Myrtle Beach Paper Salutes New Station

Myrtle Beach’s Sun News shines the spotlight on Raycom newbie WMBF, which launches in exactly 12 hours. The daily paper is owned by McClatchy, and is actually located right next to the new WMBF digs on Frontage Road in Myrtle. When I was down there in late June, WMBF GM Ted Fortenberry and the Sun publisher had had informal talks about partnering on things like editorials and weather coverage.

Fortenberry tells reporter Lisa Fleisher: 
"The biggest challenge is just the new technology, just learning. The way you edit, shoot. Everything connects through an IP address. It’s not like the old days."

Raycom senior v.p. Marty Edelman tells Fleisher the station cost around $10 million to build. He adds:

"We don’t really expect to be profitable until really the third year, but we’re prepared for that. It’s a very strong, healthy growing market. We felt there was a need there for another full-power major television station."