General · EdgepediaOctober 3, 20266 min read

The Cowboy Way

The Cowboy Way (also known as The Cowboy Way: Alabama) is an American reality television series that follows three working cowboys, Bubba Thompson, Cody Harris, and Chris "Booger" Brown, as they build their cattle business in South Alabama while living by what the show calls an old-fashioned cowboy code.¹ It is an original one-hour series of the INSP network, produced for INSP by Glassman Media, an independent Los Angeles-based production company.¹ The same name also belongs to a 1994 theatrical comedy starring Woody Harrelson and Kiefer Sutherland, and to a Western-themed streaming channel that INSP later built around the series.²^•³

Key fact	Detail
Format	One-hour reality (docuseries) program on INSP, rated TV-G, about 43 minutes per episode¹^•⁴
Main cast	Bubba Thompson (rancher and carpenter), Cody Harris (rodeo champion and cattle dealer), Chris "Booger" Brown (cattleman and horse trainer)¹
Run	Seven seasons, 2016–2020; season 7 ran July 29 to October 14, 2020⁵^•⁶
Setting	Robertsdale and Baldwin County, Alabama, with the trio's Faith Cattle Company⁷^•⁸
Production	Glassman Media for INSP; executive producers include Andrew Glassman and Aaron Long¹^•⁹
Filming ratio	More than 100 hours of footage shot for a 42-minute episode¹⁰
Availability	Streaming on Amazon Prime Video, Tubi, Peacock, The Roku Channel, Pluto TV, and other services⁴

Spoilers

Premise and cast

The series documents the lives and careers of three friends who ride the open range and run a cattle operation in South Alabama, balancing ranch work with family life.¹ Their partnership is named Faith Cattle Company; according to Bubba Thompson, the name came from the decision to quit working for a rancher they disliked and go out "on faith" to start their own ranch.⁸

Each of the three brings a separate trade. Bubba Thompson is a rancher and skilled carpenter who became a businessman working for his father-in-law's company; he married Kaley in September 2015, and they have a daughter, Andie.¹¹ Cody Harris is a retired professional calf-roping competitor with multiple championship buckles who now produces rodeos, including the annual "Bulls on the Beach" rodeo in Orange Beach, Alabama; he and his wife Misty, a champion barrel racer and former nurse, run Full Moon Cattle Company, a custom beef operation, and have a son, Carter.¹¹^•¹⁰ Chris "Booger" Brown grew up on the family farm and is a horse trainer; after a blind date arranged by Misty he married Jaclyn, a widowed pharmacist, in September 2017 and became stepfather to her son Matthew.¹¹

Origin

The show grew indirectly out of the CMT dating series Sweet Home Alabama. Cody Harris was a cast member of that show's first season in 2011, and Bubba Thompson appeared on the third season, finishing as runner-up in 2012. That show's producer liked the cowboys and proposed filming a pilot about their lifestyle.¹⁰^•⁸

Broadcast history

The first episode, "Bubba, Cody and Booger," carries a premiere date of January 17, 2016 in INSP's own season 1 episode guide.¹² Other listings give a first air date of August 5, 2017, and an INSP press release of October 2017 says season one premiered "this past summer"; the episode guide also lists episodes 102 through 106 with August and September 2017 premiere dates.⁵^•¹^•¹²

The series ran for seven seasons. Season counts per episode guides are 10 episodes in season 1, 8 in season 2, 9 in season 3, 10 in season 4, 9 in season 5, 9 in season 6, and 12 in season 7.⁵ INSP greenlit the third season in October 2017 while season two was still in production, citing ratings growth and favorable feedback.¹ The sixth season was greenlit on March 1, 2019, and the seventh on August 29, 2019, before season six had premiered; season 7 was scheduled to premiere in spring 2020 and ultimately aired from July 29 to October 14, 2020, closing with the episode "Final Cow Down."¹¹^•⁶

Beginning July 15, 2020, INSP made every season available across multiple digital platforms for the first time.¹¹ The series later streamed on Amazon Prime Video, Peacock, Tubi, The Roku Channel, Pluto TV, Plex, and other services.⁴

Production

Filming takes place in and around Robertsdale in Baldwin County, Alabama.⁷ Cody Harris told the Alabama Farmers Federation that the crew shoots more than 100 hours of footage for a 42-minute episode because "you don't stage roping a bull."¹⁰ The cowboys have described the camera crew's presence as an added complication when cattle and horses are not cooperating; Booger Brown noted the difficulty of getting all the action on camera when 200 head of cattle each want to do what they want to do.¹³

Storylines across the seasons

Season arcs track both the business and the families. Season 1 centers on separating a rogue bull from the herd, Bubba and Kaley preparing for their baby, Cody staging a rodeo, and Booger taming an unruly mare.¹⁴ Season 2 follows the trio to Mississippi for their biggest cattle drive.¹⁴ Season 4 involves an all-or-nothing deal with a wealthy rancher and a chuck wagon race.¹⁴ Season 5 shifts the men from cowboys to cattlemen, with road trips to Texas to build relationships with ranchers.¹¹ Season 6 puts the partnership's future in question and includes a Texas job herding cattle by helicopter, which inspires Cody to try drone technology in their operation.¹⁴ Season 7 reunites the three after they had gone separate ways, and follows Booger's plans for an old-fashioned cattle drive through the center of town, inspired by his family's roots in the Florida cattle business.¹⁴^•⁶

Reception and afterlife

INSP's senior vice-president of programming, Doug Butts, attributed the show's success to the cowboys' "authentic lifestyle," citing long hours, uncertain income, and injuries.¹³ True West Magazine called the series "an unassuming and unexpected charmer" whose naturalness contrasts with staged reality shows.¹⁵ In 2022 INSP launched a Cowboy Way FAST channel, a free ad-supported streaming channel carrying The Cowboy Way: Alabama alongside other INSP originals such as Ultimate Cowboy Showdown and Wild West Chronicles.³

Other uses of the name

The Cowboy Way is also a 1994 American comedy film directed by Gregg Champion, starring Woody Harrelson and Kiefer Sutherland as cowboys who come to New York City to find a missing girl, with Dylan McDermott, Ernie Hudson, and Marg Helgenberger; it runs 107 minutes and is rated PG-13.² The phrase also appears in coverage of Taylor Sheridan's Western television output; a 2022 emmy magazine profile of Sheridan was titled "His Cowboy Way."¹⁶

References

Topic: Encyclopedia › Arts and culture › Screen and stage › Film and television › Series and fictional screen worlds › Unscripted, reality, and web-native series › Celebrity, family, lifestyle, and court reality series › Lifestyle, dating, and docusoaps › Wealth, real estate, and lifestyle series

Initially written Oct 3, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 3, 2026; Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 3, 2026; Oct 25, 2026; Nov 1, 2026 · Last review: Oct 25, 2026

Notice something wrong?