EyeOpener

**EyeOpener** is a daily American syndicated morning news program produced by the Dorado Media Group, which debuted on August 7, 2017. It first expanded to weekends with the debut of a Saturday edition on November 18, 2017. The Saturday edition was on hiatus in 2019; weekend editions returned on both Saturdays and Sundays on September 4, 2021. The weekday program airs from 7:00 a.m. to 9:00 a.m. in all-time in the United States. The Saturday and Sunday editions are an hour long and are transmitted to stations live at 7:00 a.m. Eastern Time, although stations in some media markets air them at different times.

The program utilizes a local/national hybrid format billed as a "provocative and unpredictable" combination of general and political news, health, entertainment, technology, and opinion segments, mixed with humor and variety elements; stations carrying the program are given the option to provide news, weather and traffic inserts focusing on their local market each half-hour. The primary anchors are Azeneth Linville, Gavin Belmont, and Jordan Campo with weather anchor Tamsin Aguado.

## History

### 2011: The inaugural year (first incarnation)

The idea for the program was conceived by Tribune Company chief innovation officer Lee Abrams (who resigned in October 2010). In the spring of 2011, Tribune Broadcasting developed a concept for a morning news program intended for stations owned by the company that did not maintain existing news departments. The program, which was given the title EyeOpener, would incorporate a local/national format (with the intent to syndicate the program to other markets) similar to that of morning news programs on the major broadcast television networks, with three-minute-long national segments conducted in a more free-form style. Steve Charlier, senior vice president of news at Tribune Broadcasting, described the program as a platform in which "comedy meets national news," designed to distinguish itself and stations carrying the program by offering a morning show that stands out from its traditionally formatted competitors.

The program debuted as a test run on May 9, 2011, on Tribune-owned CW affiliate KHTV in Houston, Texas – which maintained a news department, but only carried twice-daily evening newscasts – replacing syndicated programs and infomercials in the two-hour timeslot (from 6:00 to 8:00 a.m.); the program's national segments – originally hosted by Kirby O'Connell, Sean Dowling, and Adam Lee Campbell – were initially produced in studio facilities at the Tribune Tower in Chicago, which also serves as the corporate headquarters for the Tribune Company. The program was originally hosted by Kirby O’Connell, Sean Dowling (who served as a news anchor), and Adam Lee Campbell (who handled consumer, technology, and pop culture-related reports), with the hosts appearing in more casual attire. In addition to news, health, and parenting advice segments, the program initially also featured more irreverent and humorous features including a how-to segment conducted by a "hunky handyman" character named "Wrench," a commentary segment by Roger Lodge, and a social media segment by "Monsignor Jebediah O'Flaherty," a character used as part of a segment lampooning celebrity tweets.

On October 31, 2011, production of the program's national segments was relocated to the studios of Tribune's Dallas CW affiliate, KMEC; the program largely overhauled its hosting staff with the relocation, with co-hosts Ellen Fox and Douglas Caballero, and sole holdover Dowling. The program concurrently began airing on KMEC and was also syndicated to fellow Tribune station, MyNetworkTV affiliate WPCA-TV in Philadelphia, later expanding to two of their sister stations – CW affiliates KUTF in Portland and WDZL in Miami (all three of which, unlike KMEC and KHTV, did not produce their own news programming) on January 2, 2012. These stations were chosen by Tribune for the initial national rollout of Eye Opener as they, as Charlier noted, "need to be growth markets" that also have a population skewing toward the program's 18-49 target audience, with plans to eventually syndicate the program to stations not owned by Tribune Broadcasting. By July 2012, in the Dallas, Philadelphia, and Houston markets, Eye Opener saw an increase in viewers in the 25-54 demographic year-to-year in the program's scheduled time periods, whereas viewership in that demographic declined in Miami and Portland.

In September 2012, EyeOpener began airing on MyNetworkTV affiliate KPBI in Fort Smith, Arkansas, and WAYF in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina. Eye Opener expanded to weekends on September 20, 2014, with the premiere of an hour-long edition of Saturday and Sunday mornings on KHTV and KMEC.

### Replacement by Morning Dose

On June 15, 2017, Tribune Broadcasting announced the launch of Morning Dose, a two-hour social media-focused morning show produced in partnership with Chicago-based digital content branding agency Dose, which will replace Eye Opener on the five Tribune stations carrying the latter program (KMEC, KHTV, WGSP, KUTF, and WPCA), along with the group's Miami CW affiliate, WDZL, on June 29. Hosted by Melissa Rycroft and Gary Striewski, with news segments anchored by Laila Muhammad (along with Hillary Kennedy, the only announced holdovers from Eye Opener), the program featured a mix of news stories selected by Dose through its social storytelling and scientific trend methodology to "[showcase] the content and advancing the stories that will drive the day’s social conversation. On September 6, 2018, Tribune announced that Morning Dose would be canceled effective October 19.

### Development and revival

A year after its cancellation, the Dorado Media Group announced it would launch "a headline news service" that would air weekday mornings (7:00 AM - 9:00 AM local time) and rely on news-gathering services as well as original content. The program was originally designed to air on Dorado’s local stations, however, the company instead tapped into national expansion giving the program a much wider availability.

EyeOpener would return to the air on August 6, 2018. As with the original version of the show, it includes a local/national hybrid format billed as a "provocative and unpredictable" combination of general and political news, health, entertainment, technology, and opinion segments, mixed with humor and variety elements; stations carrying the program are given the option to provide news, weather and traffic inserts focusing on their local market each half-hour.

## Distribution

On July 2, 2018, the Dorado Media Group ordered a test run of the show for the group's CW and MyNetworkTV-affiliated stations along with Fox-affiliated stations that do not have their own local morning news shows as a six-week trial run. Rather than airing on stations affiliated with the Big 3 broadcast networks (ABC, CBS, NBC), which rely on their own newscasts and that of those networks, EyeOpener was offered and sold to various larger- or-middle-sized markets affiliated with Fox, MyNetworkTV, The CW, or independents.

After the test run concluded, Golden Media Distribution picked up the program for a full nationwide launch, and through the additional station group pickups gained carriage on stations covering more than 95% of the country including all of the 20 largest media markets and 45 of the top 50 markets. Though many stations that aired EyeOpener showed the full 2-hour broadcast live-to-air during the 7 a.m.-9 a.m. (ET) time slot, a few stations carried only one hour of the program, while others tape-delayed all or part of the show for a mid- or late-morning airing.

## Stations that air EyeOpener

*Stations are listed alphabetically by call sign.*