The Kansas City Star from Kansas City, Missouri • 125

Star TV A Radio January 8-January 14 19 84 Page 3J KEKR continued from pg 1J astral first thing you have to understand is the availability of any kind of audience for a given Mr Cless explained be simplistic if you try to run programs at midnight obviously you not succeed Except for the summertime children watch television mainly in the morning and in the mid- to late afternoon he said audience is basically the non-working woman and older people who are retired By 5 in Kansas City an opportunity to pick up a family audience because kids are home from school people who are working are home By 9 we need to worry about the kids The next step is to look at the moves of the other players he said the mornings from 7 to 9 all three network stations are doing news and information programs from the networks The independent stations then have an opportunity to counterprogram to devise a program schedule that is different from the network offerings for the people who necessarily want to see news and Channel 62 made its move with cartoons the daytime the networks are generally showing daytime dramas so from noon until 1 :30 in the afternoon showing game shows After offering 90 minutes of cartoons beginning at 3 pm Channel 62 shows programs that Mr Cless considers family and we get into prime time that is the most difficult area for an independent station trying to he said reason is that the networks are spending huge amounts of money on new first-run programs In order to do something there we have to do something different from what the networks are doing Different in this case means game shows at 7 pm Merv Griffin at 8 and clips from Grand Opry performances more than 20 years ago at 9 And when the network affiliates all serve up news at 10pm Channel 62 shows part of the new breed of video music programs this one from Philadelphia The game of programming stop on weekdays of the main complaints I would get when working for a network station was people calling up and saying that on Saturday morning nothing for adults to Mr Cless said His alternative is and I think are roller derby and wrestling he said Knowing what types of people are watcl New listings Beginning today Star TV Radio includes program listings for KERK-TV Channel 62 of Kansas City and KLDH-TV Channel 49 of Topeka Channel 62 is an independent station Channel 49 is an ABC network affiliate the air initially is to provide someplace on the schedule for programs for almost anybody From sign-on to sign-off according to audience surveys over the last year KSHB-TV Channel 41 Kansas other commercial independent station attracts no less than 11 percent of all people watching television Mr Cless predicts that Channel 62 will attract viewers from all stations particularly Channel 41 think take some of their audience based on the fact that we are an independent station just as they are and some of our programming will be just as popular as he said He would be happy if after one year Channel 62 had 6 to 8 percent of all viewers of the early disappointments you have when you start programming is that you find out no matter what you any kind of programming-half the people like it at Mr Cless said "If you run a cowboy movie half the people like it If you run a newscast half the people like it Fortunately Mr Cless dais iWvIkSM Hi pWTIwWfTnniTi-jigill percent will do nicely for now ferent programs is another phase Most network reruns in syndication are offered several years in advance That means that some of the programs Mr Cless may have wanted to put on Channel 62 simply could not be acquired for two or three more years had to develop a schedule based on what the other stations had decided not to he said Bidding on reruns of "Magnum and to had ended before Channel 62 had a chance to get in on the auction However some shows such as reruns have yet to be purchased in Kansas City Hired only five weeks before Channel 62 went on the air Mr Cless was obliged to use programs bought for the station by its majority owner Media Central of Chattanooga Tenn These included most of the cartoons and Country When Group the syndicators of "PM learned that the show would be dropped by Channel 9 it approached Channel 62 about carrying it ijaMOkm local work requires a staff of seven people Despite the or maybe because of Mr Cless relishes the opportunity to play the programming game Being with a smaller organization gives him more creative freedom Mr Cless said Other stations where he has worked tried to be aggressive he said fact is that because old line and because they have been in business a long time and they have many corporate rules and regulations and procedures the individual freedom of management is not as much as in a situation like Looking at Channel 62 moves what would a competitor think? "I would read two Mr Cless said of all that operating as a traditional Aik) he said because of the number of college basketball games being scheduled for broadcast would see very possible that this station may be more aggressive than some independents in trying to acquire event programming think be in the sports business but you can overkill during the 18 or 19 hours we on far too steep a demand for a station that currently employs only 28 There is yet another aspect that Mr Cless must consider when playing the programming cost of each move Syndicated network reruns cost at least three times as much today as they did only five years ago he said used to be possible for the program director to sink the station by guessing wrong on every guess that he or she made to get the schedule up in the past five years because of the high cost of syndication the program director can sink the station just by paying too much for product shows even though it may be very suc stations are.