Hallmark channel set to win again this Christmas

Call them maudlin, cheesy or formulaic. Wooden or contrived. Michelle Vicary, Hallmark’s queen of Christmas schmaltz, couldn’t care less. Because she knows what works, and why it keeps working. We’re talking, of course, about Hallmark holiday movies, soon to be wall to wall on cable channels for a solid month. Want a primer on how it goes? Here’s a text trailer for “A Cookie Cutter Christmas.”

Imagine you’re a single lady with a bad case of the “burns everything in the kitchens” when one day, conveniently close to Christmas, you meet a tall, dark single dad who just happens to be Betty Crocker in the kitchen. Such is the “plot” of A Cookie Cutter Christmas, one of 12 Hallmark Channel movies new for the season. Right, and if you guessed the movie actually includes the line, “all I want for Christmas is you” then maybe you’ve seen these movies before. Lots of folks have … and will again this season.

Want another helping of Christmas romance, Hallmark style? How bout some “Christmas Cookies”? This one takes place in the adorable little New York village of, I’m not making this up, Cookie Jar. Our story begins when the beguiling beautiful and blonde but, of course, icy and evil Lady of the Tale arrives in town with a “generous offer” to buy the town’s major source of employment, a cookie factory. The owner of the factory is reluctant to sell, but up to his Santa hat in unpaid liabilities, so he’s left with little choice other than to … somehow seduce the ice queen, win her heart and save the town. Spoiler alert: he wins, she talks her boss into letting it alone and drops her boyfriend for Mr. Cookie. Happy ending, right? But did Mr. Cookie make good on his debts? Unclear, but Hallmark doesn’t dwell much on such trifles. There are oohs and ahhs to elicit and hearts to melt. The payoff line here? “It takes a little bit of love to make something really special.”

So, have you overdosed on saccharin yet? If so, you might not be the target market for this kind of entertainment. But Vicary and Hallmark don’t mind. They know who is,

and that’s what makes them so good – and so successful – at what they do. They understand what their market is looking for, and so they serve it up as much as possible, no matter what critics and naysayers and TV movie Scrooges have to say.

The formula works, and it serves a market looking for the polar opposite of Bad Santa 2, hitting theaters soon. Is there much to complain about in these TV treats? For some, sure. But for the people who know exactly what to expect, and look forward to it, these films are as warming and delightful as a mug of steaming cocoa.

Phil Shawe is an entrepreneur in New York.