KRCW's Jennifer Ferro on building a community model

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Appreciate you doing this. Oh, I'm so happy to be here. Okay, so for, for those who don't know, give us, g- give a rundown on the sort of history of KCRW. So KCRW started in 1977 in a classroom of a junior high school, and the founder said there was three chairs, and only two of them had, had all their legs, and there was, like, one typewriter.

And, and our founder, Ruth Seymour, was this, you know, woman of letters and created this radio station that really was so unusual, like, played radio dramas from the BBC. The founder, DJ, who was a lifeguard, and, you know, he was really into world music, and she's like, "Okay, you're gonna do a three-hour daily program called Morning Becomes Eclectic," which is referring to a, a poem which was something like Morning Becomes Electric or something like that. I mean, just very, very heady stuff, and really kind of built this world of culture and intellectual interest out of this little, small little place on a, on a junior high classroom.

And it was just off the playground, and when people would open the door, you could hear the kids screaming out there. And, like, you know, some of the biggest reggae stars in the world came to that crappy little room and, and- Mm-hmm... talked to an audience and got intro... World music got introduced really from KCRW for, for a lot of people.

And then, you know, just over the many years, we just grew but kind of kept that same ethos of, of building this kind of, you know, culture and community-focused interest for curious people who wanted to read books and eat good food and find out what interesting music was about out there and talk about politics and literature and things like that. So it's kind of this little oasis in the public radio world. So we st- we exist today, we're a little more sophisticated than that.

We're in a big building we've raised a bunch of money for and, you know, have, have modified our programming. Mm-hmm. We don't run dr- radio dramas anymore. [chuckles] But we still kind of exist as a little bit of an oddity in the public radio sphere 'cause a lot of public radio stations are very focused on journalism and building newsrooms, and that's not really where we put our focus.

Of course, we care about news, but I think the way that we look at what news is is, like, news is about what's happening in the world around you and what's happening in, you know, something a little closer to home. And it, it may not be a journalist piece, but it might be someone talking about some really compelling art shows that are happening, or music that's, you know, dropping or food that's, you know, restaurants that are going on around, are happening around LA that people wanna know about.

So we just take a very wide lens at the kind of stuff that we make and who we're trying to attract. Yeah. So you've been in radio for a while. What, what do you love about radio?

Because, I mean, a lot of times when people are like, "Bra- ra- ra-" I'm like, yeah, radio's still around, like still exists. I know. Like, you know? I know.

Well, it's weird- Like, a lot of people still listen to it... like, I, I am not... I didn't come to KCRW for radio. I came to KCRW for KCRW and- Yeah...

to be around smart people who talked about interesting things, you know? And so even when people are like, "Oh, you're a br- you know, you must know a lot about radio," I'm like, "I don't really know anything about radio." Yeah. I know about, like, building community and trying to build something that people wanna give money to that they don't have to.

But I have been here, I mean, my history is I, you know, went to UCLA, and I volunteered while I was here and then got, I came in as the founder's assistant, and after a couple of years just was like, I, you know, I didn't go to college to be an assistant. I was this feminist of, like, I, this is not, I'm not gonna be an assistant. And, and she said, "Well, what would you do if you stayed here?" And I said, "Oh, you need a number two," because the truth was she's a very formidable person.

People were very afraid of her. I was not, so people would come talk to me, and I would, you know, kind of be the go-between. So I said, "Oh, you need a number two." And she's like, "Okay, you can do that."

And so then I stopped being her assistant [chuckles] and then I, I came, became more of, like, the COO role. And so I've been here since I was a very young person. Okay, so you've been in, I mean, it's a radio, so [laughs] so you've been in radio for a while. Yes.

But like, I, I... Tell me about that because, like, it's interesting 'cause I'm usually talking with people who are adapting businesses, say, from like magazines to- Mm-hmm... you know, digital, right? And that's been a difficult transition, or newspapers to being...

That's a r- even more difficult transition. Yeah. And you're, you know, it's, like, it's interesting 'cause you say KCRW. It's, it's a brand, and it is because, like, it's, it's known, like, in other parts of the world, like- Mm-hmm...

you know? [laughs] Like... But tell me about, like, you know, that, the transition also as, like, a, a, a public media. What is the sort of transition that you're in?

Because, like, everyone I talk to in media is operating a quote, unquote "old business" while they're building the new business, and it's really difficult. It's so hard. It's so hard, yes. So I mean, our business, like...

So you know, really it's, it's about building this community that, that's willing to pay for something that they can get for free, and the primary means for that for us for the last 50 years has been the radio, and the radio's a really powerful thing. So to go back to your question of what I like about radio, radio was an, was a habit medium, or is a habit medium. When you would drive in your car, you turned on the radio. You did it religiously.

Back in the old days, I was here when people used to have AM/FM radios to wake themselves up. Remember when you had those and like- Oh, yeah... you would play the radio? So that was, like, you know, the, the bread and butter of public radio is like, oh, everybody wake, literally wakes up to Morning Edition on NPR on our station.

So then cell phones came in, and then that, you know, started, we got a little distance there. But I think, you know, the, the next transition, it's not just the phone, but the, but COVID really was in a sense, like, this black swan event for, for public radio because it really interrupted the, the habit. It was such a radical departure because before it was like you went to work five days a week. Y- you know, you drove no matter what, and when you were in your car, the easiest thing to do was, was turn on the radio if you wanted to find out what was going on.

Yeah. And so when you are, when you have that kind of habitual relationship with your audience, they're a really loyal audience. They stay with you really long. They give you money because they're very invested.

And so when COVID happened, it just immediately changed everyone's habits, and then when, you know, people kind of, whatever, came back to the office, which is not, you know, uniform or universal- Mm-hmm... it's like maybe three days a week, maybe two days a week. Well, that's just like you're cutting, you've only got two-fifths of people's attention now, and so that's the big change. And then what we saw in COVID was with radio, it was the older end of the demographic spectrum that really sticks with radio because it's, you know, it makes sense, right?

That's something you kinda grew up with, and it's like, "I know how to use that thing. I'm gonna use it," and that's part of your behavior. And what the big challenge for, for public radio is really being accessible in, in all the different ways that people consume media, and I think when I look at public radio, you know, we don't have a content problem. We have an accessibility problem.

And, and as you've talked to so many of people with legacy businesses, you, you still get, you know, immense value from this legacy product, this radio thing that we've got. And so you're trying to both sustain that while you're also looking for new audience and being relevant to new audiences. So that's- Yeah... that's our, you know, that's our project.

And then you have a funding, you have a funding element to that transition too, right? Because- Yeah, so that was another... Yeah, so- A little curveball, right? Like, I don't know.

Yeah. [laughs] I mean, so, so the way it works in, in public media is that- Yeah... the larger well-endowed stations like KCRW, like, we only got about 4 1/2% of our overall budget from the federal government, but the spectrum, the way it kinda works in public radio is, like, large stations like mine pay more for NPR programming, which subsidize, subsidizes the smaller stations that are in locations that may not have a lot of economic diversity. And so, or they just don't reach that many people at all, you know?

Mm-hmm. But it's important to have them there, and so we pay more so they don't have to pay as much, and so they would get a lot more of the federal funding. So th- some, like, I sit on the board of Marfa Public Radio. Marfa Public, Marfa, Texas, is, you know, this speck of a town, but their broadcast signal covers 30,000 square miles, and in a lot of places, they are literally the only live media that exists in those places.

Now, there's not a ton of people, so they don't have a lot of people to draw on to- It's very trendy, though. This is the second time Marfa... I had B- I had Max Cabot from the Big Bend Sentinel- Oh, yeah... in Marfa on this podcast a couple years ago, so.

[laughs] Yeah. I mean, it's a, it's a magical place. It's a cool town. Yeah.

Yeah, I haven't been. Totally unsustainable as a per- [laughs] as a place and, but, you know- It's more of a brand than, like, a location. [laughs] I wanna say. Yeah, I don't...

You gotta go. It's really- No offense to any Marfa- It's really great... residents It's really great there. But, but, you know, like, they had, like, 35% of their budget coming from the federal government.

So f- when the loss of federal funding, they are struggling a lot more than we are because again, we have great economic diversity to, to lean on. So but I, but I, what I think is interesting, and we were talking before you started taping, was, you know, this notion of what does a federal subsidy do? And, and, you know, that federal subsidy was in place for, like, 58 years or something. Mm-hmm.

And it, I think, you know, as a concept it was d- you know, c- we used to call it, like, budget dust. It was budget dust in the, in the national budget. But it, it, there's this, there's this notion of, you know, building this kind of public infrastructure for public good, whether it's public parks and public libraries. There's public media.

And, and when you look at the television side of the equation, equation, they, they were, you know, the, the kind of education they provide in pre-K and, you know- English speakers learning English and kids just learning how to talk, you know, that kind of programming is just so valuable, and I think it was, you know, created a great benefit for this country. So but I think the thing that gets tough is when you, when you get a federal subsidy, you can't help but, you know, you, you make that constituency, which is Congress, you make your messaging and your, your, you do things in order to make sure that that constituency will fund you again or give you more funds should you need it, you know?

And it's, I don't know if it's, if it's the, the best thing, but I do believe that it, you know, it was a great, it's, it was a great, great thing that it did, and I think a lot of people are more educated and know more about their communities- Right... because of it. So what was the funding pie then, like, before the subsidy, like, went away? Because I think, like, it cuts both ways because I don't know if you saw this, but, like, I would guess, like, when you're, like, asking for, like, donations or, you know, voluntary donations from, from listeners, I'm sure some would be like, "Wait, you're public radio.

That means, like, 100- you get 100% of your..." And you're like, "No, no, no." Yeah. "Oh, it's like 4%," like.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, that was always part of the, the process is explaining how we work. And, you know, for, for many years, you know, so our, our pie now is divided just into two, two things. Individuals, which are almost up to 70% of our funding now, and then corporate support.

So and, and, and there's some, you know, foundation donations in there too, but for us it's mostly just individuals who give that make up that 70%, and then the rest is coming from what we call underwriting from sponsors. Okay. How has that mix changed, or is that, like, static? I think in, in times past it's been maybe 60/40, where 40% was from sponsorship.

But, you know, after this kind of targeting by the administration really, and really if you remember, it feels, it feels like 10 million years ago. [laughs] But it was just [laughs] last year, I guess, that there was a lot- Like the chainsaw stuff? Yes. And there was a lot of- Okay...

you know, public radio and public media was kind of number one on that agenda to get rid of the subsidy, try to kill it all together. But because of that, because of that focus and being the target and being in the bullseye, so many people came to contribute because they were like, "This is, you know, I love this place. This educated my kids," or, you know- Right... whatever.

You know, so we've, we've had an incredible- So it was almost good marketing in some ways. [laughs] Like, I don't want to say, like, it's like... Look, I have this theory of a lot of things that, that have been done by this administration in some ways, like, have actually helped. I think you can kinda squint and say, like, "You know, this could, you know, what's going on in Iran right now could actually benefit, like, decarbonization and climate change more than any protest ever did," because [laughs] it's- Yeah...

creating the absolute need. Like, Europe is never going to trust, you know, having all their energy be controlled that way. So I don't know, maybe, I mean, you saw, I, you know, it could be that it, it in some ways helped by reminding people who maybe just took for granted public media and, you know, truly want, want it to exist but, you know, didn't, didn't give, didn't cough up the money. Yeah.

And, you know, I, I think there's, like, we've got, there's a lifespan of that rage giving, is what we're calling it, you know- Yeah. Rage giving... where it's like- I like it... you know, you've got all this passion for that, but a- what's interesting too is we look at, like, what happened to Planned Parenthood and what's the other one?

Like, Sierra Club where in Trump one they had a Trump bump, right? A lot of media has experienced the Trump bump. And then they, their coffers were fattened and they kind of, like, reset and hired more people, et cetera, et cetera. Then Biden came into office and then just everybody, all the people who were supporting are just like, "Well, you guys are good now.

I don't need to worry about it." Yeah. And then in Trump two, people are enraged about different things. So Planned Parenthood, who is actually getting their funding cut and desperately need the support, all their rage giving came in Trump one when they didn't necessarily need it.

So we're trying to be, like, very sober about this. Like, we have, you know, gone through this before with, with Trump one and we're like, we're not gonna be, you know, hiring a bunch of people. Like, we know this is temporary. And I think the thing for us is really where we've been spending our last number of years focusing on, which is, like, how do you build this organization to be a community that, that is perpetuating and sup- and sustainable in this new world?

And, and the thing is, like, the federal funding change and the, and, you know, we're also under a little bit of a threat from regulation with the FCC, so that was also a big, you know, thing on day three of the administration where the FCC- Mm-hmm... chair, who knows what he's doing, really focused on a bunch of public radio and public television stations to challenge the way that we raise funds from sponsors. We call it underwriting, but y- you know, his, his thing is like, is this really advertising?

And if so, does that either challenge your license entirely or basically just cut off a source of revenue? So it's pretty, it's pretty crafty. But regardless, we are, we are already moving in a direction for that kind of outcome anyway because we see the writing on the wall. Yeah.

Not just with the administration, but just with u- usage and the way people listen. Right. I want to get to that, but just on the funding front, like, is this a structural change or is this, like, it just, you know, this administration has targeted public media? I mean, you're on the board of NPR, and I can't tell.

Look, over the years I can remember, like, public media has been a bugaboo for a certain, like, portion of the, of our political system, right? And Trump has acted on it. A lot of other administrations, from what I remember, just kind of complained a lot. N- nothing lasts forever, right?

Yeah. Or is this- Is this something you think that is a structural change in that public media will never be the same again? Or does it snap back? Oh, well, I, the funding's never gonna come back.

I mean, if, if, like, I just look at the whole abortion rights situation, and, you know, it, it, it will... I mean, it's gonna take 40 years for there to be any change in the abortion rights thing. But, and, and the thing, and like, it just, it, like, when you go and lobby on the Hill, and you see what immense amount of momentum and accidents that it takes to happen to actually pass something like that, like the, like the Public Broadcasting Act, even though it still exists, but to get that funding back and the thing, I, I just don't, I don't think, I think it's structurally changed.

And, and, and again, I think it's, in a lot of ways I think it's good because the way that, that people use media has already been changing quite a bit. Yeah. And, and the way that you have to address that kind of to me is part and parcel with public funding be- going away, you know? It's like you, you have to, we have to change ourselves to operate much more responsibly, responsively to our audience.

And I think, you know, Brian, you mentioned it when you were talking about, when we were talking off, off taping about Europe and how there's subsidies and then it kind of, you know, alters your responsiveness. Well, it can create, everything creates incentives, right? And so I think what I saw, like, is that it's creating incentives to chase, chase subsidies to, and it's also creating an entire ecosystem of the people who facilitate those subsidies and want them to continue, and then it le- can lead to dependency, and in some instances it distorts the market.

Yeah. But I think it also distorts not being focused on the community or audience that you are theoretically serving. I mean, capitalism has its flaws, but it makes you very [laughs] customer-focused, I find. Absolutely.

And, and that's where you get to see where answering to a customer and answering to- Yeah... a subsidy or a federal government are not at all the same. Yeah. So you guys have changed a lot.

I mean, your model is totally different, right? So d- talk to me about, like, all the things that you're doing, not just with, like, the app and with podcasts, but with c- with community, and particularly with events. Yeah. Yeah.

So I mean, I, it's funny, like, when I r- read about or read your, your stuff, your Substack, about other media companies and events and stuff, we, we do events. We probably do well over 100 events a year. And so they range from really small to a pie contest that we held on Pi Day where we had 400 bakers and 10,000 people come out, talk to the bakers, and watch this pie judging. Not pie eating contest, pie baking contest.

So we, we do a wide range. We've got over 18 events we just launched for the summer where we will be, we will be at different cultural centers all around Southern California. So we get to go to where people are, and we introduce people to these cultural institutions that maybe they wouldn't have gone to before. And we kinda look at ourselves as this, like, cultural, you know, glue that, that pulls all these things that are good about living here together.

We don't necessarily do events to make money. So we, we use our, these events to really cultivate relationships. And I think the thing that our business model is really about is, you know, getting bec- almost like a cultural institution rather than a radio station, or rather than a media company. So we, we use media to bu- to, you know, cultivate this community.

We don't build the community in order to make media. You know? I don't know if that makes- Right... any sense, but, but- No, no, no, I think it makes a lot of sense because I think a lot of media these days and going forward is just that.

It's not what you're producing, whether it's, it's radio programming or whether it's a magazine or something like this. Ultimately, it is about a, a, I think a lot of media is going to be about having a community that wants it to exist and that can serve as... I'm sure, like, a KCRW, you know, fan, like, they kinda wanna connect with each other. There's, like, probably a personality type.

Oh my gosh. Okay. So people put KCRW listener in their dating profiles. Yeah.

So- So, you know. I think it says, that says a lot about- Yeah... the type of person that you think, yeah, you, so you're right. People wanna connect with each other.

And I think everyone, it doesn't matter if you're public media or, or, you know, or just for profit, like, everyone is, like, they have to think of themselves as brands, you know? And you express that brand in a whole bunch of different ways. And, you know, KCRW is, you know, it's a brand at the end of the day. You know?

Yeah. It means something to people. Yeah. Yeah.

Both in Los Angeles, but I think of it, I don't know, maybe I'm wrong with this. I do the, I think of it as like, it kind of like, let's say I hate iconic, but it's like a classic, it's like an LA brand. Yeah. And I think that, you know, if we weren't in LA, it wouldn't have the same resonance beyond LA, right?

It, it represents something specific about the city of Los Angeles, which, you know, is sort of known across the country, which is g- you know, fantastic. Um, we, we love, you know, representing LA in that way. So you have like, y- y- you guys do, like, a music festival. You have the, the, the Summer Nights, I believe, is coming.

Yeah. It's not, it's m- it's more like it's free, all ages. We have music there, usually featuring our DJs, sometimes bands, a cultural institution, food, other activations, stuff like that. So it's just, like, a great summer hang really for all ages of people.

Yeah. And you're also - I mean, you're kind of big on the... You, you're using TikTok and, and Instagram and all these different, like, channels. Yeah.

And I'm just, like, wondering, like, how do you think of that, like, all, like, fitting together? Because again, like, I was, like, listening to a, a podcast with, like, Roger Lynch, like, from Conde Nast earlier today, and it's totally different. I mean, that, you know, used to be a magaz- a bunch of, you know, magazine brands, and now, I mean, they're, they're brands that have magazines, but they're expressed in completely different ways where the magazine is... And it - he was saying when he, it arrived there, it was, like, the majority of not just their business, but, like, how they connected with the audience, and now they connect with their audience in totally different ways.

Is, is that similar to, to- Yeah... KCRW? Definitely. Definitely similar.

And so one that - one of the things, like, that we're leaning hard into is to - I- is into email newsletters because again, we're looking at ways that how do we, uh, show up in your life when you're not listening to the radio? And increasingly, more and more people are not listening to the radio because they're - either if they're gonna listen to things, they may listen on demand or listen to podcasts, or they may not listen at all to things. I mean, podcasting is much, much bigger than it ever was, but it still doesn't take up a giant, you know, portion of the media diet.

There's just so many other things. See, that bums me out, honestly. But, you know, that's fine. Yeah.

I know. Me too. But, so yeah, like, th- that is definitely one way we're, we're leaning in, and we're seeing a lot of interest. So we have around 300,000 people on our email list.

Even our - the podcast, those - we launched, launched a couple new podcasts that are specific and not focused on Los Angeles. One of them is Question Everything that's really about journalism and really interesting conversations about the Section 230, that law that protects a lot of the platforms from being sued. Mm-hmm. And then Sam Sanders show, which is about pop culture.

And we're seeing, again, when I'd said before, like, we don't have a content problem, we have an accessibility problem. Like, this is where our, the younger audiences are coming through and, and listening, and we're... I think Question Everything's over - it just had its two millionth download, and Sam Sanders is, is quick behind it. So yeah, we're of, you know, of course we're gonna continue to develop products, hopefully audio pro- products, 'cause I do love, I do love audio.

I like to get in deep with people. But our, but our newsletters are really - we're finding this great community of people, and we've, we've got one newsletter we just launched. We, we were looking at, like, which demographic do we think that we have some purchase with? And we were like, millennials, elder millennials, you know, who are backseat babies.

Like, they grew up in the backseat of their parents' car- Yeah... like I did with my kids. So my, my seventh graders could talk to any teacher about Syria, you know [chuckles] because they were forced to listen over long commutes to k- to public radio. But we developed a newsletter community that's all around children and what to do with your kids in LA, with the understanding that, like, you l- if you live in LA with kids, you're here for a reason, and part of that is the cultural diversity that exists all around you, and you want your kids exposed to that.

So how are you gonna get there? And so we, we each week provide a series of things that people can do and dive into, and we're - I mean, that newsletter has grown really, really fast in just a couple of months. So that's exciting to see that, you know, we can target a particular kind of demographic or need and, and we can fill it because of our trusted brand of KCRW. So do you end up thinking about that as, like, like a pie chart about how you reach, you know, your, your community?

'Cause you're doing it in person, you're doing it on social, you're doing it in newsletters, you're doing it in podcasts, and also you're doing it in terrestrial radio. And I would guess, like, you know, maybe at a previous time it would be like, well, these other things are in service of terrestrial radio. Or I don't know, like, is, is terrestrial radio now, like, a much smaller portion of, like, how you end up reaching your audiences? I- 'cause I ask 'cause, like, I've worked for magazines during the transition, and, like, there was always...

I always found, like, we were spending 80% of our time, energy, and focus, like 80% of meetings were about a, a print product when 80% of our audience was being reached through events, newsletters, at the time blogs. Well, which is, which - that's Substack now, right? Isn't it the same thing? Yeah, exactly.

Yeah. No, that's exactly where we were, and now it's flipped the other way. So we, you know, w- we also look at this pie chart as what are those things for? So when we look at Instagram, we know that those people are gonna stay on that platform.

They're not gonna come off and find us. They'll come- Turn on the radio... to events probably. Yeah.

But they're not gonna turn on radio. Yeah. And they're not gonna come to our website, which I, we can talk about. I don't - we don't really have a lot of, put a lot of value on our website.

It's, it's there. It does its job. It provides the music soundtracks to what people heard on the air if they wanna find it. But we've been, we've been kind of away from a website from a, for a very long time.

But, but we do look at which channel provides the most potential for connection and relationship. And so next to radio's the, the deepest 'cause it's the most habitual. Podcasts are next, and then newsletters are, are following s- shortly after that. And then when we look- Hmm...

at, you know, TikTok, and we look at Instagram and YouTube, those are things that really are brand awareness tools, you know? Like- Right... this is who we are when you're in this world, we're, we're there too. And we create content that's specific for those, for those channels.

And I think, you know, the, I'm sure everybody, all, a lot of your other guests have been there too, where, you know, like you said, you, you made You use those channels in order to promote something you were doing on your preferred channel. Right. Yeah. And now we don't do that.

We are, we're really invested in just, we know people are gonna stay there, so we create the content and say, like, "Here's the whole story." Is, is email strategically more important because it's really good at, at, at getting people to, to donate? Or is it still like, you know, the, the, the, the radio is still best for that? 'Cause I would just imagine, 'cause I remember I was...

B- I've been on the B2B side and, and we never talked about PGs. They talked... I would, you know, talk with these other publishers that are consumer publishers, and I'm like, we never even looked at, at that stuff. We, we, we did email because email, like, you send out an email for, like, some event, and, you know, you would make, like- Yeah...

a ton, like, a ton of revenue. Like [laughs] this is, this is great. Yeah. And so we're, you know...

Yeah, it's a big conversion. You know, a lot of people convert on emails. They read our emails. They open our emails, which of course, you know, we're all drowning- Yeah...

in them. But they do open them, read them, and then respond. And so we look at it as a, just another way to have a relationship, whereas if we were thinking only of radio as our, as a place to have that relationship, we, you know, we'd be lonely. Yeah.

That's a good point. So how do you end up getting people to voluntarily give? And has that changed at all? 'Cause I mean, look, I talk with a lot of people who, who are building consumer revenue, not in a voluntary.

It, it's, it's, "Oh, you, you don't get this product." We're do- you know, they're selling products to people. Th- th- th- there's a nuance and a difference when, when you're, you know, asking people to voluntarily cough up money. Yeah.

Yeah. Well, that's our bread and butter. I mean, we learned- Yeah... how to do that a long, long time ago.

Has that changed at all or no? Not really. I mean, I think, you know, what we're doing with our app is we're, we finally have a product that we can c- we can offer. And I like to look at it as, like, there's certain segments of audience that are gonna be altruistic and give.

And I used to coach kids soccer for a long time, and in AYSO, like, was like, "Oh, everybody plays, but every parent volunteers." And the truth was, it was two people on every team, and I was one of those people. You know, like- Yeah... that's it.

Those are the only parents who actually volunteered. And I look at it the same way with giving voluntarily, right? It's like, okay, wait, so no one's gonna know if I don't give. No one's gonna shame me.

I, I still get to hear this product no matter what. Y- you know, there's just a small sele- uh, percentage of people that are gonna do that. And, and for us, that's been really fantastic, and we are fine with that, with that spread. But we've been really interested in trying to have some kind of product that we could sell.

And so what we're doing with our app is building out members-only content, like music programming. People really, really love our music progra- programming. And when you talk to people about KCRW, the ones who love us the most are like, "Oh my God, the music is so great." And so now we're, we're changing the way we're offering up music, and, and our next launch of our s- of our app, which will come in the next couple of weeks, we have music that's designed for, you know, working focus, sweat, you know, exercising, dance party, dinner party, that kind of stuff.

So it's still our DJs doing, you know, human, not algorithmic-based selections, but it's gonna be - they're gonna be designed for behavior. And you can only get those if you're a member. So we love having that, you know, that distinction because for those who need something more than an altruistic reason to give- Yeah... that can help.

And then, like, the- They need a nudge. They - people need a nudge at the end of the day. Yeah. Yeah.

I mean, the, you know, it's like one of those things where what do you do when no one's looking? And some people are gonna give because they're just those kind of people. And I'm okay with all of them. No judgment.

I've been various- Yeah... different people in my life, you know? It's like the t- you know, uh, you can do it with a tote bag. You can do it with, you know...

I'm, like, one of the few people who, who subscribed to Slate in, like, 1997 for the umbrella. I had that umbrella for a long time. But it helps, you know? Like, it helps to, to give people a reason, basically, to convert.

And is it still- Yeah... mostly, I mean, do you do, like, pledge drives? Mm-hmm. We're in one right now.

Yes. I was on the- Okay... air this morning. Yeah, we still do pledge drives.

And, you know, one of the things that was a big change in our business and public radio in general, but certainly for us, is, is the, the ability to charge people monthly. Because then, you know, you don't have to have this renewal cycle where, you know, people may still like you, but they're like, "Oh, I'll get around to giving again when I, when I get to it," and they never get to it. So when you have a lot of sustaining members like that, your pledge drive shrinks a little because, you know- Yeah...

you've got a lot of your most loyal already in the, in the family. But the we're - w- what we look at our, our pledge drives or our fundraising efforts, we're trying not to use the word pledge drive 'cause people are like, "What's a pledge? I don't get it." Fair enough.

"Like, I just gave you the money," is we're, we're looking at them really as just, you know, urgency creators because that's the other thing, like what you were saying, y- people need a nudge. Yeah. It's like you need a deadline, you need a, you need some stakes. And, you know, we, we create these fundraising seasons.

We blast people through our, our, our emails and on Instagram and all that kind of stuff when we do it in this particular season, so it helps us create urgency. Yeah, it's like the public media version of, like, like, the cyber weekend sale. I mean, you need to do [laughs] like, you know- Yeah... that's what gets people, like, that's what gets people over, over the line.

You alwa- you always need context, you know? It's like we - I was just looking at some numbers we did. W- we have this thing, Public Radio Giving Days, that someone in public radio [laughs] created a couple years back, and I'm like, "What is that? I don't know."

But, but it's a focus, you know? It's a way to focus people's attention, like, "Hey- Yeah... if you appreciate public radio, well, the next two days, this is the time to give." I know.

And people give. So I lo- I love that. I have a confession to make. I would hear Leonard Lopate Like, I don't, I think he just didn't like it.

Like, and he was like, "And again, I'm here to ask you." [laughs] I'm like, "Oh, my God. I'm ready to, I'm ready to give Leonard money so he doesn't have to keep... " He, he wasn't into it.

Put him out of his misery. Oh, that's not a very good, it's not a very good, like, level of energy to be [laughs] asking people for support. I think it's a personality thing, but I could be wrong. Hmm, might have been effective.

It's... [laughs] What do you think about, look, a lot of people are looking for different revenue sources, obviously, in, in media. And, and there has been some success cases of non-public media going to voluntary contributions. I had Steve Sax on here from The Guardian.

Texas Tribune has, has had success with this model. Vox was- I know... was trying it, which was always peculiar to me, as they, they were at least once valued at $1 billion and had raised a ton of venture capital money, but maybe people didn't know that. I would just be like, "I don't know if I should be donating to, to vox.

com for that." Do, do you think that that is, like, I don't know, it just seems difficult to pull off, to have one foot in both worlds. One foot in the world of trying to- Well, one foot in the world, I mean, there, there's different, like, models, right? But, like, you know, take The Guardian, for example.

I mean, they have, you know, an advertising business, too. And, you know, but they've just chosen to have a consumer revenue model that is voluntary. Yeah. Well, I- You know, rather than being like, "You give me money, I give you this.

You get access-" Yeah... "to this and that." I am listening to that interview you did re- regarding Guardian was super, Guardian was interesting because of course it's a public radio model or a public media model. And- Yeah...

and public media has been doing this for so long now. And I think our friends in other media say like, "Oh, that, people will do this? They'll give you money for no, you know, for free, basically?" So I, I think, I think a lot of that success is based on this training that, that pledge drives created for people through many decades.

And I do think that, like, you know, when you have a brand promise that, that shows you're for the good, I, I think it's totally legit to be asking for that. And I, I think about some podcast hosts that I listen to who are also asking for support. And, you know, I, I would bet the amount of people who give because they have members-only content has gotta be, like, 5%. The rest are like, "I just wanna give you money 'cause I care about you.

I like you, and you're asking me for support." Yeah. "And so I wanna support you. I want you to succeed."

You see that a lot in the s- in the newsletter/Substack/Beehiiv world. I mean, like, I think one of the most lucrative Substacks is Letters From An American. And Heather Cox Richardson doesn't, it's, it's basically a donation model. Yeah.

As, as far as I can tell. There's no actual- I mean, she, she deserves it. She does so much content. Yeah.

It's like, my God. I, she, I don't know. Does she, isn't she a professor or something like that, too? Yeah.

I don't know how she has time for all that. It's a very lu- well, it's a very lucrative side gig, so, um. [laughs] She's just got a lot of subscribers. She's at the top of the list, so good for her.

She works hard, but she probably makes, like, millions of dollars a year, so. But I think that there is that. It's, it's, it's hard for larger corporations to pull off. I think you're seeing it with, again, with a lot of the sort of individuals because, because there's some kind of, like, parasocial connection.

And then you see it, and I think it's particular with audio, because I'm a big audio fan. I don't do, like, the video with the podcast. I don't, I think that's weird, personally. I just don't think that people, I've, I've yet, I, I've yet to understand it.

Well, you know what I think it is? 'Cause I feel the same way as you. I think it's because YouTube is the second largest search engine, and one- Yeah... of the s- frustrating things about podcasts is, how do you find them?

And YouTube kind of helps discover. Yeah. But yeah, I don't, who are these people and how are all this- We'd be having a different conversation, I think, right now if it was like, you know, I know we're doing this over video, but when people are on video, I think they become more performers. Hmm.

I don't wanna say performative, but they can be performative. And I think what I also notice with audio is, and this is, go back to what you said, you attach yourself to a part of their l- their, their life, a, a different habit. 'Cause we wanna, wanna always talk about developing habits, and we want people to develop habits around, like, us, which is pretty arrogant, to be honest with you. But if you start to develop a habit around a commute, I mean, people in LA, from everything I've heard, have long commutes.

They're in the car a lot more than people in New York City, that's for sure. Or, or if, I guess the psychos who drive in New York City. But, you know, I always hear, "I listen to you when I'm walking the dog. I listen to you when I'm vacuuming, when I'm doing the dishes, when I'm running, when I'm walking," et cetera, et cetera.

And on one hand, I would be like, "Oh, that's not, like, deep engagement." I'm like, "Oh, no. I love that. I love to be attached to a different activity."

And you can do that. Oh, my gosh. And you're inside people's heads. That's what I think- Yeah...

is so great about audio. And it's like, what I used to think about all the time, not, not, like, perversely, but I mean, like- [laughs]... we could literally be with someone while they're naked in their bathroom. You know?

Like, we're, we're next to them talking about stuff. Yeah. They're, you know, it's very, it's very intimate. Yeah.

And I think that- And you're not distracted, you know, by people where you... I think the video part, it just creates another separation. And I think that probably helps with the conversion because the human voice has, has a connectivity, I think there has been research on that, that is actually even more than, like, sight. Like, I mean, the sound, it does, it does build some kind of connectivity that is advantageous then, I think.

Yeah. But. Yeah. And you're not distracted by how people look.

Yeah. [laughs] So final thing is, what is, like, what is the future that you see for Public media, right? Like, 'cause we said it's like structural change has been going on, and we're, we're, we're never gonna be like, I just don't believe, for, for better or worse, like, America is very different than, than, than Europe. I mean, we had been talking, like, you know, they- they'll support arts and all these things, and we've got, like, you know, what's going on at the Kennedy Center, and we're getting some ballroom or something.

Like, I have no idea. We just go in a different direction, and I spent a fair bit of time, like, in Europe, and I just think that we're gonna become less like that, not more like that, but I could be wrong. I think you're absolutely right. This is not a country that necessarily invests in...

Well, anyway, they're, they don't invest in things like that. Cultural infrastructure. We'll just put it like that. Yes, let's just put it that way.

I, here's what I think is- We don't do infrastructure well at all, so- That's very true... it would make sense. [chuckles] That's very true. You know, the, the future for public media, the thing that, that public media has is this incredible trust with an audience that has been built over decades and decades.

And even if people aren't listening or watching, they know what public media means. They know what a tote bag... You know, like the tote bag signifies something. The, the, the great amulet for public radio is the mug, you know?

That, that is really powerful, and I do believe that as m- media that comes at us is really gonna be filled with a lot of AI-generated content, that you're not gonna be able to know if it's real or not real. Sometimes that won't bother people, but sometimes it really will. There's always gonna be a place for, for public media because it's like those are your nerdy friends who are telling the truth, you know? Yeah.

And, and I don't know. I think that's a really good thing. You know? It's just like, it's like the library, right?

Like, people are like, "Oh, nobody reads books." But public libraries are more full than they ever have been because they transformed themselves into these kind of social community centers. And I think that's what we're trying to do at KCRW, not to become a community center necessarily, but more of a community institution that, that binds people together and something that you need to check out to know what's valuable in your community, or some of the things that are really valuable in you- in your community.

And I, and I, and I, and the one thing I do, I will say- Yeah... also about public radio is that there are so many public radio stations in every single state, in all these communities, and they're people that are on the ground. They're the people that you, are in your PTA and, you know, you see at the grocery store, and they're there providing you with information. You know, it may not be news, like, from the journalism sense, but when it's, it's, it could be news of, like, "Here's where you can go recycle your e-waste," or, "Here's where you can get resources when you're in trouble."

Those are, that's the news that is important to people where they live. Yeah. And just the final thing is, is about the demographic question. You know, I think there's always been an assumption that anything sort of analog is rejected by younger generations, and I think maybe we, this, this is the generation [chuckles] that, like, bucks that because they've been immersed in, in digital media and in feeds and algorithms and, you know, the, it's, it's had a lot of negative repercussions that I feel that, that they know well.

And you see signs of it. I feel like sometimes it's, like, overdone because it's something that, you know, in journalism it's, like, almost too good to check, you know? [chuckles] It's like, oh, people wanna do, like, they love magazines again. Yeah.

And, you know, they wanna meet up in parks, and they, they hate dating apps and whatnot. Yeah. [chuckles] I feel like we want- The, the ubiquitous trend story in The New York Times. Yeah.

Yes. It's motivated, motivated reasoning, just like... But do you see... I mean, how do you think about both being relevant to, to, you know, young audiences, but also whether they'll just come, come around to you?

You know, to, to not always being on a phone because, you know, look, you're, you're available on a phone obviously. But it seems like the screen, it, it, like, I think there's broad, like, acceptance to the fact that the screen plus algorithmic feeds is, like, kinda menthol cigarettes. That smell. [chuckles] Yeah, but look what...

I mean, menthols are not super popular anymore. [chuckles] No, I, I think, you know, I, I believe that if you have an authentic or you, or you're an authentic provider, and you can create an authentic relationship, then it is just an accessibility issue. It's just, like, how do people find you? Are you wherever people are?

And that's, like, our whole live event strategy, that's really what it's about. It's a, it's an acquisition play. It's like, "Hey, we're in this cool place providing this interesting experience. Come and check it out.

Learn who we are, and know that this is what we've got for you in hopefully whatever form you wanna use it." I do think that, like, we're in the hot age of algorithms, but I don't know if we should be so sure that that's what everybody is gonna want going forward, and especially the young ones. And I've got Gen Z kids, and they are, like, they never buy new clothes. They are into, you know, records and all this kinda stuff that's, like, kind of, like, trying to take back their individuality- Yeah...

and humanity. And so I think that if... You know, we're, we're committed to being 100% human, and I'm gonna just put my money on people caring about that in the future. Yeah.

Yeah, I would... And, and I think there, there is a really good case to be made that the more human stuff is going to be more valuable as the synthetic inevitably becomes, like, you know, 90-plus percent of, of information and content out there. It's just, just by its nature of, you know, and, and there, there, this has been proven in economics. Like, just by the nature of it being harder to make stuff, that, that creates scarcity, and the cr- and scarcity creates, creates value.

So- Yeah... that's my whole- Yeah. Well, good. That's what we're going for.

Scarcity [chuckles] creates value. Awesome. All right. Thank you, Jennifer.

I really appreciate you doing this. Oh, Brian, thanks so much. It's such a pleasure to talk to you.