The forerunner of HSN was launched by Lowell "Bud" Paxson and Roy Speer in 1982 as the Home Shopping Club, a local cable channel seen on Vision Cable and Group W Cable in Pinellas County, Florida. It expanded into the first national shopping network three years later on July 1, 1985, changing its name to the Home Shopping Network, and pioneering the concept of a televised sales pitch for consumer goods and services. Its competitor and future owner QVC was launched the following year. The idea for HSN had its roots in a radio station managed by Paxson. Due to an advertiser's liquidity problem in 1977, the company was paid in can openers. Left with having to raise the funds, on-air personality Bob Circosta went on the radio and sold the can openers for $9.95 each. The can openers sold out, and an industry was born. Circosta later became the new network's first ever home shopping host and would eventually sell 75,000 different products in over 20,000 hours of live television. In 1986, HSN began a second network that broadcast free-to-air on a number of television stations it had acquired under the name Silver King Broadcasting. In 1999, the stations were sold to IAC founder Barry Diller and changed its name to USA Broadcasting, with a few of them ending HSN programming outside of overnight hours and taking on a local programming format equivalent to Toronto's Citytv. HSN continues to air on low-power stations. Ventana Television has the same street address as HSN, and is the holding company for its broadcast licenses. In 1997, HSN formally launched its second nationwide electronic retail venture, a 24-hour network under the America's Store name. In April 2007, America's Store ceased operating permanently. Most of the America's Store hosts were absorbed into the HSN programming schedule. In 1998, Home Shopping Network launched a Spanish-language service Home Shopping en Español on the Univision-owned Galavision subscription network. In 2000, the Spanish version rebranded itself as HSE and began broadcasting on low-power stations in the U.S. and Puerto Rico. It also ceased to broadcast through Galavision. In June 2002, HSE ceased to operate. In 1999, the company launched a website, HSN.com. In an attempt to engage with younger consumers in 2009, HSN produced a 14-episode online video series, Faces of Beautiful You, which follows three young women who find solutions to many of life's problems through HSN's beauty products. The campaign included a Facebook widget, character blogs, and profiles for the three main characters on Twitter, MySpace, and Facebook. In September 2000, Home Shopping Network officially changes its name to HSN. Mindy Grossman became CEO of HSN in 2006, and aggressively reinvented and relaunched the brand. She took HSN public in 2008, and has overseen its multibillion-dollar retail portfolio and multimedia expansion. Grossman left HSNi in May 2017 to helm Weight Watchers. On August 19, 2012, HSN co-founder Roy Speer died after a long illness. Bud Paxson died on January 9, 2015. In April 2017, HSN CEO Mindy Grossman stepped down to assume the CEO position at Weight Watchers. On July 6, 2017, Liberty Interactive announced it would buy the remaining 62% of HSN stock it did not already own in order to acquire the company for its QVC Group. QVC CEO Mike George would be CEO of the combined company. In September 2018, HSN had partnered with Pickler & Ben talk show for a "shop the show" feature that allows viewers to buy featured items From HSN via the show's website and HSN.com. On Friday, June 14, 2019, HSN ceased its 24/7 live broadcasting model. Live programming was rescheduled to be from 7am to 2am EST daily, with the midnight hour being repeated on a loop throughout the night.
High definition
In August 2009, HSN launched a high definition simulcast feed, which broadcasts in the 1080i resolution format. At launch, it was carried by Time Warner Cable and Verizon FiOS, and like the SD feed, is now carried by most pay-TV providers.
Sister channels
HSN2, launched on August 1, 2010, acts as a timeshift channel carrying tape-delayed presentations of products and programming. Dish Network has carried it since launch.
America's Store, formerly the Home Shopping Club Overnight Service, was HSN's secondary service that was on the air from 1988 until April 2007.
HSN's U.S. operations are based in St. Petersburg, Florida, which houses its corporate headquarters, studio and broadcasting facilities. Additional call center facilities are located in Roanoke, Virginia & Toledo, Ohio. Distribution centers are situated in Roanoke, Piney Flats, Tennessee, and Fontana, California. In October, 2018 Quarate announced the closure of the Roanoke distribution center in favor of a combined QVC/HSN distribution center to be located in Bethlehem, PA. HSN also operates retail outlet stores in Orlando, Brandon, Bardmoor, Tampa and St. Petersburg. HSN is live 24 hours a day, 364 days a year. During live broadcasts the word "LIVE" is inserted above the on air graphic on the top-right corner, which is now always the case. HSN's hosts stay on the air for 2 or 3 hours and feature 5 to 10 products at a time. The channel usually ends live broadcasting for the Christmas holiday at about 4:00 pm EST Christmas Eve, and returns live at 11:00 pm EST Christmas Day. For the first twelve years, a looping Yule log was aired from Noon Christmas Eve to Midnight December 26. The show allowed members of the staff to go on camera with their families to say hello to relatives back home. Previously aired broadcasts could be re-watched on the YouTube channel of HSN. HSN first uploaded full-length episodes for several of the most popular programs, for instance The Monday Night Show with Adam Freeman, in February 2016, then expanded it to cover all programming on August 26, 2016, including the pre-recorded Christmas broadcasts.
United Kingdom
HSN had a UK sister network called HSE, which has ceased operating.
was launched in 1987 as Canadian Home Shopping Network, HSN's sister network in Canada. In 1999, the station was sold to Rogers Communications and is no longer affiliated with HSN.
Home Shopping Network is currently aired in the Philippines via Shop TV, a shopping channel owned by Solar Entertainment Corporation. It is also aired as a paid advertising block on PTV, IBC, BEAM TV, AksyonTV and most of the channels owned by Solar Entertainment Corporation including Diva Universal Philippines which is a joint venture with NBCUniversal. In 2015, the HSN brand is no longer named on screen, but they used the shopping channel's name.
Home Shopping Europe was launched in Italy in 2001 as Home Shopping Europe, replacing H.O.T. Italia. In 2003, the frequencies of HSE were sold to Mediaset and the channel was renamed Mediashopping. In 2011, Home Shopping Europe bought the channel back; the channel was renamed HSE24.
Technology
Call center
HSN National started life with a standard rotary phone system that concentrated calls to the front of the queue. This corresponded to the front row of order takers in the HSN Studio at the Levitz Center in Clearwater, Florida. After several months, this system was no longer adequate and HSN entered a phase where a phone system from GTE was used. HSN claimed that the systems' inability to handle the high call volumes resulted in a loss of business. HSN sued GTE for $1.5 billion. In a counter-libel suit, GTE claimed that HSN had slandered the company; GTE won a $100 million judgment. Both parties settled out of court.
Original order taking system
HSN developed its original order taking system on a Burroughs Large System mainframe using the LINC 10 fourth generation language.
