from bbgi.com
November 1, 2001
You can probably cancel the New Orleans rumors because of this from November.........rumors were based on Beasley as the owner, running Stern in other markets......but they sold what they bought quick !....could be why it didn't happen - RobK
Commenting on the agreement, Beasley Chairman and CEO, George Beasley, stated, "Over the long term, Beasley has established a successful record of managing its station portfolio through acquisitions and divestitures. The proceeds of this transaction will reduce borrowings under our revolving credit agreement while enabling us to better focus on those opportunities offering the greatest return to our shareholders. We trust the stations will continue to grow and prosper under the management of Wilks Broadcasting."
Completion of the transaction, expected to close late in the first or early in the second quarter of 2002, is subject to FCC approval and other customary closing conditions.
Thanks to RobK for sending these stories in...
from Business Wire
January 31,2001
As previously announced, in conjunction with the closing of the transaction Allen Shaw, 57, the President and Chief Executive Officer of Centennial Broadcasting, will be joining Beasley Broadcast Group as Vice Chairman and Co-Chief Operating Officer. Mr. Shaw previously served as the Chief Operating Officer of Beasley from 1985 to 1990.
Commenting on the transaction, Beasley Chairman and Chief Executive Officer George G. Beasley, stated, "We are delighted to add two more top 50 markets to the Beasley Broadcast Group portfolio and to welcome our new Las Vegas and New Orleans teams and Alan Shaw to the Company. Based on our analysis, there is strong growth potential in each of these markets, and we look forward to applying our operating disciplines to help these station groups realize their fullest potential."
Founded in 1961, Beasley Broadcast Group, Inc. is a radio broadcasting company that, upon completion of pending transactions, will own or operate 44 stations (27 FM and 17 AM) located in eleven large- and mid-sized markets in the United States.
This news announcement contains certain forward-looking statements that are based upon current expectations and involve certain risks and uncertainties within the meaning of the U.S. Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Words or expressions such as "intends", "expects," "expected," "anticipates" or variations of such words and similar expressions are intended to identify such forward-looking statements. Key risks are described in the Company's reports filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. Readers should note that these statements may be impacted by several factors, including economic changes and changes in the radio broadcast industry generally. The Company undertakes no obligation to update the information contained herein.
Beasley Broadcasting to purchase stations..........Classic Rock WRNO/New Orleans is one of them. Beasley now in unique situation to bring Stern back to New Orleans for the 3rd time, on WRNO. WRNO currently looking for an edge over classic rock competitor.............
Beasley is a huge Stern supporter.......they have Stern on their classic rocker in Ft Myers, and recently added Stern in North Carolina, despite the contract issue.
I would say their is a HUGE chance that this will happen......sometime after Jan 31st (when the deal closes)
Rob
from YAHOO Business News
Wednesday December 13, 5:40 pm ET
Press Release
--snips--
from New Orleans City Business Online
1/03/2000 - Vol. 20 - Issue 28 - Page 17 - #2028
The King of All Media has lost the New Orleans portion of his domain, and plans are in the works to install a local morning talk junta.
Howard Stern’s three-year run at "The End," KKND-FM/106.7, came to an end of its own Dec. 17 after the station declined to renew his show’s contract. Earnest James, New Orleans market director for KKND parent company Clear Channel Communications Inc., says he decided to bid the show farewell for financial reasons. The show is expensive, James says, and the contract renewal provided an opportunity to try something new and more profitable.
"I believe that, long term, I could enhance shareholders’ value by creating a great radio station from top to bottom that was locally produced, because of the uniqueness of New Orleans," he says.
That uniqueness, some suggest, may make a nationally syndicated show like Stern’s less competitive in this market. "New Orleans really embraces its own," says Debbie Reed, owner of local buying firm DRI Media.
Reed doesn’t expect Stern’s departure to change the market much, because "oftentimes, advertisers don’t even want to be on the show, so it just doesn’t enter into a lot of my client decisions." Don Cooper, executive director of the Greater New Orleans Broadcasters Association, agrees. "I don’t think it’s of major significance to the local market," he says. "I think it’s significant to Stern if local stations are becoming unhappy with the results they’re getting from him."
But Reed also points out that a good morning talk show is essential to any station, because the morning drive time provides peak listening hours, and listeners want and expect talk.
According to research firm Arbitron Corp., KKND’s overall summer market share from 6 a.m. to midnight was 4.7. The Stern show’s local take was 7.5, says Dave Seyler, senior editor of the Radio Business Report, a trade publication. "That was the strongest part of (KKND’s) day, which makes you wonder why they’re dropping him," Seyler says.
James says the decision to discontinue Stern was purely local; other Clear Channel stations all over the nation will continue to air the show.
On the national scene, Stern continues to hold his own, Seyler says. "I haven’t heard any sign that there’s any kind of major trouble," he says. "He hasn’t even been getting fined by the (Federal Communications Commission) lately."
Still, James is confident that his people can put together "an edgy, competitive, unique morning show" to replace the shock jock.
"There are stations around the country that are very popular, even stations in this marketplace that are very popular, that don’t have Howard Stern," James says. "That’s not in any way to put down Stern. He’s a great talent.
"But at the same time, do I believe that there are other great talents out there, and do I believe that listeners will listen to radio stations that don’t have Stern on them? I do."
Media buyer Reed mentions four factors that will draw her attention to a new show: personalities, pricing, packaging and ratings.
James would not provide details on the composition of the new show or when it will take shape, saying only that it will "take a while," that it is in "the building process," and that the station won’t waste time. He says a number of Stern fans have complained, but he hopes to win them back with the right morning chemistry. In the meantime, the station is playing music.<> Don Buchwald, Stern’s agent, did not return calls for comment.
December 23, 1999
from saltserver.com
James was no doubt referring to the station's failure to acquire and retain advertisers. According to Kathleen Benfield, director of the AFA of New Orleans, their group has corresponded with nearly 300 KKND advertisers, both local and national. Benfield reports that they have had an approximate 85% success rate in convincing advertisers to refuse to support the pornographic Stern program. In December of 1998, AFANO members picketed hard-core local advertisers and in April, 1999, AFA national mailed letters to their supporters in New Orleans, asking them to correspond with the hard core advertisers. In the waning days of the program on KKND, the station has relied on strip clubs, porn shops, and bar rooms to fill the advertiser vacuum. Noticeably absent were car dealers, retailers, grocery stores, electronics outlets and beer commercials.
This is the third time a broadcast radio or television station has yanked the program. Stern initially surfaced in New Orleans in the mid '90's. EZ Communications acquired the Stern program and began running it on its flagship station in New Orleans - WEZB. In November of 1995, Benfield began corresponding with WEZB advertisers and the Federal Communications Commission. By June of 1996, the station dropped Stern and approximately 18 other hours of sexually oriented programming.
Six months later, Clear Channel bought the Stern program and began carrying it on KKND in January, 1997. Benfield, now affiliated with the American Family Association, began corresponding with KKND advertisers and filing complaints with the FCC. KKND was hit with an FCC fine in 1998.
In August of 1998, New Orleans UPN Channel 54 began broadcasting the Howard Stern Radio Program for television. The American Family Association of New Orleans filed complaints with the FCC in October and that month, the station moved the program from 10:30 p.m. on Saturday to 3:00 a.m. on Sunday morning. By the following summer, Channel 54 also dropped the program. Channel 54 also had problems with advertisers.
Clear Channel Communications carries the Stern program on several of its stations across the country. Earnest James has said that this will not affect those stations. Clear Channel is one of the largest corporate providers of Stern.
December 22, 1999
from Radio Digest
The End (KKND 106.7 FM) dropped Howard Stern from its morning lineup after Friday, Dec. 17, said Ernest James, market director of the seven New Orleans stations owned by Clear Channel Communications.
Other Clear Channel stations carrying the Stern show across the country have not made the same decision, according to James, who oversees KKND and sister stations WODT (1280 AM), WYLD (940 AM and 98.5 FM), KUMX (104.1 FM), WNOE (101.1 FM) and WQUE (93.3 FM).
"The contract with us was up," James said, "and I made an economic decision not to renew the contract. Hopefully within the next two months we will have a local morning team taking the Stern spot. Right now, we're playing music."
James would not comment on the cost of the Stern contract or savings, if any, resulting from not renewing the contract.
"New Orleans is a unique radio market," James added. "We felt we could build a morning show that was locally produced and focused on New Orleans that would give us better economic results than continuing another contract with Howard Stern.
"We've been happy with the Stern show and the ratings it produced, but we just felt it was time to do something locally. This is going to be a challenging time for us to put together a morning team to replace the Stern show."
James said The End management has an idea of what it wants in the morning team, but a final decision of whether the team will be a two- or three-man team or simply one strong personality with several others revolving around the personality has not been determined.
"As far as advertisers are concerned," he said, "we've lost one advertiser and gained one advertiser, but it's early, yet. This is going to be a challenge, because Howard Stern had strong name recognition and popularity.
"Generally, a contract (with Howard Stern) is a multi-year contract, and we just felt it was time to do something locally."
The Howard Stern show aired in The End's morning-drive slot from 6 to 10 a.m. "Sometimes Howard would run until noon," James added, "but the show was mostly a 4-hour segment.
"If the contract had not come to an end, we wouldn't have made this move. We know we have some diehard Stern fans out there (in New Orleans) and they are going to be shocked and disappointed that Howard Stern is not going to be on our station. We hope those fans will be patient with us, because we felt this was a natural opportunity for us to create a local morning show."
"We're not just going to put something together," promised James. "We're going to make an exhaustive search to find the right team to put in the Stern time slot."
from: Radio Digest
December 14, 1998
Management at alternative rocker "The End" (KKND 106.7) finds itself between angry listeners, the American Family Association, and a syndicator.
How is that possible? One person: Howard Stern.
Apparently, KKND has been editing some of Stern’s references to race and sex. It all stems from an FCC fine slapped on "The End" this summer in response to indecency complaints about Stern’s program brought by AFA. It seems that Clear Channel, which owns KKND, wants to avoid further fines, hence the censored words and phrases.
Kevin Renzulli, the webmaster of what he describes as "The Original Howard Stern Superfan-Produced Super Site," tells visitors to koam.com that the editing hit the fan with Stern’s listeners December 8.
Renzulli also says the Stern program has been interrupted by KKND. "A caller claimed that a (Stern) bit was cut out and in its place, a man was singing gospel," said Renzulli.
A market insider confirms for RadioDigest.com that "The End" has indeed been playing music during Stern’s show, and he speculates that the music is to fill gaps edited out of the program or to promote the station’s music to Stern’s attractive cume audience.
A request for an interview with Dave Stewart, KKND’s program director, was ignored, possibly because the station faces potential legal action from Stern’s syndicator.
To further stir the situation, AFA plans to picket KKND’s sponsors. The pro-family group says it contacted the business in question both by mail and phone "to inform them of the vile nature of the program." AFA also sent transcripts of the show to illustrate the "racist, sexist, (and) pornographic material which is Stern’s trademark."
In a press release, AFA’s Kathleen Benfield attacked Stern by pointing out that the popular shock jock "discusses explicit sexual topics, uses expletives, and laughs at such things as child rape and murder (and) also has made extremely degrading remarks about women, black people, other minorities and the handicapped."
Other indecency complaints about Stern content aired on KKND are pending with the FCC.
There’s no indication what KKND plans to do to mollify its listeners or to address the situation publicly.
Clear Channel’s two most successful New Orleans properties - WQUE (93.3) and WYLD (98.5) - are programmed to reach predominantly black audiences.
Stern’s controversial remarks about race would no doubt infuriate minority leaders in the Big Easy, should they be made aware that the most popular stations among New Orleans’ black listeners are owned by the same company that gives Howard Stern a local signal.
6:00 a.m. - Listeners suddenly realize en masse that "The End" has been censoring Stern bits for language (i.e., the "n word") and sexual content. Although it’s been going on for weeks, it was never so blatant as this morning. KKND is flooded with phone calls and faxes.
6:15 a.m. - KKND puts its phones on auto-hangup. All incoming calls are rudely picked up and slammed down without a word.
7:30 a.m. - A listener calls into Stern’s program and relays the news to Howard on the air. Stern goes ballistic, exclaiming, "This really burns my balls!"
7:40 a.m. - Domingo Ruiz, who works for KKND and had been referring to himself as the producer of Stern’s show, confronts Stern on the air. (Ruiz later removes the outgoing message on his answering machine that states his producer position.)
7:50 a.m. - Stern accuses Ruiz and KKND of butchering his program. Ruiz responds by telling Stern, "I’m not butchering, I’m censoring."
8:00 a.m. - Stern vows to have Don Buchwald, his agent, investigate the editing of his program. "I’ll just pull the show out of New Orleans," says Stern on the air.
- Dean Nordine
Howard's moved from 16th place to 4th in the morning ratings (12+). Current share is 7.0.
Howard inherited, from the old KKND morning guy, ratings of 16th place with a 1.6 share since starting again in New Orleans on January 20, 1997.
The Stern show finished in first place with men 25-54 with a 11.2 share and is within striking distance of the number one spot in the 12+ demo.
Howard was on WRNO prior to being on WEZB.
Back to ratings.
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