News

Valerie Kattz is the midday personality for Alpha’s 107.1 The Monkey WXYK (Gulfport, MS) and she used her hosting chops to co-MC the 5th annual “Rock N Rollover” event benefitting the Humane Society of South Mississippi.

It's the second extension Smulyan has granted in his effort to take Emmis private. The first was for two weeks, which expired September 30. This latest extension expires Friday. Smulyan is offering shareholders $4.10 per share, which amounts to approximately $46.5 million.

(By Bob McCurdy) This weeks Monday morning blog summarizes a client meeting we had last week. It's a great example of how knowledge of certain marketing fundamentals enabled us to guide the client to allocate their radio spend in a direction that will likely lead to a greater return and a more satisfied, long-term client.

Taking our early month look at radio's biggest ad category, we find out that September U.S. auto sales are forecast to fall about 1% from a year ago. Forbes is reporting that new vehicle sales will be 1.43 million. This would be the fifth month in the past seven to show a retail sales decline. A year ago, sales hit a record high of nearly 17.5 million vehicles.

On Friday iHeartMedia in St. Louis made the change to 100.3 The Beat, which is now the home of STL’s new Hip Hop and R&B music. The station also picked up the syndicated morning she The Breakfast Club.

Earls Family Broadcasting in Arkansas has added a new radio station to its lineup. On Saturday, October 1, the new 98.1 FM, all-Christmas went on the air. Dubbed Branson’s Classic Christmas, the station will air Christmas music 24 hours a day, seven days a week, through December 25.

Herbster becomes VP of programming for iHeartMedia’s Pacific Northwest Region, as well as serving as PD of Z100 and JAM’N 107.5 in Portland. The region includes Portland, Seattle, Spokane, Fairbanks and Anchorage.

It’s the Hagerstown-Chambersburg market and they’ve snapped up Dorsey to be their new VP/Market Manager. The market is home to WHAG-AM, WCHA-AM, WCHA-FM, WIKZ-FM, WQCM-FM, and WDLD-FM. Most recently, Dorsey held the position of Director of Sales in the Hagerstown-Chambersburg market.

The news comes from the 89.3 WFPL website. Bickers was a host on 89.3 WFPL and 91.9 WFPK for nearly 20 years. He died Thursday. He was 45 years old. Those who knew him best described him as affable, funny, and engaging.

Twenty-eight-year radio vet Mike Vincent has left his PD/on-air post at WSJR/NASH FM 93.7 in Wilkes Barre, PA, to take up his new dual role for Cumulus’ four-station cluster in Melbourne, FL.