Citadel Broadcasting Files For Bankruptcy

Citadel Broadcasting, which syndicates Don Imus's radio show, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy yesterday. The NY Times reports it did so "after agreeing to turn over control of the company to its creditors in exchange for reducing its debt. The filing by the company, which owns 224 stations across the country... was not unexpected but does reflect the troubles plaguing the radio industry amid steep declines in advertising revenue and big debt loads." The AP adds that Citadel also owns KABC-AM in Los Angeles, WLS-AM in Chicago, WABC-AM and WPLJ-FM in New York and KGO-AM in San Francisco and that "Citadel's WABC is home to several syndicated hosts, including Don Imus, Rush Limbaugh, Joe Scarborough and Mark Levin."

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By Jen Chung in News on December 21, 2009 10:19 AM

Comments [rss]

NannyState

This is resally disappointing. I was hoping for chapter 7 liquidation. Corporate radio lives to ruin another day.

Sommelier

Imus? Remember when he was actually innovative & funny?

Gothamist_Cynic

Who the fuck listens to the radio anymore?

Darrell

Maybe because many of those stations are news stations, and the consumer is more likely to listen to the news on TV or on the internet (like what I'm doing right now) than on the radio, and what isn't has been converted into top 10 stations, which no one cares about because we all have iPods and MTV, and if we all wanted to listen to the top ten, we have those sources to listen to.

What was great was when we had stations dedicated to a genre because then it was about music discovery. CD101.9 was a great radiostation. Oh, but not anymore. Every time a station gets an audience, the people in corporate go and flip the format to something every other station does such as Rock or the Top 40s station, and then they fire everyone on the station and replace all the shows.

Splicer

Radio, like the record and publishing businesses, has suffered from the consolidation wrought by the Telecommunication Act of 1996. The bill of goods sold to consolidators like Clear Channel, Citadel and Cumulus that massive profit margins were possible did not take into account changes in technology nor the economy and what those things would do to paying off the massive amounts of debt incurred. Also, the race towards "maximizing profits" has also made radio into a gray and bland product from coast to coast. Get rid of DJs and support staff because the executives want to put more in their pockets. What they don't realize is that they are destroying any reason for people to listen.

Splicer

I didn't meant to suggest that the record & publishing businesses were affected by the Telecommunication Act, just that consolidation had ruined those businesses by lowering the quality of product by forcing maximization of profits.