Audacy Shuttering Pineapple Street Studios
Numerous news outlets, including Variety, Bloomberg and Podnews.net, are reporting that Audacy is closing podcast production house Pineapple Street Studios. Pineapple Street was acquired by then-Entercom in
2019 for $18 million as the podcast industry was really taking off in terms of listenership. Podnews.net notes, “Audacy shut Cadence13 (a $50mn purchase) in March 2024, and rebranded Podcorn ($22.5mn) as Audacy Creator Lab in April this year.” An Audacy spokesperson says in a statement, “This difficult decision aligns our resources with our core strengths and the most promising growth areas for our podcasting business. We’re sorry to say goodbye to talented colleagues and are grateful for their contributions.”
Effective immediately, nine-year iHeartMedia Sacramento market president Sara McClure transfers within the company to become VP of its Unified Partnerships For California division. Replacing McClure as Sacramento market president is Steve Darnell (see story above). iHeartMedia Unified Partnerships president Michael Preacher states, “I am extremely excited to have Sara join our division. She will be broadening her responsibilities and offering her incredible expertise to leading agency partners throughout California.” McClure looks forward to, as she notes, “advancing my career by joining the Unified Partnership division. This incredible team has unlimited possibilities and I’m excited to bring my scope of marketing and big-idea thinking to our partners.” The Chico State University (California) alum has nearly 30 years of experience as a media executive, including director of sales for Entercom Sacramento, as well as positions at CBS Radio and Sinclair Broadcasting. She will report to United Partnerships EVP Breeanna Malik. Unified Partnerships provides advanced media resources for its ad agency partners.