BOYCOTT RADIO STATION ADVERTISERS
Bonneville International Corporation, managed by Deseret Management Corporation, is a broadcasting company wholly owned by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (the LDS Church).
Bonneville International Corporation owns about 30 radio stations and one NBC affiliate television station. Additionally, the Bonneville Communications division provides broadcast distribution services and PSA production services to non-profit organizations, notably the LDS Church during its semi-annual General Conferences.
If you live in the broadcast areas of these Bonneville International Corporation radio and one television station, boycotting them effectively will be a little different and will require some organizing with like-minded individuals and organizations. The more people, politicians, churches, and community organizations that sign on with your efforts and participate, the better.
The Bonneville station needs to be monitored to determine its advertisers. Then these advertisers need to be approached. Letters can be sent, but also local folks can and should organize to ask for a meeting with the advertisers to express their concerns and to ask that advertising on these stations cease. Let them know that you will publicize the results of your meeting with them. You may find some of these advertisers have LGBT-friendly policies already and do not even know about Bonneville’s LDS connections.
Remember: Be polite but firm in letters and in meetings with the advertisers asking them to stop purchasing advertising at Bonneville stations because their purchase supports discrimination and hate. There are other radio stations for them to choose from. Tell them you want a written response assuring that they will stop advertising at Bonneville stations. Be sure to tell them you cannot and will not purchase their products anymore until the company notifies you in writing that they have ceased advertising at Bonneville stations. Sometimes, their advertising buys entail contracts over a period of weeks, so expecting an immediate cessation is not entirely realistic.
Last of all, really don’t purchase their products until they do what you have asked. Tell your friends about the boycott and the reasons for it.
The more visible you and your allies are, the better. Sitting at home and complaining won’t help. Be active! Always be non-violent, don’t lose your temper, and prepare in advance for designated spokeperson(s) to interact with the press. But expect sniping remarks in retaliation. (Like the community isn’t used to that…)
Expect a variety of PR tactics in response, even assurances that the boycott is helping their business. The boycott really won’t help them. Their allies might have to spend money to help them, but that keeps them from spending it in other ways that harm the community. And you won’t be listening to these stations anyway, so their advertising dollars will be wasted that way.
The Bonneville stations and their cities:
Los Angeles
• KSWD 100.3 FM
Chicago
• WDRV 97.1 FM & WWDV 96.9 FM
• WILV 100.3 FM
• WTMX 101.9 FM
Washington, D.C.
• WFED 1050 AM
• WTOP 103.5 FM & 103.9 FM
• WWWT 107.7 FM & 1500 AM
Seattle
• KIRO News Talk 710 AM & 97.3 FM
• KTTH 770 The Truth
Phoenix
• KPKX 98.7 FM
• KTAR 620 AM
• KTAR 92.3 FM
St. Louis
• WARH 106.5 FM
• WIL 92.3 FM
• WMVN 101.1 FM
Cincinnati
• WKRQ 101.9 FM
• WSWD 97.3 FM
• WUBE 105.1 FM
• WYGY 94.9 FM
Salt Lake City
• Bonneville Communications
• Bonneville Satellite
• KRSP 103.5 FM
• KSFI 100.3 FM
• KSL 102.7 FM & 1160 AM
• KSL 5 Television
• KUTR AM 820