LOOKING FOR A COMMERCIAL DUB? DON'T LOOK TO FOREVER!

[fowler]

Too stupid!
Sounds like corporate HQ has a paper plan for revenue enhancement, which, in the real world, will just piss-off clients under the 3 thou limit.... and wind up costing business, and good will.
Find it in The Search for Excellence, Chapter 3 "Peevishness as strategy"

 

[wiifm]

One of their former GM's, Rod Burnham, made a ton of money doing outside v/o work. I wonder how he would have reacted to this little game.

Anyway, to prohibit jocks from picking up a little extra cash on the side when they are paid like dirt is unconscionable. And charging for dubs also is beyond the pale. I hope like hell this whole scheme backfires.

Steve, are you live in the mornings?

 

[shilton]

One of their former GM's, Rod Burnham, made a ton of money doing outside v/o work. I wonder how he would have reacted to this little game.

Anyway, to prohibit jocks from picking up a little extra cash on the side when they are paid like dirt is unconscionable. And charging for dubs also is beyond the pale. I hope like hell this whole scheme backfires.

Steve, are you live in the mornings?

Man, I hate to get into the whole "is it Live or memorex" deal...but let's just say sometimes it is...sometimes it isn't and you can try to guess when I'd love to be live more often than I get to but with the "real job" its pretty tough for me to dedicate as much live air time as I want to. That has been the nice thing when I was at G101 and now at B94.5 is the staff has been very accommodating and allows me the luxury of going live if I want to and time permits and the rest of the time, I can track at will. its tough to find that kind of flexibility.

Rod still does a lot of outside work. Back then, many of us did...I did voiceover for all kinds of car dealers through a local production house. it was good easy money, although typically I only did clients who fell outside the marketplace so while you may hear my spot on the local tv stations, you'd never hear it on a competing radio station in the market. In any case, it seems like a rediculous policy to me. Seems to me, the general rule of thumb for the staff should be "if you want me to be exclusive...you PAY ME to be exclusive". If the payscales are just as bad as full-time radio pay seems to be these days, you should be free to use your voice as you please after hours. I can see saying "don't go work part-time at the competition"...but what's a little voiceover work gonna hurt? its a very unfriendly practice for the employees and its not done in many major markets let alone small places like Altoona, Johnstown and State College.

 

[fried man]

I don't know if Al Dame is still around but he could tell you some good stories behind the stories about the Forever people...especially one in particular whom I will not mention but I think you will get the drift when I say "Harrisburg". Enough said, I don't need the aggravation.

 

[Sandman_316]

So how does one get into outside voice over work? It's something I've always been interested in just to pick up some extra cash. Any advice from the voices of experience?

 

[shilton]

So how does one get into outside voice over work? It's something I've always been interested in just to pick up some extra cash. Any advice from the voices of experience?

Try calling local production houses and ask if they need any extra voices or call the local tv stations too. They sometimes need extra voice help but make sure you understand the setup (will you be going to their studios, or will they expect you to cut it on your own and send it to them) cause if they want you to cut it yourself, your station may have an issue with you using their prod facility to generate money for someone else. You will also want to know if they expect you to fully produce the spot, or just do a dry read because once again if they want it fully produced, you'd need to make sure you have the rights to use whatever production library you use (beds, etc). To stay on the safe side, I'd say try to find someone who will just let you do the dry read. Don't know what these pay today, but about 10 years ago, I was pulling $50.00 per cut for dry read spots. Considering I could belt those out in like 5-10 mins each doing a few takes...it was pretty decent cash but the work is very sporatic so don't expect to get rich either.

Don't know if its still the case or not, but Rod used to cut his for some company in Harrisburg which was nice for him as it allowed him to do the work, yet most of the work was aired outside of the market so it was not a conflict for him. Good luck!

 

[DLionz]

How did they implement this new policy forbidding jocks from seeking outside work?  Did they just hand out a memo?  Did they have them sign a contract?  If so, did they give them a raise?  Start paying them per commercial produced in-house? 

An employer can't change an employee's terms of employment without offering them something.  I'm no lawyer, but I do understand a thing or two about contracts.  You can't change terms of employment without offering some type of consideration, particularly when you are taking potential earnings out of the pockets of your employees.  That means that they owe something to ALL of their employess, not just the ones that were already getting money for outside work.  Otherwise, there is no valid agreement for the jocks to not sell their voice to production houses.  So if I was a Forever jock and I didn't sign anything and get a raise (or at the very least a handful of Subway coupons), I would just go about continuing to market myself to production houses. 

I am not an attorney, and nothing herein should be construed as legal advice.  If an employee of Forever reads this and believes that he/she may be entitled to continue to pursue outside work, I strongly suggest that you schedule a consultation with a local member of the bar regarding whether there is a valid agreement to restrict your activities.  ;D

 

[DLionz]

OK forget that...... you're screwed.  Pretty much left with the option of giving up your extra cash and continuing to pray at the altar of Forever in the hope that they will increase your pittance or quitting.  Boo bad employers! HOORAY BEER!!!!!

 

[RFHog]

Yes, Forever issued a memo stating that their jocks would no longer be permitted to do any outside voicework. Forever claimed the jocks would make more money with their in-house production effort called "Endevour". In the memo, jocks would be paid for outside voicework but only if the client also spent $3,000 with Forever. How many clients do you think will actually do this??? The jocks won't see a dime.

As for the legal issues, I don't believe Forever has contracts with their jocks. PD's maybe. So the jocks are "at-will" employees. Forever can set any policy they want... if you don't like it, you can go get a job at the station across the street. Oh wait, Forever owns that one too.

 

[DLionz]

ya that what i figured out. Its a shame because "at-will" works out great for everyone involved when you have an ethical employer and an ethical employee. It's too bad the FCC has relaxed ownership to the point where one company enjoys enough power to dictate to its employees like this. Yes, they are free to work elsewhere. But where? I'm sure most have non-competes, not to mention Forever owns virtually every station in the market. So employees are faced with the choice of forfeiting potential income, packing up their families and moving X miles away to look for work, or quit the biz entirely (and any other media for that matter) and seek a new career (at least until the non-compete runs out) .

OK and what about the client who wants a particular voice talent enough to actually buy $3000 worth of advertising from Forever (not likely). If this scenario every happened, what is that particular employee's cut? "Oh he get $50 for the spot."-- Im sure.

Looks to me like they are trying to create the same monopoly in production houses as they have been able to create on radio in general. "If you want to buy advertising on any of our stations (almost all in town) you have to have it produced by our in-house for this price. If you want it to go to another station somebody is going to pay us $50. So there is a premium TO US for you to have consistency to your message. Oh ya, there is no way on Earth that your out of town advertising agency can hire our guy to voice your out-of-town spots. They can however BUY THE AD FROM US."

Are they charging a "dub fee" yet? I imagine all the time and energy it takes to record a dub into the system has got to be worth at least $30-$50, per station cos im sure that they will have to dub it in individually for each station. *wink *wink

I can't figure out if they are over-estimating or under-estimating their voice talent. Over-estimating that they think a client is in love enough with them to pay $3k (or have them produce all of their advertising for everywhere), or under-estimating them in that they will passively agree to anything.

 

[Sandman_316]

Just got a statement from Forever for $50 for a commercial dub.

I was so glad to receive it! I needed some confetti for my New Year's celebration!

 

[yocco]

First of all, a dub today is generally just an attachment to an e-mail. I can't believe they actually make a "dub" of a spot anymore. This practice by Forever is certainly a disservice to the advertising community.
It's also hurtful to radio in general in the area. All radio companies should be doing what they can to get clients to buy radio first. This will drive some clients away from the medium to TV and newspapers. Mark my words. My vote for worst idea by local radio in 2007.

 

[shilton]

First of all, a dub today is generally just an attachment to an e-mail. I can't believe they actually make a "dub" of a spot anymore. This practice by Forever is certainly a disservice to the advertising community.
It's also hurtful to radio in general in the area. All radio companies should be doing what they can to get clients to buy radio first. This will drive some clients away from the medium to TV and newspapers. Mark my words. My vote for worst idea by local radio in 2007.

Here is how I liken this practice. Let's say you buy a Chevy. Naturally Chevy would like you to get it serviced at their garage because it benefits them further financially. But suppose Chevy said "if you get you car fixed elsewhere, we will charge you a surcharge anytime you do so". That sounds nuts, but the fact is that is precisely what is hapenning. How many people do you think would buy Chevy if word got out about something like that? No company will win awards for customer service by giving their customers reasons not to buy their product.

If I were a big spending client it would not take me long to ask them if they'd prefer me to take my money elsewhere but only time will tell if this will hurt their bottom line or not. No matter how you crack this nut, the message is clear....Buy your advertising elsewhere and we will make you pay for that.

Does not sound like a great idea to me.

 

[temp]

Leave it to the corporate radio mentality to find a way to nail both the customer and their own jocks in one inept move. This is one of those ideas that any typical corporate suit could have spun to sound logical, but for a brief moment, anyone with a brain should have been able to suspend reality long enough to say "wow, this is in the top 10 of the all time stupidest things I've ever heard." That person should have been one of the owners or anyone else in the company in a position to kill it. So have they shot themselves in the foot with this one or do advertisers just swallow it and pay?