Clear Channel Pres./CFO Rich Bressler Takes Aim At Pandora On Company Financial Call

Rich Bressler

There weren't too many kind words for webcasters... and specifically PANDORA YESTERDAY (11/7) on the CLEAR CHANNEL investor call from Pres./CFO RICH BRESSLER. Echoing Chairman/CEO BOB PITTMAN, BRESSLER reminded those on the call that "we're real radio," and described streaming music services as, "not even close to being real radio. They are not a free-standing service.”

BRESSLER took on PANDORA specifically, saying “all their stations, combined, have yet to penetrate the top 10 in NEW YORK.”

As for any impact that PANDORA has had financially on CLEAR CHANNEL, he commented  “We have not seen any impact on local ad sales from any digital service -- whether it’s PANDORA or iTUNES RADIO. These guys are a convenient way to make a playlist —- but I can’t overemphasize it’s not even close to being real radio,”

The remarks followed comments earlier this week (NET NEWS 11/5) from PANDORA MEDIA CFO MICHAEL HERRING, who boasted PANDORA had 1.49 billion hours in MARCH, and that the webcaster had 8% of radio listening in the country.

BRESSLER called those numbers, “internally-generated statistics.”

Listen to the full call here.

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