Gray Media - General Thread

[TheRolyPoly 2360]

I just found an article regarding WGGB/WSHM in terms of news as a result of the layoffs.

 

TL;DR - The 7:00-9:00am weekday morning news is gone and so are their weekend evening newscasts.

 

https://www.westernmassnews.com/2024/11/04/western-mass-news-programming/

[tyrannical bastard 3931]

Gray is turning into another Sinclair with these draconian moves.

 

I'll admit it, I let my guard down on this company.  They seemed like a cheap company back then as they sucked up companies like Schurz and changed their cheap graphics packages on their stations like dirty underwear every few months.  Then Sinclair bought more stations, and Media General succumbed to Nexstar.  Then when Raycom "merged" with Gray, there seemed to be some hope.  Putting Meredith out of their misery was another accomplishment of theirs along with all of their "committment" to Atlanta, WGCL/WANF, and whatever "Assembly Atlanta" is.

 

But the problem is, and always has been the top-bottom mentality of these companies that has destroyed the stations they've acquired, instead of using the best practices of strong stations to make the company better.  (Only problem, it's too expensive) It's a problem that's not unique to TV, it's everywhere as companies are leveraging their assets to the point of selling off the parts to make the top richer and the minions doing the work being laid off and whoever's left getting more work for less pay or not enough to keep up with the rising cost of everything.

 

And if it's ugly now, just wait.  God willing if this election goes the wrong way....we're literally screwed as these companies have decimated our news sources and a generation of voters has been sorely misled on what news is.

 

That's it for me now.

Edited November 5, 2024 by tyrannical bastard

[nathannah 2401]

9 hours ago, TheRolyPoly said:

I just found an article regarding WGGB/WSHM in terms of news as a result of the layoffs.

 

TL;DR - The 7:00-9:00am weekday morning news is gone and so are their weekend evening newscasts.

The weekend evening newscasts aren't much of a loss with all three of their networks pre-empting with college sports freely, and the 7am-9am block was Fox exclusive, but they're certainly a skeleton crew to begin with there. And they seriously either need a new facility (saw it in May and the neighborhood is in a lot of flux) or to re-merge into WFSB.

 

It really does feel like the stations in Springfield have become more and more just Hartford-New Haven market extensions, and for a long time the success of the Patriots could hide the struggles; not so much now.

[TheRolyPoly 2360]

26 minutes ago, mrschimpf said:

It really does feel like the stations in Springfield have become more and more just Hartford-New Haven market extensions, and for a long time the success of the Patriots could hide the struggles; not so much now.

 

I mean... for the longest time, WFSB's ID did go by Hartford - New Haven - Springfield so they can do it again and Gray, Nexstar, NBCU, and Entravision are in both markets so its plausible but not a reality anytime soon.

[tyrannical bastard 3931]

The companies are almost undoing their local buildups in favor of the adjacent markets that used to serve them in the analog era.

 

Building up these fill-in affiliates was only a way to get an in-market affiliation for the local viewers and exclusive DMA stations for cable and satellite. Now that those are dying, the adjacent markets are getting the slack to pipe back to the local viewers. 

 

Still a lose-lose situation since the local station is getting distant content and the other market has to water it down for themselves to deliver it.  A distant viewer would have gotten an overall better product from a larger market station being piped in.

[rtmclaug 67]

Are there any Gray stations actually worth watching/working for?

[TheRolyPoly 2360]

Tonight is Sharon DeRycke's last night on the 10pm news desk at KWQC. She'll still remain though for the 4, 5, and 6pm news.

 

https://www.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=948381043769131&id=100057917327947

[TheRolyPoly 2360]

Starting this Monday, Nov. 11th, KVVU will air their weeknight 7:00pm newscast with limited commercial interruption. This isn't a one time thing either... its permanent.

 

https://www-fox5vegas-com.cdn.ampproject.org/c/s/www.fox5vegas.com/2024/11/05/more-news-less-spots-fox5-vegas-creates-landmark-newscast-with-one-sponsor/?outputType=amp

[tyrannical bastard 3931]

18 minutes ago, TheRolyPoly said:

Starting this Monday, Nov. 11th, KVVU will air their weeknight 7:00pm newscast with limited commercial interruption. This isn't a one time thing either... its permanent.

 

https://www-fox5vegas-com.cdn.ampproject.org/c/s/www.fox5vegas.com/2024/11/05/more-news-less-spots-fox5-vegas-creates-landmark-newscast-with-one-sponsor/?outputType=amp

I"m surprised more stations don't do this.  Spot advertising has been dwarfed by retransmission revenue in terms of overall revenue for a long time.

[jjj 17]

5 hours ago, TheRolyPoly said:

Starting this Monday, Nov. 11th, KVVU will air their weeknight 7:00pm newscast with limited commercial interruption. This isn't a one time thing either... its permanent.

 

This is great.  I would love to see more stations do like this.

 

So they are giving up roughly 8 minutes of commercials for perhaps 2 minutes of ads for one advertiser.  They could also run a minute of ads at 7:00:00 and maybe 3 minutes at 7:27:00.  I can't wait to see how this is executed.

 

Las Vegas is almost my second home and "Ed Bernstein Injury Lawyers" is one of the larger advertisers in the market.  They are a big sponsor of the Golden Knights, local news, and also have numerous high priced billboards around Las Vegas.

[GoldenShine_10 92]

8 hours ago, tyrannical bastard said:

I"m surprised more stations don't do this.  Spot advertising has been dwarfed by retransmission revenue in terms of overall revenue for a long time.

 

That's probably a trial run for Gray to see if it works, especially with (for most stations) political revenue gone for a while.

[TheRolyPoly 2360]

Gray has launched yet ANOTHER local sports network... Tennessee Valley Sports and Entertainment.

 

Why is there no article on this? Because Gray has launched it very quietly so shhhh...

 

According to TV listings from what I've seen thus far, its on WAFF 48.3 Huntsville (the originating flagship station) and on WSMV 4.2 Nashville. Both stations are carrying it in 720p 16:9 HD.

[GoldenShine_10 92]

4 hours ago, TheRolyPoly said:

Gray has launched yet ANOTHER local sports network... Tennessee Valley Sports and Entertainment.

 

Why is there no article on this? Because Gray has launched it very quietly so shhhh...

 

According to TV listings from what I've seen thus far, its on WAFF 48.3 Huntsville (the originating flagship station) and on WSMV 4.2 Nashville. Both stations are carrying it in 720p 16:9 HD.

 

I'd assume that WVLT will get into it too - and in Chattanooga, WRCB??

[TheRolyPoly 2360]

14 hours ago, GoldenShine_10 said:

 

I'd assume that WVLT will get into it too - and in Chattanooga, WRCB??

 

If they do so, not yet. WVLT hasn't added it yet. And for WRCB, I thought they would consider it since Scripps News (3.5) is going away. However, I just checked TV listings, and WRCB will replace Scripps News with Grit at 6:00 a.m. on Saturday morning, November 16th.

 

So... that's probably out of the question now.

[tyrannical bastard 3931]

So Gray finally said they're laying off people, and that more could be coming....
https://thedesk.net/2024/11/gray-media-layoffs-q3-earnings-report/

 

I'd be curious to see which markets will be serving whom when content has to be piped in.

Even before, in places where Gray has almost TOTAL control of a given state (Mississippi, Alabama, etc...) there have been lots of out-of-market stories making their rounds.  They can play it up as "from the state capitol" but that can only go so far when it doesn't have to do with state issues and becomes another rip and read of a car wreck on an interstate 200 miles away just because the road is in the same DMA.

 

And if there's a football game going on upstate.....same idea.  Roll something and War coverage of someone's seat getting hotter.

 

Even the lifestyle shows send cooking segments to each other across the country.

 

With a unified graphics package, it gets harder and harder to tell where something comes from.

 

We'll see how things progress over the next year.  I'm not holding my breath.

[WCX-TV 17]

They already started to axe at WGGB in Springfield, MA. Even cut ALL weekend newscast as of last weekend 

[Megatron81 256]

In Lansing Gray canceled 11AM newscast & 4PM newscast surprised they even had a newscast on at 4PM in Lansing as nothing really happens there.

[tyrannical bastard 3931]

Looking at the TV listings for WTVY in Dothan, Alabama.

 

Things seem status quo until this Friday.  Local 2 hour morning show (5am-7am), Live at Lunch (12:00-12:30) Half hour newscasts at 4,5,6 & 10.

However, the 10pm show is listed as "Nightly News".

 

Starting next Monday, "Today in Alabama" is on at 5am & 5:30am.  WTVY's morning newscast is from 6-7am.  Everything else remains the same.

 

WSFA is probably doing the piping in of the newscasts.  They were once the de-facto NBC affiliate in the market before Gray started WRGX.  And when Raycom owned WDFX, they provided news for them as well.

[tyrannical bastard 3931]

Over in Meridian,  WTOK's midday newscast is gone, and replaced with WLBT Today at 11.

[KnoxvilleTVFanDerrick 3]

Over in Hazard, KY, WYMT, the CBS affiliate, recently made changes to their newscasts which will see the weekday 4pm and weekend newscasts originate from Gray co-owned WKYT in Lexington.

 

Go to https://www.wymt.com/2024/11/13/programming-update-changes-wymt-newscasts/ for more details.

Edited November 14, 2024 by KnoxvilleTVFanDerrick
Made a boo-boo and accidentally put in WYMT instead of WKYT.

[Howard Beale 57]

I wonder if Gray has decided to give up on promoting its news jobs due to the layoffs?  I point this out because Gray's various recruiters on LinkedIn are only posting sales jobs.  However, Gray's jobs website still has more news jobs versus sales jobs, and news jobs are still being posted.  Just not being promoted by the recruiters anymore.

[TheRob 937]

I knew they weren't paying attention to the news jobs when I saw a recruiting post a few months ago that used the image of a meteorologist who left the company a year ago.

[GoldenShine_10 92]

On 11/11/2024 at 4:06 PM, tyrannical bastard said:

Over in Meridian,  WTOK's midday newscast is gone, and replaced with WLBT Today at 11.

 

If a statewide newscast is introduced, the fact they don't have stations in the two northern markets does limit that...

[Howard Beale 57]

TVNewsCheck has a glorified Gray Media press release under a Mark K. Miller byline, which announces the “retirement” of three general managers of the following stations:

• WAGM, Presque Isle, Maine
• WIBW, Topeka, Kansas
• WYMT, Hazard, Kentucky

I say “retirement” because I believe these GMs retired in lieu of being fired in any future Gray budget cuts.  These are all small-market stations, and I know WYMT lost a few people in the last round of Gray budget cuts.  Perhaps Gray will have one of its many regional VPs oversee these stations, or a GM from a nearby market will also pick up one of these stations.

[tyrannical bastard 3931]

More on the partnership of WTVY in Dothan and WSFA in Montgomery:

https://www.wsfa.com/2024/11/18/wtvy-creates-expanded-partnership-with-wsfa/

 

As stated above, Today in Alabama will air for an hour on WTVY from 5a-6a with WTVY having local news from 6-7am.

 

The new info is that the 4pm show will be shared between WTVY and WSFA.  It sounds like WTVY will simulcast WSFA's 5pm show as well.

 

WTVY will keep their own 6 and 10pm newscasts.

 

Some of this has happened before back when Raycom owned WDFX.  They simulcast WSFA's 4pm newscast and aired a 9pm show that WSFA produced.

 

EDIT: They will simulcast WSFA on the weekends.  That's a big one.  And quite a 180 from the days when WDHN didn't even exist on the weekends, yet alone weekday mornings.  

Edited November 19, 2024 by tyrannical bastard