Chicago TV biz show ending later this month

“Monsters & Money in the Morning,” a Chicago television show that featured Chicago Sun-Times financial columnist Terry Savage and business journalist Mike Hegedus along with two sports commentators, is ending on Aug. 7.

Lewis Lazare of the Sun-Times reports, “WBBM’s new early morning show will be more traditional in format than ‘Monsters’ was, but still different enough to offer an alternative to what is currently available, station sources said. And Channel 2’s new early morning show will start at 4:30 a.m., the start time that is now the new norm in the Chicago market for early newscasts. The fate of the four ‘Monsters’ anchors is unclear, but sources said it’s possible one or more of them will continue to work at the station.

“‘Monsters’ lasted just seven months. It’s ratings were abysmal, about half of the already minuscule numbers WBBM was pulling in the early morning time slot before ‘Monsters’ debuted.

“WBBM general manager Bruno Cohen and news director Jeff Kiernan hoped they could give Chicagoans something different, but most viewers rejected the roundtable format with hosts discussing finance, sports and other news of the day. If nothing else, Cohen and Kiernan may have learned a valuable lesson about how far from the traditional news formats Chicagoans are willing to venture.”

Read more here.