CBS announced dozens of layoffs for its owned-and-operated station affiliates. This is according to Broadcasting and Cable Television. Consider it “Black Monday” for many CBS-owned stations. WBZ in Boston, WBBM in Chicago, and KPIX in San Francisco were some big stations that took some big job losses for employees. CBS owns 29 stations across the country, (16 of which are CBS affiliates). This is probably in response to CBS Corp. and its huge financial hit last year. A 14.6% decline in 4th Quarter earnings, which is a 3% fall in revenue equaling $3.76 billion.
Is this a bad thing that the network owns local TV affiliates? When other broadcast owners have rights to multiple stations they tend to keep a close eye on them. CBS has other fish to fry and aren’t always paying attention to particular stations that they own, because they have CBS affiliates all over the place. Nearly 200 in America.
Kicking the TV to the curb.
Courtesy: Torontoist.com
WBZ lost the most; about 30 personnel members. Now, for a station to lose this amount of staff can have disastrous effects. For example, ratings can take a hit because now there aren’t as many people to cover stories. Reporters, Web producers, and sales people all are being affected and I think this could be bad for the overall station. Then again, it is Boston and people are itching to fill these positions. (I’m available).
Other cities that felt the wrath of CBS: Miami, Denver, Sacramento, Dallas, Pittsburgh and a few layoffs in New York. Overall, 1% of CBS’ news operation was cut in a round of layoffs.