WTVO Puts Tongue In Cheek For Holiday Promos

WTVO and WQRF, the ABC and Fox affiliates in Rockford, Ill., created some lighthearted holiday promos this year.

WTVO is owned by Mission Broadcasting, and is operated through a shared services agreement with Nexstar, which owns WQRF.

Shawn Anderson, WTVO-WQRD’s creative services director, shared these spots along with a note.

Tired of the stale “HOLIDAY MEMORY” spots that EVERY station puts on the air this time of year? We are too.

I wanted to share with you the holidays spots we did here in Rockford.

Aaron Rice, (the stations’ promotion manager), did a fantastic job with coming up with an idea and ran with it. And the best part? All the anchors were completely on board as well.

NOTE: This last WTVO holiday spot, like the others, takes its inspiration from the classic movie, A Christmas Story, which was based on Jean Shepherd’s semi-fictional anecdotes in his 1966 book, In God We Trust: All Others Pay Cash.

In the mid-1990s, Shepherd lived in Ft. Myers, Fla., where I was the marketing director at WINK, the CBS affiliate there.

WINK’s news director at the time, the legendary Mel Martin, knew Shep, and invited him to come into the WINK studio to do commentary one night while we were in election coverage. Beyond shaking his hand, I don’t recall what election it was or anything about his contribution.

Here’s the clip from A Christmas Story involving the decoder and then, WTVO’s take on it.

Got some station holiday promos you want to share? Email me at paul@newscheckmedia.com.