Heavy/HGTV
HGTV stars Ben and Erin Napier
Good news for “Home Town” fans! HGTV announced on September 13, 2023, that its hit show starring Erin and Ben Napier has been renewed for an eighth season and that a premiere date for season 7 will be announced “shortly.”
Via a joint Instagram post with the Napiers, HGTV shared, “BREAKING NEWS: #HGTVHomeTown has been renewed for Season 8! 🎊 🎉 And if you’re anxiously awaiting the Season 7 premiere, know that we’ll have a date/time for you to mark your calendars shortly 😁🗓️”
Fans were thrilled to hear more “Home Town” is on its way. The only issue? Eight years into “Home Town” being on the air, there has been some communications confusion about which season the Napiers are actually filming.
Here’s what you need to know:
Erin Napier Says She’s ‘Always Grateful’ to Get to Keep Making ‘Home Town’
HGTV’s announcement said that it will soon announce a premiere date for its seventh season, but its website already lists multiple season 7 “Home Town” episodes as having aired in 2023. Meanwhile, Laurel Mercantile Co., the general store co-owned by the Napiers and two other couples in Laurel, Mississsippi, has an entire page listing out show details and shopping guides from 18 episodes labeled “Home Town Season 7.”
HGTV has not responded to Heavy’s request for clarification. But whatever the accurate season number is, the good news for fans is that more episodes of “Home Town” are in the works.
Erin shared the post to her Instagram Stories to celebrate the announcement, writing, “always grateful to be coming back to your TVs!”
And fans celebrated the news, too, with comments expressing their relief and excitement.
One wrote, “Yay! I’ve watched and rewatched all the seasons. Bring on new episodes; congratulations!”
Another commented, “Awesome!! 👏🏻 best team and show!”
The most recent season of “Home Town” debuted in December 2022 and at that time, HGTV announced via press release that it had ordered another 20 episodes of the show to air in 2023.
In April 2023, the Napiers also starred in the second season of their show’s spin-off series, “Home Town Takeover,” alongside fellow HGTV couple Dave and Jenny Marrs. The two couples oversaw revitalization and renovation efforts in the small town of Fort Morgan, Colorado.
Erin and Ben Napier Never Expected to Become TV Stars
Discovery+/HGTVErin and Ben Napier dance on the set of their first movie, “A Christmas Open House”
When the Napiers began revitalization efforts in their own town of Laurel, with the help of a small group of friends, they never expected it would land them on TV. But the path to having their own show seemed to just appear in front of them as they followed their passions, they’ve said.
“Honestly, it started as a game for us,” Ben said during an appearance on “The Today Show” in April.
Erin added, “Just to see how far could we take Laurel. How much improvement could we see if we did this? If we did that? And if you got these people involved, then what happens? And how does it change and grow? And it was just for fun.”
During a June 2021 interview on the “At Home” podcast with fellow HGTV star Drew Scott and his wife Linda Phan, the Napiers revealed how they then wound up being on TV.
Nearly a decade ago, Erin was running a small stationery business, designing wedding invitations and blogging about their life and home in Laurel. When former HGTV producer Lindsay Weidhorn saw a profile of their home in a 2014 issue of “Southern Weddings” magazine, she followed Erin on Instagram and Erin followed her back.
One day, she said, when Weidhorn posted that she was watching a rough edit of a new “Property Brothers” show, Erin commented that she had a really cool job. Weidhorn replied that she was glad she’d reached out, asked to connect via email, and eventually flew the Napiers to New York to meet about starting a show about home design and small town revitalization.
“If she had not posted about editing your rough cut, I would not have left a comment,” Erin told Scott. “If I had not left the comment, she would not have said ’email me.’ We never would have had a conversation about the show!”
Just before Weidhorn approached the Napiers about their interest in being on TV, Ben had decided to leave his job in youth ministry to focus full-time on woodworking and revitalizing Laurel — and the email felt like a sign they were on the right path.
“Just before we were contacted about the show, I had decided to resign from student ministry at our church,” he told Lucchese in 2020. “We consulted with other pastors, with our parents, and with God. We prayed almost nonstop for months leading up to my resignation.”
He continued, “When the email came asking if we had ever considered being on TV, I had sealed the envelope on my resignation letter an hour earlier. We didn’t see it as “this is God’s plan for our future” but more as an affirmation that we were following God’s plan. We agreed that we would follow that path as far as it went.”
“Home Town” premiered on HGTV in 2016 and has been a ratings winner for the network ever since.
Liv Lane is an entertainment writer who covers the Hallmark Channel, The Voice, American Idol and HGTV for Heavy. She has three decades of experience as a radio host, publicist and motivational speaker, and is an accomplished watercolor artist. Liv attended the University of Minnesota and is based in the Twin Cities. More about Liv Lane
