Coastal Television Broadcasting Group have agreed to purchase most of the broadcast assets owned by Mike Reed and Bill Christian under multiple banners including Waypoint Media, Vision Communications and Star City Broadcasting.
Included in the deal are the four radio stations operated by Star City in Lafayette IN: Variety Hits “95.3 Bob-FM” WBPE, Country “Y95” 95.7 WYCM, CHR “Z96.5” WAZY, and Conservative Talk “104.3 The Patriot” 1410 WSHY/104.3 W282CJ.
The deal also includes television stations in Elmira NY, Jackson TN, Jonesboro AR, Lafayette, and Meridian MS, a centralized NewsHub based in Little Rock, and the Nulogic Digital Marketing. Led by Bill Fielder, Coastal Television currently owns stations in Anchorage AK, Casper and Cheyenne WY and Tupelo MS.
Christian and Reed had agreed to sell their stations to Standard Media in November 2019 for $59.2 million, but that deal did not close. They then sold their eleven Elmira and Olean NY radio properties to Seven Mountains Media for $1.8 million in a three-way deal also involving Family Life Ministries earlier this year.
Broadcasting industry veterans Mike Reed and Bill Christian, have signed an agreement to sell most of their stations to Coastal Television Broadcasting Group. Terms were not immediately announced. The deal includes nine big four network affiliates, five CW or MyNets, numerous diginets and four radio stations, as well as the centralized NewsHub in Little Rock Arkansas, plus the fast-growing Nulogic Digital Marketing agency that serves the TV and Radio stations.
Five years ago, Christian and Reed launched new ABC, NBC, CBS, Fox and CW stations in previously unserved markets of Jackson, TN, Jonesboro, AR and Lafayette, IN. They effectively built more big four networks in a three year period than anyone in history. “We are so excited that we could bring new local service into these markets, while growing our legacy stations in Mississippi and New York,” said owner Mike Reed. “We jumped in feet first and provided new options for local news and programming and showed our commitment to our communities by providing local scholarship endowments to our universities. All of our stations eagerly embraced our mission of “Paying it Forward” to our employees, our advertisers and our communities. We are excited that Coastal Television Broadcasting will continue and grow that tradition.”
Bill Fielder and his management team, including Scott Centers, are aggressively building a strong group of stations in markets across America. Starting with a single station in Alaska in 2008, his Coastal Television Broadcasting Group expanded its reach and coverage over the past decade to cover the vast state of Alaska. Then in 2020, they added coverage of the majority of the state of Wyoming to Coastal’s portfolio. Coastal also owns a station in the Tupelo/Columbus Mississippi DMA. This acquisition more than doubles the size of Coastal, resulting in a presence in the northeast, midwest, southeast and west.
Bill Fielder added, “We are enthusiastic to announce the acquisitions of these television and radio stations, the NewsHub and Nulogic. All of these businesses have strong leadership, a strong tradition of community service and incredible teams driving them forward. I know I speak for all Coastal’s team when I say that we are proud that Mike Reed and Bill Christian have entrusted us with the stewardship of their businesses.”
“We see this as a win-win for all involved,” says Christian. “As the broadcasting industry consolidates, it is important for small broadcast companies to scale in size. Mike and I looked out at the landscape, and we felt these stations could best compete by combining with another group to maximize leverage. We are proud of what we have achieved and are grateful to all of our teams who have worked tirelessly to serve our communities, from finding lost dogs to giving life-saving information from tornadoes to COVID, while providing world class entertainment and sports programming.”
This story first appeared on radioinsight.com