I’ve finally become a cable-cutter. That’s right, all my television programming either comes through the air or over the internet.
It’s only been about 50 years of relying on cable or more recently satellite dish programming. It feels good but it still isn’t free.
Growing up we only got two TV channels around these parts and one of them was pretty fuzzy unless you had a great antenna. We could get CBS out of Amarillo really clear. I believe they had repeater equipment in Clovis and even tagged it as a Clovis channel for a while.
The NBC channel coming out of Roswell wasn’t nearly as clear. You either had to have a way to rotate the antenna or have a really tall tower or you were going to get lots of static and snow.
That meant we got real comfortable with Dan True giving us our weather forecast from Amarillo. That makes it tough to see him gain his heavenly wings earlier this month.
After we moved to town television changed fast and furiously. First off the house we moved into had a huge tower for the TV antenna. About that same time KENW was getting its act together and our options had doubled and the quality was better and soon in color thanks to a color console set that weighed about 400 pounds.
Cable was available too but we didn’t get it right away.
But before I was in junior high we were living in the 20th Century like other city folks.
The choices available today, including the ability to watch a whole season of your favorite show in one weekend all in high definition or even 4K technology, boggles my mind. For my wife, who actually sold televisions in her family business, it’s magic. She hasn’t quite wrapped her mind around whether a program is live, on demand or whatever.
The last company we had satellite service with still hasn’t stopped trying to up-sell my service. They somehow can’t look my file up and see that I really did drop them. I’m so happy to get off the merry-go-round of services that would lure you in with great deals and free add-ons to attract you as a new customer then treat you like dirt as soon as the promotional period ended.
Everything I’ve ever learned all my life in business said it cost companies lots of money to get new customers and it was much more cost efficient and better business to hang on to your existing customers with good customer service.
Unfortunately that ship has sailed for a lot of the world we live in today. The only place you’ll find anything that resembles good customer service is in your hometown with people you know
Karl Terry writes for Clovis Media Inc. Contact him at: