FAQ ABOUT RETIREMENT OF CALLING ALL PETS
What’s happening?
Wisconsin Public Radio has elected to retire Calling All Pets. Calling All Pets is ceasing weekly national production effective immediately. Archive programs will continue to be offered to stations nationwide through June 30, 2009.
What does Trisha think about the news?
She’s sad, as are we. She says:
“Although I am sad that WPR has decided to cease production of Calling All Pets, I understand they have to make the decisions that they think are best for the long term health of the station. I won’t take it personally—I understand that business is business. I am grateful for the chance to have spoken, laughed and sometimes cried with so many wonderful people who share a mutual love and respect for the natural world. I will miss Larry terribly, but l look forward to being on his show, and to staying connected with all the listeners of Calling All Pets on his show, and through my blog and website. Thank you all for a great ride.”
Mike Crane, WPR’s Chief Operating Officer says:
“We join Trisha in feeling sad about the end of Calling All Pets. The media world is changing rapidly and WPR faces intense pressure to allocate resources carefully. Calling All Pets has been without a national distribution partner for several years now, so we’ve been producing and providing it to stations ourselves. WPR management decided that was no longer sustainable.
It’s been a great experience working with Patricia, Larry and the crew, and we’re very proud of what we accomplished together in the last 14 years.”
Why is this happening?
Calling All Pets is the only program WPR distributes nationally on its own. We have not had a distribution partner (such as PRI, which distributes our other national shows) for several years now. And (also unlike the other national programs) we have provided Calling All Pets to stations for free, which means that there has been no revenue to offset our expenses. In evaluating our priorities for the current fiscal year we decided that it was time to retire the program rather than continue to commit the significant resources (about $130,000 annually) needed to make the program successful on a national level.
Why now?
All radio stations are under extraordinary pressure to carefully allocate resources in light of rapid changes in the media environment: a careful examination of our budget priorities led us to conclude that it was time to retire the weekly national program.
Two years ago, after a year-long production hiatus, WPR and Patricia McConnell met to consider the program’s future, and committed to at least a year of new production, including the assignment of additional staff to produce, market and distribute the program. We agreed to meet at a future date after evaluating our effort. WPR concluded that our increased effort resulted in a stronger program: unfortunately, it also resulted in what we ultimately felt were unsustainable expenses. Even with the renewed effort we felt substantially more was needed to properly market the weekly national program, and those funds simply aren’t available.
Does this mean changes for WPR’s other national programs?
It doesn’t. Those programs (Whad’ Ya Know, To The Best of Our Knowledge, and Zorba Paster on Your Health, are all distributed with our partner Public Radio International (PRI) and we plan to continue those programs.
What about the Calling All Pets Web site?
WPR will continue to provide an extensive archive of Calling All Pets audio for the foreseeable future. Additionally, we are providing a prominent link to Patricia’s recently relaunched Web site www.patriciamcconnell.com where visitors will find an extensive set of resources including books, DVDs, and a connection to her blog The Other End of the Leash. |
