A TV/Radio career in Canada

[travisl5678]

I'm a teenager in California with a love for radio and tv, and I've become very interested in radio and tv in canada. I was wondering how the radio/tv job market looks up there, along with what differences there are to expect, would I need to go to college in canada? and if so are there any schools anyone would suggest? What are really good markets, stations, companies, or networks to work for. As an american citizen, what would I need to do to live and work in canada, and would being an american make it hard to find a job? For what its worth I have french canadian ancestory and a french canadian last name.

 

[FreddyE1977]

I was having a discussion along these lines with someone the other day as Ashleigh Banfield was on our TV screen.

There has been a long line of Canadians working in national TV news down here in the States.
(Banfield, Morely Safer, Keith Morrison, Peter Jennings, John Roberts, etc.) We seem to have a
more or less Open Door policy when it comes to employing Canadians in national media. But I
get the distinct sense that door only swings one way. Am I wrong?

 

[Bob1370]

Couple things for Travis to consider...Canadian stations have hired Americans rather frequently, and vice-versa, although if you're moving north it helps if you have family ties in Canada that could get you a Canadian citizenship certificate. And if you get an offer from Toronto, you'll make big bucks, close to what you will get in Chicago (which is about the same-sized market as the Greater Toronto Area). Vancouver? Comparable in pay and benefits to a top-20 market, pays a lot like Detroit or San Diego.

What you may be disappointed to find out (as I found out when approached by a couple of Canadian stations in some rather large markets including Hamilton and Ottawa) is that the money's not as good as you might expect. A top 10 or top 20 Canadian market may be no bigger in population, or ad revenue, than market 50 in the U.S. That means salary and benefit packages will be no bigger than the top-50 market where you've been working in the U.S., and the cost of moving alone makes it a questionable sideways move. Life in a Canadian market is nice, you make as much as a market of similar population in the US, especially these days when the currencies of the two countries are within a few pennies on the dollar of par. But you need to compare the markets you're moving to or from by the numbers--specifically by 6+ population and ad revenue--to see if you'll really do better moving in either direction across the border.

Another thing for Travis to consider; there are markets within a short distance of your own home, places like Las Vegas, San Diego, Sacramento, of San Francisco/Oakland, that are just as desirable places to live, and just as attainable, as a comparable Canadian market. Why not think about the markets you know, closest to you?
I wound up opting to stay home rather than making a sideways move in my own career just for a change of scene, and have never regretted it.

 

[FreddyE1977]

Interesting. Who are some of the more notable Americans working north of the border?

 

[Bob1370]

"Interesting. Who are some of the more notable Americans working north of the border?"

Not quite sure who all is doing it now, but there's a long history of Yanks popping up on some of the biggest Canadian outlets. One of the most notable is Andy Barrie, a Baltimore native who hosted CBC's Metro Morning wakeup show on CBC Radio One in Toronto until he retired a year or two ago...before that, he was a fixture on CFRB's talk schedule holding down the midday show.

1050 CHUM in its Top 40 heyday was full of US talent; its longtime morning man, the late Jungle Jay Nelson, came from Buffalo where he'd been a TV and radio host on WKBW and WKBW-TV before he headed north. Scott Carpenter, their former night man, was an American who later worked in DC before he quit the business and went into the information technology biz--he's now living and working in the southwestern US. And let's not forget another former CHUM night guy, Jackson Armstrong, who came from North Carolina by way of Cleveland, and later left CHUM to go first to KB and later to KFI in Los Angeles before heading home to the Carolinas for the final stage of his career before he passed a few years ago. Americans who crossed the Detroit River to work at CKLW included Motown's own Dick Purtan (who later crossed back to Motown), Charlie Van Dyke (now on the air in Phoenix), and Buffalo's Tommy Shannon, who retired recently after going home to Buffalo and finishing his career at Oldies 104 WHTT. John Landecker was CFTR's wake-up man before he returned home to Chicago and WLS; he's now at oldies WLS-FM.