The BOB & TOM Show marked a significant milestone earlier this week. The show reached 30 years in syndication and 40 years on flagship station WFBQ, Indianapolis.
Bob Kevoian and Tom Griswold started the comedy and talk show, which is now syndicated by Westwood One and heard weekdays from 6 to 10 a.m. (ET) on over 80 stations across the US.
I caught up with Tom Griswold and asked him to reflect on 30 years of syndication and how the future looks.
So, let’s start at the beginning.
“The notion of going into a syndication situation was actually pretty funny. We had been voted the most stolen from radio show in America, and that was in one of the trades. And so, the great Frank Wood from Cincinnati, Frank saw that and said, hey, look, why don’t we give this a try? And he was really the guy that decided, yeah, this could work, and we’ll kind of dip our toes into this and see how it goes,” said Griswold.
“And that’s exactly how we got started. We pretty much, with only a couple of minor changes, are using the same clock we used right from the beginning with respect to how much time is allocated to the local stations and how much time we’re spewing, whatever it is that we do.”
Griswold says keeping a local component going with a national show is a balancing act.
“It was kind of a tricky process to keep a local component going and at the same time be generic enough to have a national show. And so we were really lucky, and we kind of figured out a way to do that by having certain segments in which everyone would have an opportunity to be local, including all the affiliates.”
The most significant change to the show over the years was Bob Kevoian’s retirement at the end of 2015.
“We’ve had a couple of other people leave, but at the same time, everything else has kind of changed on the outside of radio. I can remember going back to the eighties when the fax machine was the greatest thing that ever happened to radio stations. Instead of just having to answer the request line and have some guy requesting Ozzy, you’d get a fax from a brain surgeon going, hey, you guys were talking about this aspect of the human brain. I happen to know a lot about it.”
“Then, of course, since then, obviously, the digital revolution has taken hold. We’re dealing with a whole new world of instant communication and the whole world of email and texting, etc. So, it’s in many ways completely different, but in some ways, it’s still the same, which is trying to engage an audience with content,” said Griswold.
So, looking forward, how do you maintain a loyal audience and attract new people?
“That’s a really good question. We’re working on trying to make sure that we don’t sound like antiques on the air. We have a number of younger people working on the show. A couple of them are my sons. One of them is on the air. One of them is off the air doing behind-the-scenes stuff.”
“The cast of the people has actually changed a little bit in that we’ve got some younger minds out there working with us. And at the same time, we’re just trying to stay contemporary.”
I acknowledged that asking Tom to pick one or two highlights from 40 years of shows was probably unfair.
“Yeah, there have been so many. We’ve always had a tremendous list of great comedians that have come through, sometimes very young men and women that end up becoming big stars, sometimes just great club comedians that come through on a regular basis. In general, that’s been a terrific asset to the show.”
“The other component is we’ve had a lot of fun shows in which various artists have come in and played live. We have an ancillary studio that can accommodate them. You get a guy like Peter Frampton who comes in, and he’s such a great guy, and he’s so funny, and he’s willing to play around with us. Those are true highlights when you get great artists in the world of rock that are also just wonderful people.”
So, let’s flip it around. When did something happen that left you scratching your head and wondering what were we thinking? Maybe a promotion that didn’t work out?
“We did a thing where we took a bunch of listeners to Florida. And it was somewhere, I think it was St. Pete or somewhere in that general area. Anyway, the point of the story is we’re all in this big hotel. We were there for a week. With all these listeners.”
It was fun. But we went to check out, and our general manager was losing his mind. What’s the matter? Well, it turns out that one of our winners wasn’t up to speed on how the minibar worked. They had drained their minibar every day. And their bar tab was a couple of thousand bucks. And they did not have the money to pay for it. They just thought that was part of the deal.”
“Every day they would drink three bourbons, three gins; it was like a George Thorogood song.”
“The other one was that whenever we go to the Bahamas, we warn people, hey, look, don’t rent the minibikes, whatever they are, because the driving is really treacherous out there. So, one couple did it. Of course, they got into an accident.”
“The guy described to me later that he went into the clinic, and he says I wouldn’t have let my dog in there. So, they were OK. But I mean, we warned them.”
Knowing I could listen to his stories all day, I asked for a couple more.
“I’m sure some of your readers will remember the days when Disney World and Disneyland would bring down a hundred radio stations. And they would place them all over the theme parks. We couldn’t get down there when they wanted to film an announcement for whatever reason.”
“They said we really want you guys to do this. So, we will fly you down on one of our private planes. The private plane was called Ear Force One, like Mickey Mouse ears.”
“We’re flying, and we’re partway there, and we’re somewhere in Tennessee, and the pilot comes on and says, we can’t tell if our hydraulic system is working. We’re going to try to land right now. So, they say we’re going to go to Nashville.”
“Of course, the plane landed successfully, but it was a little bit scary. After all that, including our near-death experience, had the plane crashed, it would have truly been for naught since they ended up, whatever that was for, they ended up not doing it.”
What does the future look like for The BOB & TOM show?
“I’d like to do it another nine or 10 years. I’m in really good health. I just had my annual physical and passed with flying colors. I feel like I’m getting a little bit wiser, which means I’m now thinking I’m less smart than I used to think. This is a great world of radio. Just every day is different.”
“So many people have jobs that are the same over and over again. We get to go in every morning and see what’s going on, and then we kind of become part of it.”
“It’s a real privilege to have such an interesting job. The trick is going to be just keeping up with all of the changes in formats and delivery of the various types of stuff that we do. I think that the most important part will always be the radio component.”
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Jeff Lynn serves as Editor of Barrett Media’s Music Radio coverage. Prior to joining Barrett Media, Jeff spent time programming in Milwaukee, Omaha, Cleveland, Des Moines, and Madison for multiple radio groups, including iHeartMedia, Townsquare Media, NRG Media, and Entercom (now Audacy). He also worked as a Country Format Editor for All Access until the outlet shut down in August 2023.
To get in touch with Jeff by email, reach him at Jeff@BarrettMedia.com.
