Ex-LI man closes on Radio Group purchase

Jeff Warshaw seems never to slow down. He hop-steps into a small conference room in Farmingdale, slapping his hands together like a man who is always just about to run out of time.

And part of what Warshaw does is sell time: airtime.

The company Warshaw, 48, started in 2004, Connoisseur Media of Westport, Conn., has officially become the owner of the Farmingdale-based Long Island Radio Group, which owns WKJY/ 98.3 FM, WBZO/103.1 FM, WHLI/1100 AM and WIGX/ 94.3 FM.

Last week, Connoisseur closed on a $23-million deal to buy the radio group from Newton, Mass.-based Barnstable Broadcasting, after having first announced the purchase in March.

Warshaw, Connoisseur's chief executive, has radio in his blood. In 1967 his parents and uncle bought WTHE/1520 AM in Mineola, which sells airtime to local and national ministries and religious institutions. His parents, who live in Roslyn, still own the radio station.

Warshaw, a 1982 Roslyn High School grad, bought a radio station in Indiana while he was still at the Wharton School of Business. He has since sold that station but now owns 24 others, including the four on Long Island.

"We were looking to expand our business," said Warshaw, who lives in Connecticut but is a regular visitor to his parents' home. "We heard these [four Island] stations were for sale." The purchase was Connoisseur's largest, and the stations are its biggest.

Long Island radio is a huge market. John Caracciolo, chief executive of Ronkonkoma-based JVC Broadcasting, owner of four Long Island stations, estimates that Island advertisers spend $50 million annually on radio spots, or airtime.

But there is only a handful of radio companies serving the Island -- Connoisseur, JVC, Atlanta-based Cox Media Group and San Antonio, Texas-based Clear Channel Communications Inc., among them.

How to get market share? Warshaw thinks the best way is to continue the formats his four stations now follow, which include programming for Gen-Xers as well as baby boomers. No major changes are planned, he said.

Warshaw smirks when asked whether radio is dying in the Internet age. After every major technological advance -- eight-tracks, CDs, satellite radio and iPods -- radio was declared dead or dying.

Radio, Warshaw said, "is all about being local. It's the original social media."