Category Archives: Radio

Interview with Mary Quass

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Mary Quass has been doing the radio thing for a long time. She bought her first station in 1988 and was right in the thick of the consolidation “land rush” of the late ’90s. Mary’s from a small town in southeast Iowa (Fairfield) and got her first radio job in 1977 selling advertising at KHAK in Cedar Rapids. She became sales manager of the station for two years (1979-82) and then served as GSM at KSO Des Moines until she returned to Cedar Rapids to purchase KHAK.

Ten years later, Quass Broadcasting merged with Capstar to form Central Star Communications, and Mary oversaw all aspects of the radio stations in her region. In July 1999, when the company merged with Chancellor Media to become AMFM Inc., Central Star Communications consisted of 66 stations in 14 midwest markets.

I’ve known Mary for a long time and she’s been a good friend to our company. Mary is one smart lady and she doesn’t think out of the box because she doesn’t know there is a box. So I called to get her take on what’s happening “out there.” I asked her about satellite radio, podcasting, consolidation, blogs, Internet radio and a bunch of other stuff.

AUDIO: Interview with Mary Quass 30 min MP3

Correction and update: I knew that Mary had been interviewed by Radio Ink in 2003 –and mentioned it in the interview– but when I went back to check a couple of things I thought I was looking at a new interview. I wasn’t. But I found a couple of interesting nuggets while re-reading the piece. Remember, this was two years ago.

“We cant just stick our heads in the sand and think that the Internet wont have an impact on Radio. This is the first technology to mean that anybody can have a radio station as good as, if not better than, whats out there today  and it has nothing to do with a license. I want to be in and out of the business by then. When I was growing up, I could tell you my favorite radio station, and I was adamant about it. Well, a 12-year-old today can tell you the artists, but they may or may not have a Radio station where they know the DJs. Im very concerned about this, because we havent remained relevant to these people.”

“As an industry, we got away from that and have lost sight of the fact that we must give people product that they cant get everywhere else. If we dont differentiate our product when the Internet becomes wireless, it will be a whole new ball game for all of us. We had better be ready, or the frustration we feel will only grow.”

“Radio audience as big as it’s ever going to get”

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I had lunch this week with a long-time acquaintance who happens to be one of the most successful small market broadcasters in the country. His stations generate millions of dollars in ad sales and have for years. He asked us to come up and talk about the Internet and I was expecting the usual “Don’t waste your time on that Internet bullshit” line. So, when he said (paraphrasing here) if broadcasters don’t figure out the Internet, they’ll perish… the hair on my arms stood up. He went on to say he thought radio’s audience was as big as it’s ever going to get. And that most small market radio stations are breaking even at best. Oh, and he said he didn’t know any young people that listened to the radio these days. Digital radio? Gonna be bad, not good, for rural broadcasters. He said more but I was in such a state of shock I can’t recall everything.

And I’d heard it all before. Online, not from a life-time broadcaster. I didn’t get the impression he’s shared his concerns with other broadcasters. Sort of the elephant in the room that nobody is talking about. And I’m not going to out this guy. Besides, nobody would ever believe he said –or believes– any of the above.

This must have been the mood when the plains Indians saw the first wagon trains roll over the hill. It ain’t gonna ever be the same again. Might be good. Might be better. But it ain’t gonna be the same.

Podcasting impact on traditional radio

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“Thanks to the new technology, more people than ever will be creating and listening to audio programming in coming years. But the radio industry, a members-only club for the best part of a century, is turning into a free-for-all.” (Business Week)

The folks at Bridge Ratings report “the use of digital music players does not appear to be significantly affecting time spent with traditional radio.” In fact, you’ll probably listen to more radio after listening to mp3’s for a while.

KBOA listener remembers

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Yesterday’s post about the percentage of people who say they “love” over-the-air radio (19%) has been stuck in my head. I’m sure there are lots of people who dearly love their local station but do they (can they) love it like we used to?

“I listened to KBOA on the farm in Arkansas. My grandfather bought me a transistor radio when they were first available as pocket size. They were very expensive and would use up a battery in no time. KBOA was the main choice in the cotton fields when we would chop cotton. Everyone chopped with me so they could listen. My dad demanded that I chop cotton very fast, so everyone would work hard to keep up!” — Larry Jones, Kennett, MO

In all fairness, radio in the late 40’s and 50’s was pretty much the only game in town so perhaps loyalty was easier to come by. Do I love my satellite radio? I do. Do I love my little mp3 player (not an iPod)? I love the idea of being able to easily record and listen on the go. Do I love any of our local radio stations? … I’m thinking, I’m thinking!

On-demand media

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From a new survey by the Arbitron ratings company and Edison Media Research (as reportd by The Washington Post):

Four formats — news-talk, adult contemporary, pop hits and black-oriented — account for more than half of all radio listening in the nation. For more than a generation, the radio industry has attributed this to listeners, saying they demand that narrow focus. But the on-demand media revolution has revealed that argument to be little more than corporate spin.

About half of Americans age 55 or older have bought “Me Media” devices, such as TiVo and iPods, that put the consumer in the control booth, but according to a new survey by the Arbitron ratings company and Edison Media Research, about 90 percent of everyone younger than 55 is already on board.

The iPod, Apple’s digital music player, is more like the transistor radio than any other gadget in media history, in that it is making a powerful entrance into the American home mainly through the teen market.

The percentage of people who say they “love” their iPod (35 percent) or their satellite radio (40 percent) versus those who “love” over-the-air radio (19 percent).

But the study says there’s still time for radio to respond: Only 20 percent of Americans own an iPod, subscribe to satellite radio or listen to Internet radio, whereas 95 percent of the country regularly listens to radio.

Like Norm said, “It’s an on-demand world and I’m wearing Milk Bone underpants.” Or something like that.

Garrison Keillor: Confessions of a Listener

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“The deregulation of radio was tough on good-neighbor radio because Clear Channel and other conglomerates were anxious to vacuum up every station in sight for fabulous sums of cash and turn them into robot repeaters. I dropped in to a broadcasting school last fall and saw kids being trained for radio careers as if radio were a branch of computer processing. They had no conception of the possibility of talking into a microphone to an audience that wants to hear what you have to say. I tried to suggest what a cheat this was, but the instructor was standing next to me. Clear Channel’s brand of robotics is not the future of broadcasting. With a whole generation turning to iPod and another generation discovering satellite radio and Internet radio, the robotic formatted-music station looks like a very marginal operation indeed. Training kids to do that is like teaching typewriter repair.

After the iPod takes half the radio audience and satellite radio subtracts half of the remainder and Internet radio gets a third of the rest and Clear Channel has to start cutting its losses and selling off frequencies, good-neighbor radio will come back. People do enjoy being spoken to by other people who are alive and who live within a few miles of you.”

— From the  The Nation (May 23) [via Doc Searls]

RTNDA’s Dan Shelley gets it

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Dan Shelley is a long-time and valued friend. For a dozen years he ran one of best (probably THE best) radio newsrooms in Missouri. In 1995 he moved to Milwaukee to become the news director of WTMJ. A year ago he was elected chairman of the Radio-Television News Directors Association (RTNDA) and took over those duties a couple of weeks ago at the association’s annual meeting in Las Vegas.

In his first speech as chairman, he outlined five challenges or issues facing “electronic journalists.” We asked him about blogging, podcasting and satellite radio.

AUDIO: Interview with Dan Shelley 30 min MP3

I’m not sure Dan –or any other mere mortal– is capable of taking broadcast journalists where they need to go but he’s the right guy at the right time.

Don’t worry, be happy

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Thanks to John for pointing us to this iPod thread on a forum at MissouriRadio.net. Interesting look at how real radio folk view what’s happening:

“For Christ’s sake, QUIT WORRYING about all that other crap. Movies didn’t kill us, TV didn’t kill us, satellite won’t kill us, and iPods sure as hell won’t kill us. So why all the damn fuss over this crap? Let’s just do some good radio, and all the hype over “Podcasting” and all that other irrelevant (yes, irrelevant) crap will eventually die down.”

XM Radio Online

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This is just a very different listening experience. The player displays the artist and title currently playing each of my preset channels. Listening can be as passive or interactive as mood dictates. And the audio quality (on my DSL connection) is pretty amazing. Radio good enough to pay for.