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10 yrs later, another set of firings at KGO

Hole in your radio

Hole in your radio

Exactly ten years and one day after Cumulus blew out nearly the entire air staff at KGO, they've had another "Pre-Xmas Employee Blowout!"

Afternoon talk host Chip Franklin was sacked along with others. Traffic reporter Heather Hamman is posting that she was also canned. Names of others aren't available yet.

It's not just Cumulus. The consolidators have eliminated tens of thousands of on-air voices since the ownership caps were decimated. NAB loves its lobbyists.
 
Hole in your radio said:
Exactly ten years and one day after Cumulus blew out nearly the entire air staff at KGO, they've had another "Pre-Xmas Employee Blowout!"

Afternoon talk host Chip Franklin was sacked along with others. Traffic reporter Heather Hamman is posting that she was also canned. Names of others aren't available yet.

It's not just Cumulus. The consolidators have eliminated tens of thousands of on-air voices since the ownership caps were decimated. NAB loves its lobbyists.
Click to expand...
Reality check: when ownership caps were expanded, much of the reasoning was that over half of all US stations were not profitable, and Docker 80-90 had made local radio in many smaller markets a losing proposition. Radio was in a crisis, with so many more stations and no new revenue.
 
Hole in your radio said:
Exactly ten years and one day after Cumulus blew out nearly the entire air staff at KGO, they've had another "Pre-Xmas Employee Blowout!"

Afternoon talk host Chip Franklin was sacked along with others. Traffic reporter Heather Hamman is posting that she was also canned. Names of others aren't available yet.

It's not just Cumulus. The consolidators have eliminated tens of thousands of on-air voices since the ownership caps were decimated. NAB loves its lobbyists.
Click to expand...


KGO-AM isn't what it was in the past. also the number one News/Talk station in San Francisco is KQED-FM and KCBS Radio has been the go to places for news for years now.

https://ratings.****************/content/arb009
 
Hole in your radio said:
The consolidators have eliminated tens of thousands of on-air voices since the ownership caps were decimated. NAB loves its lobbyists.
Click to expand...

On the other hand, if having full staffs of local talent would lead to good ratings and revenue, the owners would never get rid of anyone. But that's obviously not the case at KGO. The management has been patient with this staff. In fact, corporate replaced the market management at least twice in the last few years. So the idea that they just target staff is not true. But KGO's all local staff was doing just two-tenths of a point better than the co-owned station running all syndication. That's not saying much for live and local radio.

If you just look down the hall, the staff is pretty much intact at KNBR, right? Why do you think that is?
 
Hole in your radio said:
NAB loves its lobbyists.
Click to expand...

Just FYI, the NAB *are* lobbyists! That's what they do. For 15 years, they've been lobbying for MORE deregulation, hoping to allow companies to own MORE stations in every market. They almost got their wish during the last administration. Ajit Pai and the FCC passed even more deregulation, and then it got held up in the courts. The current government is not into deregulation, but radio is way down on the priority list, and the FCC is deadlocked with only four commissioners. So no new regulations coming from this crew.

www.politico.com

Trump's FCC chief leaves legacy of deregulation and 5G fights

Ajit Pai's departure may spur Senate Republicans to fast-track confirmation of a Republican FCC nominee in the lame duck, which would create a 2-2 split that could slow Joe Biden's priorities at the agency.
www.politico.com www.politico.com
 
All Trump bashing all the time just didn't make them any money. Thats why I quit listening right after they added all the local staff to the on air line up.
 
TheBigA said:
On the other hand, if having full staffs of local talent would lead to good ratings and revenue, the owners would never get rid of anyone. But that's obviously not the case at KGO. The management has been patient with this staff. In fact, corporate replaced the market management at least twice in the last few years. So the idea that they just target staff is not true. But KGO's all local staff was doing just two-tenths of a point better than the co-owned station running all syndication. That's not saying much for live and local radio.

If you just look down the hall, the staff is pretty much intact at KNBR, right? Why do you think that is?
Click to expand...
Golden State Warriors, San Jose Sharks, San Jose Earthquakes, San Francisco Giants, A's and 49ers are keeping KNBR popular for now and until otherwise.
 
Negin said:
Cumulus destroyed the once great KGO 10 years ago.
Click to expand...
No, they did not.

The biggest "hit" to KGO's ratings was the introduction of the PPM about 12 years ago. All stations that had a narrow cume, few occasional listeners, and long TSL were seriously impacted by a ratings system that showed that "long listening spans" were really bits and pieces of listening off and on over a period of time.

But prior to that, Mickey and his crew did not refresh the format in the years after Y2K. The talent was getting older, and the topics reflected the talent. Jack Swanson, the helmsman for programming, has not gotten a successful gig since then, despite a high profile but short-lived gig at KCBS.

There have been many ideas on what they could have done, such as partnering the traditional hosts with new people from a younger generation or getting producers who could line up guests and topics that had greater appeal for younger demos. But they should have been doing that years before the PPM hit.

That KGO team worked for thirty-some years. But it grew stale, and then was whacked by the new ratings system. Cumulus just did not know how to fix it, so they destroyed the foundation that could have been used to build a modernized version. There is enough blame for both Mickey and Cumulus to have second helpings.
 
DavidEduardo said:
No, they did not.

The biggest "hit" to KGO's ratings was the introduction of the PPM about 12 years ago. All stations that had a narrow cume, few occasional listeners, and long TSL were seriously impacted by a ratings system that showed that "long listening spans" were really bits and pieces of listening off and on over a period of time.

But prior to that, Mickey and his crew did not refresh the format in the years after Y2K. The talent was getting older, and the topics reflected the talent. Jack Swanson, the helmsman for programming, has not gotten a successful gig since then, despite a high profile but short-lived gig at KCBS.

There have been many ideas on what they could have done, such as partnering the traditional hosts with new people from a younger generation or getting producers who could line up guests and topics that had greater appeal for younger demos. But they should have been doing that years before the PPM hit.

That KGO team worked for thirty-some years. But it grew stale, and then was whacked by the new ratings system. Cumulus just did not know how to fix it, so they destroyed the foundation that could have been used to build a modernized version. There is enough blame for both Mickey and Cumulus to have second helpings.
Click to expand...
What do you think Citadel would have done back then before the PPM came out since Disney around this time sold ABC Radio affiliates to Citadel like KGO-AM and KABC-AM. It makes me wonder if KGO-AM was allowed to get an FM signal how much will it remain relevant and put itself in a competitive position against KQED-FM. But when CBS Radio managed KCBS-AM and decided to put all news on 106.9FM it was in response to the rise of KQED-FM at that point.
 
RadioPatrol said:
What do you think Citadel would have done back then before the PPM came out since Disney around this time sold ABC Radio affiliates to Citadel like KGO-AM and KABC-AM. It makes me wonder if KGO-AM was allowed to get an FM signal how much will it remain relevant and put itself in a competitive position against KQED-FM. But when CBS Radio managed KCBS-AM and decided to put all news on 106.9FM it was in response to the rise of KQED-FM at that point.
Click to expand...
Good questions and observations.

I think one of the issues is the demographic change in the San Francisco market. The fewer old white guys there are, the less appeal there will be for any talk format that we know today.

Beyond that, the increasingly polarized political climate has made the far right and far left extremes a very hard sell to advertisers. In the case of KGO, which for years was "conservatively liberal", I think the change in the market mood made that approach less appealing.

I don't think that an FM signal would have helped maintenance to the degree that the format has declined based on content. The traditional talk format just leans old. In San Diego, Clear Channel tried adding an FM to its AM talker, and got no added results... but that was an eternity ago.
 
TheBigA said:
Cumulus had that option a few years ago when they had the failing KFOG. They opted to simulcast the much higher-rated KNBR on the signal. That's your answer there.
Click to expand...
Also KNBR is the number one Sports/Talk station and second talk radio station in San Francisco after KQED-FM and All News KCBS.
 
Signal Geek said:
And decades earlier (in the 70s or early 80s, I think), long before Cumulus, KGO-AM simulcasted for a year or two on FM 103.7.
Click to expand...
It was from approximately 1966-1968 or so. Nothing but music. Great, great music!

Jingle: "One 0h three point seven, K...G...O......San Francisco!"
 
landtuna said:
It was from approximately 1966-1968 or so.
Click to expand...

I think your dates are closer to correct, because the FCC simulcast rules kicked in after that, preventing FMs to simulcast AMs, and in the ABC group, they came up with a national FM rock format called "Love" that ran on most of their O&Os. In 1971, the station became KSFX. It returned to KGO-FM for two years from 82 to 84 running ABC's TalkRadio format.
 
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