Tifton Radio is a disgrace

[radionut925]

WOW, what a great discussion!

I bought two heritage AMs here in Kentucky back in December, where they were doing everything WRONG, except that the former owner had the good sense to still employ a full-time News Director and do five local newscasts per day. In the past seven months, I've discovered that practically everybody I talk to tunes in for the news and obituaries, then tunes out until it's time for the news again. And, Bell County Kentucky, I can assure you, will give ANY Georgia county a run for it's money when it comes to how many folks have less than a High School education. Educated or not, folks like to know who got arrested for pot, and what the sirens were for last night.

How am I fixing the tuneout problem? Simple...first and foremost, I've gotten my house in order technically so that folks could hear my signals, and hear them well. Then, Live/Local WAS the answer for me...at least for several hours per day. Some owners believe that they can't afford to do it. Me, I believe I can't afford NOT to do it. Suddenly, our stations are on at the banks, the car dealers, and in the mall. Why? Because live/local is working.

I have long agreed with Art's premise of having a full-time News Director. I'd just about do without a GM before the News guy. Small communities like mine, and many Georgia communities, have no real outlet for local news other than radio. Some of us have an amazing opportunity to serve our communities, and pay the light bill and airplane note (I jest) in the process.

What I've found is that there are plenty of GREAT little radio towns out there. Problem is, our industry is running VERY short on good operators who see the good sense in doing things the right way. I compare a radio station to a sapling tree. Sure, you can trim away a few of the little branches from time to time. But cut too much, and the tree is going to stop growing and die. Radio works the same way. Trim some expenses here or there, but when you cut too deep, you'll fall apart. Or that's my opinion, at least.

Good points. Very well said.  Thanks for your input.

[PaulBWalkerJr]

I would agree with everything Mr Wilkey said!

[krameronkiss]

INow, many stations just hook themselves up to either a computer, a satellite dish, or both.  People who want to break into radio nowadays are lucky enough just to land a job even running the board, or do a few voicetracks and/or commercials, let alone a full-time on-air job. 

Amen. I think that was one of my fears after spending 4 years earning my broadcasting degree from Georgia Southern. I think it comes down to this: there are radio people and there are corporate people. I have met a lot of PD's who genuinely care about radio. Then there are those I call the 9 to 5 PD's. They are there to make sure that "the man's" radio station is running OK and that the all mighty dollar is still coming in. I am lucky to be working with folks that genuinely like radio. I think that a lot of stations just need to find more of these people...

[Brian Peters]

Not to chime in at the wrong time and my intentions here are not to create a negative atmosphere but to enlighten the pre-decided opinions about local radio.

Local radio is a crock. No one is going to be 'local' enough for any one to really give a hoot. To do it right you DO need a full time or at least part time news guy with proper equipment, PD, a production director, not any of this multi task stuff. Multi task dilutes the sound. One will have to suffer over the other.

No one is going to spend the money in a small market to do it right.

Why hasn't local/small stations done as well as they should? Is it the programmer? Not hardly. Is it Corporate? I do not think so. Is it the local management? Not really.

Who is to blame in this instance? I think it is just simply the state of affairs.

I had the oppurtunity to program in Tifton for WKZZ for 8 months, and I have visions, real visions on what local radio should be, a different fresh approach to battle the onslaught of sat radio, ipods etc. But was I able to implement these changes? Was I able to make an approach and get things how I wanted it? No to both.

For God sakes I could not change the clock structure! I did not have access to the music changes, I wanted to follow r and r and the like but I could not because corporate kept all of that tight under there buttons.

So many things prevent new fresh ideas to this corporate madness that IS 'local/smalltown' radio to try to stir the pot a little. I am not saying imaging sells radio, but imaging has alot to do with the overall sound, as we all know. Imaging was sick!

*gets off the soap box*

[Brian Peters]

Let me also say one more thing, John Higgs, GM (WKZZ, WRDO, WDMG AM/FM, WBHB) at the time and still GM is a great radio man and deserves more credit then he recieves. He has nothing to do with the problems that confront programming at those stations. It is all corporate.

[Radio Lawyer]

I unfortunately must agree with Art's statement.  I had the privilege of serving as news director at WTIF in the mid to late seventies and to do high school football occasionally after that.  The station--with the Al and Allen Show, the absolute best local news commitment in south Georgia, and a community presence second to none--was one of the best small market AM stations in the country.  Art Sutton was part of that station for several years in the eighties.

My wife and I drove through Tifton last month on our way to Jekyll Island and the format I heard was atrocious.  There is nothing local about that station or anybody else in the Tifton market except for high school football and Sunday morning church services.  Unfortunately, that is becoming the norm everywhere.  Almost without exception, every station I picked up on an 11-day vacation through the Georgia and Carolina coasts was syndicated junk with either canned music, the tiresome talk of Hannity and Limbaugh or other stuff that was so unbearable I longed for the satellite radio I have in my other car.

I am fortunate to live in Rome, Georgia where we have local radio with local news at least a few hours a day.  For the most part, however, local radio is causing its own death by divorcing itself totally from the local community because management either doesn't get it or doesn't care.

I entered radio as a parttime employee at WLBB Radio in Carrollton as a high school junior.  We were local to the core as I continued in that capacity during summers and holidays while a student in college.  I graduated and went to Tifton where the tradition continued.  WTIF ostensibly changed its FM format to contemporary Christian so people would listen at work during the day.  Syndicated canned music--regardless of the format--certainly is not my idea of what I want to listen to anytime.

[Brian Peters]

While I respect Art Sutton and his time and tradition as a 'icon' or of the 'old guard' with Al Cohen and David Haire of WTIF, the time of these old giants is no more. The reason why you all think Tifton radio is a disgrace is because it is done the way you did it 40 years ago. Let me tell you something the PD for WTIF and the PD(s) for WKZZ really do care about local radio. Corporate atmospheres and stretched budgets are to blame. Back 40 years ago you people all had one job each. One guy was the 'morning show guy', one was the news guy, or two. One was the engineer or you maybe had 2. You had interns running wild ready to help out, you had a GM and his job was to, guess what General Manage, not do 3 remotes on saturday. You had 2 office girls, plus another one to do traffic, you had Account Executives who were pounding the pavement, you had a production director who did production, everyone had their job. Nowadays, GM's, PD"s, and if you are lucky you have an engineer that MAY come in and repair equipment, GM's are expected to do remotes and sell and manage and come up with promotions, PD's are along the same lines, make sure the station is on air, do some jerry rigging to equipment, do music changes, (if you arent satellite), imaging, production, client damage control for IDIOT accoutn executives, make sure your board ops are there on time for the ga game, can I keep going? I could fill up a couple pages probably. The game has changed folks, corporate has squeezed us because they gotta make a profit. It is getting harder and harder to make a profit because corporate wont hire any one who lets them use their creative minds to make a LOCAL, fresh station sound, nor will they allow for new fresh ideas or killer imaging.

What really sells a station now? How cheap of a package can I get for my dollar?

BTW, WTIF is NOT on a bird. It is a format that is programmed by a programmer, not a PD that programs 80 stations in a facility out in california. Cont. Christian is NOT an atrocious format. The format has not had enough time to mature yet in the eyes of others so it is easy to pick on it. It is a hard format to sell but if you can make it sell like KXOJ gets it sold, then you have better sales numbers then any AC station in the area.

I am all about old school radio and the good ol days, proverbially and I respect our predescessors, immensely, you can ask Al Cohen about that fact, personally, but why does every one have a negative attitude towards ANYTHING that Three Trees Communications does? They try to do things differently, they don't try to do it the 'tried and true' way which is BTW, quickly fading. Radio has found itself in a serious pickle and it has to be mobile in order to stay on the air. Three Trees deserves more credit for trying formats that no one else has the BALLS to try. While I am not burning bridges here with future gigs, I am simply a little irritated about negative attitude towards Tifton radio/Three Trees and the people that are involved in its current inception when its all corporate! Corporate has caused these issues.

[olhankster]

I was wanting to be a PD so bad in 1988 that I left a great position with 99WAYS in Macon for what turned out to be a similar position in Douglas at WDMG. I was so discouraged for the first year of working the same show I did in Macon, never get paid for remotes and deal with substandard programming at the time ( FM Stereo 99-5 (breath here) Ahllllllivvvvve). I also had the same problem that many new Radio people had in their first three years; an ego as big as Texas.

I thought I was going to change the way they did things. They were not corporate owned and had a standard South Georgia operation for the 1980's: A General Manager that also did remotes, A News Director that also sold and did remotes, A PD that did a six day a week airshift and remotes...and so on. Everyone on staff did remotes and never was paid. I was working nights and had to come in to do a Farmers Furniture remote at 8am because "I already give you a salary to do this". Though many stations paid for remotes, not all did. And it wasn't until after I left and came back before I actually became PD. The GM still had his hands on everything and I couldn't do what I wanted to do. (Sound familiar?) It was sounding great, then, the owner wanted to go satellite and I lost a good morning person, but kept the rest of the staff.
 
I now Manage a growing operation in a small town that makes a good dent into the nearby metro. It is all automated with some local elements and especially High School Football. In September, I will start a new morning show on our Oldies Station (the top biller) and host it myself (still have name equity in the market)....yet I am also the General Manager, handle Programming for our News Talk FM, imaging for all three stations, make several sales calls a day, serve on various local and state committees and still have time for my family. My Operations Manager also handles Traffic and Production and represents us various local events...and quite frankly does a better job in this multitask enviroment than any three people I have worked with. My Promotions Director handles Production for our group of five stations and even helps with servicing some accounts. Instead of sitting around complaining of how it should be, we are getting it done. Plus, the product is far improved than what was there before, including during the days this group was live and local. (Not bashing previous folks when I say that, we just changed with the market.)

It's not the number of employees nor having a sales staff that leaves you alone so you can Program in peace. Nor is it having a full time News Director, though it certainly helps, especially on stations like WTIF. It's a matter of rolling up your sleeves and leaving the ego at home. We all have a job to do and we must get it done. We all have to work together. Until that happens, be prepared for more Satellites, Automation, iPods and other things to "hold us back" from local programming or what other excuse you can think of. I would gladly hire people that could do the job, if it made sense, but I have come across way too many egos and not enough people who wanted to actually work.

Give me people with passion for the business like David Haire, John Higgs, Jay Braswell, Art Sutton and even Brian...No matter the level of experience, they all do their best with what they've got and leave a good example for the rest of us.

[fwillis]

Hank:Your old homestead WDMG AM will be changing formats next week to News/Talk.

[Art Sutton]

Brian, I don't consider myself, Al, David or any of the others mentioned here, icons. All of us recognize things change and audiences change but radio is about giving the local audience what they want and having capable people be able to sell the message. Al Cohen is still modern enough in his thinking he could operate a successful station in any small market.

A big part of WTIF's problem stems from owners who paid way too much money for the stations and in their desperation to turn things around and stem their losses, have tried everything to overcome the fact they obviously don't need to be in the business. Those type operations are tough for anyone to survive and I advise people to not work in those type places if it can be avoided.

As for multi-tasking, I've been in radio since 1977 and I've yet to work in any radio station that an employee did just one thing except the local news director. I personally don't think a newsman should do anything but news..all good local news. I would make an exception for off air operations managers also doing local news.

Much of the blame for radio's perceived demise is the attitude you can't do it like it was done 10, 20 or 30 years ago. I beg to differ. What made radio successful following the invention of TV still works today. The way you do it may have changed and the number of communities which still have viable enough advertising markets to support such an operation may be fewer..but the principles of what makes local radio successful is still very much the same. A good example is WSB in Atlanta. I remember them well when they played music. The station's success was built on local news and information. Trust me it wasn't the music. People didn't jump for joy when Roger Whitaker came on to sign. You can't play music on AM in a major market and be #1 but WSB is still a local news and information station that people in Atlanta know to turn to to find out what's happening...and there are a lot of new people in Atlanta and young people in Atlanta who don't remember the Voice of the South from White Columns on Peachtree Street or Elmo Ellis' editorials.

 Come to think of it, all the great small town radio stations I remember from the "past", that is what set them apart. They were community information sources. Nowadays on AM, it's usually news-talk filler between the features that maintain that "image."

 Another problem may well be that many of those in small town radio today have never actually worked in a small market station that is doing well since there seem to fewer and fewer examples of them out there.




While I respect Art Sutton and his time and tradition as a 'icon' or of the 'old guard' with Al Cohen and David Haire of WTIF, the time of these old giants is no more. The reason why you all think Tifton radio is a disgrace is because it is done the way you did it 40 years ago. Let me tell you something the PD for WTIF and the PD(s) for WKZZ really do care about local radio. Corporate atmospheres and stretched budgets are to blame. Back 40 years ago you people all had one job each. One guy was the 'morning show guy', one was the news guy, or two. One was the engineer or you maybe had 2. You had interns running wild ready to help out, you had a GM and his job was to, guess what General Manage, not do 3 remotes on saturday. You had 2 office girls, plus another one to do traffic, you had Account Executives who were pounding the pavement, you had a production director who did production, everyone had their job. Nowadays, GM's, PD"s, and if you are lucky you have an engineer that MAY come in and repair equipment, GM's are expected to do remotes and sell and manage and come up with promotions, PD's are along the same lines, make sure the station is on air, do some jerry rigging to equipment, do music changes, (if you arent satellite), imaging, production, client damage control for IDIOT accoutn executives, make sure your board ops are there on time for the ga game, can I keep going? I could fill up a couple pages probably. The game has changed folks, corporate has squeezed us because they gotta make a profit. It is getting harder and harder to make a profit because corporate wont hire any one who lets them use their creative minds to make a LOCAL, fresh station sound, nor will they allow for new fresh ideas or killer imaging.

What really sells a station now? How cheap of a package can I get for my dollar?

BTW, WTIF is NOT on a bird. It is a format that is programmed by a programmer, not a PD that programs 80 stations in a facility out in california. Cont. Christian is NOT an atrocious format. The format has not had enough time to mature yet in the eyes of others so it is easy to pick on it. It is a hard format to sell but if you can make it sell like KXOJ gets it sold, then you have better sales numbers then any AC station in the area.

I am all about old school radio and the good ol days, proverbially and I respect our predescessors, immensely, you can ask Al Cohen about that fact, personally, but why does every one have a negative attitude towards ANYTHING that Three Trees Communications does? They try to do things differently, they don't try to do it the 'tried and true' way which is BTW, quickly fading. Radio has found itself in a serious pickle and it has to be mobile in order to stay on the air. Three Trees deserves more credit for trying formats that no one else has the BALLS to try. While I am not burning bridges here with future gigs, I am simply a little irritated about negative attitude towards Tifton radio/Three Trees and the people that are involved in its current inception when its all corporate! Corporate has caused these issues.