hollywood Reporter. “It will be sad to say goodbye, but I look ahead with such a knowing that what the future holds is even more than I can see.”
The Harpo shakeup
happened almost a year after real estate developer Sterling Bay Cos.
closed a reported $32 million deal for the company's four-building
facility.
Changes Ahead
When the decision to close Harpo was announced, company presidents, Sheri Salata, and Erik Logan cited the need to streamline operations and have the whole OWN team in one location.
OWN has posted three consecutive years of growth,
and in February of 2015 it was named the number 20 ad-supported cable
network among women. The network got off to a rocky start but seems to
have found its footing in recent years. They are aiming to produce more
scripted shows
(as opposed to the “docuseries” like the docuseries “Lindsay,” with
Linsay Lohan). OWN also has plans to work with well-regarded filmmakers
like "Selma’s" Ava DuVernay, and Harpo still has a development slate of
films and shows. As well, Winfrey plans to get back in front of the
camera for some OWN projects. She had a role in last year’s “Selma,” and
plans to work with DuVernay again.
The Bottom Line
As Winfrey rose to fame and became an international brand, her iconic
Harpo Studios was responsible for producing some of the most seminal
television of the era. Winfrey announced the closure of Harpo Studios in
early 2015, in an effort to move all operations under the OWN banner in
Los Angeles. With all efforts focused on OWN, 2016 should be a crucial
year for the company.
