The San Francisco Chronicle‘s Andrew Ross is scratching his head at the latest changes at endlessly changing KGO AM 810 in that city.
“If you’ve enjoyed listening to my Chronicle colleague C.W. Nevius on KGO Radio for the past 15 months, be sure to tune in Friday,” Ross bemusedly noted earlier this week. “It’s his last day.”
Apparently Nevius isn’t the only exiting host. Ross got a KGO executive to briefly comment on the newest staff adjustments.”We looked at a list of features and decided we didn’t need all of them, but will focus instead on putting on a good news program,” he said. But the article adds that there is “considerable anxiety in the newsroom about the future.”
Jennifer Waits and I have been tag team writing about the station since it sloughed off a small battalion of beloved hosts in late 2011, sparking demonstrations and Facebook revolts. The upheaval came after the signal was acquired by Cumulus.
What good has all this shuffling done? According to the article, KGO has dropped to number 16 in the SF Bay radio market and takes an almost daily beating on Yelp.
Here’s just one Yelp commentary:
“Just read how low the approval rating has come to for KGO. Not surprised. Except for Ronn Owens, the new hosts are dreadful. Monty is the worst. Used to be my favorite station, and always on . No more. Wake up, out of town owners, and restore this station to its former glorey.”
Oh, to be a fly on the wall at Cumulus corporate meetings to hear what they’re thinking and saying. What’s the logic here?
