Radio Executive: Amanda Cupido. ‘Connecting to community’

Amanda Cupido, ‘12, is the director of talk and talent at Corus, leading the radio station, 640 Toronto radio station. That means she oversees the shows on the air, radio promotion, managing the budgets, creating partnerships with local organizations, and occasionally hiring people to work for some of the shows. Amanda Cupido is also an award-winning podcast producer, the Founder of Lead Podcasting, author of Let’s Talk Podcasting: The Essential Guide to Doing it Right, and, a journalism instructor. Reporter Joseph Ryan shadowed her for a day:

Amanda started her day by responding to emails while listening to 640 Toronto. She had to find a replacement for a weekend host who had a family emergency. She was also planning a big launch party for a new beer that was made by640 Toronto and a local Toronto brewery called Great Lakes Brewery.

At this time, I joined Amanda at the station at Corus' offices by the waterfront. The office space is gorgeous, beautiful and modern. The wharf is a cherry on top of the beautiful building in Toronto. We took a tour around the office and the newsrooms and said hello to everyone who worked there.

We went across the street from the office to Great Lakes Brewery, to make some final touches for the big launch party a few days later. 640 Toronto and the brewery were launching a co-branded beer, which has a QR code for people to scan and listen to the podcast by 640 Toronto’s team.

Time to record a promo for a charity, the Canadian Cancer Society, just one of the local organizations and businesses which partners with 640 Toronto. Amanda Says she values partnerships with the community: "What radio is most known for, and one of the strengths of radio, is the connection to the community. It's one of the things that also makes it stand out from podcasts. Radio is local; it's on the ground, we're able to broadcast live from community events, and we're able to connect with listeners. It’s something that we hadn't tapped into as much in the (pandemic) lockdown or even prior to lockdown.

At the lounge to meet with Jason Chapman, the executive producer of 640 Toronto. They reviewed and approved some promos that were going to go to air a few days later. At the lounge, I found the infamous slide at the Corus offices. I also saw one of my childhood heroes, Max, from Max and Ruby.

Lunch.

It was time for an important meeting with the "Fab Four," which consists of Amanda and 640 Toronto's executive producer, Jason Chapman, Patrick Malkin, the operations manager and Briana Carnegie, the news manager. They have an hour-long meeting to discuss the things that need to be managed in terms of programming, what is needed, and what tasks are getting done for the shows. 

Down to the radio newsrooms/studios where Amanda provided the news team with some updates. "I'll try to go down two or three times a day just to pop my head into the studio. Say hello. Make sure everything's okay," says Amanda.

Time for another meeting with the news and talk station program directors and news managers from Corus from across the country.

One last meeting for the day with the marketing team from Corus to help plan for the launch event with Great Lakes Brewery and their co-branded beer. 

At the end of the day, Amanda is back answering emails, keeping track of the newsroom and making sure the shows were running smoothly that evening. 

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.