In the 37 years since he moved to Maui, Chuck Bergson, president, CEO and director of Pacific Media Group, says the Hawai‘i media company has grown from "a little, one-radio station you can only really hear in West Maui" to 21 stations across the Islands and a handful of other mediums and platforms.
Its evolution continues with the recent launch of CULTURE by Pacific Media Group, a new network that offers podcasts, social media shorts, YouTube shows and local documentaries, bringing new media platforms together with legacy media.
Radio has always been the core of the business, Bergson told Aloha State Daily during a recent interview at the company's Downtown Honolulu offices.
"But we saw early on that the world was changing, the media landscape is changing, so you have to change with it. You've got to evolve," he says.
Today, Bergson says PMG has four radio stations in Honolulu, six on Maui, five on Kaua‘i and six on Hawai‘i Island — including three in Hilo and three in Kona; offers the digital news sites Maui Now, Big Island Now and Kaua‘i Now, and advertising at most of Hawai‘i's airports; bought the Maui Visitor Channel and Scenic Hawai‘i; and also publishes visitor guidebooks for the state as well as Maui, Hawai‘i Island, Kaua‘i and O‘ahu.
Bergson compares the newest evolution to a rainbow: at the beginning, he says, are "these wonderful legacy media platforms, and as the world changes and you start to go over the rainbow, you get to the top of the rainbow, and that's where we're now looking to modernize and evolve into this new media environment and ecosystem."
And when you bring legacy media together with new media, "then you have something really special. That's the pot of gold at the end. So that's where we are today."
"There was a great opportunity because it's all kind of happening all around Hawai‘i in little spurts," Josh Duhaylonsod, head of creative content for PMG, told ASD. "You've got podcasts, which I've been a part of, ... and you've got social media, and you've got all of these influencers. It's kind of all there, but no one has really put them together in a space and led from the front. When Chuck started talking about maybe this project we could do, the idea was that there's over 30 years of experience and strength in media through Pacific Media Group. What better way than to do this new project with that grounding?"
As the tagline of its website notes, CULTURE offers content that "moves Hawai‘i forward." And Duhaylonsod says it all starts with Hawai‘i itself.
"Pacific Media Group has always been about Hawai‘i. It's a company from Hawai‘i for Hawai‘i," he says. "There's no one from the Mainland calling the shots. It's Chuck from Maui. The staff here is from here. That was very interesting, where it was like 'Hey, we're here working to present to the world the stories of Hawai‘i and so the idea was [to] create content that we could produce at a high level, we could then distribute it on YouTube, all the podcasts on all platforms, and then we could create content."
Duhaylonsod says the radio used to be the center of communication.
"It told you what was cool, who's the new artist, where's the new concert or event, and since technology has progressed, a lot of that has been dispersed, so why not have the radio stations bring that all together?"
There are three original podcasts made for the CULTURE network: Santo Loco, Sugar Caddy and TRXTR. Original podcasts are "podcasts of people, content that we believe in," Duhaylonsod says, noting that PMG does the full production. There are two affiliate podcasts as well, which are partner shows carried by CULTURE: Mike Kai Podcast and Headliners Hawai‘i.
"With those five podcasts that we've started on, we feel we have a good base," Duhaylonsod says. "... There's something for everyone, whether it's entertainment or its mindset, business, golf, sports, whatever it is, we feel like these five wrap a lot of that together and I'm sure we're looking to grow that shortly, as well."
One of the new YouTube shows is "Listening Party," which he compared to a "more artistic" version of NPR's Tiny Desk concerts.
"Back to that [idea of] breaking new artists and helping artists get their music out, we do the full production of a live, invite-only event, and the artist plays their music, and as they're playing, they're explaining the thoughts and theories behind it," Duhaylonsod explains. "They bring up other songwriters, producers, engineers, and they can stop, restart, they can say, 'Hey, this is what it used to sound like.' It's really the craft behind the music so people get to know them well."
The debut episode featuring singer-songwriter IZIK can be found here.
Another is Behind the Scenes: On Tour, which will take viewers behind the scenes of local artists on tour. Featured first will be a look at tour life with Johnny Suite and the Green.
"These are everyday local guys that's going to be at Red Rock and they're going to be in Vegas and they're going to be in Washington, and what does it look like to sell out 10,000 people, because these bands are doing that," Duhaylonsod says. "How does that feel? And it should ignite that next generation to go, 'We can do that. We're from right here.' I think that's another testament to what Pacific Media Group is doing here. When you see our content, you should be inspired and you should want to go and be bigger than yourself, and that's what CULTURE is."
Duhaylonsod says the initiative is unique in that it bridges the gap between radio and "what's happening now." The radio's distribution size can also be leveraged to promote the local acts.
"If you just do your own podcast, it's you, your mom and all your family and a couple of friends," he says. "[If] you're doing a podcast with us, it's a massive network behind you."
"Really, what we're trying to do across the board is elevate people — elevate the artists, elevate the podcasters," Bergson says. "There's a lot of talented people that can create things and where the void tends to be in a lot of cases is distribution. How do you get distribution? How do you get it seen? How do you get it heard? So we're trying to do these things with the idea of elevating people. Let's bring them up, bring them along, give them some support, and help that all feed together and complement. With all of us working together to promote things of Hawai‘i through different platforms and different mediums, and talking about different things culturally, to me it's a winning combination. I think not only will the people who live here understand and appreciate it, but the people who love Hawai‘i and value Hawai‘i will enjoy and help us perpetuate this."
Stephanie Salmons can be reached at stephanie@alohastatedaily.com.
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