''First Business'' (full name First Business News) is a nationally syndicated financial news and analysis television program, produced by First Business Network LLC, a

subsidiary A subsidiary, subsidiary company, or daughter company is a company (law), company completely or partially owned or controlled by another company, called the parent company or holding company, which has legal and financial control over the subsidia ...

Weigel Broadcasting Weigel Broadcasting Co. is an American television broadcasting company based in Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, alongside its flagship station WCIU-TV (Channel 26), at 26 North Halsted Street in the Greektown, Chicago, Greektown neighborhood. It cur ...

, in

Chicago Chicago is the List of municipalities in Illinois, most populous city in the U.S. state of Illinois and in the Midwestern United States. With a population of 2,746,388, as of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, it is the List of Unite ...

. Anchor Angela Miles, reporters Chuck Coppola and Bill Moller, and executive producer Harvey Moshman brought viewers commentary from the floors of the

Chicago Mercantile Exchange The Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME) (often called "the Chicago Merc", or "the Merc") is an American derivatives marketplace based in Chicago and located at 20 S. Wacker Drive. The CME was founded in 1898 as the Chicago Butter and Egg Board ...

and the

Chicago Board Options Exchange Cboe Global Markets, Inc. is an American company that owns the Chicago Board Options Exchange and the stock exchange operator BATS Global Markets. History Founded by the Chicago Board of Trade in 1973 and member-owned for several decades, the ...

, as well as from their studios in the

West Loop The Near West Side, one of the 77 community areas of Chicago, is on the West Side, west of the Chicago River and adjacent to the Loop. The Great Chicago Fire of 1871 started on the Near West Side. Waves of immigration shaped the history of t ...

. The program, which typically aired before local and national morning news timeslots, had been marginalized as those shows began to start earlier (as early as 4:00 a.m.), with ''First Business'' often moved to lower-rated and lower-viewed

graveyard slot A graveyard slot (or death slot) is a time period in which a television audience is very small compared to other times of the day, and therefore broadcast programming is considered far less important. Graveyard slots are usually situated in the ea ...

s. The program's cancellation ended 47 years of Weigel Broadcasting and their flagship station

WCIU-TV WCIU-TV (channel 26) is an independent television station in Chicago, Illinois, United States. It is the flagship television property of locally based Weigel Broadcasting, which has owned the station since its inception, and is sister to two ...

(channel 26) carrying and originating business-focused programming from Chicago.

Syndication

As of the fall 2011 season, the program was carried daily on more than 100 US broadcast stations and in outlets across 46 foreign countries, with affiliates across all the major networks, as well as independent stations. Air times varied, though the timeslots for the show in the majority of markets was 4:00am through 7:00am leading into early morning national newscasts or local morning newscasts. The only requirement the show enforced was that the program must air before the

NYSE The New York Stock Exchange (NYSE, nicknamed "The Big Board") is an American stock exchange in the Financial District, Manhattan, Financial District of Lower Manhattan in New York City. It is the List of stock exchanges, largest stock excha ...

opening bell at 9:30am ET (except for Alaska or Hawaii, where time zones necessitated a post-opening bell airing). The show was syndicated by Weigel Broadcasting and sold by Edward. E. Finch & Company.

History

The ''First Business'' program was originally launched in 1989 by BizNet, the broadcast division of the

United States Chamber of Commerce The United States Chamber of Commerce (USCC) is a business association advocacy group and is the largest lobbying group in the United States. The group was founded in April 1912 out of local chambers of commerce at the urging of President Will ...

Washington, D.C. Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly known as Washington or D.C., is the capital city and federal district of the United States. The city is on the Potomac River, across from Virginia, and shares land borders with ...

From its inception through its BizNet years with the Chamber, the First Business program production team was led by BizNet News Director Densil Allen. The production of First Business was later taken over from BizNet by CONUS Communications, a joint venture of Viacom and

Hubbard Broadcasting Hubbard Broadcasting, Inc. is an American television and radio broadcasting corporation based in St. Paul, Minnesota. It was founded by Stanley E. Hubbard. The corporation has broadcast outlets scattered across Minnesota, Wisconsin, Missouri ...

also responsible for All News Channel, who would produce the program until 2003. Barton Eckert hosted the program from CONUS' bureau in Washington, with his anchor segments being fed via satellite to Hubbard in

St. Paul, Minnesota Saint Paul (often abbreviated St. Paul) is the capital city of the U.S. state of Minnesota and the county seat of Ramsey County. As of the 2020 census, the city had a population of 311,527, making it Minnesota's second-most populous city a ...

, where news packages acquired from CONUS' local member stations nationwide and other sources would be inserted into the program along with Eckert's anchor segments fed in from Washington, with the finished program being delivered via satellite to local stations from St. Paul very weekday. During this era, the program also aired weekday mornings at 6:30 AM on the

USA Network USA Network (or simply USA) is an American basic cable television channel owned by the NBCUniversal Media Group division of Comcast's NBCUniversal. It was launched in 1977 as Madison Square Garden Sports Network, one of the first national sports ...

; at the time CONUS produced short ''USA Update'' news briefs for the network. In 2003,

took over the program and moved the show to Chicago. With the loss of affiliates for the show as stations began to expand local morning news and force it into a

, Weigel decided to shut down the program. Its last edition was produced before the Christmas break, on December 22, 2014. Former host Angela Miles now hosts and produces the identically formatted ''Business First AM'', which airs in a similar time slot and shares many of its same Chicago-based contributors.

Notable former on-air staff

CNN Cable News Network (CNN) is a multinational news organization operating, most notably, a website and a TV channel headquartered in Atlanta. Founded in 1980 by American media proprietor Ted Turner and Reese Schonfeld as a 24-hour cable ne ...

** Nicole Lapin ** Stephanie Elam ** Claire Leka

References

External links