1 of 1- RadioActive
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GNR640 Runs Out Of Replacements
Everybody deserves some vacation time in the summer. But how much is too much all at once?
GNR640 has wound up running a 3 1/2-hr. reroll every evening, from 6:30-10 PM five days in a row, simply because too many people are off at the same time.
It starts in the morning when Peter Shurman is substituting for Greg Brady.
Then at 9 AM, Alex Pierson - normally on at 6:30 PM - is taking Kelly Cutrara's spot in the line-up.
And Arlene Bynon is sitting in for John Oakley on the drive-home show.
How you let your morning and afternoon drive hosts both go in the same week is beyond me. But because they don't have enough fill-ins, Pierson's show is rerun at 6:30 PM because they obviously don't have anyone left to take the shift. That's pretty poor planning to have to rely on reruns that early in the day because of a lack of personnel.
Hopefully, at least some of the missing will be back next week, although Pierson has already told her listeners she's gone for two weeks after this one is over. Hopefully, there will be enough people returning for someone to take her place.
- betaylored
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Re: GNR640 Runs Out Of Replacements
Really enjoying Peter Shurman filling in, wish I'd had professors that explained different issues as clearly and concisely when I was in university.
This ludicrous under staffing, bad vacation planning plus no movement to shore up the morning show is the equivalent of driving a car on fumes. Why would Corus allow this. 640 has never been this poorly run, on the verge of being run into the ground.
Could there be a major rebranding for the station in the works?
Last edited by betaylored (August 17, 2021 8:49 pm)
- RadioActive
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Re: GNR640 Runs Out Of Replacements
I honestly thought Corus had really stepped up their game after leveraging the Global branding and hiring more news people, at the exact same time when Bell was destroying CFRB.
But this scenario with three people on vacation at once seems very bizarre to me. Someone should have told at least one of them to delay their time off by a week or so, so they'd have enough people to fill out a full schedule. Not what you'd expect in the major market of the country, even in the dog days of August.
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Thread Starter- Just a Radio Fan
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Re: GNR640 Runs Out Of Replacements
Don't want to sound like an old geezer here but back in my time vacation requests would be submitted and if the shifts could be filled in your absence, all was good. If others had requested the same time off and there were not enough people to fill shifts, you were S-O-L. If a couple of different people wanted the same week off it came down to seniority. What was most important was making sure all of the shifts were filled. Obviously this is not what is important at GNR 640. A wise man once told me if you lose them in the summer it is tough to get them back in the fall.
- Radiowiz
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Re: GNR640 Runs Out Of Replacements
RadioActive wrote:
I honestly thought Corus had really stepped up their game after leveraging the Global branding and hiring more news people, at the exact same time when Bell was destroying CFRB.
But this scenario with three people on vacation at once seems very bizarre to me. Someone should have told at least one of them to delay their time off by a week or so, so they'd have enough people to fill out a full schedule. Not what you'd expect in the major market of the country, even in the dog days of August.
Sounds like both stations are operating on similar budgets.
NT 1010 is pouring their money into the radio announcers while AM 640 is tightening up their radio announcer budget in favour of a news heavy staff.
More importantly, AM 640 has local news staff. They're not in Ottawa getting Toronto street names & locations wrong.
RadioWiz & RadioQuiz are NOT the same person.
RadioWiz & THE Wiz are NOT the same person.
- betaylored
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Re: GNR640 Runs Out Of Replacements
I've been enjoying listening to regular Newstalk 1010 roundtable contributor and fill in host Amanda Galbraith on the afternoon show for the vacationing Jay Michaels this week, and she's a good example of Mike Bendixon (sp?) finding a natural talent, bringing them along slowly, not over facing them, to use a sports term, and then letting them go do their thing.
When Ryan is away and it's Amanda and Jay, it's a REALLY enjoyable change from Doyle's Jack Russell terrier after a squirrel uneven style.
Only a few more weeks of summer replacement radio to go ... Green Day had the right idea with that song.🍁🍂🍂🍂🍁🍁
- Just a Radio Fan
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Re: GNR640 Runs Out Of Replacements
So it is not only Alexx Pierson being re-run during the vacations. Tonight on their regular Employment Law show which is bought time, it was a rerun as well from a few weeks earlier this summer.