BY LARRY NAGER
The Cincinnati Enquirer
The biggest, hungriest conglomerate in the national entertainment jungle is about to consume Cincinnati's top concert promoter, according to published reports.
The Nederlander Organization, parent of Nederlander of Ohio, which manages Riverbend, the Taft Theatre and Bogart's and co-owns the Crown, is in negotiations with SFX, the multibillion dollar, New York-based entertainment conglomerate run by Robert F.X. Sillerman, according to the Los Angeles Times.
For the past couple of years, SFX has been buying up regional concert promotion companies, including Sunshine in Indianapolis and the daddy of them all, San Francisco's Bill Graham Presents. But consumers probably won't notice much of a difference if SFX does enter the local market.
"The effect of SFX on the concert business here has been negligible," says Marc Allan, who was pop music reporter at the Indianapolis Star when SFX purchased Sunshine in March 1997. "They continued to book the same number of shows this summer at Deer Creek, and they brought in the same kinds of acts. If you didn't know that SFX had bought Sunshine, you wouldn't have known anything was different." SFX reportedly is interested in Nederlander, one of the last of the independent, family-owned concert production companies, not because of its Cincinnati holdings, but because the Nederlanders own and control much of New York's Broadway theater district.
But the Nederlander purchase also would give SFX control of Nederlander of Ohio, its Crown holdings and its contracts with Riverbend, the Taft and Bogart's. The result would be virtual control of the Tristate's amphitheater and arena concert industry. SFX also controls Polaris near Columbus.
Mike Smith, head of Nederlander's Ohio operation, discounts buy-out rumors. "I don't think there's anything to all this, other than SFX has been buying up promoters all over the country and we're one of the ones that they haven't bought," he says.
However, should such a purchase take place, he says, "I don't see anything changing. Structurally, all the promoters that they've bought have continued to work for them. In every case across the country nothing's changed, the structure has remained identical." One potential change could mean an increase in arena and amphitheater shows. Along with purchasing promoters and facilities, SFX has been buying up entire tours to fill its new facilities at lower costs. Additional revenues are being raised through aggressive pursuit of corporate sponsorships.
But that cost-cutting probably won't mean lower ticket prices, given the huge sums SFX has been paying for its new companies. In December, the company announced $240 million in new acquisitions, including $65 million for Bill Graham Presents.
An attempted Nederlander purchase may be delayed by the Justice Department, which is conducting an antitrust review of SFX.
