C. Crane recently exhibited at the Public Media Conference 2017 in beautiful San Francisco #PMDMC17 (Public Media Development and Marketing Conference). We previously exhibited in 2013. Once again we were blown away at the awareness these stations have in relation to their listeners. It’s much different than we see and experience in other environments where there seems to be more disconnect between the station and the listener. We believe it’s because these stations exist because of their member base. No members supporting the station equals no station or a “lesser” station.
What is Public Broadcasting and why should I listen?
America’s unique public broadcasting system is a collaboration of 1,300 local non-commercial radio and television stations that meet the standards of and are supported by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. They work with each other and with hundreds of national and local producers and community partners to ensure that Americans have universal access to high-quality non-commercial programming….
https://current.org/about-public-media/why-public-media/
We speak with people every day who couldn’t imagine a day without their local public radio station. The variety of programming includes NPR, BBC, classical music and often local on-air talent (which you all know is hard to come by in these days of mega consolidation, syndication and automation).
You might wonder how C. Crane fits into Public Radio since we’re normally an advertiser and well….there isn’t really advertising on Public Radio. We fit in, in a few different ways.
- We build radios that help the listeners get the signal. Often these stations are in rural areas or have fringe area listeners who struggle to receive the signal – our radios are high quality and help them pull in the weak signal and sound great too!
- If the station’s power is too low (or maybe it’s HD so the coverage radius is small and limited to their vehicle or an app) – we offer our internet radio which in many cases is the perfect solution. If the stream isn’t already available, we are usually able to have it added within a short period of time.
- Our radios make great membership premiums. The most popular is the CC Solar Observer.
- In the event our products don’t make sense for a premium, we also have a radio for resale program. We offer this to both public and private stations where they can offer our radios direct to their listeners. They are known as “Orphans”.
- This year there was also a lot of interest in our new CC Buds Pro – Earbuds for Voice. A LOT of people listen using earbuds daily and finding a good pair, where you can hear the voice at a reasonable price is hard to do. We see earbuds in our futures 🙂
We met the most amazing, down to earth, community minded and radio loving individuals at PMDMC and were so honored to be a part of this event. Stay tuned for some really great blog posts based on some of the people we met and stories we heard at the show!
Do you listen to Public Broadcasting? Share your favorite Public Broadcast show/station(s) in the comments below to be entered to win the NEW CC Buds Pro! Drawing will be held July 31st. Please only one entry per person.
Congratulations to Mer on your win of the CC Buds Pro! Thank you all for participating.
This is a little embarrassing. On All Things Considered, they did an April Fools Day report each year at the end of the show. It was a report that sounded legitimate, but was really a joke. If you feel for it, as I did, you felt a fool. The one that really got me was a report that Starbucks was building a coffe sluice that would carry coffee beans from Seattle to New York City, with a spur on to Boston. The report included an interview with the mayor of a small town in North Dakota. The sluice was going to cut right through his town, and NPR asked about the impact on the town and on the environment more generally. I fell for it completely. Even worse, one year later I fell for the April Fools Day report again; this one about loyalty discounts for people who had a visible tattoo of a company’s logo. Worst of all, I made a living as an auditor; someone whose livelihood depends on having a healthy skepticism.
I am fortunate that there are still a couple of locally owned commercial radio stations that are not part of large media conglomerates, so I do have some great radio choices. Then, I’ll turn to NPR, and I am always pleasantly surprised by the level of reporting, features, and even comedy that I hear on NPR. So I do my best to rotate between the three stations, but I especially love the podcasts I am able to access via NPR. They are all good, but my favorites are on Fresh Air.
Atlanta picked up a second public radio station last year: WRAS 88.5 FM at Georgia State University.
It runs the same NPR news schedule as the first station, WABE 90.1 FM, but its local shows are more politically oriented, while WABE’s local programming tends toward art, culture and local news.
I prefer WABE in the morning because the local news warns me of what I’m facing before I walk out the door in the morning: traffic, weather, etc.
Public broadcast from Penn State University
I listen to North Country Public Radio on my CCRadio and my CCSolarObserver. My favorite shows are “Radio Bob’s Rhythm and Blues Show” and “The Eight O’Clock Hour” (both locally produced), and NPR’s “Only a Game”.
Public radio isn’t for me. The programmers are far left and their views offend me. If there was a conservative network built on the listener-funding model, I would tune into it. As it is, only commercial stations cater to my views because they’re in business to make a profit. That’s not a four-letter word by the way.
KCRW in Santa Monica, CA has an amazing range of programming with regards to music, entertainment, and documentary, and outstanding locally produced shows in addition to the syndicated NPR & APM shows they run. I think it consistently is voted the best Public Radio station in the country because of this. They also have a robust online presence with a lot of functionality. It’s where I discovered the show radiolab.org, which is one of my favorite podcasts.
I’m retired, and periodically host at USFS campgrounds during the summer months in the northern CA Sierras. Public radio complements the weather service broadcasts that I rely on for safety, news, and events that I can pass on to campers. At elevation, my go-to is KVMR in Grass Valley or affiliated frequencies from Truckee-Tahoe, Camino, or Angels Camp. At the end of long days, soft music is a welcome distraction that I keep low so as not to disturb others.
WNKU – Public radio from Northern Kentucky University
My favorite public radio programming comes from WGUC in Cincinnati. In addition to offering a lineup of great classical music, their on-air personalities have an obvious passion for the music. There are a lot fewer classical music stations than before, but WGUC continues with more of what has made the station great. CCrane is a great company also.
KALW, the first FM station west of the Mississippi!
http://kalw.org/about-kalw