Dissolving a Duopoly Discussion

[TV News Marketer 9]

Not sure if this has yet to happen so it's primarily a question in theory.

 

In this age of duopolies, triopolies, LSAs, etc., has there ever been a situation where there was a dissolution of a combined station after one of the joined stations/licenses were sold?

 

Since the primary objective of combining stations is to reduce overhead and combine efficiency, most multiples operate out of one facility with one newsroom, sales dept, and maybe two master controls ... what happens when a station no longer has its own "physical plant?"

 

Example: In Los Angeles, CBS operates KCBS-TV (CBS2) and KCAL-TV (KCAL9) from one facility and staff since the CBS purchase of KCAL9 from Young Broadcasting and its move from its home on the Paramount Lot. Say CBS wanted to buy more stations and saw selling KCAL as a way to lower their ownership cap, what do they sell beside the license? Would a prospective buyer have to come to the table with a leased broadcast-ready newly-staffed new home for the license to create a station?

 

Likely this scenario wold never happen in an industry that believes it has to consolidate to survive but I throw it our for discussion ...

[Viper550 268]

(this should be moved to Specultron imo)

 

How much of a physical presence is even required to run a TV station nowadays, when almost all of your operations can be consolidated and hubbed within your company headquarters or some other facility? As you know, Equity Media took this approach to extreme levels, while Lockwood is using a similar internet streaming-based version of the concept. One could set up the bare minimum needed to control a station remotely while you prepare the local facilities.

[rkolsen 1679]

I'd imagine in the short term they would continue to lease facilities, like what's going on with Sinclair and Howard Stirk Holdings in the mean time. I would also think depending on the situation any employees dedicated to that channel would transfer over (since KCAL has dedicated anchor team) like they would during any other transfer or ownership. If they needed to get out in a short amount of time but still had the transmitter and didn't need to go live they could set up using a channel in a box solution.

[DirtyHarry 720]

 

Not sure if this has yet to happen so it's primarily a question in theory.

 

In this age of duopolies, triopolies, LSAs, etc., has there ever been a situation where there was a dissolution of a combined station after one of the joined stations/licenses were sold?

 

 

Yes. Outlet had what it claimed was the first TV duopoly in the country when it LMA-ed WWHO-TV in Columbus (WCMH) and later WLWC-TV in Providence (WJAR). The WLWC call letters were the former call letters of WCMH-TV . They were parked in Providence to keep Columbus competitors from resurrecting them like WWJ-TV was resurrected on Channel 62 in Detroit.

 

NBC traded the LMA-ed stations to Paramount for WVIT-TV and they later became CBS/CW O&O's.

 

CBS sold WLWC to Four Points, which later sold to Sinclair. SInclair sold the station to OTA Broadcasting. CBS sold WWHO (and WNDY) to LIN and LIN sold the station to Manham Media and the station is operated by Sinclair (WSYX).

 

 

 

Video : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3jvQiHTWw4o

[Thundershock MN 169]

Not sure if this has yet to happen so it's primarily a question in theory.

 

In this age of duopolies, triopolies, LSAs, etc., has there ever been a situation where there was a dissolution of a combined station after one of the joined stations/licenses were sold?

 

Since the primary objective of combining stations is to reduce overhead and combine efficiency, most multiples operate out of one facility with one newsroom, sales dept, and maybe two master controls ... what happens when a station no longer has its own "physical plant?"

 

Example: In Los Angeles, CBS operates KCBS-TV (CBS2) and KCAL-TV (KCAL9) from one facility and staff since the CBS purchase of KCAL9 from Young Broadcasting and its move from its home on the Paramount Lot. Say CBS wanted to buy more stations and saw selling KCAL as a way to lower their ownership cap, what do they sell beside the license? Would a prospective buyer have to come to the table with a leased broadcast-ready newly-staffed new home for the license to create a station?

 

Likely this scenario wold never happen in an industry that believes it has to consolidate to survive but I throw it our for discussion ...

First of all welcome to TVNT! Yes, there have been some duopolies broken up over the years. One of the weird side effects of all the M&A activity is that to the best of my knowledge we have seen legal duopolies broken up for the first time. The first being KTXY & KCEB and the second being KTVK & KASW. In both cases they have yet to totally complete the divorce and, KASW is still in limbo as to who it's final owner will be. Plus, with the recent goings on between Tribune and Fox in Seattle it's possible we could add two more broken duopolies to the list...although, that's looking more and more unlikely.

 

If you wanted to add in "virtual" duopolies you could add KDBC & KSTM. Although, in that case one station is "divorcing" their current partner and moving in with their "new" partner. You could add WMMP (now WCIV) and WTAT in as well. And, If you want to go a little further back you could include KENS & KCWX in this list as well.

 

I'm sure there are a few I might be missing but, you get the gist. In any case the station wouldn't lose it's transmitter and tower. So, in most cases the station being sold would likely be just the license (which includes the Tx & Tower.) Barring a move in with another in market station like KDBC moving in with KFOX or, buying the operation of another in market station in station like WMMP (now WCIV) did and co-opting it as your own you're going to be building a new station from the ground up. But, it doesn't take a ton to run a station now days. You could simply rent out a small office space and hook the Transmitter to a channel in a box and call it good. Or, you could go one step further and just outsource master control to Encompass, etc. It depends on how far the new owner of the jettisoned station wants to go in building things back up.

 

 

Also, just an FYI I know it was a hypothetical to illustrate your point. But, CBS selling KCAL wouldn't lower their percentage towards the ownership cap. Duopolies don't add to the ownership cap percentage as their "national audience reach" doesn't change. They still have the same "national audience reach" whether they have one station or two in a market.

[sanewsguy 509]

I am surprised nobody has mentioned this. The best example is WTXL in Tallahassee. From Wikipedia:

In 2001, Media Ventures Management (then owner of WTXL) entered into an outsourcing agreement with the Sinclair Broadcast Group who owns NBC affiliate WTWC-TV. Sinclair began to operate this station that merged virtually all of its operations from the original studios to WTWC's facilities on Deer Lake South on March 17, 2002. The arrangement was the first of its kind in the United States. The Southern Broadcast Corporation (now Calkins Media) acquired WTXL's license on November 30, 2005 while the arrangement continued. On February 20, 2006, the partnership between the two stations was dissolved when the Southern Broadcast Corporation gave notice to terminate the agreement with Sinclair. As a result, WTXL moved out of the WTWC building.

 

After leaving WTWC's facilities, WTXL rented studio space from Florida State University's PBS affiliate WFSU. On June 20, 2006, this station broke ground on new studios in a commercial park in nearby Midway. WTXL fully moved into the new facility in August 2007.

During the interim I believe offices were in temporary trailers, and master control was outsourced to Equity (Encompass did not exist until 2008).

 

WCTV's old building (in a rural part of the market; they moved into their current facility in 2005) is still there too but I guess WTXL opted to build their own facility.

[tyrannical bastard 3496]

WWHO is one of the few stations that has moved from independence, to a LMA duopoly partner, back to independence, and now part of a virtual triopoly.

 

They also could be the only station in the country that has partnered with ALL 3 of the competitors over their history, as WCMH produced their first set of newscasts in the WB 53 days, WBNS produced a primetime newscast in the LIN era, and now WSYX running a repeat of their 11pm show.

[TV News Marketer 9]

Thanks for all the insightful responses!

[AKA 35]

They also could be the only station in the country that has partnered with ALL 3 of the competitors over their history, as WCMH produced their first set of newscasts in the WB 53 days, WBNS produced a primetime newscast in the LIN era, and now WSYX running a repeat of their 11pm show.

KAYU in Spokane has had their 10 pm newscast produced by KREM (1991-1993) and KHQ (1993-1995, 2004-present) at different times. For a short time while the station produced its own in-house newscast (1999-2004), they shared a few staffers with KXLY.