On Friday, Sept. 1, its San Francisco and Pittsburgh stations introduce new call letters and branding.
CBS To Transition Eight Stations From CW To Independents
All eight CBS-owned stations that currently are affiliates of The CW will transition to independent stations, beginning Friday, Sept. 1. The announcement was made by CBS Stations President Tom Canedo, who oversees the eight stations that will become independents.
As part of the transition, KBCW San Francisco will change its call letters to KPYX and be branded as KPIX+, and WPCW Pittsburgh will change its call letters to WPKD and be branded as KDKA+. The stations’ new brands align with the call letters for their CBS sister stations, KPIX San Francisco and KDKA Pittsburgh. The other six stations will keep their current call letters and will be branded with the city where they are based and channel number (e.g. KSTW-TV, Seattle11).
The newly minted independent stations’ fall schedules will feature a total of seven local, one-hour newscasts. CBS says “the 8 p.m. newscasts on WPSG Philadelphia, KMAX Sacramento, Calif., and KDKA+ Pittsburgh will be the only local newscasts airing in their respective markets during that hour. And the 8 p.m. and 9 p.m. newscasts on KPIX+ will be the only local newscasts airing in the Bay Area during those hours.” KPIX+ is also airing a new local 7-9 a.m. newscast, The Morning Edition from CBS News Bay Area.
In addition, seven of the new independents will air CBS News’ 48 Hours in primetime, beginning Monday, Sept. 11, when the award-winning crime and justice series launches in weekday syndication.
KDKA+ already has the jump on adding local sports in primetime. Last week, the station began airing the Steel City High School Football Showcase — a 10-week series of games under the Friday night lights (kicking off at 7 p.m.) featuring several of the Pittsburgh area’s top local teams. In addition, KDKA+ has secured the rights to college football on Saturdays featuring the Presidents’ Athletic Conference, which is composed of nine local schools.
BRAND CONNECTIONS
Comments (3)
TrueBroadcasterGO1965 says:
August 30, 2023 at 7:11 pm
These lineups anything special. With the new nascar and ACC deal these stations are not better off. Being independent today is death if you don’t have a strong sports or news product.
AIMTV says:
August 31, 2023 at 10:11 am
Indies can hopefully be a source of innovation and experimentation to see what may work. Sports has already reached a saturation point and while some Pickle Ball, Hop Scotch, and Tiddlywinks rights are still up for grabs (as of this writing), it’s no longer a “Content is King” world. A recent study release demonstrates that over 20% of viewers give up watching anything and go do something else (probably social media) because they are so confused and overwhelmed trying to find something decent to watch. Today, “CURATION is King” not content. There is only so much football or NASCAR that most humans can or wish to watch and much of it is already available on some outlets somewhere (and come on, LIV Golf ratings have been a joke). Advertisers will soon figure out that by simply delaying the start time a few minutes, viewers can skip their glut of commercials in that programming as well. Sports isn’t dead, and it isn’t dying but it is overdone and will not save broadcast TV. Same thing with News. They are just more examples of everyone running to kick the same ball, like a children’s soccer game. There’s a lot of good programming out there… much of it never before airing in the USA and not the same old cable rerun retreads dressed up to look like something new (sometimes good but usually lipstick on a pig IMHO). Perhaps big broadcasting corps. should have someone or a team dedicated to hitting up MIP conferences, scouring YouTube for new talent, visiting film festivals, etc. to just see how vast the content options are. But we have to stop trying to kick the same old soccer ball at the same time, first. This could be a start.
Ken Foote says:
August 31, 2023 at 10:25 am
This strategy will take a lot of time, money, and patience……all of which are limited !!