Passion

Bob Pittman is telling Wall Street in his usual cheer-leading style that it's time for "a new life for radio." 

Meanwhile, CBS' Les Moonves is bullish on radio as-is, it seems.  And, their stock price certainly makes it look like he knows what he's talking about.

There's no sense taking sides in the battle of publicly-traded companies in their efforts to tout their stocks.  That's a very profitable business in itself, and reinvention or not, it's not radio to me.

The great thing about talking to our clients, local radio people, every day is that I never seem to have time to dwell on that.

Instead, I am reminded every day how passionate worker bees in thousands of communities are, as they work with passionate creative artists, music promotion executives, advertisers and our equally passionate listeners.

For example, just today....

In telling Country Aircheck's Chuck Aly about next Friday’s Taylor Swift Worldwide Radio Remote (10/26), Big Machine's John Zarling said of Swift: 

“She’ll spend six hours on the 26th talking to radio. She’s spent 20 hours in the last two days doing national radio interviews. And there have been countless media days around the world in the last month. She works harder than anybody to make all this come together.  It just shows Taylor’s conviction and continued engagement with radio, and how much she believes in radio as a way to reach fans.”

KIRO/Seattle's Linda Thomas just blogged

"How could my dream job get any better? It just did.  Here's the funny thing about a new dream coming true. It's exciting and it's frightening.  Creating unique stories for Bonneville Seattle's traditional and new media platforms is my full-time job. A little fear is a good thing. All the interesting stuff happens when we step outside our comfort zones."

Catch me tomorrow and I'll have even more fresh, new stories about what happens when passionate content creators engage listeners.

If you're inside a radio station and not just a corporate office somewhere, I'll bet you can do the same.

Grab some passion and spread it around!

A Tumultuous 15 Years

In May of 1996, I started to write a weekly newsletter I called "RadioIQ," which was the predecessor to this blog.

I found this item as I was paging through old issues today:

• "It will take $15 billion in trading to complete the consolidation process -- defined as the point at which 75% of radio is in the hands of the top 10 groups." By that measure, the industry has 80% more consolidating to do, said Alex. Brown & Sons Managing Director/Sr. Media Analyst Drew Marcus, who estimated that the process will take at least two years to complete. Fast-growing groups are best positioned for success in the long run. That is especially true of the public companies. "The fastest-gaining [radio] stocks are the consolidators," said Marcus. He pegged consolidators' stock growth at 2.5 times the rate of static companies. "Individual stations are too volatile, and we don't like companies that rely on just a few." He said companies like his, which underwrite many initial public offerings, look for groups that generate no more than 25% of their cash flow from their top two stations and keep debt leverage under 6.5. - Heard at the May 1996 Kagan Future of Radio Acquisitions & Finance Conference
  
  
• "Size -- if you are a public company -- is rewarded, as is diversification," said American Radio Systems Chairman/CEO Steve Dodge. But size for size's sake can be dangerous, Dodge warned. "These are still delicate critters that have to be marketed, programmed, and sold. I don't know that anyone has proven they can effectively run a 100-plus-station radio group."

It's going to be informative to see how many of these statements also apply to Cumulus-Citadel when it closes in September and how the few remaining "small" groups like Hubbard, Emmis, Entercon, Bonneville, Townsquare, Cox et all play out their futures in the face of it.

If you read this blog, your career prospects will be shaped by it.