Jeff

Jeff says‚ a lot of the damage that’s been done to the industry has been self-inflicted. Bonneville’s Bruce Reese said (jokingly) it’s been cut, but none of us [on the panel] did it, we all behaved responsibly. Reese then said it’s tough to generalize about 15,000 radio stations‚ and he says the recession didn’t just whack Radio. Every person who runs a business has had to make some really tough decisions. Jeff Dinetz at NextMedia said getting an entire cluster down to 20 sellers is not good. There are not many people representing us on the streets. He also believes we have no bench for talent, and that’s pretty sad. Maverick Media’s Gary Rozynek said he’s trying to hold the line on staffing and cuts “We are still live and local 6am to 7pm. You have to have a certain level of staffing in the building to deliver on the commitments you’re making to the community and to your customers.” To him, being staffed up is an advantage to us versus the competition, we can be out in the community. We can be doing promotions‚ our stations are going to be very relevant.

January 15, 2008 – What’s Important? Connoisseur CEO Jeff Warshaw is old-school.

What’s important is investing in your business, investing in your community, investing in your people. I totally understand why what’s happening at many stations is happening: they’re leveraged so high, they have to grab any piece of business they can. It’s not the iPods, it’s not the Internet that’s the problem. We did it to ourselves. People consolidated, borrowed too much, paid too much, cut training, cut innovations, and they’re also cutting rates. When a car dealer is buying advertising and he can buy wonderful stations for cheap rates‚ well, that’s why the market is shrinking. The Radio business has to re-set itself and people have to reassess what station values really are. They have to go in and pay reasonable prices and run them like real businesses, instead of like ever-increasing cost-cutting machines. I see a lot more pain ahead for the industry, but I’m hopeful that stations end up in the hands of dedicated operators. But right now, mostly, nobody’s investing, nobody’s innovating new formats. We’re doing it, but the big companies aren’t. In Erie, we put on a new station and Bob FM became #1 in its first book. We promoted it, we got out in the street. Radio’s still a great business, if you do the things we used to take for granted. Do the research, do the promotion, try a new format, get on the street. (Hey, we give away tee-shirts.) And the people who have that kind of passion, bring them in.

Westport, CT – March 21, 2006 – Jeff enthusiastically responds to yesterday’s lead story about how the selloffs by Citadel and others may play out. He tells Inside Radio “I think stations should be in the hands of people who are excited about running them.” Like him. He says Connoisseur’s got the expertise and the capital and says if some operators aren’t excited about the business – “We’ll be happy to take those stations off their hands.” He says Radio’s problem is that “people paid too much money, they’ve already cut promotions to nothing and they’ve cut people.” But he says it’s time to do great Radio and “make the product interesting enough to be interesting to advertisers.” He admits that Radio’s no longer a “double-digit business.” But at reasonable station-buying levels it’s still exciting (his favorite word). And for the brokers out there – Jeff’s phone number in Westport is 203-227-1978. Are there more Jeff Warshaws out there?