The Fate of the Big 3 Record Labels

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  • The threat of Spotify, TikTok and even Fortnite on record label dominance.
  • The move by Spotify and others to encourage artists to go direct and bypass record labels.
  • New competition for record labels in discovering artists and picking the hits and where it leaves radio.

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The Cumulus Debt-Reduction Plan

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  • Shock deal:The market Cumulus would sell in a New York minute.
  • What is the Cumulus business plan now that they have vacated key markets?
  • Are the rumors true about Cumulus’ next big move?

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Cutbacks On Deck for Entercom

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  • What this means for markets that will become “hubs” and those that will become “spokes”.
  • How programming, management and sales shakeups will go down.
  • The future of sales commissions at Entercom.

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Katz Strong-arming Stations

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  • The push to force reluctant stations into programmatic selling
  • The one-sided arbitrage that lines Katz’ pockets
  • How the take-it-or-leave-it offer actually works

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Panic at Entercom

David Field is starting to sweat.

He’s ordering severe layoffs right now because he promised lenders $110 million in cost savings when Entercom took over CBS Radio and two years later, the actual realized savings is approximately half that.

No radio consolidator has ever promised and actually delivered cost synergies that ambitious probably because it is dangerous to do so but Field’s world is beginning to get uncomfortable.

The stock has lost more than $10 a share since the merger was announced, Field’s EBITDA growth figures have been consistently devalued and Entercom is in the same industry with iHeart and Cumulus – one that is selling advertising for less than it is worth making it impossible to deliver consistent year-over-year revenue growth.

The dew is off the lily for Field which is why his plans to shrink expenses will soon be right up there with iHeart and Cumulus.

Dig deeper into Entercom's severe cutback plans

Nielsen’s Overnight Ratings

The CEO of Media Monitors is selling the benefit of their new overnight Nielsen ratings like this:

“We found that the number of quarter hours increased toward the close down of WPLJ on Friday. This was due to more panelists tuning in more often just to hear the swan song of that station.”

Philippe Generali was talking about those high-interest final hours of broadcasting for the iconic WPLJ in New York before it switched to religion.

Why suddenly measure overnights – turns out there is an answer for this and a lot of radio stations are not going to like it.

How this move has little to do with radio as we know it – it’s a sly move with another end in mind.

Even the planned name for Nielsen overnight’s is not going to be called Nielsen Overnight giving a revelation of what this move portends.

With radio groups and stations trying to cut expenses, why is Nielsen and Media Monitors trying to sell them something else at this sensitive time?

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The Emmis, Beasley, Urban One Deals

So, let’s get this straight.

Emmis sells its 50.1% interest in its Austin radio properties for $39.3 million.

That’s only about $3 million less than Cumulus got for KLOS-FM, Los Angeles, a storied station in the second largest market.

And much more than Cumulus got for one legendary WPLJ-FM, New York that was bundled with WRQX-FM, Washington and WYAY, Atlanta with three more smaller market stations thrown in for the low, low price of $103.5 million devaluing WPLJ to garbage status.

And then yesterday, Beasley buys WDMK-FM, Detroit and three translators thrown in for only $13.5 million – and yes, I get that Detroit is not New York or LA or even Austin but something is seriously wrong with the radio industry with fire sales like these going on.

If the good stuff is selling for pennies on the dollar, how does that value the rest of the radio industry?

Cumulus was working on the WPLJ sale for months only to just give it away.

What other stations are on the block and under the radar?

But wait, has the market finally bottomed out for radio stations?

And is it a good time to buy?

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Entercom’s Expense Cutting Shortfall

From almost day one David Field has been telling investors and lenders that there are lots of financial savings to be realized once the two companies merge.

In fact, Field upped his predictions from $25 million in cost cuts all the way to $100 million and even later added another $10 million on top of that.

So far best estimates show approximately half of that $110 million in cutback savings has been reached – some of them came from CBS which was coerced to do them by Field prior to the merger.

Now Field is having a tough time grinding out more savings which sounds like great news for current CBS employees who want to hold on to their jobs except it isn’t.

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Radio’s 3 New Rising Competitors

Ask any radio person and they likely cannot name one of the three most potent threats to time spent listening to radio.

And you thought it was consolidation and greedy bankers.

That, too.

But under the radar three alternatives to radio are rapidly gaining strength while the people who are running the radio industry can’t see them coming.

And we’re not talking about digital – it is a factor no doubt, but not the next thing.

More concerning is that these new threats are targeting both young and older, available radio listeners.

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The Liberty Takeover of iHeart

  • Liberty has been buying iHeart debt at pennies on the dollar
  • iHeart isn’t necessarily against a Liberty takeover
  • The iHeart board has open spots for Liberty appointees
  • Can Liberty be stopped?
  • Other potential buyers

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The Demise of the Morning Show

If you caught any of the farewell jock appearances on WPLJ late last week, you heard more radio personality that exists in an entire lifetime on the air for one last goodbye.

It was odd to hear Scott Shannon with Todd Pettengill together considering that Pettengill reportedly went to Cumulus and supposedly offered to take over the WPLJ show for a lot less money getting Shannon fired.

Still, for a few final days the airwaves oozed of what makes radio great – personality and that station had tons of it from the early Allen Shaw ABC days up to and including Cumulus, the company that sold WPLJ for a quick buck.

There was a time when a good morning show drove 50-60% of the total stations revenue but consolidators found a way to weaken these important shows in the name of saving money.

But it’s heading in the wrong direction again.

Radio groups can’t make their revenue numbers without adjusting them to look better.  You saw how Entercom dumped in all that heavy billing from WBEB which it purchased in Philadelphia late last year totally misrepresenting year over year revenue.

Now, faced with more declining revenue, hard-pressed group owners are revisiting ways to cut the great expense of paying for talent in the morning.

They’ve already tried syndication, promoting second bananas to take the helm and other strategies.

Bean counters are readying some frightening new ways to diminish or replace talent driven morning shows.

Don’t even ask.

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Trade & Remnant Ads Blowing Up

In a Midwest market very recently, Cumulus paid a 50% commission to one of the top barter and remnant agencies to secure a buy.

For years, barter and trade have been rearing its ugly head in radio at the hands of desperate radio groups looking to grab whatever ad dollars they can even at the overall expense of the industry.

All of this in a boom economy!

Can you imagine what would happen to radio if an economic downturn feared by economists currently actually kicked in?

So right now, trade and remnant advertising is hitting new highs or should we say new lows.

The rules are being re-written on the fly and one gigantic change that will make matters absolutely worse has taken off with a vengeance. 

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Competing Against Streaming Playlists

Spotify and Apple offer more music than listeners can ever consume.

It’s like a cable channel to older people where they watch only a handful of channels even though they are paying for hundreds.

But now there is new evidence that radio isn’t losing audience to Spotify, Apple Music and streaming music services mainly because they offer too few songs.

It’s not about that at all.

Instead, the few main objections to radio are solvable. 

It’s just the industry is looking at streaming music competitors the wrong way.

The fix.

The easy part and one thing that will take some guts.

How to compete with such potent streaming services.

And the quickest way to start winning young listeners back.

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The iHeart & Cumulus IPOs

Radio has not been able to successfully launch an IPO for years now.

Think Alpha Media.

So why are iHeart and Cumulus even trying now when there is even less interest on the part of lenders and investors?

iHeart signaled some type of public offering in their bankruptcy.

And now it appears Cumulus, out of bankruptcy but not out of financial trouble, may be on the verge of having what iHeart is having.

There are two IPO options to look for – it will be one of these.

How iHeart’s IPO will be priced.

How the Cumulus IPO must deal with distressed debt partners.

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The Cumulus Foreign Ownership Waiver

They’re kidding, right?

A special waiver to allow foreign investors to own 100% of Cumulus?

Or at least some of it.

Why now and why look to offshore financing?

Their stock is trading at close to $17 – and they just dumped $1 billion in debt out of bankruptcy – so what’s driving this sudden move.

What if the FCC says no?

The repercussions at Cumulus clusters – will there be more nationalizing local jobs, cutting costs, etc.

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Meruelo’s One Market Strategy

It’s hard to believe with its purchase of KXOS-FM, Los Angeles, Meruelo is a dominant player in the second largest market with its fifth radio station.

All it took was money of which Meruelo has plenty thanks to the casino business.

And radio stations desperate to sell at pennies on the dollar.

Of which the industry has many owners waiting in the wings.

But that alone is not the future of radio.

Meruelo becomes a big player in LA.

Now what other markets do they need to be in.

These people have a plan that is so unlike that of traditional radio owners that it deserves a closer look.

What the radio industry is looking for next after consolidation may be what Meruelo is doing.

Why are they so bullish on a radio industry barely able to break even?

Here’s the next piece of the puzzle. 

What the greater radio industry should go to school on now that consolidation has failed.

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Cumulus Cash Flow Crisis

Cumulus is back in financial hot water.

Real operating cash flow numbers have been revealed.

The local revenue and trade numbers without adjustments.

They’ve had to trade more and report it as cash revenue – here is that number.

Their recent firing of hundreds of traffic directors is juxtaposition against real expense figures that they legally have to disclose.

How is podcasting working out?

And what is Cumulus becoming more dependent on.

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Why Are Spotify & the Record Labels Getting into Podcasting?

Go figure.

Spotify, Apple Music and the other streamers have become the new radio among in-demo listeners.

But they barely make a profit because music rights fees are so high.

The music industry is soaring.

So why are streaming services like Spotify going into podcasting, a place where Apple already resides without earning its usual profit margins.

Spotify is spending hundreds of millions to build its podcasting platform concerning the music industry.

Now the record labels are jumping in.

Two just launched podcasting deals.

Radio can’t seem to profit from this nascent business.

What do the record labels know that radio doesn’t?

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The Westwood One Dilemma

Lew Dickey didn’t spend $260 million for Westwood One only to see it wither away like this.

Mary Berner all but announced everything is for sale at Cumulus publicly (except Dallas) but she artfully stayed away from commenting on the big elephant in the room – their underperforming radio network.

No statement of support and continued ownership.

No growth plans other than previously mentioned podcasting rep deals.

No sale sign.

Yet Westwood One has two big insurmountable problems begging the question – what are the Cumulus lenders currently overseeing the company going to do with Westwood One.

Are there any interested buyers remaining?

Why is their profit shrinking faster than anticipated?

Is there a plan for shedding Westwood One entirely in a breakup?

The mixed signals as described by those behind the scenes.

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Entercom & Cumulus Outsourcing

Radio is fast adopting outsourcing as a business model.

Nothing is sacred. 

The newsroom at Entercom’s 1010 WINS for example is an expense so great that Entercom is urgently looking for ways to cut the head count down.

But now, faced with the inability to grow revenue, control costs and post a real profit that isn’t adjusted to look good, Entercom and Cumulus are ready to adopt new ways to run radio stations as if they were SiriusXM.

How programming, management and sales will be affected at these two radio groups.

Cumulus and Entercom both have ambitious outsourcing plans.

The time frame is aggressive.

Ignoring the risks they are fully aware of – one group has actually tried outsourcing experimentally and it didn’t work – how they are going through with it anyway.

The body count – first real numbers on just how many jobs will be lost in just one job description by year’s end.

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Should Radio Be Rebranded Audio

Bob Pittman’s first post-bankruptcy news release did not have the word radio in it one time in spite of the fact that terrestrial radio delivers the lion’s share of iHeartMedia’s total revenue.

Even more so since iHeart split Clear Channel Outdoor from the media platform.

Entercom’s two favorite words are Radio.com and audio presenting a somewhat split message.

And iHeart and Entercom plan to appear together to promote audio to the trade as the amazing platform of the future as a united industry searches for ways to brush away the tarnish they, among others, inflicted on radio through vicious cost cutting.

Podcasting is audio and iHeart has spent $100 million while still in bankruptcy staking out a bulkhead – perhaps that’s a clue.

But is radio right to be rebranding terrestrial radio as audio?

What are the advantages that these radio groups seek other than the obvious one?

Is there a downside risk?

And, there is a better way.

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Summit Media as a Potential Buyer

Radio buyers are hard to find these days.

Prices are going down but have yet to bottom out.

And lenders are vanishing – not high on financing radio acquisitions.

There’s EMF, Meruelo and then not too many more potential buyers available right now.

One potential buyer is Carl Parmer’s Summit Media, the company that originally bought a handful of smaller Cox market spinoffs and has been building from there.

With station prices going down, is Summit a player ready to pounce?

And what markets would they be interested in?

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The Projected Effect of Podcasting on Radio Listening

iHeart has spent over $100 million lately to enhance its podcasting efforts.

Cumulus while spending virtually nothing is using podcasting as its savior from poor spot revenue results.

Entercom – check, podcasting spoken there, too.

Meanwhile Spotify, one of the giant music streaming services along with Apple, invested over $400 million of late – with more to come – to make podcasting a co-equal with music much to the chagrin of record labels.

The questions are – can a radio company compete with mega apps that have such dominance?

And what about the law of unintended consequences?

In other words, do we have first clear look around the corner at how podcasting will affect radio’s main terrestrial business?

Does it cause radio listening declines?

Will podcasting help or hurt music streamers and radio?

What will be the effect on younger audiences?

Is it smart to promote podcasting as much as radio does?

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The Cumulus Leftovers

Mary Berner recently sold over $100 million in prime major market radio properties to Educational Media Foundation (EMF), more to others and traded stations and/or clusters to Connoisseur and Entercom in a desperate attempt to raise money.

She settled for EMF pricing – the bottom feeders of station buyers.

And she had to give up former cash cows like Bridgeport, CT cluster because to be blunt, they fired the manager with all the know-how and revenues tanked.

The new Cumulus board may have forced Berner to start selling assets to make them more whole but the rushed way in which it was done leaves them with orphan stations, a dinged Westwood One network and AM stations they seemingly can’t give away.

What they did wrong to be left holding so many unsellable properties.

The options going forward for selling additional stations.

What Cumulus will have to do to repair the damage done to Westwood One in unloading major market stations.

And, what’s not for sale.

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Entercom’s Cost Cutting

iHeart and Cumulus may have had no choice but to resort to bankruptcy, but Entercom is flirting with even more danger than these two competitors.

The CBS Radio merger that David Field wanted to do so badly that he allowed CEO Les Moonves to dump $1.5 billion of debt on the company before he sold it has not gone well.

It’s more than mismanagement and firing the wrong CBS executives, it’s deeper.

Quarter by quarter Entercom promises a turnaround and even using “adjusted” accounting procedures, they can’t deliver causing their stock to suffer.

What was worth over $16 a share before the merger, is now in the $6 range and slips to $5 and change regularly.

Now, there is only one way to survive the last three quarters of the year and it is to slash expenses.

The cuts will come from three format groups and are likely to target all job categories but one in particular.

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iHeart’s New Beginning

With the court’s blessing iHeart Media has emerged from bankruptcy and reduced their debt from $16 billion to a much lower number -- $5.75 billion.

iHeart says it’s back to business as usual but what does that look like after bankruptcy?

Will they now be able to service the $5.75 billion in debt at unfavorable interest rates in a declining ad market for radio?

iHeart split Clear Channel Outdoor and the radio division and that comes with new pros and cons.

The real question is, is the focus back to terrestrial radio?

How do they service even reduced debt when it is so high?

And is a buyer ready to move in and take over?

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Entercom Programming Cutbacks

No announcements have been made.

The radio trade press is in the dark.

Entercom is at work retooling its radio stations.

This is the same Entercom that less than two weeks ago was bragging to investors and lenders that they are growing by leaps and bounds.

Turns out David Field is running out of ways to cut costs.

The new retooling plan targets certain types of Entercom stations.

Evidence of how desperate Entercom is to save money as actual revenue falls short.

Those who are being targeted have the one thing in common.

And there is already a pattern of where these layoffs can be expected right down to the specific daypart.

Read the full article now

The Increased Agency Commission Sham

Several years ago, iHeart began searching for ways to annihilate their local competitors by drastically dropping rates and generously upping commissions.

It was a nuisance that competitors had to suffer.

Now, Entercom has gone all in with iHeart in a “price fixing monopoly” of sorts unlike anything ever seen before.

The price is not fixed by agreement, it’s fixed by greedy competition to drive radio rates down at all costs until one of the two predator radio groups is left standing and any third parties are effectively kept out of major buys.

How are they able to do this – burned market managers know exactly.

Why increased agency commission is becoming the new “trade”.

The three buying services leading the race to the bottom.

More shocking is what these three buying services do with the extra commissions that are the highest ever offered.

The actual year to year metrics that show the disastrous downward effect rate dropping is having on radio comparing big advertisers such as USAA and Cox.

What radio operators not named iHeart and Entercom are doing to push back.

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Mike McVay’s Cumulus Exit

Mike McVay is gone.

And the decision to cut him loose says more about the new direction of Cumulus than it does about McVay.

McVay was hired by the previous regime hated by current CEO Mary Berner.

She stuck with him until no matter what happened because if there is one thing about Mary Berner, she protects her small but compliant management team.

So, beyond the corporate spin, what made McVay fall on his sword at this late date?

Does this mean that market managers can have renewed hope that regional VPs Bob Walker and Dave Milner will be next?

How is the removal of McVay and the uncertainty of Cumulus management related to their future plans?

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Entercom’s True Financials

Last week Entercom told analysts reporting on the first quarter 2019 revenue that the company grew revenue by 43%.

Did it?  

Some Wall Street people are beginning to ask the question how is Entercom doing as good as David Field claims when their stock is hovering so close to a mere $4 a share, the acknowledged breaking point.

So, we took the un-doctored 10k filing Entercom is required to produce as a public company and we asked financial experts with high level radio experience to dig into the legal figures that Entercom cannot parse in search of the true numbers.

Is David Field telling big little lies about the merged company with CBS Radio?

How much cutting back did Entercom really do and at what level are further cost synergies accurately projected going forward.

What about cash flow – this is the true measure of a radio company’s viability – how does Entercom do on that?

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Larry Wilson Eyes a New Radio Group

Here’s a man in his 70’s who is not running for president but can’t seem to give up his addiction for radio.

He built and sold Citadel for a profit.

Turned that into some seed money for Alpha which he planned to cash in on an IPO just when radio was falling out of favor with Wall Street.

Wilson was ousted from Alpha by Paul Stone, something you may want to remember as Larry reportedly wants back in with yet another group.

Not Alpha – could his new company be called Beta?

What Wilson sees that others don’t in buying radio now.

Wilson wrote an email to 141 of his closest friends – what’s in it.

Who is ready to back Larry Wilson – and you’ll need to take a seat for this one.

Read the full article now

Entercom’s Hidden Problems

Entercom is a company selling false narratives.

EBITDA up 42% -- but it’s not real EBITDA, it’s adjusted to make it look like growth.

Revenue barely up in the first quarter.

What happened to David Field’s promised cost synergies?

What’s Entercom’s real EBITDA using generally accepted accounting principles?

Meanwhile, there are new revelations about Entercom.

Why is it a risky investment?

How the future of the company is uncertain.

And what’s the real truth about Entercom’s financial problems.

Read the full article now

Alpha’s Growing Desperation

So, when last we visited Alpha Paul Stone had made a modest investment in the cash starved Alpha Media and wrestled control from founder and then CEO Larry Wilson.

Today, Stone is calling the shots.

But things are growing more desperate.

What is Stone’s plan to turnaround Alpha now?

Big decisions coming soon.

The “Cumulus” option.

What brokers are peddling now.

Read the full article now

Cumulus Board Split Over Berner

Coming up on one year out of bankruptcy and CEO Mary Berner is presiding over a Cumulus board unsure of what to do next, her own future in doubt.

The company’s bankruptcy court valued Cumulus at $1.3 billion for the purpose of giving haircuts to lenders and other aggrieved parties.

That $1.3 billion is about even with the company’s revenues on a good day.

That means, Cumulus is presently worth nothing.

There is an explanation for the sale of great FM stations in New York, LA and DC along with a strategy to trade stations at this late date.

But there is a shocking strategy going forward if some board members get their way.

What will Cumulus sell next?

What’s the plan for making the company work and revenue grow without the major stations that they recently sold?

The real problems inside Westwood One, the only part of Cumulus that posts a modest profit and there are many.

And how critical is the split over Berner’s game plan?

Read the full article now

Outrageous New Nielsen Rates Coming

Nielsen is getting ready to reveal substantial rate increases to its radio clients even as they fight their own financial problems and feed rumors of a sale.

Radio stations would be devasted by these increases which have leaked to our sources as Nielsen ratings is one of the major expenses radio groups can’t easily get out from under.

But it may be even worse than that.

Just how substantial are the planned rate increases – still not revealed to clients.

Are they retroactive under existing contracts or will they be for future deals?

What about diary markets where continuous measurement is the plan?

And what are the 3 likely take it or leave it options for owners who can’t afford the rate hike?

Read the full article now

Streaming Crisis Ahead

The record industry is booming right now and radio isn’t.

Network television is on the decline and what audience is left is out of demo.

Everything is about to be disrupted again.

Trouble ahead for the music industry and they can’t see it coming.

And even as TV is being redefined, the streaming pay model is showing signs of stress.

What corporate takeover could shipwreck the record industry?

What are the concerns about streaming music services?

Can radio survive performance rights fees?

The replacement for network TV coming soon.

Read the full article now

Why Radio No Longer Breaks the Hits

Increasingly, new artists are rising to prominence and new songs and albums are climbing the charts with little to no radio airplay.

Deniers in the radio industry have a lot of excuses but little understanding of the dangerous dynamic that threatens music radio more than anything else.

In the past few weeks and in recent months radio has flubbed opportunities to drive hit music to the top of the charts – after all, that’s what radio used to do, right?

What has changed now?

Why aren’t radio groups learning from their mistakes?  Just in the past two weeks, another artist lit up the music charts without radio airplay.

Is this a fixable problem or another unfortunate circumstance?

One thing more than any other is forcing program directors to cede breaking new hits to streaming music services like Spotify and Apple Music.

Read the full article now

Entercom’s Freefall

If you owned Entercom stock three years ago and held it today through the botched CBS Radio merger, your investment would be down 42%.

More recent news is just as bad.

Shares have been rebounding a little over the past month up 6.5% after a year of sustained underperformance.

Still Entercom is down 39.4% over the past 12 months.

What’s wrong with Entercom – how can it be this bad?

David Field’s broken promise that spooked money people.

What keeps investors up at night about the future of Entercom.

And what’s this insider buying the Field family does to boost the price up a few cents.

What are these rumbling of bankruptcy and when.

Read the full article now

Townsquare Turnaround

Townsquare has been the radio industry joke since it came up with the idea of buying micro-small radio markets, using station help to generate digital content and enter the events business.

The events business fell on hard times and Townsquare sold it for what they could get.

Previously, they tried to sell the entire company and got no takers.

They fired their founder, appointed co-CEOs for a year (a strategy that only troubled companies embrace) and finally gave up.

The giving up part turned out to be the unexpected consequence that could be a model for other stations feeling the advertising downturn.

Why is Townsquare’s future looking up?

If no one wants to buy them at any price, why are they rebounding today?

What is Townsquare doing to successfully operate in a depressed radio market?

A tough question is – will anybody buy them now? 

Read the full article now

The Cumulus Exit

Cumulus is fast becoming Townsquare but without a digital strategy.

That’s awful to say but, really, it’s true.

Cumulus is selling off major market assets to get whatever it can to placate lenders who have already taken a haircut in bankruptcy.

Going forward, the future is not as predictable because there is a belief that even the people running Cumulus – and that includes the new board of directors representing the aggrieved lenders – are not sure what move to make next.

What about the option to sell more of their best revenue producing stations.

What happens to the overall company now that it has lost significant cash flow.

Then there is the problem of losing key people before they are ready to.

Why are they suddenly trading smaller markets while giving away major market class B FMs?

Which option is implemented next.

Read the full article now

Entercom’s Next Round of Operational Changes

David Field spent money recently for the advice of Bain Capital on how to run Entercom.

Never mind that Bain is the genius behind iHeart’s $20 billion bankruptcy.

And a main investor in Nielsen the singlehandedly most controversial way to measure real radio audiences.

What’s in the works starting soon.

Now that David has had a few weeks to digest the gist of the Bain recommendations, he’s ready to implement them and both legacy Entercom and newly-purchased CBS Radio have plenty of reasons to be concerned.

Whose jobs will not be safe under the Bain recommendations -- six job descriptions will either be virtually eliminated or drastically cut back and when it will take place.

What functions will not be affected at Entercom even after enacting Bain’s suggestions.

Bain’s recommendations on employee compensation. 

And talent fees.

Read the full article now

Beasley’s Dominance over Entercom

Entercom is supposed to be the big kahuna in sports having inherited many CBS Radio brands.

But Beasley looks like they have Entercom’s number.

The CBS sports professionals are gone from Entercom and the David Field of Dreams is now the strategy that replaced sports talk.

Suddenly, Beasley is doing things that are not just beating Entercom.

How Beasley is using the old CBS sports playbook against Entercom, the company that bought the CBS stations.

The mixed news on sports programming that makes money but drives listeners away in droves.

Just when Entercom and Beasley are betting their futures on sports, everything just changed again.

Read the full article now

Entercom Salesforce Public Shaming

There is no doubt that David Field and his top cadre are feeling pressure from the failed CBS merger and the inability to build shareholder equity for their stock.

Now it appears the pressure is being applied to local station management where itis beingredirected to employees who are performing at a high level – just not high enough to bail out top management.

How Entercom has devolved to shaming their employees.

The way they do it --- to the horror of other employees who look on in fear.

Why this could be the template for other stations.

And why Entercom is only targeting CBS stations.

Read the full article now

The 2nd Cumulus Selloff Including KLOS

Cumulus is apparently willing to weaken its competitive position by selling more radio stations to pay down debt holders.

Usually radio groups do this to keep the wolf away from the door.

In the case of Cumulus, the wolf is already in the company (lenders in ill-humor) which is why they are selling off assets that would be critical to continue operation.

The $100 million raised from selling stations to Educational Media Foundation was just the beginning.

What does the 2nd piece of the Cumulus selloff look like?

Will KLOS will be sold in round two?

What’s up with the previously scheduled “reunion” of Mark & Brain.

Has Cumulus found a buyer for standalone AM stations they no longer need such as KABC and WABC?

Westwood One’s fate.

Read the full article now

Streaming Music Services Confronting Radio

Streaming music services are killing radio.

Playlists are preferred over radio formats.

And it’s getting worse.

Just 39% of 16-19-year old’s listen to music radio, while 56% use YouTube instead for music.

But wait.

Lew Dickey bought a streaming music company Akazoo which focuses on emerging markets and yet he still wants to own radio stations. 

How does he square that?

What’s the new role for modern radio?

Is it even worth doing radio formats for Gen Z or younger Millennials given their unavailability?

And can the connected car and smart speakers help radio defend against streaming music services?

Read the full article now

Plans for a Second Alpha Media

Financially-troubled Alpha Media is in the hands of investor Paul Stone and he is selling whatever he can apparently without regard to whether his surviving radio group needs the billing to remain a going concern.

Stone is experienced.

Has done this sell-off routine before and he always comes out ahead.

Now, there are plans afoot – not by Stone this time – to build another Alpha-type radio group.

Will it be local and live?

What markets is this entrepreneur scouting.

A buyer when no one other than EMF is buying stations.

Who is this masked man and what’s his plan?

Read the full article now

Voltair/CBET PPM Enhancements Backfire

Voltair and then CBET were designed to improve radio listenership.

Their technology essentially presents a “louder” encoded signal that more accurately records radio listening on Nielsen portable people meter devices eliminating drop outs that can occur with certain formats like spoken word or some music formats.

After a period of denial, Nielsen introduced CBET and the radio industry has been rolling along getting credit for the listening it earned.

Or is it?

Why a new analysis indicates further problems with both Voltair and CBET technology.

How these problems could upend the ratings stations and radio groups thought they had.

What the evidence is – and it’s dramatic.

And where that leaves over 1,000 stations that until now thought they were doing themselves a favor by applying Voltair and CBET.

Read the full article now

Bye-Bye CBS All-News All the Time

You give David Field 22 minutes and he’ll give you a world of things that are wrong with CBS Radio.

Field has apparent resentment for CBS people and the very stations he bought.

He’s already fired lots of CBS managers, employees, talent – even people critical to his future success.

Now, Entercom is turning its attention to undoing what CBS Radio has succeeded in doing on the air.

How Entercom has begun tinkering with iconic CBS stations.

On-air changes that lay an egg and defy reason.

Read the full article now

Nationwide iHeart Downsizing Begins

Rumors started flying last week.

Now, it has been confirmed.

Wide-ranging iHeart downsizing of on-air talent that promises to further degrade the on-air product has begun.

Which format is being targeted?

What’s reportedly in the lengthy corporate emails describing these firings.

Why it is likely to be the first step not the last to cut costs.

And why even the survivors are going to fear that a sharp knife is coming.

Read the full article now

New Breeze Soft AC Format Intel

Nothing is hotter than soft oldies. 

And nothing is worrying program directors more than the crosswinds that are developing.

The soft AC format aka “The Breeze” has been adopted in numerous markets looking to flank a hot AC competitor and erode their ratings.

New intel shows for the first time how “The Breeze” is rearranging station ratings.

Consistent proof from several PPM markets where soft AC has been in place for at least six months.

Is soft AC the right move going forward based on evidence?

Do we know the weaknesses so they can be addressed?

Who is winning in markets where “The Breeze” and soft ACs are doing battle.

Some observations from 3 PPM markets …

Read the full article now

The iHeart IPO

With iHeart, it’s all about changing the subject.

Bob Pittman’s much-touted multimedia platform that collapsed into bankruptcy was designed to take your eyes off of their $20 billion in debt.

Podcasting is promised as the future moneymaker to make up for slipping spot revenue  but it has never produced cash positive results for anyone.

“All Podcasting All the Time” stations were supposed to show iHeart putting their stations where their mouth is except they put it on only 1 out of 848 stations – in iHeart’s Allentown market on an AM station guaranteed not to attract the money demo, but still – it changes the subject from the poor job iHeart has done of managing lenders and shareholders money.

Now, they’re back selling radio like this -- “Consumers listen to the radio because the voice on the other side sounds like a friend” – their actual words in its filing from the company that brought you layoffs, voice tracking and less live and local. 

All this begs the question what kind of investor would support an IPO for a sinking ship in stormy waters?

No radio group has been able to do an IPO for years, why does iHeart think they can?

What happened to Apple and Liberty – often mentioned as wishing to takeover a terrestrial radio company.

How will iHeart stations be managed and operated if this IPO is successful.

And what if it’s not?

Read the full article now

The Decline of Average Quarter Hour

Nielsen doesn’t like to release numbers that are not favorable to its radio clients.

But a stealth look into forbidden PPM figures indicates trouble.

Not just a decline in average quarter hour.

Worse – far worse.

And now it can be documented and explained with evidence you’re not supposed to see. 

How can 250 million people a week be listening to radio for so little time.

Who is ramping up to take advantage of this?

How do you stop the decline of AQH?

Read the full article now

FCC Investigating Entercom

Lawyers are involved.

There appears to be a lot of fast talk but the last thing Entercom needs is to pull out a gun and shoot itself in the foot again.

The stock is 39 cents shy of the $4 range – unthinkable when the CBS merger was announced and Entercom stock was flying high at $16.

Investors are concerned with impairment charges that Entercom is writing off to reflect the new, lower valuation of its assets.

And a fear that more impairment charges are coming as Entercom fails to put its CBS merger on track and is stifled by the same revenue decline that has affected other radio groups.

Now there is this new development …

  • How the FCC caught Entercom red-handed.
  • Entercom’s shocking defense.
  • How a disgruntled CBS employee may have dropped a dime to turn them in. 
  • The offense was bogus until the FCC sniffed around and found something else. 

Read the full article

The Cumulus Ratings Collapse

  • Mary Berner says Cumulus is turning around.
  • She’s on a victory lap based on financials and ratings.
  • Investors are now questioning their ratings performance.
  • Leaked documents about their top ten markets.
  • Blunders, missed opportunities, flat out incompetence documented.
  • And in the one market where Cumulus hit it out of the park, they did the unthinkable to ruin it all making investors nervous.
  • Is it finally Mike McVay’s fault?
  • What’s the plan -- investors are now “woke” for answers.

Read the full article

Why So Many Bidders Want Universal Music

  • A handful of new, powerful buyers have emerged in addition to Liberty Media – the rundown.
  • Why so much interest in owning one of the big 3 record labels.
  • How radio could be disrupted and upended if some buyers on the list above control some or all of Universal.
  • What happens to the media business if a cellular carrier buys Universal.

Read the full article now

The Glut of Radio Stations for Sale

Among brokers, the word is that almost every radio station is for sale.

That’s an over exaggeration, but it points to the desperate situation facing owners of radio stations.

The question is:  with few buyers and an industry that has been trending downward in revenue, what happens if owners who have to sell can’t find a buyer?

  • Panicked sellers can’t find buyers – here’s their 3 other options.
  • Why so many station owners want out so badly.
  • Prices are going down and still no buyers – what’s up with that?
  • No sale, no problem – look at the radio station of the future if owners have to keep them.
  • The one way sellers can find a buyer this minute – today – without lowering their prices – so why are they refusing.

Read the full article

Radio’s Hip-Hop Problem

  • Radio is losing young audiences at a record pace because of music playlist mistakes – here’s a station that figured out and huge ratings followed.
  • Spotify and Apple Music are today’s radio to younger audiences – the secret sauce to their music playlists.
  • 22 million people subscribe to a Spotify playlist that features today’s hit music – here’s how many subscribe to the most popular hip-hop playlist.
  • Examples of how to play more hip-hop to attract more 18-34’s – and what to avoid.
  • Can pop coexist with hip-hop on a station that intends to be number one 18-34.

Read the full article

Entercom’s Stock Apocalypse

Analysts may be starting to see things my way as it relates to Entercom.

Their stock price has been sinking from a $16 high before the CBS Radio acquisition to within a quarter from being a $4 stock as of close yesterday.

And that means institutional buyers may either be forbidden from investing in “ETM” by their own rules or because they have increasing concern.

Either way the CBS merger is appearing to be the bust we called it from outset and evidence of incompetence are everywhere around the company’s attempt to clean up their mess.

  • Even Wall Street is starting to turn on Entercom – their reasons, concerns, eye-popping quotes.
  • What one thing that almost nobody in radio can name is worrying the financial community the most about Entercom.
  • Previously untold details of how Entercom staves off the dumping of their stock – and it’s all legal if not deceiving.
  • Surprising doubts percolating from fans of David Field concerning Entercom’s growth plan.
  • Real concerns about the all-news stations Entercom bought from CBS Radio – identified and analyzed.

Read the full article

Compare monthly vs. annual subscriptions here

Report news in confidence here.

Jerry will appear with Lew & John Dickey together on stage at the 2019 Conclave in Minneapolis June 20thin a deadly honest conversation about Cumulus and the future of the radio focusing on growth opportunities for radio people in the new modern media.  Details here.

Fact Checking the Cumulus Turnaround Claim

Proud Mary is back to playing her A game.

Claiming that she has turned Cumulus around but the assertion appears to have no relationship to the facts according to people familiar with the internal workings of Cumulus.

The truth is – Cumulus is not a turnaround, it is a very troubled company.

Just because Mary Berner says it is so does not make it so and that is backed up by facts.

The happy talk radio trade press fell for Cumulus proclaiming a “victory lap” although the facts suggest a weakened company that is misleading the public as to the seriousness of their situation.  

Here are the facts from financial people close to Cumulus based on their recently filed 10-K.

  • How financial experts close to Cumulus debunk dubious company claims of a financial turnaround.
  • Cumulus says revenue is up – here are the real results with specific figures.
  • What is the truth about Cumulus’ cash flow based on correct numbers.
  • How bad is their debt – a critical indicator of future performance is revealed.
  • What to watch to predict more station and asset sales like the ones to EMF for quick cash and low return.

Read the full article 

Compare monthly vs. annual subscriptions here

Report news in confidence here.

Jerry will appear with Lew & John Dickey together on stage at the 2019 Conclave in Minneapolis June 20thin a deadly honest conversation about Cumulus and the future of the radio focusing on growth opportunities for radio people in the new modern media.  Details here.

iHeart’s All-Podcasting Station

  • Will iHeart’s all-podcasting station get ratings and generate revenue?
  • The one fatal flaw that could shut this new station down fast.
  • Which radio stations/groups should be considering a similar all-podcasting station for their markets?
  • Is it time to jump in or wait?
  • What will work and what will not in a radio podcast format.

Read the full article

Compare monthly vs annual subscriptions here.

Report news in confidence here.

Lew & John Dickey and I will be together on stage at the 2019 Conclave in Minneapolis June 20th in a wide ranging and deadly honest conversation about what happened at Cumulus and where the future of the radio industry is – obviously, it’s not working for companies that can’t fire people fast enough.  We will talk about growth opportunities for radio people in the new modern media.  Details here.

Radio’s Horniest Buyers

There’s EMF and then who?

EMF’s vast religious broadcasting empire is buying up great radio properties these days for low, low prices because so many stations are for sale.

Brokers list 7 radio groups as potential solid buyers even as radio revenue declines.

The current multiple times cash flow that will be used to price the stations is different.

And it’s interesting that timing is everything but especially in buying or selling a radio station – that “sweet spot” has recently changed, too.

  • There are 7 buyers for radio who are hot to own more stations (not counting Lew Dickey) – here are their chances to expand.
  • The radio group that will pick around the edges and the one loaded with cash that’s under the radar.
  • Why the majority of sellers can’t take even a good offer these days.
  • The up-to-the-minute going multiples for radio acquisitions according to financial experts – broken down into small, medium and major markets.
  • The $103.5 million Cumulus/EMF giveaway – is that the new normal?

Read the full article

Compare monthly vs. annual subscriptions here

Report news in confidence here.

Only Lori Lewis could make this happen -- Lew & John Dickey and I will be together on stage at the 2019 Conclave in Minneapolis June 20thin a wide ranging and deadly honest conversation about what happened at Cumulus and where the future of the radio industry is – obviously, it’s not working for companies that can’t fire people fast enough.  We will talk about growth opportunities for radio people in the new modern media.  Details here.

The Untold Story of the Cumulus/EMF Sale

I thought Cumulus was between a rock and a hard place.

The “victory lap” and turnaround that they are selling this week is far from that.  In fact, Cumulus is still in a precarious position unless it gets to choose its own facts.

That they were forced to sell iconic WPLJ-FM, New York and other major market properties to EMF for a lot less than they were worth is not the win-win they are trying to sell the public. 

Who calls selling major market stations a win-win when you essentially vacate a market?

After all, they must have needed the money to remain as a going concern.

Cumulus sold those valuable assets for virtually nothing not to keep operating or investing in future businesses as they tried to spin it to the public.

You could almost forgive and understand that.

Mary could now use the proceeds to fund her wall – I mean, her podcasting business.

But it’s worse.

Is Mary Berner even still calling the shots?

Remember this name – Paul Stone. 

Where is the $103.5 million EMF check really going?

Are more Cumulus stations being readied for sale?

Read the full article now

Entercom Labor Troubles

  • Here is the employee lawsuit that David Field should fear the most – and it’s being considered.
  • Details on a disturbing firing allegedly designed to get the union’s attention.
  • How Entercom is trying to pushback unions in 50 markets.
  • How the feared “messing” with his moneymaking all-news stations has begun.
  • What radical severance cuts Entercom is trying to impose.
  • What about digital?
  • Union fears on outsourcing revealed.

Read the full article now

Compare monthly vs annual subscriptions here

Report news in confidence here.

Lew & John Dickey and I will be together on stage at the 2019 Conclave in Minneapolis June 20thin a wide ranging and deadly honest conversation about what happened at Cumulus and where the future of the radio industry is – obviously, it’s not working for companies that can’t fire people fast enough.  We will talk about growth opportunities for radio people in the new modern media.  Details here.

The Westwood One Sale Attempt Revealed

  • There is an offer on the table right now involving Westwood One – here are the details.
  • Westwood parent Cumulus reportedly wants to sell -- what they want in return.
  • Why one prospective buyer is now going over Mary Berner’s head to get the deal done.
  • How many other Westwood One buyers are making their move.
  • How Westwood has started to consolidate operations detailed – first word on offices to be closed.

Read the full article 

Compare monthly vs annual subscriptions here

Report news in confidence here.

Lew & John Dickey and I will be together on stage at the 2019 Conclave in Minneapolis June 20thin a wide ranging and deadly honest conversation about what happened at Cumulus and where the future of the radio industry is – obviously, it’s not working for companies that can’t fire people fast enough.  We will talk about growth opportunities for radio people in the new modern media.  Details here.

Spotify & Apple vs. Radio for Hitmaking

At the end of 2018 there were 278 million paid subscribers to streaming services according to The MIDIA Research Global Music Forecasts.

And many more users who listen through free ad-supported options.

Nielsen says free terrestrial radio reaches 270 million people per week.

The radio industry claims radio is the number one source for music discovery although anyone with children or who work with Millennials will have a hard time with that claim.

We hear a lot about that special relationship between radio and the record labels being over now in the era of streaming music services such as but not limited to Spotify and Apple.

So, the question is – which is more critical for breaking new hits?

Radio?

Or streaming music services and playlists?

Now we have the answer based on data including every song that broke either the top 50 on Spotify or radio according to Billboard dating back to the week of December 29, 2016.

  • How many weeks does it take radio compared to Spotify to break a new hit record – the evidence is in.
  • What curated playlists mean to Spotify and streaming music services and how they work.
  • Does a song last longer on radio or Spotify?
  • Does radio work simultaneously with Spotify or separate from it in exposing hits?
  • Which genre gets the fastest traction when exposed to today’s hitmaking process.
  • What is the main new role of radio airplay?

Read the full article now

How the Internet Impacts Radio Time Spent Listening

Lori Lewis and Chadd Callahan’s outstanding annual collaboration “This Is What Happens In An Internet Minute” gives an accurate and sobering snapshot of how we – and our audiences – live in the digital world.

Interestingly, Nielsen either doesn’t have or will not release radio listening statistics to offer a comparison.

There are trends that are important – some of them startling:

  • The state of concerns about privacy based on actual metrics.
  • Is Facebook fading?
  • The first real read on Stories, the Instagram feature that owner Facebook bet heavily on in which users can easily produce their own content.
  • Paid subscriptions for video, audio and music – how does this vie for consumer attention.
  • The relationship between consumers and their smart devices.
  • Attitudes about bots and building stronger relationships with our friends.

Radio used to compete with TV and maybe one or two other mediums. 

Here’s what the competition for attention looks like every 60 seconds in the era of social media and mobile connectivity.

Read the full article now

SiriusXM’s Aggressive Expansion Plans

In the early 90’s – just ahead of consolidation – radio executives were suspicious of the two satellite radio monopolies authorized by the feds.

They thought pay radio with a no-commercial option could really hurt them.

It tuned out they were worried about the wrong thing.

Sirius merged with XM and somehow CEO Mel Karmazin talked the DOJ into believing that this wasn’t a monopoly and Liberty rescued Mel just before they showed him the door.

Satellite radio is a good cash flow business that no one under 45 will continue to pay for and they know it.

They have aggressive expansion plans that specifically target terrestrial radio.

  • What are their plans for iHeart?
  • What’s the present status of their move to control iHeart stations? Is it definite?
  • Who will run all the assets?
  • The untold disruption ahead as a satellite company also runs a terrestrial radio group for the first time – some examples.
  • What happens to iHeart’s 850+ stations under SiriusXM – a preview.
  • What other acquisitions is SiriusXM eying?

Read the full article now

The Next Cumulus Markets to be Sold

Not one of my current NYU students knows what WPLJ is.

It is true that they come from a generation that has never been without Napster, music piracy, iTunes, iPods and, of course, streaming.

So, they have no horse in the race that an iconic and technically superior radio signal is being sold off to Educational Media Foundation (EMF) to turn into a religious station.

I still can’t believe Mary Berner went there.

Selling WPLJ, all but eviscerating DC, trading stations with Entercom to cut costs.

Sure doesn’t sound like someone who wants to remain in the radio business.

And now, it appears the Cumulus auction is not finished and other markets may soon become available for purchase.

  • Which 2 markets are thought to be next?
  • Is EMF in the equation or are there other value buyers stepping forward?
  • What is the time frame for the next round of Cumulus station sales?
  • Why one of these markets will be a tough call because it is a cash cow that helps revenue but can get them a big payday – weighing the factors.
  • Are they done selling super signals like WPLJ – in other words, was PLJ a one-off?

Read the full article now

Westwood One Bombshell

Since Cumulus, owner of syndicator/network Westwood One went into bankruptcy rumors have surfaced that Westwood One is for sale.

It appears any attempt to sell Westwood One fell short of a decent offer so the company plunders on with an asset some believe they would rather monetize for their lenders by selling.

And yet it appears something major is up with Westwood One.

If not a sale – say to Entercom which would just about kill their stock price if they even tried – then what? 

  • The most likely solution that would leave affiliate stations in a quandary. 
  • A sale – not to the likely buyer Entercom, but to this company that is not on anyone’s radar.
  • Why keeping Westwood One is becoming untenable for Cumulus.
  • Where podcasting fits into the Cumulus Westwood One strategy. 
  • Why a frontal attack by this interested party could terminally drive what’s left of Westwood One’s value down. 

Read the full article now

Entercom’s Real Revenue Revealed

Now we know why David Field is letting analysts carry Entercom’s water on adjusted EBITDA and “assumed” synergies.

The real adjusted numbers belie reality which suggests that Entercom has already begun what could be a long spiral down.

Digging in to the reported numbers, actual performance of Entercom/CBS Radio is headed the wrong way and it suggests that lots of changes are coming or else this merger experiment is as good as over.

The market has been suspicious of the merger from almost day one as the reasons are becoming more apparent.

  • How the massive Entercom salary and expense cutbacks are factoring in to overall revenue using real numbers they reported.
  • Projection of real revenue for 2019 compared to the past few years.
  • How analysts fears about Entercom have come true.
  • The most pressing problem that Entercom must address quickly.
  • Will current levels of station operating expenses be retained or will there be reductions?

Read the full article now

Cumulus Financials Unpacked

Mary Berner is just like the other radio CEOs when it comes to putting lipstick on a pig.

She just does it with more enthusiasm.

The happy talk radio trade press picks up on this combination of carefully selected information and brute optimism without challenge to give Cumulus a pass.

These free passes are based on no specifics, details or quantifiable metrics that a sophisticated public media investor would ever wrap their arms around.

Things are worse there than Berner is letting on.

Revenue problems, EBITDA problems, digital future problems and the evidence is all there for those who know where to look deeper into their Q4 pre-release and investor deck filed in the 8-K.

It turns out to be a lot of half-truths and taking liberty with the numbers.

Here are the real Cumulus numbers unpacked.

  • The real Cumulus revenue figure and how they compare to the adjusted ones Mary Berner is selling.
  • What’s being thrown in to prop Cumulus performance up.
  • It’s right there in the numbers – the specific group of employees who will be taking the brunt of coming expense cuts.
  • What’s the impact of Berner’s podcasting initiative?
  • The expected effects of the sale of WPLJ and watering down major markets on revenue.

Read the full article now.

David Field’s Reboot of Entercom

Have you noticed recently that David Field has muzzled his criticism of CBS Radio and its employees who he acquired through the merger?

Where he seemingly and publicly blamed them for almost everything that went wrong on the assimilation of the two companies, he has now fallen silent.

It’s not an accident.

Entercom is in big trouble missing investors’ expectations, failing to perform up to company estimations and all of this as radio continues to battle declining ad revenue and searching for a solution to the digital puzzle.

It’s not your father’s Entercom anymore.

Or maybe it is – more like founder Joe Field’s company than the grandiose dream of his son, David.

In any case, Field has decided to shake it up and the Entercom that we will see is nothing like the bumbling company that screwed the CBS merger.

  • Will Field give up more control and rely on others to help turn around Entercom?
  • Where’s Weezie – does she keep doing “Where’s Waldo” or does she reemerge and if so, how does she help the reboot?
  • The all-news franchise is in trouble and it was one-third of CBS’s revenue, who comes in to straighten that out?
  • The SAG-AFTRA pissing match – the new David Field.
  • What new initiatives are coming to pick up lagging revenue?
  • The list of what gets rebooted – and what does not.

Read the full article now

The Cox Radio Apollo Acquisition

We know that Cox Media Group is selling off its TV division to the private equity firm Apollo Global Management. 

This includes 13 Cox television stations, a radio cluster in Dayton along with some publishing assets.

No so fast with the rumor that private equity firm Apollo will also roll up the remaining radio stations which are an integral part of TV and publishing.

There are other interested buyers. 

We also know Cox will not solely retain the radio assets so they are on the move, but because Cox is a well-run media company albeit in a declining media industry, there are some breathtaking possibilities beyond the obvious.

  • Some really good buyers don’t have a chance in hell, here are a few of them.
  • Cox is keeping a minority interest so they want a deal their way so the question is what is their way?
  • Why Cox Radio is in such demand when Cumulus is out selling off icons like WPLJ and essentially vacating New York and DC among other places they need to be.
  • What it will all come down to – and what’s fascinating is that price has very little to do with it. Here’s what it will take to win the 61 Cox Radio stations.

Read the full article now

The Next 4 Radio Bankruptcies

A few years ago we predicted the Cumulus and iHeart bankruptcies.

Few believed it then.  Pure speculation, they said.  Can’t be. And the companies denied it up and down until the bitter end.

Now we’re back with 4 more radio bankruptcies and the reasons why.

Obviously when these 4 radio groups file, it will have an adverse effect on the struggling radio industry.

  • Who are these 4 groups?
  • Why will they be forced to seek bankruptcy protection?
  • Which one has the best chance of maybe – just maybe, dodging it – but even then, no guarantees.
  • We’re warning you now, some of the names on this list are shockers.
  • The latest intel on each of the 4 companies and why they are headed down.

Read the full article now

Record Labels To Squeeze Radio Events

Headlines …

  • How record labels plan to disrupt radio’s live event business.
  • The 5 radio groups with the most to lose.
  • What the record labels now want from radio and what they are willing to give in return.
  • The new difficulties of using artists for live radio events.
  • Why, of all broadcasters, SiriusXM could be a surprise live event player.

Read the full article now.

The New Radio Business Model

  • The “new” number of spots per hour.
  • Where expenses will be cut beyond what’s happening today.
  • Where does programmatic buying fit in – and does it fit in?
  • Live and local will be replaced by a new approach that begins with a “P” – this is the replacement.
  • What is reverse digital – it’s coming to radio.

Read the full article now.

Entercom Debt Worries

  • How serious are Entercom’s debt problems?
  • What is behind yesterday’s big Entercom stock selloff?
  • Is it time to be concerned about the future of Entercom.
  • How much time does Entercom have to deal with debt (remember, both iHeart & Cumulus denied bankruptcy up to the end)?
  • What they will do to cut expenses further.

Read the full article now.

Google Targeting Radio

  • How Google has plans to go after broadcast radio.
  • How Google aims to amass audio content without paying for it and profiting from day one.
  • Why Apple, Amazon, Facebook/Instagram are likely to follow Google’s lead.
  • What these tech giants see in radio while radio is flirting with podcasting and digital.
  • How radio can stop Google in their tracks by changing its business model – here’s one to consider.

Read the full article now.

Cumulus Asset Sales

  • Here’s what’s up with Westwood One – plus two buyers who could steal the company.
  • Will Cumulus entertain offers for other WPLJ-type properties now that they’ve all but exited major markets New York & DC?
  • Besides religious broadcaster EMF, who are potential buyers for prime Cumulus assets?
  • The surprising answer to what happens to money made from selling iconic radio stations.
  • The surprising market Cumulus would love to sell off major stations.

Read the full article now.

The 9-year span of listeners that could save radio

  • The sweet spot – the next great group of people who are available now to provide great radio audience growth for the next 12 years.
  • How should a station target a super group this narrow?
  • What is the secret to unlocking their passion – it comes down to one word.
  • Does “narrow targeting” involve inventing entirely new formats or making critical adjustments to existing formats?
  • What are some major do’s and don’ts with which to get started.

Read the full article now.

Entercom’s Event Business in Question

  • The “new look” live events business shaping up under Entercom
  • Puzzling revenue numbers, revamping of what’s a live event
  • New practices and policies created largely by non-CBS people
  • How even Taylor Swift lays an egg for Entercom live events
  • Walking away from money – Entercom’s new strategy

Read the full article now.

The Sale of Westwood One

  • Did Cumulus try to sell Westwood One? Is it still trying?
  • What is Westwood now worth without major New York and DC stations to clear spots?
  • What it is likely to take to buy Westwood One at this point.
  • The best buyer for Westwood.
  • What happens to Westwood One should Cumulus enter a second bankruptcy?

Read the full article now.

Cox Radio

  • Now that the TV stations are sold, why selling part or all of Cox’s Radio division could be very complicated.
  • The kind of prices Cox will be seeking?
  • Who might have the greatest interest in Cox Radio?
  • What happens to Kim Guthrie?

Read the full article now.

Cumulus Without Major Markets

  • The effect of the Cumulus selloff on competitors
  • Will more stations be sold
  • What could make Cumulus giveaway WPLJ
  • The fate of WABC-AM
  • The selloff side effects on Westwood One 

Read the full article now.

The Cumulus Motive for Its $100 Million Selloff

How prophetic was Wednesday’s headline – “Cumulus Starting to Panic”?

Several hours after it was published Cumulus announced a $103.5 million sale of WPLJ-FM, New York, WYAY-FM, Atlanta, WRQX-FM, Washington, KFFG-FM, San Jose, WZAT-FM, Savannah and WXTL-FM, Syracuse – all FM stations for pennies on the dollar to the bottom feeder in radio acquisitions Educational Media Foundation (EMF).

And EMF gets towers or leases that will generate an additional $5-7 million in revenue.

Separately, Cumulus did a swap with Entercom in which Cumulus gets three Indianapolis stations in exchange for Nash-FM in New York (Newark, NJ) and two stations in Springfield, MA.

Cumulus CEO Mary Berner said “These transactions are consistent with our portfolio optimization strategy and both deals are accretive,” as her nose grew.

And Entercom CEO David Field apparently crossed his fingers and toes when he said “We are saddened to part ways with our colleagues in Indianapolis, but know that they will be in great hands.”

Huh?

Great hands?

Cumulus is so desperate it is selling off pieces for scrap to give long suffering lenders recovery value. 

How would Field like to work on the Titanic.

You don’t need to be reminded of what the decision to sell major markets means to a radio company.

And nowhere in all this is their reference to the many jobs lost, the lies told, careers ruined all by a CEO who made her employees believe that it was the previous regime that was toxic.

Cumulus in effect announcing it is weakening itself, selling majors and running from the radio business is just the beginning of the story, here are 7 key ramifications no one dares to mention. 

Read the full article now.

Cumulus Starting to Panic

An entirely new way to run the company.

A different approach to handling employees.

A warning that as Berner begins to sweat, sudden and unusual actions will be taken to preserve her job.

Unthinkable changes just a year ago are now back on the table.

And there’s Mike McVay. 

Read the full article now.

Lew Dickey’s Altered Plan for Radio

We know Lew Dickey’s first acquisition for his new company.

Akazoo, the emerging markets music streaming service that has been profitable for the last 7 plus years and is uniquely positioned to take advantage of “glocalism”, the complex business of appealing to local musical tastes.

And we know he’s rumored to be kicking tires at TuneIn, the struggling radio streaming site that is looking for a buyer. TuneIn would easily eclipse Entercom’s Radio.com and include podcasting and music streaming at more favorable music rates.

So, what about radio?

Is Lew Dickey over it or does he have a plan to buy radio stations?

A lot of things have altered plans in recent weeks with Dickey having what every other radio group wants – a real digital platform.

Where is he on wanting what theyhave – a radio group?

Read the full article now.

What’s Wrong with the Grammys

Here we go again.

Did you watch the Grammys? Did it suck? 

Are you pissed that Arianna Grande did not participate or was she right to join the artists who are saying no to showcase performances?

Wasn’t Lady Gaga great?

Does it matter.

The Grammys are a lightning rod for what is right and wrong in the music/media space.

And every picture tells a story if you don’t mind me borrowing a phrase from an album of the glory days --- they were the glory days, right?

An industry that no longer needs radio airplay and is being attacked by at least one of the streaming music services that helped it turn in another profitable year seems to thrive on disruption. 

Read the full article now.

Connected Cars & Smart Speakers

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  1. The car radio is still very much available in today’s autos – so why is radio losing car time to mobile content.
  2. Streaming music playlists are cutting into on-air listening – how does radio fight thousands of playlists some with as many as 8 million listeners a day?
  3. Consumers keep paying for satellite radio in record numbers but few Millennials will pay for it – where does this leave free radio.
  4. AM is being taken out of cars – what are the ramifications for thousands of AM stations that are increasingly excluded from the connected car.
  5. Radio is losing share to popular in-home smart speakers – how to gain it back.

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The Deloitte Radio Study

There are some pretty amazing assertions in this year’s Deloitte media study.

Deloitte is one of the big four accounting organizations and the largest professional services network in the world so it’s not nothing when they pool information and publish reports.

Audiences will soon prefer radio over TV.

And how radio can survive by just being “there”.

And we’re not making this stuff up even though it seems Deloitte is way out on a limb.

But the most fascinating and perhaps revealing aspect of this Big Four accounting group’s state of the media has to do with where djs rank among the top ten reasons to listen to radio.

That’s worth unpacking because as it turns out, this finding actually tells a lot about the future of radio.

And also, the most popular thing about radio today that most people even in radio don’t know.

Read the full article now.

The Increasing Threat of SiriusXM

I have a contentious but glorious relationship with one of my readers, a portfolio manager who just loves everything SiriusXM does.

So, he takes me to task and I dish it right back.

Example of his prose about my critical SiriusXM comments: “You keep saying that and they keep putting up numbers unlike your radio shit crowd. And unlike radio, they are pivoting hard and are really good at digital, marketing, a wide breadth of content, sports etc. I might be old..but you are radio and old! :)”

I’m not used to being accused of being a radio apologist so you can see why this is so intriguing.

I mention my friend because he serves as a great introduction to today’s piece on the increasing influence of his favorite media company.

One scenario is they totally disrupt radio and leave it permanently injured.  And then there’s the other – that SiriusXM and all the media companies it is acquiring collapses under its own weight. 

God knows the “love letter” I’m going to get after this story.

Read the full article now.

Entercom’s Manager Problem

At the time of the merger, David Field was so anxious to offload CBS salaries higher than he was paying any of his Entercom employees that he pushed CBS to start doing it even before the merger officially closed.

Remember?

Andre Fernandez and Scott Herman were pressured to keep Field happy and as it turns out tried to talk David out of blowing things up even more interestingly enough acting like the adults in the room.

Field got his way and when he took over, he had no one to stop him.  Nine qualified and highly compensated CBS managers lined up and fired from the get go. 

Field has another big personnel problem but what he’s planning to do now can no longer be blamed on CBS. 

Read the full article now.

The Sale of TuneIn

  1. It appears one or more radio-related companies may be interested in buying TuneIn streaming music service – here are the potential contenders.
  2. The acquisition of TuneIn could instantly turn one of a handful of radio-only companies around on a dime – here’s why.
  3. SiriusXM just now closed on its acquisition of Pandora, a much larger player than TuneIn – now could SiriusXM be a serious bidder for TuneIn?
  4. Entercom took possession of Radio.com in the CBS merger – are they in for TuneIn?
  5. Doomsday scenario – if this radio buyer winds up with TuneIn it could be lights out for Cumulus’ digital hopes and a total disruption of the radio industry – here’s why that’s a real possibility.

Read the full article now.

Cumulus Valuation Using “Clean” Numbers

To be really honest, no one knows what Cumulus is worth.

In fact, the new board of directors doesn’t even know because their CEO is using adjusted accounting figures (as other failing radio groups are doing) so they can’t see whether Cumulus is coming back strong or whether its insufficiencies are being covered up.

The bankruptcy court assigned a value to Cumulus when it emerged earlier last year and that’s it.

When I ask people familiar with Cumulus and with extensive background running radio companies to cut through the window dressing and get down to a fair value for Cumulus something strange happens.

Here are the clean numbers.

Read the full article now.

The Future of Distressed Radio

Nobody is making money in radio.

Unless you accept the new digital reality, radio’s impressive reach and free cash flow stream will no longer be enough to both pay debt and post significant profits.

Radio stations are becoming distressed properties.

That’s why it seems like almost every station is on the market right now with no buyers and fewer lenders.

Is this the time to buy into radio?

Read the full article now.

Cumulus CEO Search

From the beginning of the Mary Berner regime there has been talk about if it could even be possible that a former publishing executive could turn around Cumulus Media.

She had no radio background and her time at Reader’s Digest was marked by two bankruptcies, one that she initiated and one that the board reluctantly refiled after she failed to turn the publishing giant around.

But Berner has lasted long enough to have her employment contract renewed, bonuses paid even with bankruptcy looming and a generous golden parachute agreed upon should she leave the employment of Cumulus.

And that’s the big question – will Berner stay or will she go?

One radio CEO has been IDed at reportedly pitching it and something appears to be up with the board.

Read the full article now.

Entercom on Hold

If one thing best describes Entercom since its merger with CBS Radio, it is shrinkage.

David Field’s promised EBITDA to Wall Street was and is nowhere near $400 million.

It’s hard to deny that CBS Radio is a mere shadow of its former self.

An estimated $60 million in cutbacks with approximately $40 million is coming.

Shrinkage.

This is starting to feel like an episode of Seinfeld.

Except David Field just blinked.

Read the full article now.

iHeart’s Bankruptcy Secret

I get that Bob Pittman has the credibility of a snake oil salesman.

But employees and anyone investing in or doing business with iHeart going forward are in for a big letdown and financial uncertainty.

Yes, the company is coming out of bankruptcy in a few months but as you’re about to read today all the company spin about a new iHeart is not going to happen.

Turns out Bain and iHeart made a big mistake and they are about to pay for it.

You wouldn’t admit this publicly, either, would you?

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A new subscription also unlocks these full articles …

            Lew Dickey’s New Non-radio Company

            iHeart’s Suitors

            #1 in Billboard with No Radio Airplay

            The Changing Station Buying/Selling Market

            Beasley’s Financial Troubles

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Lew Dickey just bought a little-known digital company. Now his former radio competitors should be concerned.

They have radio burdened with debt. He just bought a digital streamer that has no debt and has made money from day 1.  They need what he’s having.  Does Dickey need radio?

Read more >>

____________________________________________________________________

Fake Local is about to be replaced by personalized radio

Owners are on board with a new type of cost-cutting with a name (personalized radio) that seems as sacred as The Patriot Act.  What are they hiding?

Read more >>

____________________________________________________________________

The end of bankruptcy, the beginning of uncertainty at iHeart

To hear Bob Pittman tell it, they’ve survived bankruptcy and it is back to business as usual in a few more months.  For a guy who frequently enhances the truth, is he telling it this time?

Read more >>

____________________________________________________________________

#1 in Billboard with no radio airplay

This is a bad precedent that caught the radio industry sleeping at the wheel.  Study the way this unknown artist just recently went to the top of the album 200 without airplay or for that matter actual album sales.  Then don’t let it happen again because the record industry is watching.

 Read more >>

____________________________________________________________________

Inside Music Media contains no advertising, accepts no corporate money or consideration and is beholden only to our subscribers who appreciate it so much that they pay for it.

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Subscribers access all stories here.

“Fake Local” is about to be replaced by “personalized” radio. What’s that?

Today’s topics …

“Fake Local” is about to be replaced by “personalized” radio.  What’s that?

The end of bankruptcy, the beginning of uncertainty at iHeart

#1 in Billboard with NO radio airplay – how is this even possible?

Everything is for sale in radio.  So where are the buyers?

The reason John Malone has to have iHeart.  It’s not for radio

Why Wall Street is hating on Beasley

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The end of bankruptcy, the beginning of uncertainty at iHeart

Today’s topics …

The end of bankruptcy, the beginning of uncertainty at iHeart

#1 in Billboard with NO radio airplay – how is this even possible?

Everything is for sale in radio.  So where are the buyers?

The reason John Malone has to have iHeart.  It’s not for radio

Why Wall Street is hating on Beasley

Lew Dickey’s new company has a change of plans

Subscribers access all stories here.

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#1 in Billboard with NO radio airplay – how is this even happening?

Today’s topics …

Everything is for sale in radio. So where are the buyers?

The reason John Malone has to have iHeart.  It’s not for radio

Why Wall Street is hating on Beasley

Lew Dickey’s new company has a change of plans

Liberty wants to add 2 more media mergers to the iHeart takeover

CEOs publicly talk up radio’s future but secretly look to diversify

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Everything is for sale in radio. So where are the buyers?

Today’s topics …

Everything is for sale in radio.  So where are the buyers?

The reason John Malone has to have iHeart.  Its not for the radio

Why Wall Street is hating on Beasley

Lew Dickey’s new company has a change of plans

Liberty wants to add 2 more media mergers to the iHeart takeover

CEOs publicly talk up radio’s future but secretly look to diversify

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The reason John Malone has to have iHeart. It’s not for the radio

Today’s topics …

The reason John Malone has to have iHeart.  It’s not for radio

Why Wall Street is hating on Beasley

Lew Dickey’s new company has a change of plans

Liberty wants to add 2 more media mergers to the iHeart takeover

CEOs publicly talk up radio’s future but secretly look to diversify

Are any radio groups safe?  These 3 are bullet proof

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Why Wall Street is hating on Beasley

Today’s topics …

Lew Dickey’s new company has a change of plans

Liberty wants to add 2 more media mergers to the iHeart takeover

CEOs publicly talk up radio’s future but secretly look to diversify

Are any radio groups safe?  These 3 are bullet proof

Entercom really is in trouble and, yes, David Field could even lose the company

Cumulus is now onboarding new people to fire a large number of existing employees

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Lew Dickey’s new company has a change of plans

Today’s topics …

Lew Dickey’s new company has a change in plans

Liberty wants to add 2 more media mergers to the iHeart takeover

CEOs publicly talk up radio’s future but secretly look to diversify

Are any radio groups safe?  These 3 are bullet proof

Entercom really is in trouble and, yes, David Field could even lose the company

Cumulus is now onboarding new people to fire a large number of existing employees

Subscribers access all stories here.

Try a monthly or annual subscription here.

Liberty wants to add 2 more media mergers to the iHeart takeover

Today’s topics …

Liberty wants to add 2 more media mergers ti the iHeart takeover

CEOs publicly talk up radio’s future but secretly look to diversify

Are any radio groups safe?  These 3 are bullet proof

Entercom really is in trouble and, yes, David Field could even lose the company

Cumulus is now onboarding new people to fire a large number of existing employees

While Cumulus was pivoting to digital, Westwood One just got hit with major defections

Subscribers access all stories here.

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CEOs publicly talk up radio’s future but secretly look to diversify

Today’s topics …

CEOs publicly talk up radio’s future but secretly look to diversify

Are any radio groups safe?  These 3 are bullet proof

Entercom really is in trouble and, yes, David Field could even lose the company

Cumulus is now onboarding new people to fire a large number of existing employees

While Cumulus was pivoting to digital, Westwood One just got hit with major defections

The 80’s infusion – is adding more 80’s music working out

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Are any radio groups safe? These 3 are bullet proof

Today’s topics …

Are any radio groups safe? These 3 are bullet proof

Entercom really is in trouble and, yes, David Field could even lose the company

Cumulus Is now onboarding new people to fire a large number of existing employees

While Cumulus was pivoting to digital, Westwood One just got hit with major defections

The 80’s infusion – is adding more 80’s music working out?

Townsquare’s demise – what it means

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Entercom really is in trouble and, yes, David Field could even lose the company

Today’s topics …

Entercom really is in trouble and, yes, David Field could even lose the company

Cumulus is now onboarding new people to fire a large number of existing employees

While Cumulus was pivoting to digital, Westwood One just got hit with major defections

The 80’s Infusion – is adding more 80’s music working out?

Townsquare’s demise – what it means

Liberty Media’s iHeart play

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Cumulus is now onboarding new people to fire a large number of existing employees

Today’s topics …

Cumulus is now onboarding new people to fire a large number of existing employees

While Cumulus was pivoting to digital, Westwood One just got hit with major defections

The 80’s infusion – is adding more 80’s music working out

Townsquare’s demise – what it means

Liberty Media’s iHeart play

Radio predictions for 2019

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While Cumulus was pivoting to digital, Westwood One just got hit with major defections

Today’s topics …

While Cumulus was pivoting to digital, Westwood One just got hit with major defections

First look at how adding more 80’s music is affecting listeners

Townsquare’s Demise – What it means

Liberty Media’s iHeart play

What radio will look like by December

Soft AC “Breeze” projected ratings

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The 80’s Infusion – Is Adding More 80’s Music Working Out

Today’s topics …

The 80’s Infusion – Is Adding More 80’s Music Working Out

Townsquare’s Demise – What It Means

Liberty Media’s iHeart Play

Radio Predictions for 2019

Soft AC “Breeze” Projected Ratings

Entercom News & Sports Downsizing

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Townsquare’s Demise – What It Means

Today’s topics …

Townsquare’s Demise – What It Means

Liberty Media’s iHeart Play

Radio Predictions for 2019

Soft AC “Breeze” Projected Ratings

Entercom News & Sports Downsizing

Alpha Media’s Selloff Plan

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Radio Should Be Very Afraid of Liberty Media

Beasley, Cumulus, Townsquare and even Entercom have the most to lose because Liberty isn’t just looking to takeover iHeart, it’s thinking even bigger.

Read more >>

_________________________________________________________________________

Scary Predictions for 2019

80% came true last year so what’s ahead for a music performance tax, Mary Berner, Lew Dickey, The Breeze, Entercom’s comeback, 3 groups resorting to auctioning stations, podcasting, voice-activated listening and Spotify. 

Read more >>

_________________________________________________________________________

Projected Ratings of Soft AC “Breeze” Format

PDs tracking early meter results show “The Breeze” is killing it.  But unfortunately, Air Supply and friends appear to be killing the wrong thing.

Read more >>

_________________________________________________________________________

Entercom’s Salary Dump

David Field promised Wall Street Entercom would save $110 million in shared expenses after the CBS merger.  As 2019 starts, he’s only half way there.  As revenue declines, this promises to get ugly.

 Read more >>

Inside Music Media contains no advertising, accepts no corporate money or consideration and is beholden only to our subscribers who appreciate it so much that they pay for it.

Radio Predictions for 2019

Today’s topics …

           Radio Predictions for 2019

           Soft AC “Breeze” Projected Ratings

           Alpha Media’s Selloff Plan

           Entercom’s Salary Dump

           Deep Personnel Cuts for 2019

           Cumulus Digital Concerns

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Tom Taylor’s Retirement

Every morning when I awake, the first thing I do is reach for my iPad and scroll to open Tom Taylor Now.

Today is significant because it marks the last day Tom will ply his trade.

Now that he is retiring, I can tell some tales out of school about my friend and former associate.

When we worked together at Inside Radio, Bill Moyes did his yearly research project as usual but this particular year, we asked him to test what would happen if we stopped publishing the printed issue and started delivering news daily by – are you ready – a fax machine?

The results were predictable. 

After all, who would really want to read their radio news on thermal fax paper which was prevalent at the time – before the onset of the Internet.

Tom and I and Steve Butler, Kyle Ruffin and Christine Burke digested the research results and I drove Bill to the airport.

But when I returned to our Cherry Hill, NJ office, Tom was the first person I encountered.

He looked me in the eye with a twinkle and said “we’re going to do it, aren’t we”?

My memory of the moment was to fumble and say something stupid like “why would we risk losing all our subscribers to do a faxed publication” to which I remember Tom repeating “we’re going to do it” almost as if he would have been disappointed if I had said no.

We did it.

He did it, really.

One human dynamo found a way to come up with four pages of news everyday in an era when radio people were for R&Rto be delivered overnight or the other printed trades to arrive.

Our competitors hesitated for years giving Inside Radiothe advantage and some tried to hire Tom away.

This was a rehearsal for radio publications in the Internet era in which Tom had developed all the advantages and he thrived.

Over the past six years, Tom, Robert Unmacht and Kristy Scott published the must-read daily Tom Taylor Now.

Tom blended his curiosity with humor and humility – a great advocate of radio but not blind to radio’s challenges.

He loves radio people and they love him – it’s evident in everything he writes.

Tom was not among the trade press happy talkers who sold their soul for an ad or an interview – the publications that I made fun here in this space.

Respectful of advertisers and grateful, but he didn’t let them influence his reporting in any way.

That’s saying a lot in an industry of spin doctors, promotional experts and eventually powerful consolidated companies.

Tom wanted to be fair and in all his iterations he always succeeded.

Now, Tom is retiring.

You have to keep in mind that it may take only 5-7 minutes to read radio news but it takes all day and sometimes well into the night to gather it. 

Tom is an antiques buff.  He’ll now have time to pursue his other passion and spend more time with his sainted wife, Sharan without whom he could not have devoted such passion to such monumental tasks.

I’ve have had the honor of working with Tom, the horror of having to compete against him and respect for how Tom Taylor has handled a daunting task with grace, professionalism and conviction.

I hate to see him go, but I am grateful to have known him, called him a friend and now get to see his well-earned next act in a life well-lived in an industry so grateful to have felt his reassuring presence.

Comment on this story for publication by scrolling down to “comment” (public) or send your thoughts for my eyes only not for publication.  I value your input, wisdom and opinions and respond to every email that you write to me personally.

Here’s where to Report News confidentially in our Witness Protection Program.

Contact Jerry here

Soft AC “Breeze” Projected Ratings

Today’s topics …

         Soft AC “Breeze” Projected Ratings

         Alpha Media’s Selloff Plan

         Entercom’s Salary Dump

         Deep Personnel Cuts for 2019

         Cumulus Digital Concerns

         Auditioning for Mary Berner’s Job

Subscribers access all stories here.

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Entercom News & Sports Downsizing

Today’s topics …

          Entercom News & Sports Downsizing

          Alpha Media’s Selloff Plan

          Entercom’s Salary Dump

          Deep Personnel Cuts for 2019

          Cumulus Digital Concerns

          Auditioning for Mary Berner’s Job

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Alpha Media’s Selloff Plan

Today’s topics …

Alpha Media’s Selloff Plan

Entercom’s Salary Dump

Deep Personnel Cuts for 2019

Cumulus Digital Concerns

Auditioning for Mary Berner’s Job

iHeart’s Misleading Bankruptcy

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Entercom’s Salary Dump Begins

The unspoken reason why David Field is now pushing full speed ahead with millions in expected personnel firings.

The brutal firing of key WBEB, Philly PD Chuck Knight and why Entercom is willing to risk a ratings collapse to please Field who lives in the market.

Entercom’s new war on CBS employees – the ugly story of a major market CBS programming talent being chopped to save salary.

How low will David Field go to cut program directors’ salaries?   From a source:  a word-for-word revealing account of how little Field expects to pay some major market PDs.

Read more …  

Preview the Deep Personnel Cuts for 2019

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Subscribers will read …

  • The radio group most likely to lead 2019 personnel cuts.
  • Another group most that could seriously reduce its employee costs by a whopping 50%.
  • The one job you don’t want to have in radio because it’s going to get hit the hardest.
  • Which of these groups will not survive an economic downturn: Townsquare, Cumulus, Alpha Media, Entercom or iHeart?  Don’t be so sure you know.  One of them is a shocker.
  • Plans to cut up to $60 million in cost synergies from this radio company that may surprise.

A new subscription also unlocks these full articles …    

The Cumulus Digital Contradiction
Auditioning for Mary Berner's Job
The Cumulus WGN Rumors
iHeart's Bankruptcy Ball
Half of Radio’s Workforce To Be Laid Off
Liberty Media’s Brilliant iHeart Strategy

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The Cumulus Digital Contradiction

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  • How Cumulus is slashing digital even as it is publicly touting it as the key to its turnaround. 
  • We’ve got a list of digital VPs and employees who are leaving – and a big name that hasn’t announced it publicly yet. 
  • How one critical Cumulus market stands to lose $2 million when its Digital VP exits stage left December 31st. 
  • The role of Dave Milner in eradicating digital simultaneously as his boss talks it up.

A new subscription also unlocks these full articles …    

Auditioning for Mary Berner's Job
The Cumulus WGN Rumors
iHeart's Bankruptcy Ball
Half of Radio’s Workforce To Be Laid Off
Liberty Media’s Brilliant iHeart Strategy  

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Auditioning for Mary Berner’s Job

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  • The name of a radio exec everybody knows who reportedly has been secretly pitching the Cumulus CEO gig for years – still. 
  • And the over/under that the Cumulus board will hire him.
  • Plus Berner’s new thinking about spot ad revenue that is scaring account execs.
  • And why Cumulus can no longer either buy or sell stations without wrecking the company.

A new subscription also unlocks these full articles …    

The Cumulus WGN Rumors
iHeart's Bankruptcy Ball
Half of Radio’s Workforce To Be Laid Off
Liberty Media’s Brilliant iHeart Strategy  
The Fraudulent iHeart Bankruptcy
Berner: Everything Is For Sales

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The Cumulus WGN Rumors

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  • She’s kidding, right? But Mary Berner is not denying the rumor Cumulus is interested in WGN. 
  • What’s really going on with the Cumulus WGN rumors. 
  • What’s just changed at Cumulus that is making the group look like a station builder.
  • What Bob Pittman has to do with the purchase of WGN.
  • Why Chicago and why a station with predominantly older listeners.

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iHeart's Bankruptcy Ball
Half of Radio’s Workforce To Be Laid Off
Liberty Media’s Brilliant iHeart Strategy
The Fraudulent iHeart Bankruptcy
Berner: Everything Is For Sales
Cumulus Blows Up Detroit

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iHeart’s Bankruptcy Ball

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  • The employee housecleaning that follows the end of bankruptcy and how it will likely unfold despite the circus atmosphere surrounding this process.
  • Tuesday’s bankruptcy court confirmation of iHeart’s bankruptcy plan has been postponed at the request of iHeart – what does that mean?
  • Why iHeart’s Pittman can’t just have a serious bankruptcy instead turning it into a promotional event.
  • Is the bankruptcy outcome assured or not in light of recent developments?
  • The one thing that is certain is what iHeart will look like – stations, markets, personnel once bankruptcy is concluded. Take a peek.

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Half of Radio’s Workforce To Be Laid Off
Liberty Media’s Brilliant iHeart Strategy
The Fraudulent iHeart Bankruptcy 
Berner: Everything Is For Sales
Cumulus Blows Up Detroit
The Death of Live & Local

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Half of Radio’s Workforce To Be Laid Off

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  • There have been layoffs for over a decade, why is the worst yet to come now? 
  • The time period over which a whopping 50% workforce reduction will take place industry-wide. 
  • Which operators are least likely to resort to halving their existing staff? 
  • Will it apply to markets 75 and smaller?
  • Beyond dropping spot revenue, what are the things that are forcing owners to cut half of their employees? 
  • And the big question, what will radio look and sound like once their cost synergies have been enacted.

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Liberty Media’s Brilliant iHeart Strategy
The Fraudulent iHeart Bankruptcy
Berner: Everything Is For Sales
Cumulus Blows Up Detroit
The Death of Live & Local
The Threat of SiriusXM
Bankrupt iHeart’s $80 Million in Bonuses

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Liberty Media’s Brilliant iHeart Strategy

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  • How Liberty Media’s John Malone has a lock on the iHeart bankruptcy not Bob Pittman and Bain.
  • Why an aging satellite company SiriusXM wants to own free radio that comes with its own aging problems.
  • But Liberty is not willing to pay more than $1 billion for iHeart -- how it plans to steal the company for pennies.
  • When Liberty got control of Sirius they went it alone without Mel Karmazin, remember?  If they could live without a master media operator like Karmazin, what happens to Pittman?  Turns out it’s complicated.
  • Okay, let’s just blurt this out – why does a smart guy like Malone want increasingly irrelevant media companies. Is it just low prices or does he know something other moguls don’t know. 

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The Fraudulent iHeart Bankruptcy
Berner: Everything Is For Sales
Cumulus Blows Up Detroit
The Death of Live & Local
The Threat of SiriusXM
Bankrupt iHeart’s $80 Million in Bonuses
Brutal Entercom Firing

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Berner: Everything is for Sale

CEO Mary Berner was in San Francisco last week meeting with employees and management.

The market is reportedly trending down 13% in the fourth quarter.

Dave Milner, the major market VP who is usually by her side on these visits was not with her.

Instead what followed according to employees who were there and talked on the condition of anonymity because they fear for their jobs was almost an acceptance on the part of Berner that anything could happen in the future.

This is in marked contrast to the public Mary Berner who speaks with the intensity of a motivational speaker as she assures and reassures employees that the future of Cumulus is secure.

The facts are closing in on Berner.

Just Friday Cumulus stock, which is outrageously high priced at $11, was being shorted by investors – 40,000 trades were conducted that day on a stock that usually trades only 13,000 shares on average.

A second bankruptcy is apparently baked in so that is probably not the reason investors are betting against Cumulus.

Berner’s admissions to some San Francisco employees suddenly took on new meaning because they were scary and revealing.

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Cumulus Blows Up Detroit

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  1. Why Cumulus is willing to shoot its billing in the foot to save a salary.
  2. How the manager who exceeded Mary Berner’s expectations with the number one billing in the market wound up “re-tirefired”.
  3. Who the cheap frontrunner replacement reportedly being considered is and why employees derogatorily refer to him as “pee pants” reportedly because he’s so nervous.
  4. “Panic at the Frisco” – More intrigue in the Bay Area.
  5. How Berner intends to implement the Entercom (Bain) school of management.

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The Death of Live & Local

Tuesday 11 Hubbard firings in Chicago.

Yesterday another 11 in St. Louis.

Hear me out.

If Hubbard put out a news release that they had hired 22 MORE people instead of firing them, it would be seen as a positive sign of growth and stability.

To not see the mass firing of employees before the holidays can easily be seen for what it is.

Desperation.

But Hubbard is not alone.

New intelligence that I will share with you this morning indicates that radio groups are giving up on the concept of live and local and although they’ve been chipping away at it for years, something major has happened now to accelerate the process.

Read more >>

The Threat of SiriusXM

  • Radio’s nightmare from 25 years ago has come true – satellite radio is the future of traditional broadcasting.
  • What about digital where radio efforts are virtually non-existent – is it advantage SiriusXM?
  • Why 2019 will be the end of live and local terrestrial radio.
  • But SiriusXM has some dirty secrets that they don’t want its radio competitors to know.
  • How does a satellite service that doesn’t compete with radio for advertising and doesn’t offer its programming for free be the future of the radio industry?

Read more >>

The Next Radio Audience

  • The last Baby Boomer has moved past the 25-54 demographic so why are there so many stations doubling down on efforts to reach them?
  • Demographers reveal radio’s new target audience — one that is worth pursuing for a long time to come.
  • A warning about programming to Millennials and why radio can’t program to an entire generation.
  • Why this new “sweet spot” for radio could give birth to 6 or more innovative new formats that can drive new listening for the first time.
  • Surprising revelations about alt-rock and The Breeze (flanker adult contemporary format) — do they hit radio’s new desired demographic target?

Read more >>

Bankrupt iHeart’s $80 Million in Bonuses

iHeart is being pillaged even before it exits bankruptcy.

This is the story of Bob Pittman and 100 junior executives running off with the spoils to the tune of $82 million or more in future bonuses (not counting what was already awarded).

Publicly, Pittman is acquiring companies as if when iHeart emerges from bankruptcy current ownership will be around to manage the whole thing.

Privately, Pittman is planning an exit and the company is going to be sold but the real damage will be to the radio industry that remains.

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            Cumulus Closer to a 2nd Bankruptcy

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Brutal Entercom Firing

I get that things are bad in radio right now.

Employees treated like they are less than human while their bosses get all the benefits and respect that, by their performance, they don’t earn.

We get a lot of reports about mistreatment, toxic workplaces and abuse of power.

But the one you’ll read today is as bad as it gets and it’s from Entercom.

This harrowing treatment may be the new normal for today’s radio industry.

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            Efficacy of iHeart’s New “Breeze” Format

            iHeart’s Troubling Bankruptcy Board

            Cumulus Closer to a 2nd Bankruptcy

            Dickey to Strike In 3 Weeks

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Pittman & Bressler’s Removal From iHeart

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            iHeart’s Troubling Post-Bankruptcy Board

            Cumulus Closer to a 2nd Bankruptcy

            Dickey to Strike In 3 Weeks

            iHeart’s Secret Buyer

            $45 Million in Entercom Cutbacks Coming

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Efficacy of iHeart’s New “Breeze” Format

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            Dickey to Strike In 3 Weeks

            iHeart’s Secret Buyer

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            The Alpha Bankruptcy

            Why Investors Keep Buying Entercom

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iHeart’s Troubling Post-Bankruptcy Board

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            Cumulus Closer to a 2nd Bankruptcy

            Dickey to Strike In 3 Weeks

            iHeart’s Secret Buyer

            $45 Million in Entercom Cutbacks Coming

            The Alpha Bankruptcy

            Why Investors Keep Buying Entercom

            Apple/iHeart Investment Rumors

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Cumulus Closer to a 2nd Bankruptcy

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            Dickey To Strike In 3 Weeks

            iHeart’s Secret Buyer

            $45 Million in Entercom Cutbacks Coming

            The Alpha Bankruptcy

            Why Investors Keep Buying Entercom

            Apple/iHeart Investment Rumors

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Dickey To Strike In 3 Weeks

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  • What Lew Dickey’s new company is buying and you can take this to the bank.
  • The part Cumulus plays in all this
  • This is Lew’s first acquisition – what comes second?

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            iHeart’s Secret Buyer

            $45 Million in Entercom Cutbacks Coming

            The Alpha Bankruptcy

            Why Investors Keep Buying Entercom

            Apple/iHeart Investment Rumors

            Market Manager Sues Cumulus

            Alleged Sex Harassment/Disability Issues at Entercom

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YouTube Is the New Radio

Radio is certainly having its trouble attracting new audiences and sustaining advertisers.

Satellite radio, as we mentioned recently, looks better on paper than it does in reality.

An expensive paid subscription service that provides less music discovery than, say, Spotify, is never going to gain traction with Millennials and the Gen Z youth that follow.

Network TV long ago lost its luster with young people who now define TV with the words “Netflix” or “Hulu”.

Times have changed and in the midst of that change is a major reordering of media priorities that cannot be ignored.

  • YouTube is the new radio – This is not sudden.  It’s been happening for many years now although you’d have to be watching teenagers to see the power of YouTube developing.  If you have children – teenagers – then you know YouTube is as potent an instrument as television was when it came on the scene.  But the fact that a video app can also be replacing radio takes a little further understanding.
  • A replacement for talk radio?
  • Pirate radio on YouTube
  • YouTube as a radio with no video
  • YouTube “stars” 
  • Where does this leave the future of radio when radio doesn’t have a competitive model for IP delivered audio?

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iHeart’s Secret Buyer

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            Investors Love/Hate With Entercom

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            The SiriusXM/Pandora Mistake

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Another $45 Million in Entercom Cutbacks Coming

Summary

  • Revenue down 4% again, stock tanks to $6.85 – how CBS employees will pay with their jobs.
  • The only things that are working at Entercom were started by CBS – here’s the proof.
  • There is already a three-stage plan to start the cost savings – how it is spread out and when.
  • Things are so bad Entercom threatens to double down on the $110 million in cost synergies already promised.

Read more

The Alpha Bankruptcy

It appears that Alpha is headed for the junk heap.

Larry Wilson is out – his plan to grow a live and local radio company ran into the reality that he could never take Alpha public with a market increasingly disinterested in radio.

Yet there is a fascinating set of circumstances that could augur an outcome where the leading lender and the company employees could emerge better off than their founder. 

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            Why Investors Keep Buying Entercom

            Apple/iHeart Rumors

            Fired Market Manager Sues Cumulus

            Sexual Harassment Allegations At Entercom

            Entercom’s Operational Problems

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Why Investors Keep Buying Entercom

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            Fired Market Manager Sues Cumulus

            Sexual Harassment Allegations At Entercom

            Entercom’s Operational Problems

            The Coming SiriusXM Meltdown

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Apple/iHeart Rumors

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            Radio Music Performance Fee Surprise

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Market Manager Stands Up Against Cumulus

INSIDE …

  1. If Cumulus employees don’t like Bob Walker and Dave Milner, they’re going to like them less after they read what happened to this Cumulus market manager.
  2. She’s suing and it’s ugly – details.
  3. Awarded, never written up, willing to take a pay cut but something happened where this market manager drew the line.
  4. Alleged verbal abuse so bad she wound up with PTSD – you be the judge.
  5. How this case against Cumulus is being built as employees are learning how to stand up to toxic workplace culture.
  6. The one thing you can never do at Cumulus not matter how good you are and still keep your job.
  7. How the names Lew and John Dickey and Gary Pizzati fit into all of this.

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Alleged Sexual Harassment & Disability Issues At Entercom

INSIDE …

  • How can Entercom afford to fire a $2 million biller when they are losing $25 million a quarter?
  • One who allegedly worked 16 hours many days and ran promotions because their Philly station was understaffed.
  • Details of the heart issues, stress and nervous breakdown that followed – how she pleaded for help and was denied.
  • The Entercom conference call that went wrong when two sales execs allegedly thought the phone connection with this employee had ended and what they proceeded to say about her behind her back not knowing she was still on the line. 
  • The reason for denying an alleged $27,000 bonus claim.
  • The way Entercom fired her immediately after a short disability extension.

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Entercom’s Emerging Problems

About $1.20 in additional losses and Entercom makes it to the $4 stock range.

That would be a catastrophic fall from $16 thanks to a CBS merger that shareholders didn’t like from the word go.

But with expected third quarter losses due to be made public soon, Entercom has so many problems that sooner or later everyone will see its real value or lack of it.

For Entercom to deliver on David Field’s merger promises, he would have to greatly outperform a radio industry that is also experiencing declining revenue.

To be fair this company is still in decent shape but another year like 2018 and Entercom will be in serious trouble.

Their emerging problems are major ones – cannot be ignored.

Wait until you hear about how their much-vaunted sports operation is being received in the sports world and some of the issues Field is trying to outrun.

He can work off this list.

Read the full article now.

SiriusXM Preparing For a Big Meltdown

What kind of b.s. is SiriusXM peddling these days?

They talk about the future like they have one, but satellite radio is ready for its big meltdown based on metrics, generational changes and the one new competitor they can’t even see coming after them.

I’ve got the weaknesses they are trying to cover up for you.

And you’ll be the first to know who is going to knock satellite radio off.

No, it isn’t terrestrial radio.  Come on.

If you’ve been thinking about subscribing and would like to access this story, let me tell you what you will get.

  1. There’s trouble ahead with paid subscriptions – the kind SiriusXM relies on for most of its revenue.  Here’s what kind of trouble they’d rather not talk about.
  2. Former SiriusXM CEO Mel Karmazin threatened to stop selling ads altogether.  Here’s why he said it and why they still can’t sell ads very successfully.
  3. The SiriusXM/Pandora merger – this is spooking Wall Street.  Seriously.  It’s seen as a drag on their stock.  Here’s why.
  4. The real value of SiriusXM is a relative secret, but Liberty Media boss John Malone knows what it is and is betting the future on something that I’ll bet you don’t even know. I didn’t – until now.
  5. That expected Liberty/Sirius takeover of iHeart from bankruptcy looks great on paper, but here’s why it is a horror show in reality.

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Dropping Entercom

A few days ago a major lender became the next to the last firm to stop coverage on Entercom.

Wells Fargo remains, but their former analyst Marci Ryvicker lost her job recently and some feel because she overstated Entercom’s upside.

David Field stubbornly refuses to acknowledge that he has blown the CBS merger integration and covers up critical problems that could turn Entercom into bankruptcy babies like Cumulus or iHeart.

As of yesterday, Entercom is now only $2.24 away from being a $4 stock (down from $16).

Now he’s about to make it worse.

Read the full article now.

The Hype Over Podcasting

What’s the big deal about podcasting?

It doesn’t make significant money.

Certainly not enough to make up for mounting radio revenue losses.

Podcasting actually hurts radio station billing.

These are facts.

So why are Bob Pittman, Mary Berner, Ginny Morris, David Field and others betting on podcasting?

Fate of CBS Radio Employees in 2019

DIG DEEPER …

  • Is Entercom finally done ridding itself of CBS employees?
  • What about benefits and salaries?
  • The unsafest job by far for a CBS “leftover” in the year ahead.
  • Year two of the CBS formats all-news and sports under Entercom.
  • CBS female employees under David Field in 2019.

Read the full article now.

Top Sellers Exiting Cumulus

There are stunning new numbers on the extent of the talent drain at Cumulus.

And, like Entercom that has in essence purged CBS market managers and programming talent from their company, Cumulus is doing the same thing with the same results.

The employees they think they don’t need, they are laying off and the ones they can’t afford to lose are leaving – and the evidence is convincing.

Mary Berner did this exact same thing when she bankrupted Reader’s Digest and perhaps you don’t know how that worked out for her.

She was fired (or left) and Reader’s Digest eventually entered a second bankruptcy.

Employees want to know the Reader’s Digest strategy as they fear for their future and want to get a read on what’s going to happen next -- should they stay or go?

Read the full article now.

Losing FM on Smartphones

When Jeff Smulyan throws in the towel on his NextRadio smartphone FM project, you know the radio industry is calling Dr. Kevorkian.

No one has been more adamant and perhaps even too optimistic about unlocking smartphones to become ready FM radios than Smulyan.

And in the end, his efforts were thwarted by a small handful of incompetent radio CEOs that can somehow find the money to pay for other non-consequential things they want.

I’m thinking of $55 million to buy an unproven podcasting company, wasteful “advertiser” cruises in the south of France, an investment in the cannabis magazine High Times and pissing away millions on Nielsen. 

The repercussions for a radio industry that is publicly showing such disregard for activating the FM chips in radio will be great.

Some of the trouble starts immediately.

Read the full article now.

Pizzati Raiding Cumulus

On August 1, 2016 Mary Berner called trusted Lew Dickey loyalist and EVP Gary Pizzati into her office and asked him point blank “How do you want to go out?”

He had a three-year $1.5 million no cut contract and asked for a lump sum and contract termination.

Berner refused instead opting to honor the deal to keep him from rejoining Dickey so she benched Pizzati until the end of 2017 when he left.

Then Pizzati’s non-solicit kicked in which prevents him from hiring Cumulus employees during that period.

Now it’s payback time.

Read the full article now.

Entercom Investors Panic

Just when you worried that David Field couldn’t find anyone to replace Wells Fargo’s Marci Ryvicker to carry Entercom’s water over their failed CBS merger integration, another sucker steps up.

Ryvicker lost her gig in a very public way on the eve of the recent NAB Radio Show where she was to be a headliner.  There is no way to know whether her college friend David Field muddied her view of Entercom.

She’s now in the entertainment industry’s version of Siberia so to speak as the managing director of Wolfe Research, a company that covers oil and gas, the trucking industry – not radio, or TV, or digital, her specialty.

A lot of effort is going into covering up the fact that Entercom is ready to crash.

But it’s the changes that haven’t been implemented yet that are of real concern.

Read the full article now.

Change of Plans for Lew Dickey

Lew Dickey has wanted to buy Cumulus ever since he was removed in a bloodless coup by board chairman Jeff Marcus several years ago.

That was then.

In the meantime, Dickey has secured the money it would take for the current board (a group of lenders not operators) to seriously consider his takeover bid.

But something has gone very wrong.

Read the full article now.

Making Sense of the Entercom Mess

2nd quarter numbers that don’t add up.
 
Irrational exuberance for seemingly no reason that drove the stock up and down within 24 hours.
 
Promises about the 3rd quarter and an amazing prediction by David Field about the future of the CBS/Entercom merger.
 
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The Entercom Programming Cuts

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            New Playlists From Listeners' DNA

            Entercom Hired Bain -- Here's Their Advice

            Stations & Studios Are About to Change

            iHeart, Townsquare, Beasley, Cumulus in 2019

            Entercom's Gutting of Jerry Lee's MoreFM  

Plus every article for the past year and 4,018 in our archive like these (scroll thru/latest first)

For 27 cents a day, join the thousands of members who read Inside Music Media-- insightful, deadly honest and informative.

Read some recent FREE SAMPLES here.

Talk to Jerry privately here

Report news backed by my Witness Protection Program here. 

Inside Music Media contains no advertising.  Accepts no corporate money or consideration.  And is beholden only to subscribers who appreciate it so much that they pay for it.  Thank you.

New Playlists From Listeners’ DNA

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Become a NEW subscriber and begin with New Playlists From Listeners' DNA here. 

And read these full articles …

            Entercom Hired Bain -- Here's Their Advice

            Stations & Studios Are About to Change

            iHeart, Townsquare, Bealsey, Cumulus in 2019

            Entercom's Gutting of Jerry Lee's MoreFM

            Alpha's Surprise Exit

            Startling Revised Purchase Price of Cumulus

Plus every article for the past year and 4,018 in our archive like these (scroll thru/latest first)

For 27 cents a day, join the thousands of members who read Inside Music Media-- insightful, deadly honest and informative.

Read some recent FREE SAMPLES here.

Talk to Jerry privately here

Report news backed by my Witness Protection Program here. 

Inside Music Media contains no advertising.  Accepts no corporate money or consideration.  And is beholden only to subscribers who appreciate it so much that they pay for it.  Thank you.

Entercom Hired Bain — Here’s Their Advice

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Become a NEW subscriber and begin with Entercom Hired Bain -- Here's Their Advice here.  

And read these full articles …

            Stations & Studios Are About to Change

            iHeart, Townsquare, Bealsey, Cumulus In 2019

            Entercom's Gutting of Jerry Lee's MoreFM

            Alpha's Surprise Exit

            Startling Revised Purchase Price of Cumulus

            A New Warning About Entercom  

Plus every article for the past year and 4,018 in our archive like these (scroll thru/latest first)

For 27 cents a day, join the thousands of members who read Inside Music Media-- insightful, deadly honest and informative.

Read some recent FREE SAMPLES here.

Talk to Jerry privately here

Report news backed by my Witness Protection Program here. 

Inside Music Media contains no advertising.  Accepts no corporate money or consideration.  And is beholden only to subscribers who appreciate it so much that they pay for it.  Thank you.

Stations & Studios Are About to Change

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Become a NEW subscriber and begin with Stations & Studios Are About to Change here. 

And read these full articles …

            iHeart, Townsquare, Bealsey, Cumulus in 2019

            Entercom's Gutting of Jerry Lee's MoreFM

            Alpha's Surprise Exit

            Startling Revised Purchase Price of Cumulus

            A New Warning About Entercom

            Nielsen's New Way to Prevent Cutbacks & Cancellations

Plus every article for the past year and 4,017 in our archive like these (scroll thru/latest first)

For 27 cents a day, join the thousands of members who read Inside Music Media-- insightful, deadly honest and informative.

Read some recent FREE SAMPLES here.

Talk to Jerry privately here

Report news backed by my Witness Protection Program here. 

Inside Music Media contains no advertising.  Accepts no corporate money or consideration.  And is beholden only to subscribers who appreciate it so much that they pay for it.  Thank you.

iHeart, Townsquare, Bealsey, Cumulus in 2019

Subscribers get INSTANT ACCESS here.

Become a NEW subscriber and begin with iHeart, Townsquare, Bealsey, Cumulus in 2019 here. 

And read these full articles …

            Entercom's Gutting of Jerry Lee's MoreFM

            Alpha's Surprise Exit

            Startling Revised Purchase Price of Cumulus

            A New Warning About Entercom

            Nielsen's New Way to Prevent Cutbacks & Cancellations

            Streaming is Now 75% of All Music Revenue     

Plus every article for the past year and 4,016 in our archive like these (scroll thru/latest first)

For 27 cents a day, join the thousands of members who read Inside Music Media-- insightful, deadly honest and informative.

Read some recent FREE SAMPLES here.

Talk to Jerry privately here

Report news backed by my Witness Protection Program here. 

Inside Music Media contains no advertising.  Accepts no corporate money or consideration.  And is beholden only to subscribers who appreciate it so much that they pay for it.  Thank you.

Entercom’s Gutting of Jerry Lee’s MoreFM

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Become a NEW subscriber and begin with Entercom's Gutting of Jerry Lee's MoreFM here. 

And read these full articles …

            Alpha's Surprise Exit

            Startling Revised Purchase Price of Cumulus

            A New Warning About Entercom

            Nielsen's New Way to Prevent Cutbacks & Cancellations

            Streaming is Now 75% of All Music Revenue

            Cumulus Expands Cuts

            Voice Activated Listening & Peak Screen

Plus every article for the past year and 4,015 in our archive like these (scroll thru/latest first)

For 27 cents a day, join the thousands of members who read Inside Music Media-- insightful, deadly honest and informative.

Read some recent FREE SAMPLES here.

Talk to Jerry privately here

Report news backed by my Witness Protection Program here. 

Inside Music Media contains no advertising.  Accepts no corporate money or consideration.  And is beholden only to subscribers who appreciate it so much that they pay for it. Thank you.

Alpha’s Surprise Exit

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Become a NEW subscriber and begin withAlpha's Surprise Exit here. 

And read these full articles …

            Startling Revised Purchase Price of Cumulus

            A New Warning About Entercom

            Nielsen's New Way to Prevent Cutbacks & Cancellations

            Streaming is Now 75% of All Music Revenue

            Cumulus Expands Cuts

            Voice Activated Listening & Peak Screen

Plus every article for the past year and 4,014 in our archive like these (scroll thru/latest first)

For 27 cents a day, join the thousands of members who read Inside Music Media-- insightful, deadly honest and informative.

Read some recent FREE SAMPLES here.

Talk to Jerry privately here

Report news backed by my Witness Protection Program here. 

Inside Music Media contains no advertising.  Accepts no corporate money or consideration.  And is beholden only to subscribers who appreciate it so much that they pay for it.  Thank you.

Startling Revised Purchase Price of Cumulus

Subscribers get INSTANT ACCESS here.

Become a NEW subscriber and begin with Startling Revised Purchase Price of Cumulus here. 

And read these full articles …

            A New Warning About Entercom

            Nielsen's New Way to Prevent Cutbacks & Cancellations

            Streaming is Now 75% of All Music Revenue

            Cumulus Expands Cuts

            Voice Activated Listening & Peak Screen

            SiriusXM’s Pandora Strategy

Plus every article for the past year and 4,013 in our archive like these (scroll thru/latest first)

For 27 cents a day, join the thousands of members who read Inside Music Media-- insightful, deadly honest and informative.

Read some recent FREE SAMPLES here.

Talk to Jerry privately here

Report news backed by my Witness Protection Program here. 

Inside Music Media contains no advertising.  Accepts no corporate money or consideration.  And is beholden only to subscribers who appreciate it so much that they pay for it.  Thank you.

A New Warning About Entercom

Subscribers get INSTANT ACCESS here.

Become a NEW subscriber and begin with A New Warning About Entercom here. 

And read these full articles …

            Nielsen's New Way to Prevent Cutbacks & Cancellations

            Streaming is Now 75% of All Music Revenue

            Cumulus Expands Cuts

            Voice Activated Listening & Peak Screen

            SiriusXM’s Pandora Strategy

            Entercom Without Marci

Plus every article for the past year and 4,012 in our archive like these (scroll thru/latest first)

For 27 cents a day, join the thousands of members who read Inside Music Media-- insightful, deadly honest and informative.

Read some recent FREE SAMPLES here.

Talk to Jerry privately here

Report news backed by my Witness Protection Program here. 

Inside Music Media contains no advertising.  Accepts no corporate money or consideration.  And is beholden only to subscribers who appreciate it so much that they pay for it.  Thank you.

Nielsen’s New Way to Prevent Cutbacks & Cancellations

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Become a NEW subscriber and begin with Nielsen's New Way to Prevent Cutbacks & Cancellations here. 

And read these full articles …

            Streaming is Now 75% of All Music Revenue

            Cumulus Expands Cuts

            Voice Activated Listening & Peak Screen

            SiriusXM’s Pandora Strategy

            Entercom Without Marci

            How Dickey Will Spend His $300 Million “Blank Check”

            The Uncertain Future of Cumulus

Plus every article for the past year and 4,011 in our archive like these (scroll thru/latest first)

For 27 cents a day, join the thousands of members who read Inside Music Media-- insightful, deadly honest and informative.

Read some recent FREE SAMPLES here.

Talk to Jerry privately here

Report news backed by my Witness Protection Program here. 

Inside Music Media contains no advertising.  Accepts no corporate money or consideration.  And is beholden only to subscribers who appreciate it so much that they pay for it.  Thank you.

Streaming is 75% of All Music Revenue

  • Troubling new numbers that indicate a consumer preference for streaming music and a decline in radio as a source of music.
  • Metric based conclusions that radio is morphing into a new role in exposing music to audiences.
  • How record labels now fear losing control of how their music gets played on voice activated smart speakers.
  • Where does all of this leave SiriusXM that has just tendered a $3.5 billion offer to buy all of pioneer streaming site Pandora.
  • Streaming nightmare for record labels:  How Spotify threatens to disrupt music distribution.

Read more …