Roundhouse FM

Radio News from British Columbia

Re: Roundhouse FM

Postby the-real-deal » Sat Oct 17, 2015 11:39 pm

jon wrote:
the-real-deal wrote:So, what we have with the current CRTC rules, is essentially two classes of community radio stations. One for the very rich or wealthy and also, one for registered, non profits groups.

A bigger mystery to me, in terms of Radio Regulation in Canada, is how cheap and easy it appears to be to get a 50 watt FM license without the CRTC even being aware of it:
viewtopic.php?f=1&t=19124

These appear to be for-profit operations.




Re: Industry Canada approves 3 Surrey South Asian FMs

Postby the-real-deal » Sat Oct 17, 2015 11:37 pm

jon wrote:
From Dan Sys' Canadian Radio News on Facebook:

3 LOW POWER SOUTH ASIAN STATIONS APPROVED IN SURREY, B.C.

Details are not available but while checking the updated Industry Canada database this morning I noticed 3 new low power stations for Surrey, B.C. have been authorized bypassing the usual CRTC procedures.

VF2686 - 89.3 - 15 watts - Amrit Bani Radio Ltd. 207-12830 80th Avenue Surrey, B.C.

VF2688 - 91.5 - 4 watts - Ravinder Singh Pannu 9400 Goreway Drive Brampton,ON

VF2689 - 106.9 - 41 watts (also Ravinder Singh Pannu).

Not sure if it's the same group, but Amrit Bani Radio operates a religious South Asian station based out of Birmingham, England:
http://www.amritbani.com/

Ravinder Singh Pannu operates several Ethnic cable TV stations across Canada as well as an SCMO FM station "Sur Saagar Radio" based out of Toronto:
http://sursaagarradio.com/




Okay, which of these are 50 watt licences ? NONE ! All I see is 15 watts, 4 watts and 41 watts.
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Re: Roundhouse FM

Postby the-real-deal » Sun Oct 18, 2015 12:09 am

Howaboutthat wrote:Re: the above post... I have never read so much drivel in my life.

the-real-deal wrote: The launch of Roundhouse Radio will force 'NW and other Vancouver commercial stations of its kind, like News 1130, to get better.


Why and how? The two stations you quote are news/talk driven and have the staff to do it. Roundhouse has 2 people (as far as I know) in their newsroom. What can they possibly bring to the table in their small broadcast footprint that the others don't do already. Remember NW2 was going to take on News1130?


the-real-deal wrote:The recent events of Roanoke, Virginia, at the ABC tv station there, with one former news reporter murdering two others, brings to the foreground, how this industry really treats its workers ? The reason that we have tv reporters killing each other is because the industry is obcessed with making money at the expense of everything else.


Um... NO! The reason people were killed was due to the instability, mental or otherwise of the murderer. To bring that up in a thread about a new radio station in Vancouver is beyond headshaking. :violent1:

the-real-deal wrote:Perhaps Roundhouse Radio, if they really buy into the "rich man's" community radio concept, can change the current radio news culture, in this respect, giving it a much needed shot of humanity and more balanced thinking.


Perhaps you could explain what this means keeping in mind they have 2 news people. It seems to me you're asking for an awful lot from a station with what will be a shoestring budget after the initial investors' money runs out.


Well yeah, I do have to explain a few things to you !

They do appear to have FIVE newspeople, (not two) and what KICK ASS news people they have ! Kerry Marshall is one of the best news writers in the business, Marty Strong is a very solid, long time veteran newsman, plus they have Marcello Bernardo, a protege of George Garrett, and one of the best reporters in Vancouver, recently stolen from Corus.

Two other news bylines can be found on their news website.

Ill trade ya, Marshall, Strong, and Bernardo, any day, for 20 "fresh out of the box" BCIT grads who can't write a damn, stumble and bumble through their newscasts, can't pronounce local names, but will gladly be hired at CKNW or News1130.

Regarding the murderer at Roanoke, you claim the perp was mentally ill.

That is sheer speculation on your part. No shrink or court ever certified him as mentally ill.

What about your buddy, Al Davidson, who threatened to do harm to the up and coming younger one, Neil McRea.

Big Al must have been mentally ill, too, right ?

Go back to your room and suck on some eggs...
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Re: Roundhouse FM

Postby the-real-deal » Sun Oct 18, 2015 11:03 am

My apologies to Ms. Bernardo, the Assistant News Director at Roundhouse Radio, Her first name is Marcella, not Marcello.
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Re: Roundhouse FM

Postby tuned » Sun Oct 18, 2015 12:40 pm

Howabout is a notorious troll. Don't let him get you riled up.
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Re: Roundhouse FM

Postby Jim Walters » Sun Oct 18, 2015 1:28 pm

I'll give these guys a chance, but in reality let's see where things stand a year from now.

How many of the sign on staff will still be there? Launching with a staff of 30+ is pretty aggressive for an unproven product in an era where the target audience no longer listens to radio. Salaries along with rent, utilities and other expenses has to be well over $100,000.00 a month. It'll take a helluva lot of commercials to break even.

I'm sure there will be some charter advertisers, but if they don't get results, they won't be spending money for too long. With no track record and no numbers, the station won't be included in national buys from agencies in Toronto.

The moneybags from wine country will soon find out their new investment isn't making them a return and the tap will be turned off.

I hope this doesn't happen, and I hope it doesn't turn into another CKPM.

Just a reality check.
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Re: Roundhouse FM

Postby Howaboutthat » Sun Oct 18, 2015 1:39 pm

tuned wrote:Howabout is a notorious troll. Don't let him get you riled up.


Sorry dad, but I thought they were all valid questions/comments... some of which have been repeated here.
The comments came from the same guy who suggested they try teenaged DJs to get a younger audience. Gimme a break.
Houston, We're dealing with morons!.
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Re: Roundhouse FM

Postby kal » Mon Oct 19, 2015 4:32 pm

Set a button on the car radio for Roundhouse today. Great signal in east Van and all the way out along Highway 1 to almost Brunette. Great mix of talk, news, music.
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Re: Roundhouse FM

Postby cart_machine » Tue Oct 20, 2015 1:09 am

the-real-deal wrote: plus they have Marcello Bernardo, a protege of George Garrett, and one of the best reporters in Vancouver, recently stolen from Corus.


I'm certainly not dissing Ms. Bernardo's abilities, but as Mr. Garrett retired five years before she arrived at 'NW, that makes it a little difficult for her to be his protege.

cArtie.
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Re: Roundhouse FM

Postby Howaboutthat » Tue Oct 20, 2015 2:28 pm

cart_machine wrote:
the-real-deal wrote: plus they have Marcello Bernardo, a protege of George Garrett, and one of the best reporters in Vancouver, recently stolen from Corus.


I'm certainly not dissing Ms. Bernardo's abilities, but as Mr. Garrett retired five years before she arrived at 'NW, that makes it a little difficult for her to be his protege.

cArtie.


Careful cArtie... if you question or correct certain people here, you're branded a troll. Good catch!
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Re: Roundhouse FM

Postby cart_machine » Tue Oct 20, 2015 7:25 pm

Howaboutthat wrote:Careful cArtie... if you question or correct certain people here, you're branded a troll.


I've been called worse.

Did anyone hear Roundhouse's federal election coverage? How did they do?

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Re: Roundhouse FM

Postby DirkSteele » Wed Oct 21, 2015 5:10 am

I do wish them the best and I certainly don't wish/predict doom on the horizon, but I am very interested in the business model as well. They have lots of staff, really pretty expensive studios, and zero recognition in the business world.

That last part is the hardest and it only comes with time. We love to talk about serving listeners, resurrecting talent that was dismissed by the corporate machine, and "deep" programming philosophy. Frankly, putting on a good product is the easy part. But radio is a business. Getting established AS a business is the hard part. It is money in, money out. Yes, we are unique that we get to create our own product instead of buying something, marking it up and reselling. The creation of that product is the art (and the fun part)....but there is the business side.

When I see this much money spent on studios and mill work so fast and hard, this many staff hired/contracted....I too question the viability. Doesn't matter how much money your investors have, no one likes losing money. You can tell the investors over and over again that they will lose money the first few years of the business plan....but....you'd be surprised how quickly that agreed upon patience falls apart. I don't know the ownership specifics, so maybe I am unfair....but I have seen it happen before.

Lots of people fall for the romance of owning a part of a radio station. They may know sweet F-all about the business and then trust the creative minds they are partnered with to pay the bills. The creative people have infinite patience because they are creating their art and serving their listeners. The non-radio investor wants a return. There is the division. To directly throw mud...VISTA was like this in their previous incarnation when they launched with dozens of "investors" and a few shares in the hands of experienced radio people. They spent money hard and fast expanding as much as possible. Everyone on the creative end felt the pressure that inevitably came as the operation was failing to see a return on those initial investments.

Think of it like investing in a restaurant. Lots of people fall for the romance. But after 8 months of riding the hot new place wave with the A class chef you partnered with (your money, his/her effort), wining and dining your friends in "your" new restaurant...you get a call that you need to drop some cash on the table to make payroll..and you wonder what happened.

Suddenly it isn't as romantic.
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Re: Roundhouse FM

Postby Mike Cleaver » Wed Oct 21, 2015 1:10 pm

Dirk is being realistic.
The most recent example of the "big launch" in Vancouver was "The Shore."
Great studios, some knowledgeable people at the helm and the money boys in the back room with no broadcasting experience.
Lots of money spent on staff, promotion, studios, equipment, transmitter, etc. and very shortly after (in terms of long term thinking) programming and staff cuts began, the live parts of the day began to disappear, the promotion budget virtually disappeared, there were few advertisers and even fewer listeners.
I did an interview there with Roy Hennessy there a few months before the place was put up for sale and he admitted to me there was no money to hire great people who might have given the station a chance.
I always had the feeling that this station was built to be flipped to a big corporation anyway.
I have the same feeling about Roundhouse.
The first thing that will happen, staff reductions, automated programming, few if any sponsors and even fewer listeners.
They will then complain to Industry Canada and the CRTC that they need a power increase and transmitter site change to Mount Seymour to compete, making it even more desirable for a takeover by one of the big boys which will turn it into another cookie cutter crap dispenser.
This whole Roundhouse concept was openly discussed among a large number of radio professionals at Red's lunch yesterday, people who have worked in and been very successful in the business, both talent and management for decades.
Call it negativity or whatever you want, while everyone there wants Don and his crew to succeed but reality is harsh and not one of the people with whom I talked feel this has a ghost of a chance of success in its present form.
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54 years experience at some of Canada's Premier Broadcasting Stations
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Re: Roundhouse FM

Postby Don Shafer » Thu Oct 22, 2015 11:43 am

I was unaware that Tom started this discussion and thought I would pile on.

It was great to see many of you at the RPM lunch this week. I wish I could have stayed longer to answer some of the questions that have shown up on this bulletin board. Please contact me directly anytime at don@roundhouseradio.com or 778 228 7946. I suppose pre launch speculation questions have been mostly answered: We are a low power FM station with a foot print from the north shore to the airport and from UBC to BCIT. That's our market, the City of Vancouver and all 22 neighborhoods or approximately 700,000 people. So, no we don't get to or want to get to Chilliwack or Surrey.

I would have never suggested that we do this on AM or just on line. The quality on FM is obviously much better and it's premature to just be on line as it can't be monetized at this time the way an over the air signal can. With a format of 80% spoken word 20% music, FM makes sense. It was already pointed out that CBC has done pretty well with talk on FM as most of their stations are #1 in most markets in Canada.

We have 32 staff for a standalone FM station. Content is hyper local and all about the COV. Where most stations are 30% local and flatten their content for the lower mainland, we are over 80% local and our content is directed to anyone who lives, works and plays in the City of Vancouver. We have 7 people in our news room and some wonderfully experienced and talented staff like Kerry Marshal and Marcella Bernardo. Also, Kirk Lapoint & Minelle Mahtani teach journalism and know their way around the fifth estate. 4 people in digital, 4 show producers, a number of researchers, content and commercial producers some very talented on air hosts (some from radio and some not) and a great support team make up our cast.

Will it work? Time will tell - but then we've only been on the air for 4 days! If early sales are any indication there is a lot of interest from local businesses and advertising agencies looking for something different. The crazy test reel that John Masacar produced was a great 90 minute piece of production. The dress rehearsal with Sarah Mclachlan, Dan Mangan and dozens of Vancouver's best was unlike anything I have seen or heard or seen in my 50 years in this business.The support and best wishes has been unbelievable from those that live here and the feedback has been incredibly warm. So, while its early days, I'm pretty happy with how the team is going and certain each day will get a little bit better, more interesting and more engaging. The challenge will be to make sure that we don't start sounding like everybody else.

And yes, Terry Mulligan left the Okanagan over 2 years ago.

Thanks for listening....

Shafe
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Re: Roundhouse FM

Postby tuned » Thu Oct 22, 2015 8:00 pm

I finally got around to listening after a bit of an adventure trying to find them on tunein. There is a Roundhouse Radio there already playing music and I never was able to find the Vancouver version on tunein. Not good when they are the largest aggregator of radio streams and the app that most people use to listen on their smartphones.

I went to the Roundhouse webpage on my iphone and after one click I had a nice sounding stream on my iphone. Kirk LaPointe was on and he's very polished for someone without a radio background. The programming sounded very CBC-like which I guess is the idea. If they can capture a reasonable percentage of the Mothercorp's radio audience they should be able to make a go of it. But, you have to wonder if that's really going to happen. Why would someone switch?

I applaud the station for being live and that they've created almost three dozen jobs. Kudos to the people that have invested their money for trying to do something a little different but my gut tells me it's not going to be enough.
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Re: Roundhouse FM

Postby GrumpyOldMan » Sun Nov 15, 2015 9:13 pm

You guys are all smart enough to know, that this station has been launched to flip. It's basically a commercialized CBC format, with whiffs of the Shore mixed in. And as we all know, they'll fulfill their mandate and then sell up to become either an AC or Rock station when the principles cash in and leave after getting little to know advertising support. It's a charming little effort, not as whimsical as the Shore, but it's 18 months max and done.

On a side note, I tuned in this weekend for a few minutes. Poor Cory Price. Sounds like Lynda Steele. It's amazing how people keep resurfacing and getting employment despite perpetuating one radio cliche after another, and not bothering to do any homework at all. He embodies why this industry is so bloody mediocre. "We are the city are from Kelowna or Kamloops; I'm not quite sure." It's on the internet you lazy idiot.
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