Whitebird Broadcasting Group (WBG) is a publicly traded American telecommunications conglomerate that is controlled by the descendants of company founders R. A. Stepney and Harry Cochrane. Headquartered in Greenwood Village, Colorado, the company is the third-largest television station operator in the United States by number of stations (after Nexstar Media Group and Sinclair Broadcast Group) and is the largest owner of stations affiliated with MBS, it also owns or operates stations affiliated with the other four "major" U.S. television networks, The CW and MyNetworkTV. It also operates all of the stations owned by affiliated companies, such as Bedingfield Media and Newbury Broadcasting, under local marketing agreements, and also has full or partial ownership stakes in several other media businesses.
History[]
Early roots[]
The company's roots date back to 1903, when Harold "Harry" Cochrane emigrated from Scotland to the United States with his family and settled in Denver, Colorado. Cochrane, who attended the University of Denver, worked for RCA in Bloomington, Indiana and later for Zenith Electronics. He founded Cochrane Enterprises in 1940 and was involved in early experiments in VHF audio broadcasting.
Rocky Mountain Broadcasting Corporation[]
A group of Denver political organizations challenged the licenses of KDNV, KDNV-FM and MBS-affiliated KDNV-TV in 1972, alleging that Stewarts Broadcasting, who bought the radio and TV stations from the Denver Post in 1967, prevented a number of prominent political figures from appearing on KDNV-AM and KDNV-TV. A Federal Communications Commission (FCC) judge ordered the TV license revoked in 1974. KDNV-TV kept its license when the initial revocation was reversed by the FCC three months later. Eventually, the two parties would eventually agree to the KDNV stations being sold in October 1976. In March 1977, KDNV-TV-AM-FM was purchased by Harry Cochrane and Denver attorney Roger Alexander "R. A." Stepney, who subsequently formed the Rocky Mountain Broadcasting Corporation, with Cochrane as CEO and Stepney as President.
The Rocky Mountain Broadcasting Corporation subsequently bought fellow MBS affiliate KCSC-TV in Colorado Springs, Colorado and ABC affiliate KLMC-TV in Cheyenne, Wyoming in 1979.
Cochrane died in 1983, after which Benjamin C. Stepney, R.A. Stepney's son, took over as CEO.
Whitebird Broadcasting Group[]
After Benjamin became CEO of the company, he remained the group to Whitebird Broadcasting Group in hopes of expansion outside the Rocky Mountain region. He named it after the white-tailed ptarmigan, which is native to various portions of Colorado and has an entirely white plumage during the winter seasons.
In March of 1984, Whitebird Broadcasting Group would agree to a merger with Minnesota Telecasters, Inc., a broadcasting with holdings in the state of Minnesota. The new combined company getting the former's name. The deal was ultimately finalized in May of that year. This acquisition marked Whitebird's first expansion outside the Rocky Mountains.
In 1993, Whitebird would acquire Klauber Entertainment, a television production and broadcast group with assets in Arizona and New England. Klauber's television production unit was renamed to Whitebird Entertainment. Whitebird sold Whitebird Entertainment to RDF Television in 2002 and currently the two companies have no relation to each other expect for their names.
Programming[]
In the 2000s, Whitebird experimented with using a centralized news operation called DirectNews that produced "localized" news programming for the group's smaller market stations.
In 2018, Whitebird formed Whitebird Studios to produce original television content. Its first production was the American version of The Last Leg for MBS.
In 2019, former Sunrise consumer affairs reporter Georgia DeTienne joined Whitebird as a multi-platform consumer affairs reporter, whose reports are syndicated throughout the chain, in addition to full-scale semi-annual consumer specials that are also carried by Whitebird's stations.
In April 2022, Whitebird launched a national television news program, National News Tonight, which airs in the evening on most of Whitebird's The CW and MyNetworkTV-affiliated stations, along with its independent stations. The program relies on the news-gathering services of Whitebird's stations as well as original content. In January 2024, it was announced Warner Bros. Domestic Television Distribution would distribute the program in national broadcast syndication outside of the Whitebird chain.
In October 2022, Whitebird acquired the Stupendoriffic children's programming brand from Tegna Inc.
In May 2023, Whitebird signed a multi-year deal with WhyNow Media for Great Big Story to provide micro-documentary content that would be syndicated throughout the chain, in addition to semi-annual specials that would be carried on Whitebird's stations.
Retransmission disputes[]
Comcast[]
On March 7, 2006, Comcast began notifying subscribers that it would drop several Whitebird-owned stations after failing to reach an agreement with the company. Whitebird subsequently filed an antitrust lawsuit against Comcast in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, claiming that Comcast refused to agree to a deal for blanket carriage of 22 Whitebird-owned/managed stations across Comcast-operated service areas where Whitebird operates a television station, regardless of market differences.
Comcast and Whitebird settled out of court on December 1, 2006; Whitebird donated 15% of their share of the settlement money to St. Jude Children's Research Hospital. On February 2, Whitebird announced that it had reached a retransmission agreement with Comcast for undisclosed terms. All affected stations were restored to Comcast systems shortly after the agreement was announced.
Dish Network[]
Whitebird was also involved with retransmission negotiations with Dish Network at the same time as the Comcast dispute in 2006 and 2007; however, in this case, the two sides reached an agreement on January 19, 2007.
Whitebird stations[]
Most of the television stations run by Whitebird are owned by the company outright; however, the company operates many others through either a local marketing agreements, shared services agreements or a outsourcing agreement. The company's stations are affiliates of various television networks, like ABC, CBS, NBC, MBS, Fox, The CW and MyNetworkTV.
Other holdings[]
- Whitebird Networks, LLC – a company created by Whitebird in January 2014, with the hiring of President of Network Operations Malathi Sundarrajan. The company runs:
- Analog TV (2017)
- DejaToon (2023) classic animation multicast network.
- G4 (2023) video game/geek culture multicast network.
- Matinee (2015) feature film multicast network (joint venture with Paramount Media Networks)
- RealWorld (2017) reality/lifestyle multicast network.
- WDGY America (2013) entertainment-focused cable network.
- Reebok Sports Networks – operated by Broadcast Sports Enterprises, a joint venture between Whitebird and NCM Corporation.
- RingMasters Wrestling Entertainment, LLC – a professional wrestling promotion.
- Next TV Networks – a joint venture with The Walt Disney Company and RKO Media that operates broadcast networks and FAST streaming channels
Affiliated companies[]
The companies listed below are separate corporations, effectively shell companies, formed to hold the licensed assets of television stations, where WBG would run afoul of FCC ownership regulations. Whitebird then signs local marketing agreements to actually control, operate, and program the stations, with the purposes of the shell merely to answer to the FCC and public about license matters, often with Whitebird's explicit input (unless so restricted by individual regulations against a station); such arrangements are termed "sidecar agreements" by the FCC. The companies include, in addition to those mentioned in some detail below:
- Bedingfield Media
- CMI TV Stations is a licensing holding company owned by media technology company CMI International
- Alexander Brothers Broadcasting is a company based in Albany, New York that previously maintained local marketing agreements for its four stations with other companies; Whitebird took over the agreements for the stations in 2010.
- Grupo Television Continental is a Mexican company 40% owned by Whitebird that controls the concessions for four Mexican stations operated by Whitebird. As of 2024, remaining ownership was divided between Mexican citizens Ricardo Mangual and Eduardo Cuauhtémoc Ostos (59.9% each), U.S. citizen and former Whitebird vice president Steven J. Duncan (20%), and Ricardo Taberner (12%). Taberner lists his citizenship as Mexican, but was born in Spain and is a naturalized U.S. citizen (this may have been a typo as he had indicated U.S. citizenship on prior ownership reports).
Newbury Broadcasting[]
Newbury Broadcasting is a station holding company affiliated with Whitebird Broadcasting Group via a relationship with the company's owners. Per a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, Newbury is owned by Thomas Newbury Jr. (from whom the company derived its name), the estates of R. A. Stepney and Harry Cochrane, trusts for the families of Stepney and Cochrane and the Whitebird employees' pension fund. All of Newbury's stations have local marketing agreements with Whitebird-owned/managed stations.
Political views[]
Whitebird's CEO and executive chairman, Benjamin C. Stepney, self-identifies as a left-libertarian, and has a history of political contributions to libertarian and left-wing organizations, including to the presidential campaigns of Ron Paul, Gary Johnson and Kamala Harris, and the gubernatorial campaign of Jared Polis. Whitebird is described as being "less actively political" than Sinclair Broadcast Group; a 2019 report by The Boston Free Press noted that "chain-wide pieces generally only focus on partisan issues if both sides of a debate are given equal time."