At the end of 2011, The Airchecker named the Zone, The Station of the Year! Or maybe its… #RadioStationOfTheYear2011 in twitter speak.
He asked me to talk a bit about what goes on at the Zone to make it go.
To start, you can find the Cole’s notes on the history of the station from our wikipedia page.
The operation of the Zone is generally less exotic than many people think.
We have five DJs, a news person, a sports person (WHL Royals play-by-play), a music director/program director, a boss person, a Promotions street team person… and then most all the other jobs are shared with the Q! (promotions, creative, production, traffic, sales, engineering, internet) and/or the Pattison Broadcasting chain as a whole (more engineering and administration). Check it >> Zone Staff
Its a pretty chill place to work as far as work environments go. Bossman Johnny basically expects you to show up… engage in some form of regular office hours and demonstrate a superior radio show ever time you’re in-charge of pushing the buttons. The rest is pretty much a chose-your-own adventure from there. We meet weekly to discuss the direction of the radio station. John will discuss any challenges, complaints or praise we’ve received from the community then Bryan Capistrano (Programming) and Tindy Bassi (Promotions) let us know what is happening and what’s going to happen… then discussion and feedback…
I wouldn’t say The Zone is a democracy, but it also doesn’t feel like a corporate dictatorship.
We also meet to discuss which music to add to rotation. Our music department is led by Bryan with myself as assistant and Jade Nixon and Pol Plastino’s help, hard work and insight. Basically we listen to music, debate on which songs we think will excite Zoners the most and add them. From my understanding, a fairly standard practice with our contemporary modern rock stations in Canada.
Our promotions team dreams up the promotions that you’ll hear on all the other radio stations next year. Tindy Bassi is the director and she is responsible for both The Q! and the Zone. She is assisted by Allie Bowman (who focuses more on the Zone) and Chris Loran (who maybe leans more Q!). And we have a street team person named Clorisa.
Online and social media is Webmeister Bud. His office is covered in bubble wrap and is a highlight of tours when schools come through the station. He handles the website, direction for social media (which is executed by pretty much any Zone staff member), edits video and shoots concert footage and takes photos. We also have lots of friends that help with concert pictures and videos too (and comics, and stuffed DJ dolls).
Production is the domain or Sheldon Hovde with Cassie Price and Caleb Kirby. Sheldon has 800 kids, Cassie reads books and Caleb talks puck with me ever since Dave Sawchuk moved to Edmonton to work for EMI.
Mark Adams is the Q’s PD but he also helps Bryan and I with music and programming direction and also handles a lot of the airchecks and WHL broadcasts… plus any other special projects that require insight.
As for Victoria Royals games… Marlon Martins was brought in from Lethbridge to do play-by-play. I went to BCIT with Marlon back in like… 2000? Something like that. Small world.
Our DJs are Dylan Willows with Jason Lamb doing news… Pol Plastino is mid days, I do Afternoon Drive and Jon Williams and Jade Nixon handle evenings and weekends. *** oh and Trevor on Sunday mornings!
AND then there is… the Sales Team which includes our resident Calgary Flames fan and traffic, and administration, and engineering and also all the charity and community work above and beyond promotional events administered through the TLC Fund and…. hmmm that’s a radio station!
Thank you for listening.
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