NPR spurns $500,000 in underwriting from liquor industry

Originally published in Current, Dec. 4, 1995

By Deborah Uebe

The NPR Board of Directors voted Nov. 30 to give up roughly $500,000 worth of underwriting contributions from distilled spirits manufacturers.

And it voted to liberalize underwriting rules to allow use of some corporate slogans in on-air credits.

The decisions came after a lively discussion about public radio's image and potential conflicts between the underwriting policies of NPR and its member stations.

NPR Vice President for Development Barbara Hall asked the board to consider national underwriting offers from two distilled spirits manufacturers, which she did not name. One firm already is an underwriter for a station in the South. Although the board predicted that state laws could prohibit such messages thus frustrate the deal, the main arguments on both sides focussed on the propriety of carrying such underwriting messages.

President Delano Lewis opposed the liquor underwriting on the grounds that it conflicts with NPR's responsibility to society. He also has qualms about the network's practice of accepting underwriting from breweries and wineries.

However, the underwriting offers did find some support on the board. Jack Mitchell of Wisconsin Public Radio urged NPR to follow the lead of its member stations, many of whom accept offers from controversial underwriters but place limits on their messages.

In fact, NPR itself already accepts underwriting from one spirits company, Hennessy Cognac, which backs a New Year's Eve jazz special. But that underwriting relationship ''was never intended to set a precedent,'' Hall told the board. Rather, NPR has kept a policy consistent with the commercial broadcasting industry's voluntary ban on liquor ads.

The notion that NPR would assist advertisers that are locked out of commercial radio and TV was troubling to many on the board. Kim Hodgson of WAMU-FM, Washington, criticized the offers as being merely a way for liquor companies to capitalize on an ''artificial distinction between underwriting and advertising to get around an industrywide practice.''

But board member Lamar Marchese chided colleagues for getting ''cold feet'' instead of living up to their entrepreneurial intentions.

The board also relaxed NPR's traditional ban on slogans and calls to action in underwriting announcements. The change will bring NPR in line with FCC regs, Hall said. It will allow NPR to air a few slogans that have become company identifiers, such as ''Just do it,'' ''Don't leave home without it,'' and ''Fly the friendly skies.''

 

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