Remembering Better Days at Cumulus

Layoffs at Cumulus Podcast Network serve as a reminder - nothing lasts forever. I look back at some favorite memories and people who made them.

Greetings from the sandy beaches near St. Petersburg, Florida.

I’ve been here this week soaking up the sun.

And answering my phone.

My phone started blowing up Wednesday morning, when my old home Cumulus Podcast Network made some serious personnel cuts, including axing SVP Carolyn Chauncey, VP Jay Soderberg and executive producer Tanya Bustos.

Cumulus has been hurting financially for several years now. So I wasn’t shocked. The legacy radio company is mired in bankruptcy and searching for a way out. And Heath Freeman at Alden Global Capital - known for gutting media organizations - now has a 31 percent voting interest in the revamped company, according to Radio Ink. So I’m sure there’s enormous pressure to make the EBITDA look pretty.

When I arrived at Cumulus as executive editor, I handled the Four P’s - programming insights, platform relations, publishing best practices, and production support.

During my tenure from 2019 until 2024, I had lots of fun - like at Podcast Movement in Denver in the photo above.

I worked with Spotify on video podcasts, established a partnership with YouTube, helped the Brown Ambition podcast win several Webby Awards, and formally experimented with TikTok on podcast promotion. I also fine-tuned metadata and taught podcasting best practices.

Cumulus says it remains committed to podcasting, according to Podcast News Daily. I hope that’s true. But it will be hard to match the past.

We developed four content pillars to attract brand advertisers - News, Sports, Business Money Tech, and Life & Entertainment. We brought in top-notch talent, including Shawn Ryan, Rich Eisen, Lala Kent, BiggerPockets, Stacking Benjamins, and Afford Anything with Paula Pant. We even developed a trail-blazing partnership with Marketplace and American Public Media.

We had an excellent team led by Suzanne Grimes. Our all-star cast over the years included Robert Mathers, Kelli Hurley, Agnes Grzelak, Bryan Forbes, David Cohn, Lisa Waks, Megan Devine, Erica Farmer, Lou Pellegrino, Cory Smith, Robert Barowski, Dennis Stemplinski, and Theresa Gage.

Of all those people, only the last three remain.

Gritty and determined, we sought to carve out our place in the Wild West of Podcasting. And we did.

We became a top ten channel on Apple Podcasts and a top ten network on various podcast rankers. And we had 50 shows charting on Apple, a first in the history of the company.

I will always fondly remember those days - rather than the brutal days of this week.

Now… it’s back to the beach.

In podcasting since 2006, John Wordock runs his own consulting firm. He served as Executive Editor & SVP for Podcasting at Westwood One from 2019 to 2024. He also worked as Executive Producer for Podcasts at The Wall Street Journal until 2019. He currently works as a business reporter and multimedia journalist for WTOP in Washington, D.C.