One Tweet Caused Chip and Joanna Gaines to End their Hit TV Show!
After four very successful seasons Chip and Joanna Gaines announced last year that their hit HGTV show “Fixer Upper” would come to an end after its fifth season. This left many loyal fans instantly heartbroken and confused about why Chip and Jo would be ending such a hit series.
In the announcement on Joanna’s blog the couple explained that it was a matter of feeling like they were getting close to burn out. “We have poured our blood, sweat and tears into this show. We would be foolish to think we can go and go and fire on all cylinders and never stop to pause.”
So what was the moment that prompted such a huge decision? Chip says that the revelation came one early morning at 2 AM through a customer on Twitter. The tweet read, “Hey @chippergaines, it’s been 3 weeks, and I still haven’t gotten my wreath. What’s up?!”
This was the moment that changed everything for Chip. Last Fall Chip released a book titled “Capital Gaines: Smart Things I Learned Doing Stupid Stuff,” and in the book he shares just how deeply this tweet impacted the way he evaluated the way he was spending his time.
“I tried to shake it off, knowing that I couldn’t do anything about it then and that it would have to wait until morning,” Chip wrote. “No luck. I was up all night dwelling on it.”
The following day still provided no relief for the growing anxiety that Chip was feeling. Faced with a busy production schedule, Chip and Jo were spending their day on set for filming of “Fixer Upper” and were physically unable to personally attend to this customer’s issue.
“Who else but me should be figuring out what was ailing my growing business,” Chip continued in his book. “And who else other than me should be ensuring that we moved beyond each and every one of these mistakes?
It was at that moment that Chip was hit by the revelation that filming “Fixer Upper” was no longer an easy side job, but rather a huge distraction that was taking too much of his time and focus away from his “true loves:” his family and his business Magnolia, which has been a passion for over a decade now.
After talking it through together as a couple, both Chip and Joanna came to the conclusion that they were overworked and no longer felt at peace about continuing on with their show. All of their priorities in life were not being given the full attention that they deserved as they were forced to give more and more time to the filming of “Fixer Upper.”
In the end, the decision that they made was not because of any failures in their business or relationship, but ultimately because both Chip and Jo wanted to protect themselves from getting to that point.
Chip wrote in his book that “pure long-term exhaustion can change a person – or two persons. We had been driving so hard for so long now. And I had this sense that if I kept my foot on the gas, we might be headed for disaster.”