KFMB AM & FM sell for a shockingly low price!!!

[MarkW]

So at the end of the day, Local basically picks up FM 100.7 for $3.8 million plus whatever minor expense was incurred (broker fees, legal fees & such) in spinning 760 to iHM.

The fact an FM station with a great signal in a Top 20 market has sold for such a low price proves what a complete DUMPSTER FIRE AM/FM broadcasting has become! The market has very little confidence in AM/FM's long-term relevance as an advertising medium.

The price also is reflective of the cramped nature of the radio dial in the San Diego area. The pie is being sliced thinly.

 

[TheBigA]

The fact an FM station with a great signal in a Top 20 market has sold for such a low price proves what a complete DUMPSTER FIRE AM/FM broadcasting has become! The market has very little confidence in AM/FM's long-term relevance as an advertising medium

I think it's a unique case of a very motivated seller. You can buy a house in a nice neighborhood for very little money if you find the right circumstances. That's what this is.

The other side of that picture is opportunity. For years I'd read comments from people who'd talk about the day when "real broadcasters" could buy radio stations at "fire sale prices." This is the time. So let's see how many "real broadcasters" emerge. How many are still alive. Do any of them have ready cash?

 

[michael hagerty]

I think it's a unique case of a very motivated seller. You can buy a house in a nice neighborhood for very little money if you find the right circumstances. That's what this is.

The other side of that picture is opportunity. For years I'd read comments from people who'd talk about the day when "real broadcasters" could buy radio stations at "fire sale prices." This is the time. So let's see how many "real broadcasters" emerge. How many are still alive. Do any of them have ready cash?

Amen, BigA. And, do those who are (alive) and do (have ready cash) still see a there there?

In other words, yeah, KFMB-AM sold for a hundred grand less than the average price of a home in La Jolla. How long would it take you to make your money back selling spots on AM radio while paying for the creation of what you would consider to be compelling radio?

 

[TheBigA]

How long would it take you to make your money back selling spots on AM radio while paying for the creation of what you would consider to be compelling radio?

That's the challenge and the risk. In a way, radio is right back to where it was in the 1950s. Back then you didn't buy a radio station as your primary business. You owned other things, such as car dealerships or department stores. We see that now. The owner of a grocery store chain in NYC just bought WABC. The owner of a taxi company just bought an AM in Buffalo. The reality is you need to find another way to make money besides spots on the radio. Because spot sales is a declining revenue base.

The big complaint for the last 25 years is radio owners are just bean counters with no passion. So if you're going to buy a radio station now, it's not for a quick buck. There are easier and quicker ways to do that than radio. Does anyone still have passion for radio? We will see.

 

[michael hagerty]

That's the challenge and the risk. In a way, radio is right back to where it was in the 1950s. Back then you didn't buy a radio station as your primary business. You owned other things, such as car dealerships or department stores. .

True. Don Lee (KGB, KFRC, KHJ) was a car dealer. So was Earle C. Anthony (KFI). WLS was the World's Largest Store---Sears.

Even my first radio station, KIBS in Bishop, California, was started by a businessman. Mr. Downey owned a radio store and realized that he'd sell more of them if people could listen in the daytime, too (the only signals to get to that remote town in the Eastern Sierra midway between L.A. and Reno were nighttime signals). So he put a radio station on the air. And after he did that, he opened a record store, to sell to the public what his radio station played.

He then arranged to put four TV translators on the air---somewhat snowy re-transmissions of the ABC, CBS and NBC stations in Los Angeles and the CBS station in Reno.

And then he started selling TV sets.

 

[derek20la]

He then arranged to put four TV translators on the air---somewhat snowy re-transmissions of the ABC, CBS and NBC stations in Los Angeles and the CBS station in Reno.

Is this the reason Inyo County is part of the Los Angeles television DMA?

Whenever I visited the Owens Valley, it seemed strange to be watching stations and news from LA, but then look out the window to see the high Sierras looming above.

Bishop is almost at the same latitude as Oakhurst, located 40 miles north of Fresno.

 

[davideduardo]

True. Don Lee (KGB, KFRC, KHJ) was a car dealer. So was Earle C. Anthony (KFI). WLS was the World's Largest Store---Sears.

Even my first radio station, KIBS in Bishop, California, was started by a businessman. Mr. Downey owned a radio store and realized that he'd sell more of them if people could listen in the daytime, too (the only signals to get to that remote town in the Eastern Sierra midway between L.A. and Reno were nighttime signals). So he put a radio station on the air. And after he did that, he opened a record store, to sell to the public what his radio station played.

He then arranged to put four TV translators on the air---somewhat snowy re-transmissions of the ABC, CBS and NBC stations in Los Angeles and the CBS station in Reno.

And then he started selling TV sets.

There are many stories like that.

My favorite is about a guy who would sell things to the captive public on the trains that ran from South Central Texas to Mexico City. He found that a particularly profitable item was radio sets. He'd carry them in the train's luggage department, and pitch them on the train. But the farther into Mexico he got, the less interest as there was little local radio in the late 20's.

So he built a radio station in Mexico City. It was not the first, but it was the best and had the longest schedule of broadcasts, patterned after the American stations he'd hear in San Antonio and other places in Texas. The station was XEW, which grew to be a 250,000 watt clear channel facility with high power national repeaters. The man was Emilio Azcarraga and his radio company was the basis for the Televisa TV operation which is now one of the world's largest TV and content production companies.

 

[davideduardo]

Is this the reason Inyo County is part of the Los Angeles television DMA?

Yes.

Unlike radio ratings which are based on broadcast "on the air" coverage areas, TV markets are defined by both the RF signal coverage and the cable coverage.

If you look at some markets in the northern Rocky Mountain area, you can see even greater representation of the effects of cable, going back to the 50's when all Community Antenna TV systems only relayed the nearest broadcast TV stations to areas that were too far away or in valleys where signals did not reach.

 

[michael hagerty]

Is this the reason Inyo County is part of the Los Angeles television DMA?

Whenever I visited the Owens Valley, it seemed strange to be watching stations and news from LA, but then look out the window to see the high Sierras looming above.

Bishop is almost at the same latitude as Oakhurst, located 40 miles north of Fresno.

I can actually amplify on this a bit, having grown up in Bishop.

Bishop and the Eastern High Sierra was one of the earliest areas to have cable or community antenna TV. Immediately post-World War II, Bell Telephone began stringing cable up the Owens Valley to bring in TV signals. Reno didn't have stations yet, and stringing cable over the Sierra from Fresno (which didn't either) or San Francisco would have been impractical. So it had to be L.A.

My dad had just finished two tours in the South Pacific and moved back to L.A., where he'd been living for the six years before volunteering the day after Pearl Harbor. He took a job with Bell, and was part of the crew that ran the cable bringing signals from Mt. Wilson up into the Owens Valley. That's how he met and married my mom, who was living in Bishop.

Mom and Dad settled in Lone Pine, then moved to Sacramento, and, three years before I was born, back to L.A. My grandmother and an uncle still lived in Bishop, and I grew up going there several times a year (Easter, a few weeks in summer, Thanksgiving and Christmas).

My dad died when I was 8 and we moved to Bishop to be with family. Massive culture shock from living five miles from the beach in a city of 3 million to a town of 3,000 that was 270 miles from a major city---even though I'd known Bishop all my life.

Having L.A. media (the L.A. Times was delivered to our doorstep by 5:00 a.m., the early edition having been driven up on the Greyhound bus that arrived in Bishop every morning at 4:15---and everybody I knew subscribed since the Bishop paper was a weekly---, we got channels 2, 4, 5, 7, 9, 11 and 13 and---a big bonus---the cable also carried with it all the FM signals on Mt. Wilson) helped a lot.

And, among the other people who worked on the project, I've got my dad to thank for it.

 

[pjc1961]

Iheartradio has added the 760 AM stream to their platform via the link:

https://www.iheart.com/live/san-diegos-talk-am-760-8528/
----------
The streaming URL to use/plug in with various media players:

http://stream.revma.ihrhls.com/zc8528

The link above can also be opened in a new browser page;
a player appears and begins playing as soon as the psge loads.

 

[Neel]

Sorry, Don't mean to go off topic... (I guess this can go to California Television but do many people read that section)? but here's what I wondered about a few things:

If Lone Pine/Bishop and Owens valley is still considered LA DMA, they never show news or weather for that region on LA stations. I understand why historically it became part of LA but maybe it's time to move it to give them more local coverage?

Same with areas of Kern County like Ridgecrest and California City. Should be Bakersfield DMA in my opinion but they get LA stations there.

Finally, I noticed one station, KCAL-9 is carried in a wide area from Santa Barbara, Bakersfield to El Centro (but not San Diego). However, they only cover LA stories and weather.

 

[davideduardo]

Sorry, Don't mean to go off topic... (I guess this can go to California Television but do many people read that section)? but here's what I wondered about a few things:

If Lone Pine/Bishop and Owens valley is still considered LA DMA, they never show news or weather for that region on LA stations. I understand why historically it became part of LA but maybe it's time to move it to give them more local coverage?

Same with areas of Kern County like Ridgecrest and California City. Should be Bakersfield DMA in my opinion but they get LA stations there.

Finally, I noticed one station, KCAL-9 is carried in a wide area from Santa Barbara, Bakersfield to El Centro (but not San Diego). However, they only cover LA stories and weather.

Much of this has to do with network affiliation agreements and cable systems having to respect them. KCAL has no network, so it is the principal independent station carried all over Southern California.

Here in the Palm Springs micro-market, we have local affiliates for all 7 of the major networks, several only on LPTV stations but on all the cable systems from Whitewater to Thermal. But KCAL is unduplicated for the most part. However, the syndicated shows that KCAL has that are also on Palm Springs stations are blacked out or filled with one of the local plastic surgeon infomercials.

Markets that are not big enough to support a local TV operation are going to go for the best TV market. I'm sure that the people in Ridgecrest would rather see an LA station than a Bakersfield one.

 

[semoochie]

(I guess this can go to California Television but do many people read that section)?

As long as you are signed in, you can click on "New Posts". It will give you everything since your last visit. The only time I ever visit the "Forum" page is to start a new topic or respond to an old one. This way, if anything of interest comes up anywhere on the board, you'll have some idea.

 

[asugeorge1]

Sorry, Don't mean to go off topic... (I guess this can go to California Television but do many people read that section)? but here's what I wondered about a few things:

If Lone Pine/Bishop and Owens valley is still considered LA DMA, they never show news or weather for that region on LA stations. I understand why historically it became part of LA but maybe it's time to move it to give them more local coverage?

Same with areas of Kern County like Ridgecrest and California City. Should be Bakersfield DMA in my opinion but they get LA stations there.

Finally, I noticed one station, KCAL-9 is carried in a wide area from Santa Barbara, Bakersfield to El Centro (but not San Diego). However, they only cover LA stories and weather.

As far as San Diego goes, they have their own local independent station, KUSI cable channel 9, so that’s probably the main reason why KCAL-9 is not offered in San Diego. KUSI does a good job of being San Diego’s version of KCAL-9 with multiple local newscasts throughout the day.

As far as Palm Springs goes, I remember visiting there in the late 90’s / early 2000’s and most of the LA stations were on cable there. I specifically remember CBS 2 from LA, KCAL 9 and KTLA. Not sure when that changed (maybe David can provide better guidance on this), but some LA stations used to air there.

Southern California is very unique with how their television market boundaries are drawn. Take the San Diego television market. You have places like Fallbrook and Rainbow in the San Diego television market, but you go a few miles north to Temecula and Murrieta, they have LA television stations even though they share a lot in common with North County San Diego. Same goes with the Los Angeles and Palm Springs TV Market. You go to Cabazon and Banning and you are still in the LA market. Go a few miles down the I-10 to Whitewater and Palm Springs and you are in the Palm Springs DMA. Not sure why this is since Palm Springs is a lot closer to Banning and Cabazon, but that’s how it goes!

I kind of wish that if you are subscribing to cable or satellite and you live in one of those fringe areas where your television market could go either way, it would be nice if you could choose one that you want or get both. I know this occurs in a select few rural areas, but this is few and far between. You usually get stuck in a DMA whether you like it or not!

 

[davideduardo]

As far as Palm Springs goes, I remember visiting there in the late 90’s / early 2000’s and most of the LA stations were on cable there. I specifically remember CBS 2 from LA, KCAL 9 and KTLA. Not sure when that changed (maybe David can provide better guidance on this), but some LA stations used to air there.

I have both cable services and just KCAL is available on Frontier FiOS, but no longer is on the list for Time Warner. No other LA channel is listed.

 

[michael hagerty]

Sorry, Don't mean to go off topic... (I guess this can go to California Television but do many people read that section)? but here's what I wondered about a few things:

If Lone Pine/Bishop and Owens valley is still considered LA DMA, they never show news or weather for that region on LA stations. I understand why historically it became part of LA but maybe it's time to move it to give them more local coverage?

Same with areas of Kern County like Ridgecrest and California City. Should be Bakersfield DMA in my opinion but they get LA stations there.

Finally, I noticed one station, KCAL-9 is carried in a wide area from Santa Barbara, Bakersfield to El Centro (but not San Diego). However, they only cover LA stories and weather.

Neel: If anything, I'm the one who got carried away.

Anyway, L.A. stations don't usually include Owens Valley weather because there are 18-thousand people in all of Inyo County and 18-million in Los Angeles, Orange, Riverside, San Bernardino and Ventura Counties---and it's more than 200 miles away.

That said, they will mention insane winds or a big snowstorm at Mammoth.

But the Owens Valley people who watch L.A. TV don't need it for local weather. They have weather apps on their phones, The Weather Channel's local cut-ins are from the Bishop National Weather Service office and Bishop has its own TV station, KSRW-LP, which has cable and satellite carriage, does a local newscast and frequent weather reports.

In fact, on the original cable system, in addition to the big L.A. VHFs, there was also Channel 10---which was local weather 24/7---a rotating wheel mounted in front of a camera with a hand-printed (cue card style) forecast, a thermometer, a barometer, a wind meter, a precipitation gauge and a space for a printed sponsor message.

And, if the story's big (or interesting enough), L.A. TV comes to town. Here's an example from 1974, on KNBC: https://youtu.be/EFv3X19dA-o?t=743

I agree that Ridgecrest and California City should, logically, be Bakersfield. Those people are residents of Kern County, and the county seat is Bakersfield. But---like the Owens Valley---there were no TV stations in Bakersfield when the cable got strung. So they got L.A.

Yeah, you could change it now (the signals would go to the hubs digitally---no more worries about cabling over the mountains), and while Bakersfield makes sense for Ridgecrest and California City, it doesn't for Bishop. Neither does Fresno. It's only 80 miles away, but there's 13,000 feet of granite between them. San Francisco makes zero sense for Bishop---farther away than L.A. and it may as well be on another planet culturally. Sacramento? Maybe. But people are used to seeing L.A. news. A lot of them have relatives and friends in L.A. Their kids go to college in L.A. They grow up, get the hell out of Bishop and get jobs in L.A.

When I was growing up, once Reno had three network affiliates (KOLO went on in 1953, KCRL (now KRNV) in 1964 and KTVN in 1967), some people in Bishop thought we should get the network stations from Reno instead of L.A. (we got KOLO, which was CBS until 1972, then ABC---as a "bonus" channel). The idea was that Bishop had a lot more in common with Reno than L.A.

But other people pointed out that we'd be seeing news about the government in a different state, that Los Angeles owned the land and the water of the Owens Valley and it would be good to know what they were up to and---no small thing at the time---that in every winter storm, the first channel we'd lose on the cable would be KOLO, and sometimes it would be days before we'd get it back.

And this is probably going on all over the country. Here in Northern California, the town of Truckee gets Sacramento TV---even though it's only 30 miles from Reno. South Lake Tahoe, on the other hand, gets Reno TV---even though they're 60 miles from Reno and most of the populated areas are in California. So they're not seeing news from the capital of the state in which they live.

 

[michael hagerty]

I have both cable services and just KCAL is available on Frontier FiOS, but no longer is on the list for Time Warner. No other LA channel is listed.

Cable carriage changed in the 1990s. Here in Northern California, Sacramento got its own stations and the San Francisco stations as well. And San Francisco got ours. I have airchecks of KFRC running spots for the primetime movie on Sacramento's Channel 40. And people here still talk about preferring Dennis Richmond on the KTVU, Oakland news at 10 to the locals. Now, neither city gets the others.

But---people living in Fairfield, which is about midway between Sacramento and San Francisco, (42 miles from Sac, 47 from SF) still get both cities' stations on cable.

 

[michael hagerty]

Back to Bishop for a second, I got curious and did a little Google Maps work:

The closest TV market to Bishop, in driving distance, is Reno (205 miles). But again, it's a different state.

Second is Bakersfield (215 miles). Same state, but different issues and culture and its government, unlike L.A., has no direct impact on the lives of the people in Bishop.

Third or sixth is Las Vegas (266 miles if you go through the White Mountains, but that road is closed in winter. Then, you'd go through Death Valley, and that route is 289 miles)

Third or fourth (depending on how you get to Vegas) is Los Angeles (267 miles).

Fourth or fifth (again depending on how you get to Vegas) is Sacramento (279 miles).

Sixth or Seventh (again depending on Las Vegas) is Fresno or San Francisco. Fresno is 297 miles over the Sierra on Sonora Pass---which is usually closed from November through May. It's 323 miles if you go around the south end through Tehachapi.

San Francisco is 317 miles, but again, that's using Sonora Pass. Using Highway 395 and U.S. 50, it's 367 miles.

So, really, considering the issues with Reno, Bakersfield and Las Vegas in terms of relevance, L.A.'s the best fit.

(how long have I been in isolation again?)

 

[fybush]

Back to Bishop for a second, I got curious and did a little Google Maps work:

Third or sixth is Las Vegas (266 miles if you go through the White Mountains, but that road is closed in winter. Then, you'd go through Death Valley, and that route is 289 miles)

Unless something has changed dramatically, the pass on 168 east from Big Pine is open year-round, as is the pass on 266 continuing eastward to Lida Junction and 95 south to Vegas.

And you know how I know that!

 

[michael hagerty]

Unless something has changed dramatically, the pass on 168 east from Big Pine is open year-round, as is the pass on 266 continuing eastward to Lida Junction and 95 south to Vegas.

And you know how I know that!

Yes, I do, Scott! Glad to hear from you and hope you're safe and well. I meant to write "often closed in winter"---and last winter, it was closed more than it was open. Point being, it's not the automatic quick route that everyone takes all the time to Vegas. Nor (because of summer heat) is the Death Valley route.