The Pond Guys, Animal Planet & You!

Last week I wrote about the filming of the pilot for our new reality show, The Pond Guys. Animal Planet has purchased the rights to this show and provided the pilot does as anticipated it’s slated for production sometime this summer. They are looking to package it with their most popular show, Tanked! First season production is slated for a six to ten episodes. Here’s where you come in. Our pilot was filmed in Amelia Island, Florida because besides being February in Chicago we had a great story to shoot. William was a 14 year old boy who had the ambition and where-withal to build his own backyard pond. He reminded me of me at his age and I really wanted to help him with his hobby. Well, there are so, so many cool, fun and inspirational stories out there that involve water. I wanted to give you the chance to share your ideas with me that I could pass along to our agent, the producers and ultimately the execs at Animal Planet. We already have plenty of projects and ideas to film here in Chicago, but of course, we only want to shoot the best of the best. If you’re wondering what the best of the best looks like, think one thing…Reality TV! Lots of drama, bleeped out words and emotion. Hah! Seriously though, the number one thing we are looking for is a good story. Creating and installing a water feature for a returning Vet like some of our contractors do in Ponds for Vets. Or, rebuilding a pond for a community that’s fallen to disarray. If there’s one element every build needs to feature outside of being a dramatic transformation it’s being able to chronicle actual drama in the build. One of the shows on the option table for example is us rebuilding a water feature at a chapel right before a wedding. A worried bride and a tight time frame make for great reality TV or so I’ve been told. You get it?

Never before has our industry been so close to being relevant to the masses than the exposure a major network would provide. I want to do this right, I have to work in the parameters of what a viewing public demands, and I plan on leveraging our national network of Certified Aquascape Contractors to make that happen. So put your thinking caps on, watch some episodes of Tanked, the #1 show they want to pattern us off of, and send us your ideas for your projects to showcase. With only a six to ten episode series being featured in year one it will be like winning the lottery. But if you don’t play you can’t win. And I’m convinced, as I’m sure you are too that this concept has legs, and will become a standard twenty series program! I can picture us now reviving our waterfall building contests of the past with the accompanying wacky cast and crew. And don’t you think Pondemonium in August screams reality TV! Who’s going in the Gorilla cage to get the waterfalls flowing? The ideas are as endless as the designs for our water features. So submit away and let’s make a blow-your-socks-off Season One so we earn a season two and put water features smack dab in the minds of a reality TV viewing public!

Please send a 300 word, or less, description of an upcoming project your company would be able to organize for one of your clients to [email protected]