The Public Radio Development and Marketing Conference brings together more than 600 professionals from hundreds of public radio stations. Participants come from the most scarcely populated rural areas of Alaska to the most densely populated metropolitan areas of New York and Los Angeles. Some participants are new to public radio and to their responsibilities at their station, while others have years of experience in the same position at the same station.
Many participants work in a station with fewer than ten full-time staff.
Others work at stations with fifty or even 150 employees and are part of a department of fifteen to forty people. Station formats and missions vary as well. The Development Exchange, Inc. DEI is the only national organization offering comprehensive development and marketing expertise to public radio stations. DEI's 190 member licensees represent more than 250 public radio stations in major, mid-sized, and small markets, on the coasts and in Middle America.