<<<<<"Why are we buying spots and putting money into the pocket of a station that is dissing us every day?">>>>
Because Maynard, for one, was doing 12 shares in AMD and selling a sh**load of cars for them. We'd have some of the groups individual dealers out at 'BZ events and they'd be so all over Maynard that you'd have thought they were going to have to rent a room.
The Lemon Law was either going to pass or fail, but the day after the passage or failure, those dealers were still going to be trying to move that Detroit iron off their lots, and 'BZ helped move it.
<<<<<Do you blame the dealers?>>>>>
I don't blame the dealers for taking their best shot at the station thru their agency, but EVERYONE at the agency knew this was a non-starter. People forget, but at the time the Lemon Law debate was a real front burner, hot-button issue and the idea that the region's numero uno news organization wasn't going to be all over it was just silly.
<<<<<I am glad the GM of WBZ didn't cave>>>>>
The newsroom mutiny would have been unseemly. And, if some tee'd off 'BZer ever leaked a story that a dealer group was so afraid of the Lemon Law that they had demanded a news feature be spiked the damage to both the station AND the dealer group would have been awful to behold.
<<<.....However, I wouldn't blame the dealers if they yanked their ad dollars....would you?>>>>>
Of course, it's their money, but I'd blame them for being petulent and foolish.Business is business. 'BZ's business was covering stories of local interest. The members of the dealer groups business was selling cars. If BZ's coverage of the local scene generated listeners who bought cars, we have a symbiotic relationship.
In the event, over thirty years later, nobody even remembers that the Lemon Law exists but most of those dealers do. The names and players and mediums have changed, but the game remains the same.