According to multiple reports, Hubbard Radio is initiating a Voluntary Separation Program for all full-time non-managerial staff who work in the newsroom at WTOP Radio — the nation’s top-billing radio station.
A staff memo was distributed on Tuesday by SVP/GM Joel Oxley, who did not immediately return RBR+TVBR‘s call seeking comment.
The Program involves contract buyouts for those associated with WTOP’s FM radio operation, WTOP.com and website development.
To be clear, it is a voluntary opportunity and is being presented to staffers who are aged 55 and older.
“During the pandemic, in DC and across the country in all Hubbard markets, there was downsizing. WTOP programming did not downsize,” Oxley said in the memo, first shared by RadioInsight.com. “We hoped that the economy, radio listening in DC, radio listening at WTOP and our revenue would all come back close to 2019 levels. In 2021 we made some progress, but in 2022 both listening and revenue have gone backwards from 2021 levels, let alone where they were compared to 2019.”
That’s a bleak and somewhat surprisingly assessment from Oxley, as WTOP ranks No. 2 among all radio stations in the nation’s seventh-ranked market with a 8.1 share of all listeners. In fact, WTOP is the No. 1 commercially licensed station in Washington, D.C., and is second only to NPR Member station WAMU-FM.
Furthermore, Oxley’s comments come one month after BIA Advisory Services revealed its Top 10 by revenue for both the nation’s radio broadcasting companies and for individual AM and FM radio stations in the U.S. in 2021
What station is No. 1? According to BIA estimates, WTOP magnetized some $70 million in revenues in 2021 — up 12.9% from $62 million in 2020.
WTOP is also the only Radio station on the BIA list for 2021 to surpass its pre-pandemic revenue figure of $69.8 million in 2019.
With 103.5 MHz (formerly WGMS) its main over-the-air home, WTOP also serves Northern Virginia’s growing suburbs at 107.7 MHz and the Frederick, Md., region on 103.9 MHz (formerly WWVZ and, before that, WZYQ). Hubbard’s other service in the market is “Federal News Radio,” housed on WFED-AM 1500 — the original home of WTOP.
Together, WTOP and “Federal News Radio” attracted some 30.5% of the over-the-air revenue in the Washington, D.C. market in 2021 — 29.1% of which went to WTOP-FM.
Oxley continued his comments in the staff memo by stating, “In the past number of months we have reduced controllable costs wherever we were able to in marketing, outside vendors and not replacing personnel. We felt we needed to take this additional step of offering the Program to continue to try to be more in line with the current economic landscape, while giving eligible employees the opportunity to choose whether to accept the separation packages being offered in connection with the Program. Any eligible employee who elects to participate in the Program will receive the specific separation package offered to that employee, subject to the conditions identified in the Program.”
With news of the Voluntary Separation Program comes word that Hubbard’s Washington Director of Content Integration and Operations, Craig Schwalb, has exited. Schwalb had been with WTOP since March 2020 and was formerly Program Director of WABC-AM in New York.
