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WTMY 1280 Sarasota Sold!

H

hdradioeng

Saw this on All Access this morning, wish I had know it was such a bargain I would've bought it.

In other filings with the FCC, POLNET COMMUNICATIONS, LTD. is selling Talk WTMY-A/SARASOTA, FL to MERYL E. HEINEMEYER's SOUTHWEST FLORIDA RADIO BROADCASTING, LLC for $75,000.

Looks like according to Google, it is a Radio Ministry, does this change anything in the local SRQ media scene?
 
That's a fair price. A lot more reasonable than the pie-in-the-sky money they originally asked for.
 
Leased studio space.. leased tower space (to CC) with WSDV AM 1450 on City Island..with reduced non directional power from previous nearly 50 year location..(500 watts directional daytime/ 140 night time vs new 300 watts non directional day / 100 night) NO real estate....NO real asserts.. Can NOT be THAT much equipment... Certainly a far cry from the days of Surf Row Radio - WYND from the mid 60's to 70's....
 
Strictly stand alone
 
flwfg said:
Leased studio space.. leased tower space
Click to expand...

And VERY expensive leased space, at that. A big millstone to have around your neck if you're a standalone AM in this town. This has been a miserably managed radio station on a number of levels during my entire 21-year tenure in this market. The new owner looks like it might be a gospel outfit. That format, operated inexpensively, just might be able to pay the bills, especially since the purchase price is realistic.
 
Sad to see it end up this way, WYND was a great station in its day (I used to prefer it over WKXY, or WLCY)
I did also enjoy it in its WWZZ (WZ-1280) days as well
 
Yes.. Like I mentioned.. 1280 WYND.. Surf Row Radio.. Kicked ass as a 500 watt 2 tower directional daytimer..until the sun went down... Rivaled WKXY, WLCY, WALT .. at least during daylight hours... It was also reported than the pattern was often changed, especially during the summer and on weekends so that the pattern hit Siesta Beach a lot better than supposed to...and mod was always pushed to damn near 120 % constant
...Up through about 1980 or so if I recall... I worked there back in 1972 or so when Lowell W. "Bud" Paxon , the king of trade outs and later owner of the Home Shopping Net, Pax TV , now ION and a host of radio stations mostly in Florida...owned it...They had already seen their best days by say 1975...Was always kind of like the Rolling Stones vs the Beatles...Good vs Bad image..Rip off line as opposed to request line.. Big Bust of the week instead of Pick Hit...Antique Rock instead of Oldie...and in the late 60's they did a progressive rock hour, last hour on the air, called HEAD START.. heavy rock cuts you wouldn't hear anywhere else....... pushed the envelope more than most in the day... Johnny Dark of S. FL fame, Glenn Hill, Butch Luke, Pepper Lypsinx (James Wayman) all worked there in the day...

Think they received night time authorization over a decade or more ago... 340 watts or so if I recall ..maybe 140 watts

The land was purchased well over a decade ago by the Catholic Diocese of Venice, but the station never apparently made for alternative plan, so they now pay CC lots of $$$ to share the 250' self supporting tower with 1450 WSDV on City Island with a reduced power...( 300W D / 100W N) NON DIRECTIONAL With the new location by the water, probably makes up for the power reduction and directional pattern...rent a 2nd floor store front studio across from Hollywood 20 theater on Main Street in Downtown Sarasota..
 
I was Chief Engineer there in the late 80's and totally rebuilt the place. New Harris SX-1A transmitter, new studio equipment, AM stereo (C-QUAM). The station sounded great. We were given 340 watts nighttime, so we were on 6am-midnight. 500 watts day, 340 watts night. The owner took the station silent and had intentions on putting forty "manufactured homes" ie: mobile homes on the property. The county wouldn't let them do it, that's when they sold the property to the Diocese of Venice. Another problem, they never made payments on the new equipment, so everything except the transmitter was repossessed.
 
hdradioeng said:
Saw this on All Access this morning, wish I had know it was such a bargain I would've bought it.

In other filings with the FCC, POLNET COMMUNICATIONS, LTD. is selling Talk WTMY-A/SARASOTA, FL to MERYL E. HEINEMEYER's SOUTHWEST FLORIDA RADIO BROADCASTING, LLC for $75,000.

Looks like according to Google, it is a Radio Ministry, does this change anything in the local SRQ media scene?
Click to expand...


I guess it appears that there will be a format change as they switch from sports.
 
rfrus said:
I was Chief Engineer there in the late 80's and totally rebuilt the place. New Harris SX-1A transmitter, new studio equipment, AM stereo (C-QUAM). The station sounded great. We were given 340 watts nighttime, so we were on 6am-midnight. 500 watts day, 340 watts night. The owner took the station silent and had intentions on putting forty "manufactured homes" ie: mobile homes on the property. The county wouldn't let them do it, that's when they sold the property to the Diocese of Venice. Another problem, they never made payments on the new equipment, so everything except the transmitter was repossessed.
Click to expand...

Nice.
 
Carl Standrell was the PD when I became familiar with WYND. He had been a PD for LIN's WBBF in Rochester, NY during the back and forth fun with WAXC. He was used to doing battle with an accross the street top 40. I remember hearing the songs sped up waaaay past 46rpm..they were FAST! If RFRUS can elaborate..what the heck were they using for processing? Must have been an Audimax with the resistor jumpered..it was SUPER compressed and really really loud..WAY louder than KXY.

I was at LCY then, and we put in one of the first Dourrough DAP 310's..and while it was a different, more hifi sound..it was not anywhere near as loud a WYND.

75k with all those notes and no real assets ain't such a bargain.
 
Oh yeah.. I forgot about the turntables being jacked up to 47 & 48 rpms.. By the time I was there in 1972 we were basically had all music on carts... Much More Music......
 
Jeff

Believe it or not, during the "Surf-Row-Radio" WYND days they were running a Fisher plate reverb, a Gates Sta-Level and a Gates Limiter. That was it. They were punhing that old gates BC-500T transmitter as hard as they could.

When I rebuilt the station as WSGX, I installed an Optimod 9100 on the new Harris SX1A transmitter and it sounded great.
 
I would've LOVED to hear them on the air during that period. Guess it lasted until someone broke WYND.
 
While $75K isn't much for a station these days...POLNET can get out from under the debt load of all that rent. I hope the staff lands on their feet somewhere better...
 
Last week the morning show was live and saying they didn't know how long they would be on. This morning no ustream channel and no live show, could the change be here shortly?
 
I was scanning the dial last weekend and heard big band / swing music at 1280, and wondered if that was just a weekend thing. Tuned in today, and it appears that the music is the real deal. As I mentioned in other posts, WGUL in its music era was not running dead last, so I hope that this will have some prospects for success. Unique programming (and programmers) ought to be rewarded.
 
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