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Looks like layoffs for CHGO
https://mail.chicagofanatics.com/viewtopic.php?f=156&t=132882		 Page 1 of 3
Author:  Ogie Oglethorpe [ Wed Dec 18, 2024 1:04 pm ]
Post subject:  Looks like layoffs for CHGO


not sure of the scale yet, but Boysen and others laid off
Author:  Ogie Oglethorpe [ Wed Dec 18, 2024 1:05 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Looks like layoffs for CHGO
Herb as well
Author:  Douchebag [ Wed Dec 18, 2024 1:12 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Looks like layoffs for CHGO
Who is the audience for this? I couldn't imagine ever listening to a second of their product.
Author:  Ogie Oglethorpe [ Wed Dec 18, 2024 1:12 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Looks like layoffs for CHGO
Douchebag wrote:
Who is the audience for this? I couldn't imagine ever listening to a second of their product.

Yeah, I never understood their model or who their target customer was either.
Author:  KDdidit [ Wed Dec 18, 2024 1:30 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Looks like layoffs for CHGO
I assumed they weren’t making any money. What’s to cut?
Author:  BD [ Wed Dec 18, 2024 1:35 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Looks like layoffs for CHGO
Ogie Oglethorpe wrote:
Douchebag wrote:
Who is the audience for this? I couldn't imagine ever listening to a second of their product.

Yeah, I never understood their model or who their target customer was either.


Isn't their platform Youtube and podcasts?

I thought they were expanding this into other cities.
Author:  brucester001 [ Wed Dec 18, 2024 1:41 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Looks like layoffs for CHGO
BD wrote:
Ogie Oglethorpe wrote:
Douchebag wrote:
Who is the audience for this? I couldn't imagine ever listening to a second of their product.

Yeah, I never understood their model or who their target customer was either.


Plus Herbie didnt do himself any favors by posting woke garbage on social media all the time. He can go help Goff with his lame ass podcast
Author:  Ogie Oglethorpe [ Wed Dec 18, 2024 2:06 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Looks like layoffs for CHGO
KDdidit wrote:
I assumed they weren’t making any money. What’s to cut?

I think their only money coming in was investor dollars. Probably hoping to follow The Athletic and get new rounds of investment and hope they got acquired before they ran out.

If you were a seed, Series A, or Series B investor with The Athletic, you made money when they sold to NYT. If you were a later round investor, you lost money. Given that there is no NYT out there to buy you if you're doing what CHGO is doing, I'd imagine investors probably stop funding rounds after some time and you have to contract as CHGO is doing. The large video content companies that may buy you up are going out of business themselves (see Vice)
Author:  Curious Hair [ Wed Dec 18, 2024 2:48 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Looks like layoffs for CHGO
Ogie Oglethorpe wrote:
Douchebag wrote:
Who is the audience for this? I couldn't imagine ever listening to a second of their product.

Yeah, I never understood their model or who their target customer was either.

Weren't they going for social-justice liberals in the beginning? I watched a few minutes of some video of theirs a few months ago, I think maybe about the Sox. It seemed like they had gotten away from any sort of cultural/political valence, so what they were left with was Barstool without any of the Barstooliness, which is kind of like eating a steak that doesn't taste like beef. Okay, so it's three dudes and Unseen Offscreen Producer Girl hanging out in a loft and commenting on things. And then what? What's the hook? Pure parasocial interaction, I guess, because for however milquetoast it seemed to me, the little chat sidebar was blazing.
Author:  Curious Hair [ Wed Dec 18, 2024 2:57 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Looks like layoffs for CHGO
Ogie Oglethorpe wrote:
KDdidit wrote:
I assumed they weren’t making any money. What’s to cut?

I think their only money coming in was investor dollars. Probably hoping to follow The Athletic and get new rounds of investment and hope they got acquired before they ran out.

If you were a seed, Series A, or Series B investor with The Athletic, you made money when they sold to NYT. If you were a later round investor, you lost money. Given that there is no NYT out there to buy you if you're doing what CHGO is doing, I'd imagine investors probably stop funding rounds after some time and you have to contract as CHGO is doing. The large video content companies that may buy you up are going out of business themselves (see Vice)


Looked into this and apparently most of their investment came from Tegna, which is the broadcasting spinoff of Gannett. Given how Gannett cut newspapers to the bone, this is unsurprising.
Author:  RFDC [ Wed Dec 18, 2024 3:05 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Looks like layoffs for CHGO
I never understood how anyone could think this was going to be successful at the start.
Author:  Ogie Oglethorpe [ Wed Dec 18, 2024 3:11 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Looks like layoffs for CHGO
This makes me wonder how much they are paying for Kmet's pod where he can't really say anything :lol:
Author:  Curious Hair [ Wed Dec 18, 2024 3:28 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Looks like layoffs for CHGO
RFDC wrote:
I never understood how anyone could think this was going to be successful at the start.

Well, since their model seems to be a non-linear facsimile of a local sports-talk station, they probably looked at the auditory wasteland of 670 and 1000 and thought they could offer an alternative. They just didn't think enough about what that alternative would be, because they tried to build a non-linear radio station around Jay Zawaski and Herb Lawrence.
Author:  denisdman [ Wed Dec 18, 2024 3:51 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Looks like layoffs for CHGO
I Googled CHGO sports talk, and it auto corrects your search to Chicago Sports Talk, which takes your to WSCR. They failed at even getting themselves to the top of the search. You have to say, "no" search CHGO sports talk instead.
Author:  Ogie Oglethorpe [ Wed Dec 18, 2024 3:56 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Looks like layoffs for CHGO
They did a terrible job of branding. I wouldn't even know who they were if I didn't follow some of their people on twitter, which has always had the smallest regular audience of the major social media apps.
Author:  denisdman [ Wed Dec 18, 2024 3:59 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Looks like layoffs for CHGO
Ogie Oglethorpe wrote:
They did a terrible job of branding. I wouldn't even know who they were if I didn't follow some of their people on twitter, which has always had the smallest regular audience of the major social media apps.



Yeap, you search their name, and it takes you to their competitor. Great stuff.
Author:  Curious Hair [ Wed Dec 18, 2024 4:02 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Looks like layoffs for CHGO
denisdman wrote:
I Googled CHGO sports talk, and it auto corrects your search to Chicago Sports Talk, which takes your to WSCR. They failed at even getting themselves to the top of the search. You have to say, "no" search CHGO sports talk instead.


Yeah, their whole thing is condensing cities to four letters: DNVR, PHNX, CHGO, and the particularly clumsy DLLS. It does seem to work for the other ones, at least, but yeah, that's a catastrophic SEO failure.
Author:  billypootons [ Wed Dec 18, 2024 4:03 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Looks like layoffs for CHGO
RFDC wrote:
I never understood how anyone could think this was going to be successful at the start.


someone had to pump in a decent chunk of cash to carry these nobodies for a couple years. granted they probably werent making much but still seemed unlikely to succeed from the start. maybe the backers all along knew it was unlikely to succeed but felt if it did become a hit they'd really cash in on it
Author:  Ogie Oglethorpe [ Wed Dec 18, 2024 4:05 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Looks like layoffs for CHGO
billypootons wrote:
RFDC wrote:
I never understood how anyone could think this was going to be successful at the start.


someone had to pump in a decent chunk of cash to carry these nobodies for a couple years. granted they probably werent making much but still seemed unlikely to succeed from the start. maybe the backers all along knew it was unlikely to succeed but felt if it did become a hit they'd really cash in on it

You invest in something like this hoping that it gets swallowed up at a premium within a few years of launch. The acquisition market for media just isn't there so when that didn't materialize they're just biding time until they run out of money and the lights go out.
Author:  Curious Hair [ Wed Dec 18, 2024 4:07 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Looks like layoffs for CHGO
I realize that starting businesses simply so that they'll get acquired by bigger businesses is a reality of capitalism, but man, what a downer. That's how you get Mariano's going from piano players in the entranceway to herding you through a metal gate like fucking cattle.
Author:  OscarTangoEcho [ Wed Dec 18, 2024 4:22 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Looks like layoffs for CHGO
I honestly don't understand how someone could make a living working on these endeavors. It seems like the people involved have to cobble together a shitload of small things to make one's career. I don't fault them and I am confident they have great intentions.I feel bad for them, but what were they thinking? Here's a new podcast thrust upon the landscape of hundreds of others and we will make money?

Because...

Chicago, you know, just Chicago..so
Author:  denisdman [ Wed Dec 18, 2024 4:28 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Looks like layoffs for CHGO
This is not different than any other business in that lots of people try something and only a few become Amazon. The others, like mothernature.com and Drkoop, are in history's trash bin.
Author:  Brick [ Wed Dec 18, 2024 4:36 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Looks like layoffs for CHGO
Chicago Fanatics persists.
Author:  Nardi [ Wed Dec 18, 2024 4:45 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Looks like layoffs for CHGO
Brick wrote:
Chicago Fanatics persists.

Dive bar
Author:  Brick [ Wed Dec 18, 2024 4:49 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Looks like layoffs for CHGO
Not once we add my podcast with JORR and He/She/Them/Xe.
Author:  badrogue17 [ Wed Dec 18, 2024 5:38 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Looks like layoffs for CHGO
Can’t believe talents like Herb Lawrence and Jay Zawaski didn’t move meters
Author:  Seacrest [ Wed Dec 18, 2024 5:58 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Looks like layoffs for CHGO
RFDC wrote:
I never understood how anyone could think this was going to be successful at the start.



THIS
Author:  Jaw Breaker [ Wed Dec 18, 2024 6:27 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Looks like layoffs for CHGO
Brick wrote:
Chicago Fanatics persists.


Thank God...
(and the Wise Men, Council of Elders, and Boilermaker Rick)
Author:  Reared on the Score [ Wed Dec 18, 2024 6:34 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Looks like layoffs for CHGO
Curious Hair wrote:
RFDC wrote:
I never understood how anyone could think this was going to be successful at the start.

Well, since their model seems to be a non-linear facsimile of a local sports-talk station, they probably looked at the auditory wasteland of 670 and 1000 and thought they could offer an alternative. They just didn't think enough about what that alternative would be, because they tried to build a non-linear radio station around Jay Zawaski and Herb Lawrence.


yes this was it, not 'woke Barstool'. I think there's a gap in consistent programming to compete with not only WSCR/1000 but also the dying RSNs. And they were also trying to fill in beat coverage where The Athletic tried and then pulled back from (like the newspapers before them The Athletic was intent on 'destroying')

I think what this company has found is like what The Athletic did: can't subsidize the less popular coverage (NHL, MLS, the written word) and have to emphasize what plays (NFL, NBA, podcasts)

https://awfulannouncing.com/online-outl ... table.html

Most of their layoffs were Hockey and Baseball. Could they have done better in either not having Zawaski and Herb? I suppose. I thought some of their Cubs coverage sucked but it was mostly due to one screamo dude (Cody Delmundo) who remains, and they fired the reporter of the crew
Author:  pittmike [ Wed Dec 18, 2024 7:07 pm ]
Post subject:  Re: Looks like layoffs for CHGO
Was Zawaski launched also?
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