Category: agency news

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Radio news & notes

A few Idaho radio news & notes:

Make a greater Impact

K269GI_FX_CUKWYD/Wild 101 just added a second frequency: 101.5 FM. The station launched in 2008 at 101.1 FM — and will remain there, but the new 101.5 signal will drastically improve signal coverage in the downtown Boise core, Boise State, and the Barber Valley. The 101.1 FM signal broadcasts from a site near Parma and has great coverage in Canyon County. This new transmitter sits near the cross on Table Rock and will help the station in town.

“When we launched KWYD as a brand new station on 10/31/08 we knew we had a great rimshot,” Impact Radio Group CEO Darrell Calton told me. “But with every rimshot comes the downside: Where is there a signal issue? In our case the station was eighty, maybe eighty five percent of a full Deer Point (based transmitter). The downside? Downtown and BSU.”

Calton says there are more changes to come as the group continues to grow – now with four strong signals. The market’s first HD commercial station is up next.

More events in the TownSquare

TownSquare Media continues to amp up its events business. The Boise Music Festival just wrapped up its sixth year – and the company tweaked the model for the event. Instead of relying mostly on attendance through ticket giveaways, the radio group pushed ticket sales this year and cut back on the number of free tickets floating around. Attendance remained strong – albeit likely off the nearly 80,000 folks who attended last year (108º temps will do that).

In addition to BMF, Idaho’s Largest Garage Sale and new event Insane Inflatable 5K – the group is putting on The Huckleberry Jam at Tamarack Resort in August. The two-day festival features Ben Harper, Brett Dennen and other artists – plus a camp site and more.

Randy & Alana leave Boise

TownSquare parted ways with KAWO/Wow Country 104.3 morning duo Randy & Alana last week. The pair left the station after several years – and were hugely popular in the market, taking top honors for country stations and providing the engine that Wow Country 104.3 zoomed along on the past few years. The decision was largely Rand & Alana’s and they’re looking for their next gig – and TSQM is looking for its next country morning show.

Don Day is the Digital Sales & Product Manger for TEGNA Media in Boise (aka channel 7).

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Done deal: KIVI, KNIN go to separate camps

KIVI and KNINThe Boise DMA has new television station owners – snapping up a pair of stations that used to be joined at the hip.

On April 1, EW Scripps formally closed on its deal to acquire Journal Communications’ broadcast assets, including KIVI-TV, KSAW-TV (Twin Falls), KTHI/107.1 K-Hits, KQXR/100.3 The X, KJOT/Rock 105.1 and KRVB/94.9 The River.

Not included in the deal was KNIN-TV Fox 9. You’ll remember in September, we walked through all the possible scenarios – as the FCC wasn’t going to allow Scripps to scoop up KNIN. I laid out five potential options – and the deal took door number four:

– Scripps keeps KIVI, sells KNIN with all programming intact to an outside owner and has little involvement in the station . (snip) (I)t’s conceivable that Scripps could continue to supply KNIN with news (or it could even come from one of the other two TV news providers in the market for the right price).

Alabama-based Raycom Media worked out a deal with the trustee for KNIN to buy the station, effective essentially immediately. Channel 6 and channel 9 will become separate stations with less and less to do with each other as time goes on. A lengthy and carefully-structured shared services agreement filed with the FCC lays out the ten-year deal – and even gets into detail like what portion of the big KIVI building in Nampa Raycom may use. Some of the particulars:

  • Raycom paid $14.5 MM. Journal purchased the station for $8 MM in 2008, before it was a Fox affiliate.
  • The stations will not share sales, programming, revenue or any other financial matters. KIVI and KNIN’s sales staff will be separate, will not be allowed to coordinate, will not be allowed to cross-sell and cannot go on calls together.
  • The two stations will not be able to work together on retransmission consent deals.
  • Scripps will deliver just less than 12-hours of news programming to Raycom each week for airing on KNIN: Two hours per day each weekday, and a total of two hours each weekend. The timeslots are the current 7am and 9pm newscasts.
  • KIVI & KNIN will have to handle promotion independently. You’ve possibly already noticed that promotions on the two stations for the most part no longer mention each other (though for now they look identical).
  • Scripps will handle technical & administrative services – i.e. master control.
  • The deal is for ten years – but can be pulled apart with notice by either side.
  • Raycom will hand over a check for $131,708.33 every month to Scripps for the news programming, technical services etc. That’s a cool $1,580,500 each year – with a 2.5% bump built in each year.
  • Raycom will establish a website for KNIN. Currently “IdahoOnYourSide.com” services both stations.
  • Right now, neither KNIN or KIVI are high definition in news. If Scripps decides to go HD someday, Raycom will give them some cash to get the upgrades done.

Bottom line: KNIN & KIVI will start to act separately in many ways – particularly in the sales area. Raycom is a big television station owner – and is competitive in many markets. Will this SSA last for ten full years, or will Raycom move to make the station even more independent? Time will tell.

Two quick sidenotes: In the past two years, every major station in the market has picked up a new owner – with Sinclair, Gannett/TEGNA, Scripps and Raycom entering the fray. Only independent KTRV’s Block Communications is unchanged.

In the Twin Falls market, a similar change is afoot – after Gray Television purchased CBS affiliate KMVT and FOX affiliate KSVT.

Don Day is the digital sales manager for channel 7, and used to run IdahoRadioNews.com. Now he tweets a lot.

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Oliver Russell Named as “Best in World for Workers”

2015 Best for the World for Workers

From our friends at Oliver Russell:

Brand marketing firm Oliver Russell was recognized recently for creating the most positive overall employee impact by the nonprofit B Lab with the release of its fourth annual ‘B Corp Best for Workers’ list. The ‘B Corp Best for Workers’ list honors businesses that earned a worker score in the top 10% of more than 1,200 Certified B Corporations from over 120 industries on the B Impact Assessment, a comprehensive assessment of a company’s impact on its workers, community, and the environment.

The B Corp “Best for Worker” list sets the gold standard for high-impact companies and demonstrates any type of company can use business as a force for good. In the workers category, Oliver Russell is one of 98 companies from 13 countries and 31 industries to be so recognized. Additional 2015 Best For Workers honorees include Cooperative Home Care Associates, a worker-owned cooperative based in the Bronx, Venezuelan biotechnology firm ETAVENCA, America’s oldest flour brand King Arthur Flour and Kansas-based MAX Insurance. Thirty-five percent of honorees are based outside the US, with companies operating in emerging markets such as Brazil, Ghana, and Venezuela.

A full list of this year’s honorees can be found at bestfortheworld.bcorporation.net. And an expanded version of this news release can be found as a blog on the Oliver Russell website.

“Many companies pay lip service to the shopworn adage, ‘people are our most valuable asset’,” said Russ Stoddard, Oliver Russell founder and president. “We decided to make this a competitive advantage – to invest significantly in our employees—and we’re gratified for this recognition as it shows we’re on the right track.”

“Today’s honorees inspire all companies to compete not only to be best in the world, but best for the world,” said Jay Coen Gilbert, Co-Founder of B Lab, the nonprofit organization that certifies B Corporations and governs the independent third party standard used to generate the comparable assessment of corporate impact.

B Lab simultaneously released separate lists recognizing the companies ‘Best for the World’ (overall impact), ‘Best for Community’ (community impact), and ‘Best for the Environment’ (environmental impact) which can be found at bestfortheworld.bcorporation.net. A total of 350 companies were named 2015 Best For the World Honorees, including Natura, d.light designs, Roshan, New Belgium Brewery, Method Products, and Seventh Generation.

Each honored company is a Certified B Corporation. These companies use the power of business to solve social and environmental problems and have met rigorous standards of social and environmental performance, accountability, and transparency. Today there are more than 1,200 Certified B Corporations, across 121 industries and 38 countries, unified by one common goal: to redefine success in business. Any company can measure and manage social and environmental impact performance at bimpactassessment.net.

About Oliver Russell

Oliver Russell, a Boise-based brand-marketing firm founded in 1991, builds brands for purpose-driven companies and causes. The company counts Hewlett-Packard, Allegro Coffee/Whole Foods Market, and Mountain Health Co-op among its clients. It is a certified B Corporation, part of a growing movement of companies that believe in using the power of business to help solve social and environmental issues. Since the company’s founding, Oliver Russell has donated more than $1.8 million in cash and resources via social impact grants to nonprofit causes and social enterprises. More information about these Social Impact Grants can be found here.

About B Lab

B Lab is a nonprofit organization that serves a global movement of people using business as a force for good.  Its vision is that one day all companies compete not only to be the best in the world, but the best for the world and society will enjoy prosperity for all for the long term.  B Lab drives this systemic change by: 1) building a community of Certified B Corporations to make it easier for all of us to tell the difference between “good companies” and good marketing; 2) passing benefit corporation legislation to give business leaders the freedom to create value for society as well as shareholders; 3) helping businesses measure, compare and improve their social and environmental performance with the free B Impact Assessment; 4) driving capital to impact investments through use of its B Analytics and GIIRS Ratings platform.

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Ivie & Associates acquires CLM Marketing and Advertising

Word got to us a few days ago, and was confirmed via a press release recently issued by Ivie, that Ivie & Associates has acquired CLM Marketing & Advertising in Boise.

A couple of excerpts from the release:

CLM, founded in 2003, is a strategic creative agency headquartered in Boise, Idaho, with expertise and capabilities expanding the variety of client verticals that the Ivie family of companies serve.

Ivie has grown considerably since it was founded 21 years ago. Through acquisitions and client portfolio expansion, Ivie has achieved 40 percent year-over-year growth for the past five years. In a continuing effort to provide world-class marketing services to its clients, Ivie is constantly seeking knowledge and expertise in new areas of marketing and advertising. CLM was a perfect fit for the Ivie family of companies.

Ivie & Associates is headquartered in Flower Mound, Texas, and employs over 550 professionals throughout its U.S. and China offices.

Given that Ivie established a presence in Boise last fall, it will be interesting to see what—if anything—becomes of either local office.

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Advantage Advertising’s Chuck Christopher Supports University of Idaho’s JAMM Program

Excerpted from the University of Idaho’s Letter from the President, February 27, 2015.

Generous Gift Supports Award-winning JAMM Program

When Chuck Christopher ’84 graduated with a bachelor’s degree in advertising from the College of Letters, Arts and Social Sciences, he was prepared for success in his career. As a participant on the University of Idaho’s award-winning advertising team in the School of Journalism and Mass Media (JAMM), Chuck developed the skills and experience needed to become president of Advantage Advertising in Lewiston, Idaho, in 1987. “Being on the ad team gave me the precise experience to take into my career,” said Chuck. “The ad team prepares the best talent for success in the industry.” Chuck and his wife, Mindy, recently gave to the Advertising Team Endowment so that current Idaho students can prepare for their own future successes. The ad team, advised by JAMM faculty member Justin Barnes, has won the five-state regional competition for two years in a row.