The Morning After

Yesterday I was wandering around the Superstore Warehouse Clubthing in Esquimalt seeking the ingredients for spaghetti and meatballs.  I ran into Morgan, a guy I know from the band Dirtfella.

We got to catching up and he mentioned he now owns and operates The Pink Bicycle burger place downtown.  How rad is that?  I had never been, so Coral and I checked it out for lunch today.  I ordered this spicy blue cheese burger monster and Corj grabbed the classic Pink Bike Burger.  The meal was pretty special so my man Morgan has a good thing going on.

Donald has reviewed the Pink Bike twice… his first so-so review and his later review which was more positive.

I’d have to agree with Donald’s more recent review… my burger was savage.  It said spicy, and it was a real deal flamethrower!  I was sweating eating this beast.  Corj’s burger was as she expected, good… but the delight were the truffle fries.  I also liked the flavoured mayo to dip the fries which hearkens back to the days when I lived on Commercial Drive and I’d patronize the Belgian Fries shop.

Coral and I spent lunch day dreaming about our own coffee shop.  We talk about it all the time, but lately the idea of going into business for ourselves has taken on greater urgency.  First… unless something happens in governmentland, come December 1st, Coral is laid off from her gig helping students navigate the world of student loans.  Second, the radio DJ might be going the way of the Dodo Bird (or at least vinyl record.  Fun, but for collectors only).

I was trolling my radio gossips the other day and read that JACK FM in Vancouver canceled two of their last three live radio shows.  I don’t work for Rogers (corporate overlords of JACK FM) or Jack FM, but it is still hurtful to read that a company has no value for what I do, make radio… and yet, they’re in that very business?  WTF?  It was just a bit of a downer thing to read and once again got me thinking about my future.  You can do everything right… the Afternoon Guy at Jack was recently named the “Best Afternoon Show” or something like that, by The Georgia Straight.  That’s pretty depressing to think about.  This guy went to work everyday… did his job WELL,  people responded positively, and the company said… you know what, nothing would be better than you.  nice.

The double kick to the groin, while Rogers is laying people off at radio stations because, who knows?  They’re battling community groups that want a live/local presence in their neighbourhood?  That is not right.

The Airchecker posted this story on the internet by some American mucky muck that made me feel a bit better… but I don’t think this guy owns any radio stations… so his opinion is nice, but doesn’t create employment of excitement for radio.

I Don’t See Jack FM on the Cover of Time

That’s true, but the thumb in the eye… Rogers doesn’t care.  The Airchecker then posted another unrelated article that actually does explain the situation pretty darn good.  “Power Ratings.”

“Power ratings” measure how much advertising a format attracts, relative to its listenership.

A format with a modest audience that a lot of advertisers want to reach – like the men who listen to WFAN (A NYC Sports station) – makes more money than a format with a larger audience but fewer advertisers.

Since radio is a business, station owners will follow the money.”

My American Mucky Muck friend explains it this way:

“As the networks have learned with relatively cheap Reality TV shows, ratings aren’t the only measure of success.  The question now revolves around how large an expenditure is required in order to reap respectable audience levels.”

Yikes, so the mantra at JACK FM is not to make the best radio that they can, its not to make people happy or to entertain… but rather… be as unoffensive as possible and not bleed too much audience considering that they make as little investment in content as possible.  Then the sales team needs to “trick” advertisers into saying “hey look, our audience ‘cares’ spend tens of thousands of dollars with us!”

That would make waking up and going to work a challenge for me, but hey I don’t work there (and likely never will if/when a Rogers type stumbles on my blog… but fuck it, not like Rogers is doing a ton of hiring anyways).

I listened to Mark Ramsey’s podcast the other day… the one talking about what makes radio special…  It takes about 4 minutes of your time.

The moral of the story is this… Jack FM will likely suffer no noticiable decrease in ratings and if they do, it won’t be enough to effect billings vs. the payroll savings.  If the trend takes off, then all radio stations will be automated commercial/music robots and there will be no jobs and I’ll be slinging lattes at my coffee shop.