88.1 The Promise - SOLD

[jaxonair80]

Has anyone heard that....? I heard a shadey deal is in the works.... any truth to this?

 

[sussusstudio]

I know a few folks, who in turn know a few folks who work there. I'm not sure about sold, but money has changed hands and "lease" has been mentioned. Doesn't sound too shady to me, but I've been fooled before. The party buying 88.1 is first class, that much I do know. The party selling, well its no surprise they're selling. With the weird programming changes on some of their stations it just makes sense that they'd sell.

 

[jaxonair80]

Chesapeake Broadcasting is a "clown show" in general, I would not even go as far to say its a third class opperation. Epperson's wife Nancy runs it. So a lot of money is just going from the left hand to the right hand with unloading these stations. If I was to guess, I would say they are letting the stations go to crap so they can just unload them for cheap. They still have like 7 years left on the lease on the 4th floor in the enterprise park building, you know thats not cheap. Have you heard the programming on 1460 and 1320; the new call leters are less then sterling "WBOB, The big bob." Glenn Boyles on one station and Andy Johnson on the other AM.... At least the clowns who ran it when it was Salem were, semi professional by keeping the trash off the airwaves. At least Salem used a professional voice over guy.

As far as the promise goes, Salem by far had a better programming concept with 106.5.

River Educational Media .. shadey.

 

[Calvin@thePromise]

From Calvin at 88.1 The Promise

Hi All....
Since this blog has managed to find itself in the top 3 on Google searches for 88.1 The Promise, I thought it appropriate to respond to the rumor mill. Yes, I am Calvin and you can verify with me that I wrote this by calling the radio station if you would like: Business Line: 641-9626
First - there is no "shady deal" in the works. You are all radio people and know that LMA's are common and there is nothing shady about it.
I want people to know what has taken place so I will give it to you exactly how it has happened.
Yes, money has changed hands in the form of a deposit of $100,000 and the first months lease of $42,500 which covers some engineering, management, transmitter/tower rent and electric, insurance, and a few other things and is to begin October 1. The LMA deal is between non-profit group River Educational Media Inc., the current operators of 88.1 The Promise of which I am the general manager and who's board of directors is based out of North Carolina - and - the non-profit group of what is now The Promise Educational Media Inc., of which I am the president and who's board of directors are all in Jacksonville. I have nothing to hide, in fact - the financial information will be posted on our web site soon with our expense needs. So in fact - I saved 88.1 The Promise from becoming a Christian satellite music station with no local voice at all - what a shame that would have been.

The chain of events...

• Those of you who know me, know I have been with 88.1 since the beginning in 1984. I helped to start the radio station while I was working at the then 97 WAIV with Arthur Croften. 88.1 has been my blood for almost 25 years and now - we are enjoying the highest cumes since the station started and even higher than 106.5 The Promise had in its great days.
• I guess with success comes others that would like a piece of the success and an offer was made to LMA the station by another Christian music group that would have made it purely satellite music and no local voice at all. When I heard of the possible transaction, I made a counter offer to keep 88.1 The Promise as it is in Jacksonville and now it will remain this way - local - the way it should be.

• As for the original rumor of a complete firing of sales staff: First of all, I don't have a full time sales staff. 88.1 The Promise is mostly funded by donations from our listeners. At the current time, we do have a sales agreement with Chesapeake Portsmouth Broadcasting for their full time sales people - who share our building - that they make commission on what they do sell in the form of grant announcements for business or commercials for churches, but this is a very small part of our budget. I do not have a sales staff that I can fire. We are a very very small staff of 5 fulltime employees. I am the morning drive host, the President, the webmaster...and more. 2 of the other 4 that work fulltime have been with me for almost 20 years. Yes, there may be some unhappy sales people from Chesapeake Portsmouth because we are thinking that we should just handle sales on our own - but this is not considered a mass firing. In fact, you may find it interesting to know that with the small amount of sales money that is raised, we will be using the majority of the funds to build orphanages in KwaZulu Natal, South Africa and the Zulu Tribe - this was my original dream for the 501c3 organization that I have started to begin with and now we will have a way to do it. We will be updating the web site soon but you can find out more about it at www.ZuluFoundation.org
• Our monthly budget will be $100,000 and will include everything from salaries, to the lease payment, to rent, electric, phone and all of the other expenses that come with running a radio station. This money will be raised on the air as a "listener supported" radio station. This is our only option and is required by FCC regulation. 100% of the money raised on the air will go to the operation of 88.1 The Promise. All of our budget will be posted on our web site soon: www.fm88.org

Thank you for your time and if you have any questions, feel free to give me a call. God Bless
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