About Me – Rod Schwartz

I grew up in Chicago. As a kid in grade school, thanks to a dad who thought it a good idea, I had the good fortune to sing in the famed Paulist Choir,  This early exposure to the rudiments of music and strict choral discipline led me to develop a discerning ear—a terrific asset for someone who creates audio advertising for a living.

Chicago was an exciting place to live, with a personal soundtrack provided by some truly remarkable radio stations and personalities, especially WLS and WCFL in their heyday. As as I grew older, I became increasingly attracted to the gentler rhythms and slower pace of smaller communities in rural areas.  From September 1979 until August 2024, the picturesque Palouse region of eastern Washington was my home. Today, I live in the small but growing community of Rathdrum, Idaho.

Professionally, I’m a semi-retired radio advertising professional of more than 50 years’ experience. From 1991 until March 2024, my family and I operated Grace Broadcast Sales, specializing in the creation and syndication of short-form audio features for radio and television stations across the US and Canada.

I’ve had the privilege of contributing to radio industry trade publications including Radio Business Report, Radio World, Radio INK, and Small Market Radio Newsletter, and am the administrator of Radio Sales Café, a key networking site and resource for radio advertising sales professionals.

A student of advertising for all of my professional life, I’m indebted to many masters and mentors: Claude Hopkins, David Ogilvy, Bill Bernbach, Al Ries, Jack Trout, Tony Schwartz, Bernice FitzGibbon, Chris Lytle, Jim Williams, Roy H. Williams, Dan O’Day, and Uncle John’s Bathroom Readers, among others. In 2004, I entered my first advertising competition and came away with the $5000 Radio Mercury Award for best radio-station produced commercial in America for my client Keeney Bros. Music Centers. It remains one of the memorable highlights of my career.

The spoken word is mankind’s primary form of communication.   Print, in whatever form, is just an imitation of human speech. And, as Tony Schwartz famously observed, God’s gift to radio is that humans are born without earlids. Choosing the right words and wielding them effectively to create engaging, memorable, and persuasive radio commercials and campaigns is as exciting a challenge for me today as it was some 50 years ago, when I took on the responsibility of working with my very first radio advertising client.

Today I’m semi-retired—though still doing work for a handful of longtime advertising clients and still providing short-form syndicated audio features to radio stations across the country. As a lifelong student of advertising, I’ve come to realize that regardless of the medium (radio, TV, print, digital, social media posts and videos, etc.), the key to success remains getting the message right. Words are still the essential currency of effective communication, and human speech remains our primary form of interpersonal communication.  As Trout and Ries observed many years ago, we hear what we read.

Feel free to reach out to me by email at rod@rodschwartz.com or on my mobile, 509-592-0148.