B+C Station Awards 2023: Kyle Grimes Sets Up WCVB Boston for the Long Run

The Boston Marathon had aired on Boston rival WBZ for 17 years, but that changed this year, as market leader WCVB secured the rights in a joint bid with ESPN. The 127th Boston Marathon happened in April, and WCVB was all in. Coverage went from 4 a.m. until 8 p.m. that day, and it was also carried on other Hearst TV stations around New England as well as ESPN itself. WCVB followed not just the elite racers, but the many more who were running the fabled event for the first time — the runners who viewers would probably find more relatable. 

Securing marathon rights meant a lot more than one day of frenzied coverage. Year-round news segments such as “Better by the Mile” focus on health and wellness, and WCVB president and general manager Kyle Grimes (B+C’s pick for GM of the Year in markets 1-25) credits news director Margaret Cronan for keeping the marathon relevant all year round. 

“If we do this, it has to be about more than a single day,” Grimes said. “It has to be a year-round commitment.”

Planning is underway for the 2024 event. 

Sharing marathon content with Hearst TV sister stations in the region went smoothly, thanks in part to Grimes getting corporate oversight of WMUR Manchester, New Hampshire; WPTZ-WNNE Burlington (Vermont)-Plattsburgh (New York); and WMTW-WPXT Portland, Maine; which began in July. While sharing is easier, Grimes said each station is encouraged to do what’s best for local viewers. “I have a lot of respect for that which makes all those markets different,” he said. 

Grimes took over at WCVB in 2020, after stints as GM at WPTZ-WNNE and at WGAL Lancaster, Pennsylvania, following a run as news director of WPBF West Palm Beach, Florida. When he started in Boston, he aimed to sit with every WCVB staffer and hear from them about their job and their view of the station. The pandemic made meetings difficult, but he forged ahead and did them all — around 225, all told — from July to November that year. Some took place outside and some via video. But they all happened, and Grimes came away with a clear view of what made WCVB stand out. 

“My single largest takeaway was that I had not worked at a place where, to a person, everybody cared as much about the station and well-being of the station as they care about it here,” Grimes said. 

Forward-Looking Leader

Michael Hayes, Hearst senior VP and Hearst Television president, said the Boston GM has a knack for not only reading the market today, but sussing out what tomorrow looks like as well. “Kyle possesses the ability to operate in today’s immediacy of the broadcast business, but also the ability to look up and see down the road,” he said. “He’s very good at taking today’s problem and seeing how that impacts the station in tomorrow’s landscape.”

Grimes’s promotion to a VP role with oversight of multiple markets has led to what Hayes called “measurable results in terms of content and revenue.”

With an eye on keeping WCVB entrenched in the top spot in Boston, Grimes and his department heads continue to innovate. A new fact-checking partnership between WCVB, WMUR, ABC News and PolitiFact ensures viewers get fact-based information on electoral candidates. Longtime chief meteorologist Harvey Leonard stepped down last year, and Cindy Fitzgibbon, who grew up in Maine and had spent a decade at WCVB, took over the position. She’s also the principal meteorologist for WCVB’s Forecasting Our Future specials, a group-wide initiative focused on weather and climate. 

The WCVB investigative team will tally more than 150 reports this year, including a recent one on the incarceration of mentally ill individuals. The I-team obtained hours of video and hundreds of pages of documents that revealed how violent matters can get for the officers trying to handle the inmates. 

WCVB got regional Emmy Awards in 10 categories this year and helped raise more than $37 million for charities through station-sponsored events.  

Every station in America is facing serious challenges from Netflix, Hulu and other streamers for users’ attention, but Grimes noted that digital players are not producing much local content. “We are committed to serving the community
in a way that very few others do,” he said. “I don’t know that you need to find much more motivation than the responsibility of serving your community.”