As a rule, news and talk show host Nikki Medoro doesn’t play with explosives. That doesn’t mean she can’t recognize when something has been blown to smithereens.
“They did blow up KGO,” Medoro said.
On October 6th, KGO didn’t just change their format to Easy Listening, or Rock & Roll, they stripped the station of all previous DNA, and are now a sports betting station, whatever that is. For those scoring at home, it’s now 810 The Spread.
“If you’d have asked me what might have been a logical transition for KGO I might have said syndication,” Medoro said. “They decided to go an entirely different route. But sports betting? Who was asking for this?”
Seems reminiscent of the New Coke, Olestra potato chips, and Godfather III. Who asked for those?
Medoro began as a street reporter in San Francisco in the evenings and graduated to evening anchor with Peter Finch. Later she was an afternoon anchor alongside Brett Burkhart. Medoro also did news for Chip Franklin, then earned her own show, becoming the first woman morning drive-time host in KGO’s history.
Medoro said she understands it was a business decision and they were free to do it. Many stations have switched formats, but KGO scorched the landscape.
“When you ask what blowing up a station means, I think it’s when you take away all the local issues for people that live in the Bay Area. Issues we used to present.” Medoro said. “Listeners are no longer going to get that, at least not in the form we were offering.”
After 11 years at KGO, Medoro quickly reinvented herself. And I emphasize ‘quickly.’ The Nikki Medoro Show debuted on YouTube on Oct 17th and just completed its second week. Figuratively, the KGO body wasn’t even cold yet.
She decided to act fast as people have short memory. Medoro broadcasts from her home each day.
“I figured I’d better strike while the iron was hot,” Medoro explained. “I understand how the news cycle works, and I’ve been involved with it for 20 years. If you provide too much time, it’s not that they’ll forget you, but it’s important to feed listeners’ interest in you. Also, you don’t want to lose the groove of doing a show. Even when I used to go on vacation from my show, I’d come back rusty.”
Medoro said her heart is warmed by how patient listeners have been with her fledgling YouTube show. At the same time, she’s not afraid to say it’s hard work.
“I’m the host, technical person, sound person. I bring on guests. It’s a whole new world for me,” Medoro explained. “This endeavor couldn’t be bigger for me at this point. I guess I could have taken a month off. But my former co-worker Mark Thompson, (who also took shrapnel from the detonation) didn’t take any time off. He has more resources than I have and more background in doing this.”
Medoro has been often asked why she decided to go the YouTube route.
“I imagine there are a few reasons,” she said. “I used to co-anchor news in the morning and did my own show for years. This way I can still do what I love to do. This is really a new experience from every angle.”
Radio is clearly in the woman’s blood. Even if some huge station came calling, Medoro said she’d have to give it some thought.
“If a job offer came in and they told me I’d be doing overnights, cover a beat, be a court reporter, I’d have to say no,” she said. “I’ve done all that. I like leading a talk show, bringing on guests, interacting with guests and listeners. I’m creating my own content right now. I control where it goes. Some friends have asked if I’d considered going into television. My answer is ‘no,’ I’ve been a radio girl all my life.”
Gambles, pardon the obvious pun, were made when management dumped the long-serving format of KGO. Medoro admits she probably could have read the writing on the wall. Things were set in motion a long time ago.
“I was at KGO for 11 years. Since day one, I started sensing they were making some changes. They began letting longtime hosts go. I’ve been dealing with that kind of stuff all along. I imagine I always sensed something was coming, but it wasn’t verbalized. I’ve never been laid off in my career. I know in radio, that isn’t very common.”
That’s the understatement of 2022.
Medoro said her YouTube show is still in its infancy, clutching a pacifier. There is a huge learning curve in this area. Just because she’d like to do something on the show doesn’t mean it can happen in an instant.
“Will I do callers again? If I can figure out how to make it work I will,” Medoro said. “Something like that sounds a lot easier than it is, the technical bar can be pretty high. I’m alone. I don’t have a screener so I’m not going to open lines up to everyone. There’s an art to bringing on callers. If I’m headed in one direction on the show, I can’t afford to have a caller derail that. At the same time, I welcome counter-opinions.”
On her radio shows, Medoro said there were times when a caller would bring something up she liked and could run with.
“I can tell you I’m working a lot harder for my current two-hour show than I had to for my old four-hour show on KGO. If I can find some more funding I’ll be able to do more.”
Medoro has lived in the Bay Area all her life. She said when she was a student at San Jose State University, she always said her dream was to have her own show on KGO Radio. Dreams come true and that one lasted for several years. She fulfilled her dream of talking with people in the Bay Area, the hometown she loves. Not a lot of people can say that.
“I love that I’ve been here all my life. When I talk about Bay issues, people know I’ve been here. I know the street they are talking about, the neighborhood and its history. It’s a shared history.”
Will we see more stations suffering a similar KGO fate?
“I think it matters where you are geographically,” Medroro said. “If you’re in a large market, you’re competing with a lot of information. I guess the KGO experience could be a barometer for the rest of radio. If you haven’t already found a way to be at people’s fingertips, you’re already losing as information is so readily available. You might have the headlines, news and traffic from other sources. But radio is still the place you can talk about it. I suppose we should have had an FM presence, that might have made a difference.”
One of the interesting things about her show, Medoro said, is it appears she’s reaching a wider audience.
“Watchers have reached out to me to say their own kids are listening. I got into radio because it is immediate. Just crack open the microphone and go. Bring something to the table right away. Are we seeing the demise of AM radio? Possibly. The medium? I don’t think so.”
She said she talked with Thompson a bit about pairing up on a YouTube show.
“It made sense because we share a newscaster, Kim McCallister. I’ve had Chip Franklin on a few times. I used to work with Chip, filled in for him. He taught me how to become a radio host. I’d react to what he was talking about. I had to set this up quickly as I really had no other choice.” Medoro said former colleague Mark Thompson launched a YouTube show a week before she did. She was able to see how it all worked.
Medoro said she and Mark Thompson both have the same sponsor, Bay area attorney Steve Moskowitz.
“He’s the guy to call if you ever have any tax questions,” she smiles. “Mark has a producer and an engineer. We have some consistent money coming in. I share mine with Kim McCallister. People can donate during the show. Is the cushion the same as my salary was at KGO? Not by a long shot.
“I already knew about editing and had Adobe Audition,” she said. “I had to learn how to put up photos. I purchased a better camera, got better lighting.
I’m on daily life from noon to 2 pm. That satisfied uber-fans. You can obviously watch it anytime you want. A lot of fans from my KGO days will message me throughout the day and say they waited until the next morning to listen to a show, they were saving the experience. I also think it’s interesting that listeners are starting to get to know each other through the chat component of YouTube. That’s something new to the equation. They get a live text chat going. It’s not the same as taking calls, and I miss that.”
Her callers on KGO were regulars. Medoro knew personal things about them, laughed with them. She’d love to get back to callers and will be trying to put that together.
She also knew on her YouTube show that Kim McCallister was a necessity.
“Kim and I grew very close on KGO. We were in the same booth for hours. Mark was on right after me, but we didn’t spend a lot of time together. I trust Kim. She’s been doing news forever. I’ll chime in during her newscast if I’m shocked about something. I used to do her job and it’s fun. The two hours seem to fly by between us. In between, it’s a lot of prep.”
Would she ever leave the Bay area?
“My husband has a great job here and loves it. My kids are here. My daughter is going to start high school, both of my parents are here. I don’t know if I could leave everybody. I have a talk show, I have an opinion. I’ll talk about the facts as I know them. I’m not going to spew lies.”
Medoro said these days we have national personalities like Anderson Cooper or Sean Hannity and we can’t always identify when they’re a journalist and when they’re being a commentator.”
Hannity is a journalist? It must be Halloween.
“Anderson Cooper will cover Hurricane Ian, then sit behind a desk and be a commentator. It can blur the line.”
Life happens. Life goes on. Her YouTube show has taken Medoro into a new career direction, but it’s also a much-needed distraction.
“I know I can grow this business through baby steps,” she said. “It will become more seamless, more professional. I’d like to grow it. That takes consistency. I’ve got to make sure I put up fresh content every day. I imagine on holidays I can put up some kind of rerun.“
On the lighter side of the past few weeks, Medoro said a scary day like Halloween is a welcome break.
“Haunted houses and horror movies make me happy,” she said. “I like everything scary, the emotion of it all. I’m not an Eli Roth film type of person. I like scary music. I like to be scared. It depends what I’m in the mood for. A new movie titled Smile made me jump, or what I like to say gave me a ‘jump scare’. I do like thrillers.”
I asked Medoro if she’d start prepping for the next week after we hung up.
“I have to put on my ‘mom’ hat after we hang up,” she said. “I’ve got to pick up the kids. There are so many hours in the day. Then I have to get some costumes ready. My daughter is going to be one of the pinball machine aliens from Toy Story. My son is going to be a stick of butter. I asked how he came up with that costume idea. “You tell me,” she joked.
After a month of scary things; losing your job, creating another in a new medium, Halloween haunted houses, it would take a lot to frighten Medoro.
Jim Cryns writes features for Barrett News Media. He has spent time in radio as a reporter for WTMJ, and has served as an author and former writer for the Milwaukee Brewers. To touch base or pick up a copy of his new book: Talk To Me – Profiles on News Talkers and Media Leaders From Top 50 Markets, log on to Amazon or shoot Jim an email at jimcryns3_zhd@indeedemail.com.
