That's what James Haggerty and The Times-Tribune of Scranton (as well as other papers) reported Friday. Nexstar operates WBRE and WYOU. Our tipster reports: "The article says Nexstar is hoping to make additional revenue off its web sites. If PaHomePage.com is an example, that could generate at least 75 cents in revenue a year!"(Post updated to point to T-T story rather than DMN story)
10 comments:
The T-T reported it Friday as well: Story
What's left that anyone would want to buy? Both 22 and 28 have been gutted and are barely on the air.
That's the idea. Buy a junker, fix it up and re-sell at a good price. Actually, I think 28 does a good job but suffers from a bad rep and 16 isn't that good but gains from a good rep. IMO, they both seem to be evenly matched.
btw: At least at the 10, they ought to change the 60-watt bulb over Julie to a 100-watt.
"That's the idea. Buy a junker, fix it up and re-sell at a good price."
Sorry, Tom, that's NOT the idea. At least that's never been the Perry Sook gameplan. He overpaid to begin with--made money along the way by reducing operating costs to next to nothing--and now he'll find some other sucker to take over the debt load. And THEN what happens? Is there anyone left to lay off?
Nextar needs to bring Vince Sweeney back.
Then Nextar would be worth something.
8:03 -- What I meant was that someone with reasonably deep pockets can come in and buy the joint (or both of them) at a fire-sale price and put in the money they need to make the station(s) work.
Forget what happened in the past; get a whole new upper management in with a view. I'm trying to think of operations that do this sort of thing, that come in and turn stations around. For instance, the Adam Young ad agency has long had a name for representing tv stations that are "hard sells" for whatever reason. There are the tools out there.
Tom, I hear what you're saying, but let me counter.
Perhaps Nexstar, taken as a chain, is a dandy little fixer-upper, and might be worth buying. But WBRE and WYOU have been allowed (forced?) to deteriorate SO much, and they're SO far behind the market leader that there's probably no amount of money that can make them competitive.
Whoever gets both will have an even bigger debt load to service and will be even further away from being a factor in the marketplace.
They're fates are sealed: they'll spend less and less, do less and less, charge less and less for spots and make less and less. They'll continue to make pennies while WNEP's new owners make dollars.
Nobody's getting rich entering 1964 Corvairs in the Indy 500.
Yeah, I reluctantly sit corrected. I'm the guy with hopes, but debt loads are the cement trucks of life, ready to unload on the hapless new owners. And they are the reality of business life.
So, assuming 28 will perk along on its own, how do you save the CBS affil? Just run full network and syndie, forget the local news?
22's future? Dunno. On the late (and much lamented) "Beale's Bites" page I speculated some time back that WYOU would become a "pass-through" station: play ALL the network shows, drop news, air informercials and cheap syndicated programming to fill in the gaps.
"My Mother the Car," anyone?
I'm beginning to wonder if WYOU isn't viable as it now stands. I don't think 22 has more than 15-20 people on its news staff--maybe fewer. Add in a bare-bones production staff. If you're spending next to nothing, almost any rating generates cash flow.
Maybe Perry's smarter than I gave him credit for. If he dropped a TON of money into the place, would he get his investment back in higher ratings & revenue? Probably not.
Maybe Perry's a visionary who knew when to hold 'em and when to fold 'em. Revolting thought, but a distinct possibility.
Maybe if you slap enough advertiser decals on the '64 Corvair you can make money finishing dead last at Indy.
8:39 happened to mention: On the late (and much lamented) "Beale's Bites"
A little off-topic, but I wrote to Howard shortly after he stopped and offered to keep it going, but only as a moderator and not originating anything myself. He never replied; the first time he failed to respond to any of my notes.
Post a Comment