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| Rob Lorei (image courtesy of Florida Politics) |
Rob
Lorei is one the best-known political commentators and media personalities in
the Tampa Bay area. Until this past Monday (2/18), Lorei was also news and
public affairs director at WMNF. According to a report in The Tampa Bay Times [link], Lorei was fired after 40-years on the
job at WMNF.
The
station did not give reason Lorei was shown the door. In a prepared statement, WMNF GM Craig Kopp
said only that WMNF “…has ended its
long-running relationship…” and “We
are deeply grateful to Rob for all he has done for WMNF. … We wish Rob well in
all his future endeavors.”
The
statement added that Lorei’s forced exit “…was
an attempt to help move WMNF into ‘a new world’ beyond just radio broadcasting.”
Lorei,
64, told the Times he plans to continue his work on Florida This Week, a political
commentary show on Tampa’s PBS TV station WEDU.
WMNF
[link] is one of the nation’s oldest community stations. The programming on the
station has been evolving towards more hours of Triple A music, but there still
is a substantial news presence. WMNF produces a daily, Monday – Friday news and
interview program – MidPoint – that
airs from Noon to 1pm.
In
the Fall 2018 Nielsen Audio PPM ratings, WMNF had a 0.5% AQH share and 76,600
estimated weekly listeners. According to disclosure documents on the station’s
website, WMNF had $1.8 million in revenue for FY 2016, the most recent
information available.
Ironically,
WMNF’s ratings may have played a part in Lorei’s removal. Lorei told the Times that Kopp told him when he was fired
it was because of bad ratings. Allegedly, Kopp said that the station’s
listening audience was too low between 10am and 3pm. During this time period
WMNF airs MidPoint plus other "ratings-building" shows such as Sustainable Living and Talking
Animals.
Kopp
also complained that Lorei hadn’t posted often enough on WMNF’s Facebook page.
Lorei
intends to appeal his firing to the station’s board of directors. He told the Times:
“I don’t
contemplate any legal action. What I hope is that the board and the listeners
will recognize how much I put my heart and soul into making WMNF a success and
I hope they don’t take this lightly.”
Comments
about Lorei’s dismissal, posted on on the political blog – Florida
Politics [link], said WMNF had made a big mistake. This comment was typical:
February
18, 2019 at 8:31 pm
Content matters more than
platforms. I spent 45 years in the news business. Rob has developed over the
years into a real professional. I’m sorry this happened.
TWO-THIRDS OF FULL-TIME
CLASSICAL MUSIC STATIONS IN DIARY MARKETS HAD MORE WEEKLY LISTENERS IN FALL
2018 THAN FALL 2016
 |
| Kimberly Powell |
Last
week we posted the Nielsen Audio ratings for full-time Classical stations in
PPM markets.
We received this nice comment from Kimberly Powell, Director of
Programming and morning host at Classical KUCO [link] in Oklahoma City:
We'd love to see an
assessment of classical music trends amongst the Diary market broadcasters!
We
did our best Casey Kasem impersonation and today, Kimberly, your wish is our command.
Full-time
classical music stations in Nielsen’s Diary markets (chart on the left) showed
the same pattern as full-time Classical stations in the PPM markets. Two out of three stations in Fall 2018 saw
their estimated number of weekly listeners go up compared to Fall 2016.
We
are tracking 18 full-time classical stations.
We didn’t have 2016 data for 4 of the stations – WBBT in Richmond, WQBA
(Maine Public Classical) and WWVT in Roanoke are all news. Hawaii Public Radio
(KIPO) experienced a major reshuffling of frequencies since Fall 2018.
For
the 14 stations with complete data, 9 (64%) increased their weekly cume and 5
(36%) went down. KUCO stayed about the
same.
Congratulations
to KUCO, this year celebrating 50 years of Classical music!
Remember, as Casey said: Keep your eyes in the stars and your feet on the gound!
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