Destination America comes to Discovery

Discovery Networks couldn’t make Planet Green sprout, so the former tree-hugging network is being transformed into the unabashedly patriotic Destination America, the company will announce today.

The new channel, launching in 59 million homes on Memorial Day, aims for a manly version of TLC’S audience, says CEO David Zaslav, with shows about food, travel, adventure and natural history aimed squarely at a between-the-coasts crowd.

“We became convinced there was an opening there to build a channel based on middle America, strong values, behavior and customs,” he says.

Original series include Fast Food Mania, hosted by Jon Hein, due June 3; BBQ Pitmasters, a former TLC series that returns with new episodes on May 30; and later this summer, Ghost Town Gold, Cheating: Las Vegas (about casino scams), United States of Food and Super Duper Thrill Rides.

Hedging bets, the channel also will borrow liberally from its siblings, airing reruns of Discovery Channel’s Dirty Jobs, Storm Chasers and Cash Cab, and TLC’S Miami Ink and its tattoo-parlor spinoffs. The food and travel focus are a natural: The company has no network specifically focusing on either topic.

“It’s quintessential counterprogramming to many of the negative stories” about issues that divide Americans, says Henry Schleiff, the channel’s president. “We are a one-stop destination for all of these stories from an American perspective.”

Planet Green, which replaced Discovery Home in 2008 just as the environmental movement peaked, seemed like “it was a great idea, and it turns out that it wasn’t,” Zaslav says. “The feedback from viewers was that . . . programming about the environment was not entertaining enough. We knew pretty clearly, about two years in, that we just weren’t gaining momentum.”

The channel dropped the last of its green programming about nine months ago and has been building ratings by airing borrowed reruns from other Discovery channels as it refined the new concept.