A Rescue Plan (not a “Sustainability Plan”) for WBAI - by Steve Brown (Notated) But first a comment. To propose a “sustainability” plan for WBAI at this late date is to misunderstand the problem. WBAI cannot be sustained unless it is first resuscitated. A good diet and regular exercise may be sensible advice for a heart patient – but not after he has gone into cardiac arrest. At that point, the appropriate remedy is emergency CPR. Unfortunately, neither of the two recently submitted sustainability plans for WBAI propose CPR. Yes, they do contain sensible recommendations, which the station should certainly have implemented in the past – and hopefully will implement in the future – but they will not rescue WBAI in the present. That is because they do not address WBAI’s most pressing needs – (1) substantial and immediate cash to pay off trailing debt, stabilize operations, and purchase fund-drive premiums in advance, and (2) an equally substantial – and immediate – increase in listenership, to ensure ongoing solvency. Regretfully, the sensible recommendations of the two submitted sustainability plans will neither deliver enough cash – nor deliver it quickly enough – to make a difference. For an example, here are five of their recommendations: 1. Hire a full-time development director. Well, of course. But development directors earn an average of $120- 140,000 a year in New York City [http://www.charitywater.org/about/SALARY-SURVEY-NY12.pdf]. This is not a salary that WBAI can pay (or that Pacifica would allow). And what if we could pay that salary? In light of Pacifica’s snail-like recruitment process, and the scarcity of good development directors, it might take 8 months to a year before we find even a lackluster candidate, much less a good one. Finally, on average, new development directors take about 14 to 18 months until their efforts begin generating significant revenue. Definitely not the emergency CPR that WBAI requires. 2. Hire a new program director. Another good idea. We certainly need one. But again, money is a barrier. We can barely scratch together the $52,000 monthly rent for our Empire State Building transmitter, so how can we pay even Pacifica’s current program director salary (about $65,000), let alone the market $114-120,000 average salary for a program director in New York [http://www.recruiter.com/salaries/program-directors-salary/?id=program-directors&statewages=New+York]. (In California, the average rate goes up to $140,000). But even if we could pay that salary, and were fortunate enough to find a good program director, and even if he or she then created the best programs the world has ever seen, it would take at least a year (more likely two years) until enough listeners found those programs on the dial, and then another year or two until enough of them decided to become – not just listeners – but listener-supporters, ready to support the station with their dollars. Again, not the emergency CPR that WBAI requires. 3. Apply to foundations. Always worth doing, but much too slow. Grants often take a year or more just to file, let alone get funded. And we must understand that virtually all foundations have pulled back. Nor do they make grants to near-dead or dying organizations such as WBAI. 4. Appeal to major donors. Always worth trying (if we have any major donors left). But even if some do respond, realistically they are not likely to donate the huge sums that WBAI needs every month (about $120,000-$130,000 per month) merely to stay afloat and pay ordinary operating bills. Moreover, you may be able to tap a major donor once, for emergency funding, but trying to do so over and over is like crying wolf, and will drive them away. Again, then, not the CPR that we need. 5. Concerts, boat rides, special events, passing out flyers, etc. All good, and all good pubic relations. We should do them all the time. But as our records show, they don’t raise significant revenue (and often lose money). No CPR there, either. So what can WBAI do? Is “emergency CPR” available for WBAI? The answer is yes -- sadly. I say “sadly” because the strategies set forth below have always been available. And had they been implemented during the past 12 years – as regular maintenance instead of last-gasp emergency measures – WBAI would now have 50,000 members and enough money to buy its own building, instead of being insolvent and facing extinction. Questions about the strategies in this Plan. I am available to answer any questions about how to implement the following strategies, and am willing to supervise and/or produce phone scripts, direct mail letters, on-air carts, and any other items necessary for their success. Why listen to me – why take my recommendations seriously? Because my background includes ownership and operation of one of America’s largest phone call centers and fulfilment operations, employing more than 700 people, and fulfilling millions of packages a year. I have also spent 30 years in marketing and public relations, much of it helping non-profit organizations optimize their fundraising strategies. Some of these strategies are presented below. They are not the result of any innate brilliance on my part, but represent techniques that virtually every fundraising organization – except, alas, Pacifica – already knows and uses on a regular basis. (Our other 4 stations can benefit from these same strategies. I hope they will take note before they, too, find themselves in the same sorry state as WBAI.) EMERGENCY “CPR” FUNDRAISING STRATEGIES FOR WBAI S1. Increasing fund drive collection from 70% to 98%. – ANTICIPATED EXTRA REVENUE: Up to $1.2 million per year (or $280-$300,000 per million-dollar fund drive. – HOW SOON AVAILABLE: Can start immediately, with up to $300,000 in next fund drive, and similar amounts for each successive drive. Rationale: WBAI collects only about 70% of its fund drive pledges – virtually all of the uncollectred pledgers being cash pledges for which no check or money order is ever received. In a million dollar drive, that meanslosing up to $300,000, or $1.2 million each year. But this money is easily collectible with a minor change in the way WBAI conducts its drives. And the expected revenue would dwarf by a factor of 50 times any revenue we could possibly hope to realize from concerts, special events, book sales, or even foundation grants. (What foundation would ever give us $1.2 million a year? What foundation, these days, even has $1.2 million a year to give away?) Moreover– unlike pursuing speculative pie-in-the-sky foundation grants or dreaming about miraculous bequests from deceased millionaires – uncollected cash fund-drive pledges represent actual, not “speculative,” money. They are promises that have already been made to WBAI, by listeners who willingly made them, and who (presumably) intended to make good on them. This additional cash-pledge revenue, which can begin flowing almost immediately, could all by itself pay off WBAI’s massive debts, permanently fund its daily operating expenses, and build a fund to purchase its own building. Steps for increasing fund drive collections: S1.1 Step 1 Boost the percentage of pledges made by credit card from 55% to 85%. (which is the current percentage at KPFK). This is easily done by changing the script with which operators answer the pledge phones. (Such scripts have been made available to management numerous times; it is only a matter of making management use them.) If we can reach 85% credit card pledges, total fund drive collection would increase by up to $150,000 per million dollar drive (or $00,000 per year). S1.2 Step 2. Use the instant cash from credit card pledgers to purchase premiums for cash pledgers. And send out those cash-pledged premiums immediately – the same day or next day after the pledge is made – even though payment for the premiums has not been received. Then wait another day or two, until you are sure that the premium has been delivered ... and phone the recipient. I have provided management with the phone scripts and follow-up for this purpose. It will result in near-100% collection of cash pledges. I understand that to those not involved in non-profit fundraising, sending out premiums before payment is received may sound counter-intuitive. But it works and will generate near-100% collection of cash pledges. (NOTE: The owner of 388 Atlantic, who has been helping to implement WBAI’s premium fulfilment, did not believe in this strategy, and conducted a limited test. The test confirmed the strategy.) S1.3 Step 3. Have at least 5% of a fund-drive’s premiums in-house by the time the drive begins, so they can be shipped out (to cash pledgers) the same day or next day after the pledge is made. This is the only way that the strategy in Step 2 can work. Five percent is a manageable amount of premiums to buy in advance, given our cash flow situation. After two days, we will know exactly which premiums are good and which are not, and can more accurately judge how many will be needed to finish the drive. At this point, we should order another 10%, of premiums using the credit card money generated during days 1-3 of the drive. Then continue this process. It is simply a matter of cash-flow inventory control – something every 18-year-old grocery clerk was expected to do in his head before the invention of computers, and which should therefore present no problem for our computer-literate management team.