This one has picked up so much attention, it’s on the AP wire today.
The Wisconsin State Journal in Madison reports that Clear Channel news/talker WIBA/1310 in that Wisconsin city has sold the naming rights to its newsroom. After the first of the year, WIBA reporters and anchors will be heard from the “Amcore Bank News Center”.
No, we’re not making this up.
And it’s not even the first station in that state to do so. According to the article, sister Clear Channel news/talker WISN/1130 Milwaukee sold the naming rights to its newsroom last year to Pyramax Bank. (Banks seem to be the thing.) This part of the story has a Northeast Ohio connection, of course, as WTAM/1100 Cleveland anchors handle the bulk of WISN’s non-drive time updates via the company’s WAN. So, somewhere in the CC World Domination HQ on Oak Tree in Independence, even as you read this, an anchor may be delivering a report “from the Pyramax Bank News Center”.
A local professor in Madison tells the paper he’s not concerned, as it harkens back to the 1950’s when companies title-sponsored newscasts all the time…even at the network level. And for its part, Clear Channel/Madison notes that a fully staffed newsroom is expensive.
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