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Poss.: WGBH to buy WCRB?

http://fybush.com/nerw.html

yup Fybush has more and he think they will tranform 99.5 to non comm and he feels 89.7 would be news/talk by day, maybe jazz at night? and the studios would move to Guest St. 99.5 to stay all-classical, and Fybush thinks
"it appears that at least some of WCRB's airstaff will stay with the new WGBH-run 99.5"

>>There's no immediate word on a purchase price for WCRB..

>>Like that deal in New York, it appears that the transaction will move WCRB into WGBH's Allston studios from the longtime WCRB facility in Waltham.
 
The rumor of 89.7 going news-talk all day but staying with jazz at night makes sense to me. But if the programming switches from news-talk to jazz at, say, 8:00PM, I think it will leave WBUR (despite having a lesser signal compared with 89.7) in command of the non-comm news-talk format in greater Boston. Not clear to me that if 89.7 were to switch to news-talk 24/7 they could make big inroads against WBUR, but if they keep the jazz at night, I don't think 89.7 has much of a chance to be king of that hill, superior signal notwithstanding.
 
As soon as I get home, I'll set a push-button for 99.5 and wait for the change. One interesting item: WGBH-FM just laid off one of their longtime classical announcers, Richard Knisely. They may have to call him back to replace some of the airheads at the South Street snoozer. One thing to keep in mind: this is GREAT news for ME, Al Franken, I mean Laurence Glavin, as long as I stay put. But the 99.5 frequency is troublesome in Metro Boston itself. Wait until the first Friday afternoon that WGBH-FM 89.7 does NOT broadcast a Boston Symphony Orchestra concert! The Globe just ran an article about the WGBH Educational Foundation's budget cutbacks, both radio and TV. How will this go over with those who received layoff notices (like Knisely) or pay cuts.
 
According to the WGBH website, it appears as though WCRB will now be a Non-Comm.

Hopefully the entire WCRB staff will stay in place, Mark Edwards (whom is the only one I know) is a great guy!
 
Laurence Glavin said:
But the 99.5 frequency is troublesome in Metro Boston itself. Wait until the first Friday afternoon that WGBH-FM 89.7 does NOT broadcast a Boston Symphony Orchestra concert!
Click to expand...

If acquiring other signals is part of their game plan...is there an FM on the South Shore that would fill in the gaps?

(WPLM-FM would be a perfect counterpart.....if the Campbell's can be talked down from whatever price estimnate they were given at the top of the market.)
 
i've never pledged to wgbh before and i still wont. next time they're begging for money to maintain their program standard and volume, i'll remember the purchase of 99.5 as well as their huge Guest. St. complex. They are hardly in need of cash flow.

and btw....wcrb was always sort of the top 40 of classical. they never really got adventurous in their programming.
 
This is a good deal for everyone!

This is a win, win, win.

It keeps classical music on the air 24/7 in Boston on a station with no commercials. It gets Nassau out of the market-Doesn't the air small better already? It allows WGBH to compete against WBUR with news/talk-with Bostonians the winners.

Fourteen million though? WOW, have station values dropped like a stone! I think that Greater Media paid almost 20 million when they bought the station so many years ago. Entercom paid 30 mil for 97.7 not too long ago. That's got to be worth half that now!
 
A third station playing classical music in the daytime? That would be WHRB, Harvard's very eccentric radio station at 95.3. It plays classical music from 1pm to 10pm.

Almost nobody listens to WHRB. It got the fewest amount of listeners possible to still make the recent PPM ratings. Harvard puts an FM radio station on the air and this is the best they can do?

For classical and non-commercial stations, the ratings were:

12....WBUR
16....WCRB
22....WGBH
30....WUMB
37....WHRB

Actually, those are also pretty modest ratings for WGBH-FM, which has the best FM signal in Boston, grandfathered at 100,000 watts when the FCC max is 50 kw in this part of the U.S., and sharing its call letters with one of the nation's most popular PBS stations.


Gregg
[email protected]
 
Re: This is a good deal for everyone!

LA_Guy said:
Fourteen million though? WOW, have station values dropped like a stone! I think that Greater Media paid almost 20 million when they bought the station so many years ago. Entercom paid 30 mil for 97.7 not too long ago. That's got to be worth half that now!
Click to expand...

I thought GM paid the owners of Charles River Broadcasting ~$100 million for WCRB (FM) 102.5 about what? three years ao? At that time, based on the $100M price, there was speculation that 99.5, not being a true Boston signal, but being a full Class B that serves most of the market, might fetch $60 million. That it is now worth less than 1/4 of that in a distress sale to a non-profit organization is consistent with things I've heard about the precipitous drop in station values in this economic collapse.
 
Re: This is a good deal for everyone!

DanStrassberg said:
LA_Guy said:
Fourteen million though? WOW, have station values dropped like a stone! I think that Greater Media paid almost 20 million when they bought the station so many years ago. Entercom paid 30 mil for 97.7 not too long ago. That's got to be worth half that now!
Click to expand...

I thought GM paid the owners of Charles River Broadcasting ~$100 million for WCRB (FM) 102.5 about what? three years ao?
Click to expand...

This is not true. The price was not revealed...as it was part of a complicated 3 station swap deal.

I've seen specualtion of the price/value......but nowhere near $100 Mil.
 
Finally! Nassua is out of Boston! WGBH once again expands their empire, yet it's budget cuts at WGBH-FM and TV.
 
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