Could this mean the end to small market radio?

[NHRadio]

I remember once reading about an old man who owned a station near Boston, MA who ran a station just as you described. He'd cook his dinner in the station while doing a radio show. He also slept at the station.

That old man would be the late Simon Geller, former owner of Classical WVCA-FM in Gloucester, MA. The studio was in his home which was over a local laundromat. He was known to be...um....a bit eccentric. He finally sold the station not long before his death after fighting petitions to deny for many years. It's now owned by the Tanger family, who made their money owning outlet malls.

 

[Nate Wesley]

I am not sure this is the end of small market radio. It is the end of a bunch of move-in stations making up a cluster, or creative city of license changes like what the boys on North Shadeland have done. In Indy it only effects most of the clusters with the exception of Clear Channel. Everyone else has a station or more licensed to somewhere other than their current studio. Cumulus is really screwed on this one (Noblesville, Fishers, and Lawrence) Radio One (Indy, Greenwood and Speedway) Emmis (Indy, Indy, Indy, Shelbyville) Entercom (Indy, Indy, Greenfield) Raven (Indy, Franklin) Disney is licensed to Plainfield with studio in Carmel, Continental (Danville, Indy)

Having a live body at the station 24/7 is a fairly good idea I think. The only station around here that really is equipped and staffed to cover any sort of natural disaster is WIBC...everyone else is voice tracked.

The problem remains....broadcasters got greedy and drove the price up for the stations they acquired in the "heydey" of consolidation. Now that business has slipped a little...they are having trouble making their note payments....and have had to cut everything else. Sort of like being house poor.

The broadcasters don't hate the new potential rules because it will affect their businesses. They hate the new rules because it will affect their business models. Which is pretty much why any legislation intended to make a product or service safer or of better quality gets protested by business interests. "How dare the government make us spend more money...it'll bankrupt us and kill the industry!"

Sux 4 u, corporate broadcasters. If you want to have a cluster of four or five stations, maintain proper staffing for them according to the rules.

 

[Bongwater]

I am not sure this is the end of small market radio. It is the end of a bunch of move-in stations making up a cluster, or creative city of license changes like what the boys on North Shadeland have done. In Indy it only effects most of the clusters with the exception of Clear Channel. Everyone else has a station or more licensed to somewhere other than their current studio. Cumulus is really screwed on this one (Noblesville, Fishers, and Lawrence) Radio One (Indy, Greenwood and Speedway) Emmis (Indy, Indy, Indy, Shelbyville) Entercom (Indy, Indy, Greenfield) Raven (Indy, Franklin) Disney is licensed to Plainfield with studio in Carmel, Continental (Danville, Indy)

Having a live body at the station 24/7 is a fairly good idea I think. The only station around here that really is equipped and staffed to cover any sort of natural disaster is WIBC...everyone else is voice tracked.

The problem remains....broadcasters got greedy and drove the price up for the stations they acquired in the "heydey" of consolidation. Now that business has slipped a little...they are having trouble making their note payments....and have had to cut everything else. Sort of like being house poor.

The broadcasters don't hate the new potential rules because it will affect their businesses. They hate the new rules because it will affect their business models. Which is pretty much why any legislation intended to make a product or service safer or of better quality gets protested by business interests. "How dare the government make us spend more money...it'll bankrupt us and kill the industry!"

Sux 4 u, corporate broadcasters. If you want to have a cluster of four or five stations, maintain proper staffing for them according to the rules.

CHEERS!

The corporate broadcasters position that it will "kill" small market radio is more bull than even a steakhouse chain can tolerate. It's just an old boys club and nothing more and I have NO sympathy for them. If you can't handle it, then give back the radio stations licenses. Simple as that. Those licenses are a PRIVLEDGE. Not a RIGHT. (Look it up.) There WILL AWAYS be someone in the community of license that can make it work. And if they can't, then a NEW LOCAL owner comes into play who can. You can call it "socialism", but I swear by my Little Red Book it worked long before 1996. At least it kept the blood circulating and jobs plentiful...

Personally, I never believed radio was "dying" before Telecon '96 got signed. It sure as hell is NOW.

Here's the best way to fix the problem. One AM and one FM station, per owner, per market. Problem solved. Got a problem with that? Then GET OUT OF THE DAMN BUSINESS.

Look at the mess radio is in now because of Telecon '96! Consolidation has just TRASHED what was once an exciting and vibrant medium. And the writing is on the wall....

 

[JimmyJames]

"Consolidation will increase because of the people expense of 24/7 staffing. The majority of radio stations in this country make less than local fast food franchises. As their bottom line gets cut further, you'll find these small operators consolidating. They'll increase automation by having a single staff 24/7 instead of a separate staff for each station for half the day."

There's quite a few station groups with websites where you can see that the same people are on multiple stations with different shifts, or stage names. So, that's already happened. Consolidation won't "increase" because of this - companies are still limited in the number of stations they can run, although I still think that limit is too high.

I see no problem with requiring someone to be there 24 hours. For most clusters, it's a wise idea. The city of license studios would be a headache, and in many cases, unreasonable. Some towns are simply too small to support a radio station and there are operators serving their county or region and the communities therein very well even if their physical studio isn't in town.

 

[MACK184]

If you're operating a cluster with multiple stations, it makes good sense to at least have someone in the building at all hours. That's reasonable, and it shouldn't have to be forced at the point of law. I do however know of some groups who want everyone out by 6pm, because they just can't "afford" to have people in the building after that. A person in the building, even if it's nothing more than a college student who's there doing their homework and keeping an eye on things, is a good investment. Computers go out, a small fire could start that could turn into a total loss, a need for an emergency announcement? Nothing wrong with someone to keep track of the place. As far as a small owner operating an AM or AM/FM in a small town, just sign the place off at midnight, no real need to be 24/7. The COL item is for the most part outmoded. As was mentioned earlier, is a Fishers license only going to serve Fishers? Or Plainfield only Plainfield? Not any more. Maybe 30 years ago but not now. The FCC tends to swing like a pendulum, it very rarely finds the middle. They go from too restrictive <remember xmtr readings every half hour?> and then swing over to almost no regulation at all. They have a hard time finding the center. While some of their proposals make sense, if applied with a little reason and common sense, some are just a throw back to the 1950's, when things like COL made a huge difference. The NAB should not reject all these proposals out of hand and fight the entire package, but let's look at these proposals on a case by case basis.

 

[Radio55]

Owners have complained about "hardship" for this reason or that reason forever. It's bunk. Even with TOTALLY efficient automation with no one in the building after 7pm, they STILL complain. But enough of my complaining. Here in Oklahoma, we had some really severe weather move through Edmond (near OKC) and the key news/talk station in the city has absolutely no coverage of the tornado warning. Why? No one there. When we had a severe ice storm in Tulsa that pretty much shut the city down, our key news/talk station here was all over it. Everyone else was asleep or still playing their 50 minutes of non stop music every hour. A disgrace.

Now, I'm going to make myself sound like an old fogey here, but when I got the bug for radio over 40 years ago, my HOMETOWN station was live from sign on (6am) to sign off (10pm), they did news at the top and bottom of every hour (Live and local, no network, and it wasn't rip and read, they wrote the news scripts) and the station sounded better than anything on the air in Tulsa today. No kidding. It was great. 1kw by day 250 watts by night. Now, when there was severe weather after sign off, the owner and a couple of staffers would get up, get to the station, and fire up the transmitter and start reporting the weather. It can be done, it has been done, it has been paid for by the local owners with no whining. It was only 40 years ago, and most people in broadcasting are too young to remember or weren't even born.

Believe me, guys, radio used to be great. It can be great again. But the FCC is going to have to step in and make these owners treat the stations as the public servants they used to be. Owners can pay for it, they just don't want to.

 

[kenhawk1160]

For those of you in the business, I implore you to write your congressman. That may sound ridiculous, but we as broadcasters have more advantage than anyone...especially those in small market.

Our lawmakers are frequently on our air, giving interviews in the field, guesting on a talk show, or even their campaign ads. They know the value of small market radio when it comes to getting the word out. And those of you who can make a strong argument from a business standpoint can have an impact.

I proposed in my own letter to Congressman Phil English that if such rules are to be adopted, they should apply to stations in markets ranked 100 or higher AND, have FM facilities 50,000 watts or more, and AM facilities that use a directional antenna or a power greater than 10,000 watts. That's just a few things I proposed in my correspondence, which would protect both AM and FM facilities in small or unrated markets.

The Telecommunications Act of 1996 all but destroyed this industry. When the landmark ruling was passed in 1992 granting broadcasters "No More Than Four", it was enough to strengthen this industry, but guys at the corporate level whom I won't name got greedy. One said "I don't see why we can't own more than three FMs in a single market". Another made the argument "Do not limit the amount of stations we can own. Hertz isn't told how many airport locations they can operate!"

The reason for the greed is simple...stock price. As we know, stock prices are driven by investor/consumer confidence. As long as a company shows signs of growth, they can attract more investors, and that's sustained through revolving debt (ongoing borrowing), leaving the product nothing more than a house of cards that can collapse at any given moment. If the stock price goes down, so does the product.

Companies like CBS/Infinity and Clear Channel have learned some very hard and very valuable lessons about this and are doing something about it now, and time will tell whether it's good or bad. Smaller, growing companies like Cumulus are in smaller markets that do a very good job of meeting their responsibilities of their communities while still being profitable.

I don't believe that requiring stations to physically lie in their communities of license is altogether a good idea, at least on the small market level. Many stations simply can't survive that way. Consolidation has to be allowed to some degree, providing the needs of the community are still being met.

One station I know of in particular in southcentral PA was controlled some 30 miles away from its city of license. THREE properties were licensed to this city, and when a flood hit the region, the EAS message got on the air, but that's it. No information on emergency shelters, medical treatment or evacuation orders were given. This debacle forced the town to look into getting an LPFM license to provide the area with a reliable local radio service...something a station licensed to its own town couldn't even provide. That is alarming and should never be allowed to happen!

It's a complex problem that requires a great deal of study and attention to detail. I've told Congressman English that I would be willing to participate in any non-binding focus group or panel relative to the possible passage of this ruling. Those of us who truly want to save this business will get up and do something about it. This forum alone can accomplish nothing.

LET'S FIGHT TO SAVE THIS INDUSTRY!!!

 

[CapeRadio]

having a live person in a radio station/ group of stations, purely from a business standpoint. Is a really good idea. Think of it this way. What if a drunk dude decides its a good idea to break in and smash equipment? That equipment is worth millions of dollars. And even if the station has insurance, the way that company makes its money is off the air until it can be fixed.

Or, if someone comes in, opens up the mic, and starts saying whatever. Station is fined $20,000.

Or, if there is a mechanical failure, a fire, etc. Alarms are good, but a live person can respond to a mechanical emergency much more quickly. A friend of mine once saved her transmitter house (located behind the station she worked for) from burning down after it caught fire. Even kept the station on the during the entire mess.

Would you pay $8 an hour for a security guard? That is why the majority of radio clusters still have at least 1 person in the building overnight. Even Clear Channel shells out money for this in most of its markets

 

[virgilstreetnc]

having a live person in a radio station/ group of stations, purely from a business standpoint. Is a really good idea. Think of it this way. What if a drunk dude decides its a good idea to break in and smash equipment? That equipment is worth millions of dollars. And even if the station has insurance, the way that company makes its money is off the air until it can be fixed.

Or, if someone comes in, opens up the mic, and starts saying whatever. Station is fined $20,000.

Or, if there is a mechanical failure, a fire, etc. Alarms are good, but a live person can respond to a mechanical emergency much more quickly. A friend of mine once saved her transmitter house (located behind the station she worked for) from burning down after it caught fire. Even kept the station on the during the entire mess.

Would you pay $8 an hour for a security guard? That is why the majority of radio clusters still have at least 1 person in the building overnight. Even Clear Channel shells out money for this in most of its markets

That's what insurance is for. And how often does someone break in and smash up equipment? Where do you live? And $8 for 8 hours is an extra $64 per day/$24,000 per year plus withholding. Not an easy thing for small market operators.

The problem is for small full timers that have syndication sports/news/talk/music running overnight. If the EAS system is working properly, there is no reason to have someone stand there and stare at it all night.

Sure a corp can always find more cash to staff a metro station, but small market operators, the backbone of most small communities are surviving on ad sales, not stockholders to add more money to the til.

It makes no financial sense, and it does not make the public any safer if that is indeed the goal.

 

[Flying-Dutchman]

Time for those money lovers to exit broadcasting now. Those who love radio will
do what they love.

Time for the money lovers who have ruined this field to leave. Good Bye!

 

[justalurker]

I see no problem with requiring someone to be there 24 hours. For most clusters, it's a wise idea.

It isn't the clusters that are hurt the worst by this rule. It is the independent local station that is truly serving the local community on a dime and a prayer. Local ownership and content should be looked at ... but hiring a guy to watch one station is much more expensive per station than hiring a guy to watch a cluster.

 

[aunti-terrestrial]

What's the cost in human life if nobody's there to run an Amber Alert? In fact, what's the point of even running Amber Alerts during overnight hours? Those kids should just wait to get abducted until there's a radio operator on duty, darn it! (Of course that's sarcastic---still, gotta note that, just in case).

I know, radio is a business, but the business is (or should return to be) one of serving the public trust, first and foremost.

 

[Goat Rodeo Cowboy]

It isn't the clusters that are hurt the worst by this rule. It is the independent local station that is truly serving the local community on a dime and a prayer. Local ownership and content should be looked at ... but hiring a guy to watch one station is much more expensive per station than hiring a guy to watch a cluster.

Well spoken.

There are stations operating with total revenues in the $60,000 to 140,000 per year range. If you sit down and "game it out on paper" you quickly realize you cannot buy equipment at today's prices and real estate at today's prices and put an operation together to do that. You have to have owned this station for a long time, or buy it from someone who can pass along to you at a low price the heritage assets in their possession.

Asking a $60,000 to 80,000 per year station to add a $24,000 per year employee plus payroll taxes and benefits is simply the death penalty for that station.

Some of these station maybe need to die.

But some of these stations are all some little communities have going for them.

CNN is not going to pass along the word that Aunt Sadie died and the funeral is tomorrow morning. (Remember, these little communities don't have a DAILY newspaper to provide this information. The weekly paper will have the obit after the funeral has happened.)

The 100,000 watt FM in the 3 station cluster in the next county is NOT going to tell people that the only stoplight in town is broken and it will be four hours before it is back in operation so approach the intersection at Main and Plum with caution.

But I am quite confidant that satellite radio will sell time to the First Baptist Church to broadcast the 11:00 A.M. service on Sunday.

 

[Kent]

There's quite a few station groups with websites where you can see that the same people are on multiple stations with different shifts, or stage names. So, that's already happened. Consolidation won't "increase" because of this - companies are still limited in the number of stations they can run, although I still think that limit is too high.

Actually, consolidation will increase because most small market owners are nowhere near the legal limit for their markets. As an example, I do weekends in an unrated market that has 12 stations (10 FM's and 2 AM's) and 8 owners. You can bet that requiring a station be staffed when on-air will cause at least half of those operators to bail. With each operator being allowed 3 FM's in markets with 14 or fewer stations, do the math and you'll see that you could reasonably expect half the number of owners if these rules pass.

 

[Timewarp]

OK, Let's take a small market station as an example. WSHW and WILO. They are in Frankfort.
They are licensed to Frankfort. They do lots of public service and a good job in their community.
These new rules won't burn them because this is how Vern ran his stations all along. That's how
he thought radio should be. He is from the old school of radio thought.

The new rules may break up clusters that are run on the cheap in medium sized towns that have ignored the community of license.

The people and officials in small towns expressed anger to the FCC because they had stations in name only.

 

[bigtime]

The NAB's new pro-radio campaign talks about radio having a big advantage over MP3 players. They talk about the value of listeners hearing a person on the radio sharing that same moment with them. That moment isn't really being shared when a station is voice tracked, and it would seem that at least some listeners are aware of that. The radio industry has used technology to save money, but at what long term cost?

 

[Flying-Dutchman]

Over the past 20 years, I have owned several stations and not gone broke. Also, helped
several others start stations. One guy had 40 million. Another only 10 thousand.
Both are still on the iar. You look at the resources and make a business plan with that

The secret to survival as the owner is that you go to work and do what you have to do.
You don't spend money you don't have. You make a good guess at what income will be.
That's what you have to spend.

As the owner, you might have to work for free sometimes. That's just how it is.
You better love it. And if I have to roll out of bed to put on a tornado warning,
I will get out of bed. I won't sign off. Cause that's what a radio guy does.

 

[Ur-A-Dawg]

Dutch, quit trying to fool us. After getting half a million from Art for WSHP and almost 7
million from Russ for WKLU-I doubt you are working hard. Who were you calling a money lover?

 

[words2you]

It is appreciated and refreshing to read intelligent, well written postings on the Indiana board. As a listener living in a small town. It would be nice to have our own radio station with local politics, high school events etc. I think this is why stations like WIBC, WLW, KNOX and many others continue to do well in a rapid changing market. You get local weather, sports, politics, traffic, interviews with candidates and citizens, local news and a place for citizens to vent and talk.

Our local station is now in Indianapolis and all we here is music. I have thousands of my favorite songs on my mp3 and don’t care to listens to a lot of music radio. People love where they live and enjoy hearing about their towns. They want to stay informed with all the happenings in their community. The stations around here sound so much like the automated FM, s of the 1970’s it is as though we have gone full circle in the last thirty years.

Small business has been and always will be difficult and only a few make it. Business is similar to life. In that, there are no certainties and guarantees’.

 

[Ur-A-Dawg]

Got to work like a dawg!