The Strategy of a Public Television Station

Dan "the man" Reinhardt stared out of his 47th floor office window, as all executives do when they ponder the future in cases. Dan, the general manager for Channel 33, the public television station in a Midwestern metropolitan city, pondered the recent numbers for his donations and compared them with the four competitors he had access to:

Public TV Radio Museums Art

Time Period ($ Million) ($ Million) ($ Million) ($ Million)

Current year 1.3 0.76 1.0 1.2

Prior Year 1.6 0.75 2.1 0.9

2 Years Prior 2.2 0.65 0.9 0.7

In a 2 year period, he had seen the donations to his station drop by $900,000. In the same time period, the local public radio station had increased donations by 110,000; the museums were up by 100,000; and the combined opera, ballet, and symphony (the arts) had increased by 500,000. Since many of the supporters of the other institutions were also contributors to public television, he had seen a redistribution of their donations.

Both public television and public radio had two major ways to solicit donations: the telethon or radiothon and direct mail. Channel 33 had six donor nights per year, centered on a high profile program. In the coming year, he knew he had on tap a documentary on the life of Oprah Winfrey as one fund raiser. But he had seen a decline in recent years in the number of calls and donations.

On weekends, Dan "the man" took MBA courses at the local prestigious university, and the idea of using some form of operational strategy to increase donations struck him as a great idea, but he did not know where to begin. It had triggered one idea, to allow donors to contribute online. This seemed to be helping in the current year, as contributions were 2% above the rate of the prior year. Yet he was late in this game since all his competitors had already thought of doing this.

As he look out his office window, he could see an airplane headed across the lake, and for a moment, he wished he were on it, flying to some tropical island where he could get alcoholic drinks with little umbrellas in them and have hula dancers serenading his tanned torso. The he awoke from his reverie, when little Jimmy Bumstead, his assistant, broke in with some news.

"The numbers on our British series, the Alfie Lohan show, are down by anosther 15% at 7 p.m. And we have a contract for 27 more episodes."

"That is great," Dan said sarcastically, "What do you want me to do about it?"

"I just thought you should know," little Jimmy responded, his face hanging with disappointment.

"We have to turn this monkey in the right direction. Call a meeting of the department heads. We need a retreat to think of some operations strategies, since marketing hasn't worked."

"Where do you want this retreat?"

"Somewhere exotic. How about Bozeman, Montana?"

"Is that where Yellowstone National Park is?"

"It's close enough. If you can't find a good meeting place in Bozeman, try Missoula."

"I didn't know you had such a fondness for Montana."

"I've never been there. But I want to think like a buffalo to solve this one."

Little Jimmy left the room. He knew what to expect: Another management fad would be attempted. Operations strategies? What were they, and how could he apply them? Little Jimmy wen to his office to stare out the window, like all junior executives in cases do when they cannot figure out what else to do. Was there a White Sox game today?