Candace Cameron Bure, the actress who rose to fame while playing a key role in Full House, is celebrating a massive win as the GAF channel was announced as the fastest-growing cable TV channel during the fourth quarter of 2022.
GAF – Great American Family – shared a press release on Twitter to celebrate their monumental victory for a channel that preaches family values. Shown also on Bure’s Instagram story, which thanks fans for finding and watching the GAF channel, the press release reads:
Great news for Great American Media's #GreatAmericanFamily to end 2022 & an even better way to start 2023. Happy New Year to everyone who helped make this happen, from people on-camera & off, but especially our viewers! 🎉#GreatAmericanChristmas #WelcomeHome #GreatAmericanWinter pic.twitter.com/HwCtF021II
— Great American Family (@GAfamilyTV) January 3, 2023
“Great American Family closed out Fourth Quarter 2022 as the fastest-growing network in all of cable television. In only its second year, the emerging leader in original Christmas movies ranked #1 in Total Day ratings growth in households (+113%), People 18-49 (+100%) and Total Viewers (+116%), and #1 in Primetime ratings growth in Households (+128%) among all cable networks.”
The release also explains that Great American Family is not going to rest on its laurels following a strong end to the year:
“In addition to the fast-growing Great American Christmas franchise, the network features year-round seasonal programming events, including Autumn Harvest and Great American Winter, which feature original movies celebrating faith, family, and country.”
That last bit at the end is what really separated GAF from its competitors. While many other networks continue to separate themselves from “faith, family, and country,“ GAF has made it a point of pride to include those themes as frequently as they can. By highlighting the importance of those three things, GAF has found a niche and appears to have a lot of staying power on Cable TV.
Bure’s move away from Hallmark was a hot topic in April when the actress finally decided she had enough of working for a network that goes against her most deeply held values. When talking to the Wall Street Journal, Bure explained her move to Great American Family:
“My heart wants to tell stories that have more meaning and purpose and depth behind them. I knew that the people behind Great American Family were Christians that love the Lord and wanted to promote faith programming and good family entertainment.”
Of course, other stars were not as thrilled with Bure’s decision, attacking her from all angles. One such instance was President and CEO of GLAAD Sarah Kate Ellis. GLAAD is a gay rights activist group, and Ellis said the following of Bure in an interview with Deadline:
“It’s irresponsible and hurtful for Candace Cameron Bure to use tradition as a guise for exclusion. I’d love to have a conversation with Bure about my wife, our kids, and our family’s traditions.”
Pop Star JoJo Siwa piled on with more of the same in an Instagram post
“Honestly, I can’t believe after everything that went down just a few months ago, that she would not only create a movie with intention of excluding LGBTQIA+, but then also talk about it in the press. This is rude and hurtful to a whole community of people.”
Now, Bure has these haters, and many more, eating their words as she continues to promote family values in a loving way, only with the addition of her Christian faith. And audiences are gobbling it up.
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