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Two years ago media pundits were writing obituaries for Craig Broadcasting Systems after the Western independent broadcaster failed to win a TV licence in Victoria, B.C., beaten out by Toronto's Chum. The loss was widely viewed as the death knell for Craig Broadcasting's aspirations to become a national player.
The obits were premature. In the intervening 24 months, Calgary-based Craig has acquired 18 digital licences and launched three specialty channels-MTV Canada, MTV2 and TV Land-with another, the Stampede Network, expected to premier early next year. It also turned the media establishment on its head in April by snatching the last conventional analog TV licence for Toronto from under the noses of heavyweight rivals like Can-West Global, Alliance Atlantis and Torstar Corp.
Confounding the experts has left Craig Broadcasting president and CEO Drew Craig with a satisfied smile on his face as he sprawls in jeans and T-shirt in the tree-shaded backyard of his Calgary home on a warm, breezy July day. He's trying to be magnanimous in victory, but his eyes sparkle behind his white rimmed glasses and his face splits in an uncontrollable grin as he takes a verbal poke at his critics. "A lot of people expected us to exit the business when we didn't get our Victoria licence. The experts in Toronto felt that Chum could take us out."
Winning the Toronto/One licence was more than flipping a finger in the face of the nay sayers; it was the culmination of a long-held dream of building the company his grandfather John B. Craig founded in Brandon, Man. in 1948 into a national network. Twice in the 1980s Craig Broadcasting tried, and failed, to enter the Toronto market by buying Channel 11, now owned by Global. Drew Craig, who took over the company in 1999, was so determined to crack Canada's largest TV market' that 18 months before the CRTC issued its licence call in May 2001 for two new Toronto stations (the other went to Rogers Communications), he was preparing an application.
Craig, 43, knows that Toronto/One is the linchpin is his growth strategy, and that it offers a "tremendous opportunity" for his family-owned company. "We will be moving into the fifth-largest TV market in North America and...