[Swprograms] OT: Allen Loudell

[Joe Buch <joseph.buch@xxxxxxx>]

Allen Loudell is a regular attendee at the Winter SWL Fest, avid shortwave listener, and one time speaker at the Fest.  Allan is mentioned in the following article from the Wilmington News Journal.  The radio station of which he is the Program Director is one of the last local news stations with a true local perspective.  I hope Clear Channel sticks with their plan to keep the local focus.

Joe Buch

<http://www.delawareonline.com/newsjournal/local/2004/08/25wilmsoldtoclear.html>

Wednesday, August 25 , 2004 
 
WILM sold to Clear Channel
Radio giant to pay almost $4 million for family-owned station 
By STEVEN CHURCH
08/25/2004

Wilmington radio station WILM 1450 is being sold to radio conglomerate Clear Channel Communications Inc. for almost $4 million, a deal that marries one of the last, family-run, all-news broadcasters in America with the country's biggest radio company. 

General Manager E.B. Hawkins said Tuesday morning that his family, which has owned the station since 1949, has rejected several offers in the last five years, including some that were for more money. Clear Channel appears dedicated to keeping the station's local news format intact, which is why the family agreed to sell, he said. 

Hawkins said the current management team is expected to remain at the station, although a final decision will be made by Clear Channel. The Federal Communications Commission is expected to approve the sale in about 60 days, he said. 

Clear Channel, which is buying the station through a subsidiary called Citicasters, likes the news emphasis of the station, said Joseph Puglise, market manager for Clear Channel in Delaware. 

Experts said WILM is among a dwindling number of all-news radio stations that produce nearly all of their own programming. Syndicated talk radio programs have nearly taken over the AM radio dial because that format is cheaper for station owners to air than locally produced news reports, a staple of WILM's programming. 

Clear Channel is the biggest radio station owner in the country and is known for using syndicated programming to bring in strong profits, said Edward Atorino, a stock analyst with Fulcrum Global Partners LLC. Last year, the company's radio stations had a profit margin of 40 percent, Atorino said. Revenue from all Clear Channel divisions was $8.9 billion. 

"They are very profitable and very well run," Atornio said. 

Phila. stations top locals 

The Wilmington media market is unusual because most of its listeners tune into Philadelphia stations, not local broadcasters, said Mark Fratrik, vice president of BIA Financial Network, a media consulting company. Only about 38 percent of radio listeners tune into local stations, he said. 

WILM ranked sixth in listeners out of 12 stations in the Wilmington market, Fratrik said. His company estimates that WILM had about $1.3 million in revenue in 2003. 

Clear Channel bought WILM because the station's programming will fit in well with the company's other four Delaware properties, Puglise said. The company owns two talk radio AM stations, WDOV in Dover and WWTX in Wilmington. It also owns the FM music stations WRDX in Wilmington and WDSD in Dover. 

WILM will be able to put much of its news programming on the Dover stations, moving the entire WILM morning news show to WDOV, 1410 AM, Puglise said. 

"This may be one of those mergers where there will be more local programming afterward than existed before," he said. 

Allan Loudell, the station's program manager and longtime host of the morning news program, said the news staff was anxious when the sale was announced to employees Monday. 

But he said he was optimistic that Clear Channel would keep the local news format. The company has a financial incentive to focus on local news because that is what listeners have come to expect from WILM, he said. 

"If you don't do a lot of local programming, you are not going to have great success," Loudell said, although he acknowledged that some things are bound to change. "Are we looking at a possible tweak here and there, yeah." 

There are about 1,000 radio stations in the United States that focus on talk shows and news programs, said New York broadcast consultant Valerie Geller. Of those, only a handful are still independent, she said. 

"It is amazing that WILM was able to be an independent as long as it was," she said. 

A spokeswoman for the FCC said the agency does not keep statistics on how many radio stations are independent. 

Talk radio has risen in the last decade as federal rules were changed to allow companies like Clear Channel to own several stations in the same market. That has led to clusters of stations that are owned by the same company and share programming, said Fratrik, with BIA, the media consulting company. 

WILM remained independent during the wave of radio station mergers that began in the 1990s. Clear Channel used the federal rule changes to become one of the world's biggest media companies, with 1,200 radio stations, 41 television stations and 776,000 outdoor advertising displays in the United States. 

Founded in 1928 

WILM was founded in 1928 by radio engineer E.B. Boyle on the top floor of the Bendheim Shoe Store on Market Street in Wilmington. In 1949, the station was purchased by Hawkins' father, Ewing Hawkins, who was a beer distributor in Delaware. 

Former employees have said WILM has long maintained a much bigger news staff than most local news stations of the same size, sometimes to the detriment of the bottom line. 

"What struck me was that the station was a throwback to the days of full-service news and talk radio, where a lot of the programming was locally produced," said former WILM reporter Jim DeSousa. "We really had an astounding number of people on the payroll." 

Former WILM reporter Sharon Mittelman said many radio journalists got their break in broadcasting from the station. Mittelman left the station last year and became a writer and anchor at the national CBS Radio News in New York. 

"It was the experience of a lifetime to work for WILM," she said. 

Hawkins said the station put more of its resources into producing good news and local talk radio programs than into marketing and advertising, which affected the company's bottom line. He said for the last 50 years the company "has been breaking even." 

"It's just a fabulous product that has been undermarketed," Hawkins said. 

Contact Steven Church at 324-2786 or schurch@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx 

Copyright ©2004, The News Journal.




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