The Outlet Company was a corporation based in
Providence,
Rhode Island which owned holdings in both retail and broadcasting. The centerpieces of the group was its flagship Providence store (
The Outlet) and
WJAR radio and television, also in Providence.
Retail
The Outlet Company was formed in 1891 when opened brothers Joseph and Leon Samuels opened a department store at 176 Weybosset Street in downtown Providence. Known as
The Outlet, it quickly became a Providence landmark to the point of occupying an entire city block and attracting shoppers from all over southern
New England. For decades, the store remained strong with its sole flagship location and dominated the field of retail in not only Providence, but
Rhode Island as a whole.
With the changing field of retail in the mid-20th Century, the company diversified with opening suburban locations as well as buying some existing stores such as Philadelphia-based Phillipsborn and Bedya, the midwestern Hughes & Hatcher chain, and the Edw. Malley Co. department store chain in New Haven, Connecticut. However, the allure of building a broadcasting empire led Outlet to leave the retail business in November 1980. In 1981, the Outlet Company sold the original downtown retail store (and other stores) to United Department Stores and the flagship Outlet location was shuttered in 1982. The building was destroyed by fire on October 16, 1986.
Broadcasting
As with many northeastern department stores in the 1920s, Outlet entered radio as a means of promoting their products to a wide audience. In 1922, Outlet entered broadcasting with the sign on of
WJAR, which in 1923 became the first
affiliated station of the
NBC "Red" network
In 1949, Outlet entered television broadcasting with the launch of
WJAR-TV on channel 11, moving to channel 10 in 1953.
Along with retail, Outlet saw a mass expansion into broadcasting in the 1960s and beyond. After the sale of the retail divisions, the company went into a failed merger attempt with Columbia Pictures before it was sold in 1983 to members of the Rockefeller family. Three years later, the company was sold again to a combination of Outlet executives and venture capitalists that renamed the company to Outlet Communications and began a complete withdrawal from radio followed by a slimming down of their TV stations. In early 1996, Outlet and its three stations (plus control of two others) were sold to NBC; the name lived on as a licence name of their former stations for a while afterward.
After ten years, all three stations were put up for sale by NBC on January 9, 2006, with Media General buying the stations on April 6, 2006 (the sale was finalized on June 26 2006). This virtually undid the NBC-Outlet merger of a decade earlier.
Radio stations owned
| Station
| Frequency
| City
| Owned
| Current Owners | Notes |
| KIQQ
| 100.3 MHz
| Los Angeles, California
| 1977-86
| Radio One
| Now KKBT |
| WDBO(AM)
| 580 kHz
| Orlando, Florida
| 1963-82
| Cox Radio
|
|
| WDBO-FM
| 92.3 MHz
| Orlando, Florida
| 1963-82
| Cox Radio
| Now WWKA |
| WJAR(AM)
| 920 kHz
| Providence, Rhode Island
| 1922-80
| Clear Channel
| Original station, now WHJJ |
| WJAR-FM
| 95.5 MHz
| Providence, Rhode Island
| 1950s
| Brown University
| Donated to Brown, now WBRU |
| WSNE
| 93.3 MHz
| Taunton, Massachusetts (Providence)
| 1970s-86
| Clear Channel
|
|
| WIOQ
| 102.1 MHz
| Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
| 1979-89
| Clear Channel
|
|
| WQRS
| 105.1 MHz
| Detroit, Michigan
| 1960s-86
| Greater Media
| Now WMGC-FM |
| WTOP(AM)
| 1500 kHz
| Washington, DC
| 1978-86
| Bonneville International
| Original WTOP format moved to 103.5 FM (formerly WGMS) in 2006; 1500 became WTWP, then in 2007 became WWWT. |
| WMMJ
| 102.3 MHz
| Bethesda, Maryland (Washington)
| 1983-86
| Radio One
| Was home to the original WHFS |
Television stations owned
| Station
| Channel
| City
| Owned
| Affiliation
| Current Owners
| Notes |
| WCMH
| 4
| Columbus, Ohio
| 1976-96
| NBC
| Media General
| Owned by Crosley Broadcasting Corporation (Avco) from 1949-1976; Was an NBC O&O 1996-2006 |
| WDBO-TV/WCPX
| 6
| Orlando, Florida
| 1963-87
| CBS
| Post-Newsweek
| Calls changed in 1982 with failed merger; now WKMG-TV |
| WNYS/WIXT
| 9
| Syracuse, New York
| 1962-78
| ABC
| Newport Television
| Now WSYR-TV |
| WJAR
| 10
| Providence, Rhode Island
| 1948-96
| NBC; ABC (secondary)
| Media General
| Flagship station, was an NBC O&O 1996-2006 |
| KSAT-TV
| 12
| San Antonio, Texas
| 1974-86
| ABC
| Post-Newsweek Stations
| |
| KOVR
| 13
| Sacramento, California
| 1978-86
| ABC
| CBS O&O
| Swapped affiliations with KXTV in 1995 |
| WNCN-TV
| 17
| Goldsboro/Raleigh/Durham, North Carolina
| 1993-96
| Independent, WB, NBC
| Media General
| Was WYED-TV until 1995; was an NBC O&O 1996-2006 |
| WATL
| 36
| Atlanta, Georgia
| 1985-89
| Independent, then Fox, WB now MyNetworkTV
| Gannett
| |
| WXIN
| 59
| Indianapolis, Indiana
| 1984-89
| Independent, then Fox
| Tribune
| Was WPDS-TV for first few months of Outlet ownership |
Fant Broadcasting
In 1994, Outlet bought a minority share into the startup company
Fant Broadcasting, which in 1995 signed on two stations in Outlet markets which Outlet operated by
local marketing agreements. Both of these stations were joint
WB/
UPN affiliates (primarily the former) under Outlet control.
NBC kept involvement with the Fant stations until they orchestrated a three way deal in which Fant sold itself to
Paramount Stations Group and, in return, NBC acquired Paramount's
WVIT in
Hartford, Connecticut in 1997. Both stations later changed their primary affiliation to UPN, retaining the WB network as a secondary affiliation. WLWC and WWHO both became affiliates of
The CW Television Network (the merger of UPN and The WB) in the Fall of 2006.
External links
