10 Questions with ... Charlie Tuna

BRIEF CAREER SYNOPSIS:

I started at the age of 16 at my hometown station, KGFW in Kearney Nebraska. I worked there through my freshman year in college. Then I joined KLEO/Wichita for a year through 1965, KOMA/Oklahoma City in 1966, WMEX/Boston for nine months in 1967, and three years after leaving Kearney, I joined KHJ/Los Angeles starting on Thanksgiving Day 1967.

I'm still going after 43 years in L.A. and having done morning drive for 16 sets of call letters in Los Angeles. I currently fill-in Morning Drive on K-Earth, and I also do the Saturday/Sunday weekend shows.

1) What led you to a career in radio? Was there a defining moment, which made you realize "this is it"?

I first heard Jack Lewis, the original morning man on KGFW in Kearney, NE when I was five years old.

Jack always created a great show with fun, laughter, talk about UFO's, school snow days, he had a dressing race for boys & girls getting ready for school, and he had a lot of laughing interplay with his news man and his farm reporter. I thought he had the best job in the world when I was five years old, and I decided this was what I want to do with my life!

2) What is it about your shows that you feel really makes it stand apart from the others?

My work ethic! I've always outworked my competitors because of my love for radio. I still will do 30+ hours in a row with no sleep (and I did again just last week). I work on shows and creating content because I'm still excited about radio and what you can do with it.

3) What makes your show and the delivery of your show unique? How does this compare to other shows or delivery methods you have worked at?

I asked our delivery partners Mr. Master, (with the owner Stu Jacobs, Maria Laing and Jim Jacob) to develop a delivery system where I could customize my show content with the station's individual call letters or imaging attached to the beginning of every piece of content that I do.

This way, I could become the local personality for any station. With that being done and sounding seamless, I can add that to whatever the station itself wants from me....liners, jock plugs, shout outs, request intros, and a toll-free interactive phone number that's answered by me 24-7. I also have two Facebook pages (one public figure, and one personal), www.Twitter.com/CharlieTunaShow, my Web Site and E-mail. I personally take care of them all so I can connect with anyone in any market.

4) What is your biggest challenge with the Charlie Tuna daily show versus the 70's show, and what are you doing to overcome it?

Keeping "The 70's Show" (which is taped just a few days in advance of the air date) as current as the daily shows.

"The 70's Show" has a lot of vintage interviews from the 70's with the music, TV/movie stars, pop culture icons from that decade, and hot current stuff too. Sometimes you get lucky! I had a feeling that this Leonardo DiCaprio movie "Inception" was going to get a lot of buzz, so I went with a couple of segments about the movie and our dreams. We got a lot of great listener feedback that I hit a nerve on before I saw the first two weeks of big box office results!

5) How current is the material in the Charlie Tuna daily show and how are you able to keep it fresh and up to date?

Our material is as current as any show in a local market on a daily basis can be. I read and look at everything on TV, the Internet, YouTube, and I get tons of E-mails from my fans and listeners always sending me stuff for the show. Stu Jacobs at Mr. Master has personally overseen the evolution of this show really working with me, so it's very topical in terms of delivery timing.

With Mr. Master I can even send updates to a station that already has the show for that day. We can even replace current content with "breaking news" content that's less than an hour old in some cases.

6) How is the relationship between programmer and syndication changing? For better or worse?

In the case of Black Card Radio, it's the best syndication company I've ever worked with! They say a successful business begins at the top, and Saville Kellner, President of Black Card Radio, also has a huge international cookware company built on superior product and the absolute best customer service. That's how he wanted our syndication company to be from the start. So we offer that and then some.

We consider our affiliates our partners, and we will work with them to deliver the sales rating numbers. We can even partner with them in some cases, for local sales within the show if they'd like as Mr.Master can deliver local spots to specific stations.

7) Describe the relationship you have with your fellow co-workers? How do you motivate your staff to do better? How do they motivate you?

We always keep it a creative, positive and fun environment! Our Programming VP, Dave "Chachi" Denes heads up our team. Chachi was my PD at KBIG in L.A. for years. He recruited me and introduced me to Black Card Radio President, Saville Kellner, who is actually the real "most interesting guy in the world!" (No offense to the Dos Equis beer guy).

Masa Patterson came from affiliate relations with Premiere, and really knows his stuff! He really "gets it" when it comes to affiliates needs. Katie Lewis, Affiliate Relations, is a charmer who's fast tracking to success, and a real TCB partner for stations. Chris Johansing is our office energizer bunny who gets a thousand things done for us everyday! All of us just feed off each other, and I never hear a negative thing there, ever!

8) What should radio be doing now to secure a role in the future of the ever-changing media landscape?

Radio is no longer a faceless medium. And you have to incorporate all the tech stuff available to you to interact with that listener even more. Both my sons are graphic artists, web site designers and musicians. So my oldest son Daniel tapes a lot of the interviews I do at Black Card studios with a two camera set-up. He uses two high-def cameras, and then produces, edits, adds effects, and even electronic make-up which makes it appear you had a top Hollywood make-up artist there on set! He then posts it on YouTube as well as my CharlieTuna.com Web Site. My younger son Bryan, who designed and set up my Web Site, takes care of the tech stuff on it. I do the content myself because so much of it relates to the show I'm doing with specific video references or material from the show that the listener can find after they hear it. And all of that migrates to my two Facebook pages, my Twitter account, and we're also in the process of getting set to launch a listener rewards program on my Web Site too.

9) What advice would you give people new to the business?

You better have the passion and drive to really want to succeed in this business, and be prepared for long hours, low pay and getting stepped on as you start out in the business. You can also plan on being stabbed in the back by your "best friends," (or so you thought they were).

Don't copy any one person or try to be like them. Most of the radio stars who have made it to the top are a composite of many people they admired, looked up to, and emulated starting out. Then one day you will find yourself and what you want to be, and what you want to do on the radio. It's an epiphany you'll feel when it happens, because you'll have that comfortable feeling that you now know who you are and how you want to do your show.

10) What is the one truth that has held constant throughout your career?

My favorite quote I came across from Horace Greeley about 40 years ago: "Fame is a vapor, popularity an accident, and riches take wings. Only one thing endures, and that is character!"

1) Who do you consider your radio mentors?

The man I just mentioned, Jack Lewis, even though I was only a listener, I learned what fun radio should be. Eleven years later, I was doing that morning show I grew up listening to! Jack had moved on to Colorado, but I was so shy and in such awe of him, I never got a chance to thank him personally for being such an inspiration for me. He was even on my paper route when I was 11, and answered the door one day when I was collecting the monthly payments from my customers. But I could barely speak, I was so blown away that my idol was right in front of me. After he moved away to Colorado, he died a couple of years later. It is a huge regret for me that I never got to thanking him when I had that chance. But I did tell his story and thanked him in my National Radio Hall of Fame induction speech in 2008.

2) What is your favorite part of the job?

Producing, creating, and delivering my show to the air!

3) What techniques do you use to get a celebrity to open up in an interview?

I always stress to them to not look at this as an interview. I want them to think of it as a visit, like they were just sitting down to catch up with family and friends. I always have a thousand questions I want to get to, and I usually don't refer to the notes in front of me because I really do my homework on each guest. Then I listen to what they're saying, and let all the questions filter in as they would come up naturally in a "visit". And almost always, at the end of the "visit", the guest will usually say something like "you really did your homework on me."

4) How do you interact with your affiliates?

I am available as often as they need me. I always have my affiliates E-mail me directly with custom liners so that I can turn them around and get them back to them ASAP. I'll call them at times, as well as our affiliate relations staff just to see how they're doing and what we can do to make things better for them. Plus, they all have my studio number so they can call also me anytime.

5) How did you get your on-air name?

The late Chuck Riley (or "Chuck Dann", as he was known on KOMA in Oklahoma City back in 1966) had to do a fill-in weekend shift just before I arrived to start as the new KOMA personality. Chuck was a news man then. He was very upset about doing a jock show that would demean his journalistic integrity and he didn't want to do it. Management insisted, and told him to make up a name if he was worried about the shift affecting his news profile.

So as legend has it, the night before his shift Chuck had about a six-pack of Coors in him when the Starkist commercial came on TV. Chuck decided that was the name he would use on the air, "Charlie Tuna."

He did, played it straight with the name, and I arrived the following week to start my new job. Management explained that Chuck using "Charlie Tuna " was such a big hit they wanted me to be the permanent "Charlie Tuna." I said "You've got to be kidding!?!?!?" But here we are 44 years later!