Jim Goodmon, CEO of WRAL‘s parent company Capitol Broadcasting, spent 20 minutes telling viewers why the Raleigh station switched from CBS to NBC.
Saying the decision didn’t happen overnight, Goodmon said the switch was “a business decision for the future. We feel like NBC is the network that is committed to the future of local broadcasting.”
While sitting with WRAL anchor David Crabtree, Goodmon described the tipping point in negotiations with CBS by saying, “A contract tells a story. It defines a relationship. There wasn’t any way that I could consider the CBS agreement a partnership. It was a one-way, ‘this is how we do this’ [deal].”
He said NBC, on the other hand, gave him the impression “we’re in this together and we’re going to make this work.”
“Because they’ve got such a strong ratings share in almost every category, they can afford to tell CBS … to go take a walk,” Doug Spero, an associate professor of communication at Meredith College, told the News & Observer. “NBC, obviously, would be idiots not to jump off of WNCN and onto WRAL. It’s a win-win for NBC.”
Last Friday, both WRAL and WNCN announced the affiliation swap with WRAL going NBC and WNCN going to CBS.
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