Blogs covering the radio sector, including Pugetsound radio.com and AirCheckerRadio industry.blogspot.com, were reporting February 1 that Vancouver’s recently bought Shore 104.1 FM had laid off its entire staff.
The radio station’s website contained a message saying, “We’re making changes to make Shore FM a better radio station. We appreciate your patience. For now, we’re playing even more of your favourite Shore music.”
Nobody was available at the station to confirm the staff cuts.
Former station co-owner David Aisenstat told Business in Vancouver February 1 that he was not aware that the station was planning to cut staff.
Aisenstat launched Shore in mid-2009 along with investors such as longtime radio personality Roy Hennessy, S.L. Feldman and Associates Ltd. CEO Sam Feldman, radio personalities Bob Mackowycz Sr. and Bob Mackowycz Jr., TSN personality Michael Landsberg and Maxam Opportunities Fund co-founder SeanMorrison.
Together those investors founded Shore Media Group Inc., which sold Shore for approximately $13.4 million to a subsidiary of Montreal-based Astral Media Inc. (TSX:ACM.a; TSX:ACM.b) in December.
If the staff cuts are true, it is a sad end for the station, which had owners who trumpeted local roots when they launched the station.
“We are going to be local – live and local,” Hennessy told BIV when the station launched.
“One of the key things that motivated us to do this is that we are a Vancouver station, an independent company that is not part of a chain. We don’t have a floor of accountants in Toronto telling us what we can or can’t do. We make our own decisions.”