Nexstar Media Group Names Cathy Gunther as Vice President and General Manager of Its Broadcasting and Digital Operations in Sacramento, California
Media Executive with 20+ Years of Broadcast Television Experience Will Oversee KTXL-TV and FOX40.com
Nexstar Media Group, Inc. (NASDAQ:NXST), today announced the appointment of Cathy Gunther as Vice President and General Manager of its broadcasting and digital operations in Sacramento, CA (DMA #20), including KTXL-TV (FOX), FOX40.com, and their related digital and social media channels. Ms. Gunther will begin her duties immediately and report to Matthew Rosenfeld, Senior Vice President and Regional Manager for Nexstar's broadcasting division.
Ms. Gunther brings more than twenty years of broadcast management, programming, research, and sales experience to her new role. Throughout her career, she has consistently grown revenue and profitability by identifying and cultivating accretive, non-traditional revenue through a variety of innovative cross-platform marketing initiatives and sponsorship opportunities. Through her leadership, Ms. Gunther has successfully demonstrated the importance of creating unique and innovative strategies for advertising and marketing clients, as well as connecting local businesses with non-profit organizations to achieve mutual outreach and local service goals.
Ms. Gunther most recently served as Vice President and General Manager of KOKI-TV (FOX) and KMYT-TV (My) in Tulsa, OK (DMA #58), where she was responsible for the long-term strategy and day-to-day management of both television stations. During her tenure, Ms. Gunther made critical changes in leadership, direction, and on-air content, resulting in immediate ratings growth and making KOKI the most watched local news station in the Tulsa market as of July 2023. Under her leadership, Ms. Gunther expanded local news and significantly grew the revenue share of both stations. Ms. Gunther also increased viewer and advertiser engagement by expanding local sports programming with the creation of "Ford Kick Off to Win NCAA Sweepstakes," and the development of a locally produced college football program, "Countdown to Kickoff." Ms. Gunther joined KOKI/KMYT in 2014 as Director of Sales for both stations, rising to become Vice President and General Manager in 2017.
From 2011 to 2014, Ms. Gunther served as Local Sales Manager and New Business Development Manager at KTVU-TV (FOX) in San Francisco, CA (DMA #8). Under her leadership, the station achieved record growth in revenue share by developing new sales initiatives to meet the marketing needs of local, regional and national advertisers. Prior to her tenure with KTVU-TV, Ms. Gunther held a variety of sales leadership positions of increasing responsibility in television markets in California and Colorado.
"Cathy is an exceptional broadcast and sales executive and has delivered impressive results wherever she has worked for more than 20 years," said Mr. Rosenfeld. "I am confident that her vast sales expertise, proven broadcast and digital leadership and commitment to localism will be of great benefit to our Sacramento operations, elevate FOX40's revenue and ratings, and strengthen Nexstar's overall footprint across the west coast."
Commenting on her appointment, Ms. Gunther said, "I'm thrilled to be joining Nexstar's team in Sacramento and grateful for this opportunity. Nexstar has a deep commitment to local content and to serving its viewers, advertisers, and the communities in which it is located, and I couldn't be more proud to join the FOX40 team. I am confident that my combination of experience, skills and passion for delivering results will be valuable as we chart future success for the station's broadcast and digital operations."
Ms. Gunther is an active participant in media industry-related organizations, serving for many years as a member of the board of the Oklahoma Broadcasters Association and participating in the National Association of Broadcasters State Leadership Conference. She also has been very involved in the communities in which she has worked and lived, serving on the Tulsa Regional Chamber of Commerce Board of Advisors for the past five years and supporting chambers of commerce in San Francisco, Silicon Valley, Salinas, Monterey, San Luis Obispo, Santa Maria and Santa Barbara while working in those communities.
Ms. Gunther attended the Graduate School of Banking at Colorado University/Boulder and majored in finance. She and her husband, Curt, have been together for over 25 years. They will be immediately relocating to the Sacramento area, which is a bit of a homecoming for Ms. Gunther—she was born in southern California and lived in Sacramento for several years.
About Nexstar Media Group, Inc.
Nexstar Media Group, Inc. (NASDAQ:NXST) is a leading diversified media company that produces and distributes engaging local and national news, sports and entertainment content across television, streaming and digital platforms, including more than 300,000 hours of news, sports, and entertainment programming each year. Nexstar owns America's largest local broadcasting group comprised of top network affiliates, with 200 owned or partner stations in 116 U.S. markets reaching 212 million people. Nexstar's national television properties include The CW, America's fifth major broadcast network, NewsNation, America's fastest-growing national news and entertainment cable network reaching 70 million television homes, popular entertainment multicast networks Antenna TV and Rewind TV, and a 31.3% ownership stake in TV Food Network. The Company's portfolio of digital assets, including The Hill and BestReviews, are collectively a Top 10 U.S. digital news and information property. In addition to delivering exceptional content and service to our communities, Nexstar provides premium multiplatform and video-on-demand advertising opportunities at scale for businesses and brands seeking to leverage the strong consumer engagement of our compelling content offering. For more information, please visit nexstar.tv.
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