DISCOVERING
WNY

TWO
SERIES

   Our 8th TV series (after he spent the previous decade from 2007-2017 producing 7 Kids TV series), "Discovering WNY" constituted two versions of the show that were broadcast on four regional WNY networks from 2017-2022.
   The initial version of the show was a travel and history interstitial series broadcast on WNED throughout the entirety of WNY and the Toronto/Southern Ontario region.
   The second version of the show was a small business series that was broadcast on three WNY commercial stations featuring interviews with the owners about the continuous daily issues of running your own small business as well as tours of some of the businesses.
   Due to the economic conditions the pandemic immediately forced on all small local businesses, we had to start focusing solely on the WNED-PBS version of the show and stop producing the small business profile series in March 2020 as most small businesses were fully or partially shut down throughout the reminder of 2020 and any in-person/on-site production simply became difficult to impossible to implement.
   But, like all unforeseen challenges, you have to see the silver lining, adjust your sails and keep heading toward higher ground and in early 2022, we began a new Western, New York-centric series solely devoted to my biggest passion, small towns, with a new series entitled "Small Town WNY".
   Between the WNED-PBS version & the small business version of "Discovering WNY", this was an all-consuming job that literally took 16–20 hour days for a few years and honestly, there were many nights where it took us right through into the next day.
   What you see on the seminal episodes below were really the start of the concept for "Small Town WNY" which, in turn, inevitably led me to the broader concept of "Great Small Towns".
   We hope you enjoy the shows.

WNED
PUBLIC
TELEVISION
WNY History Series

Loading Videos...

A BIT
ABOUT THE
WNED SERIES

   From 2017-2020 I created and released one video per month to WNED-PBS for the WNY and southern Ontario and Toronto markets, hence the 36 episodes you see above. 36 months equals 36 episodes.
    The interstitial (between the shows) episodes above were always an assorted grab-bag of at least, interesting-to-me regionally-based subjects on anything I want to showcase here in WNY and I  truly enjoyed creating each and every one of them and I hope you enjoy watching them! ~A.A.

COMMERCIAL
TELEVISION
Small Business Series

Loading Videos...

A BIT
ABOUT THE
COMMERCIAL
TV SERIES

    If you've already read my "About" page entry, then you would have learned that I come from a longtime, 32 year old family restaurant that was in operation in WNY from 1968-2000.
    It was a great run and it was my family's life through all those years and as you can imagine, small mom & pop shops are in my blood.
    And as I transitioned into this business, it became my goal to allow all small mom & pops the opportunity for as much exposure as I could possibly give them for as little money as I could possibly allow and still keep the lights on.
    In time, I eventually grew my sponsorship account opportunities from not just merely sponsoring my shows with small commercials or call-out cards, but to actually having them become a direct part of it with full half hours showcases of their businesses or even, in some cases, multiple half hours.
    From early 2017-early 2020, just when the pandemic just began to rear it's ugly head and most small businesses had to shut down, I was selling and producing this version of the show single-handedly. I sold and produced over 250 of these programs along with the 350+ small business sponsorship accounts to support it all. Over 150 of these episodes made their way to broadcast. The other episodes were used for businesses online distribution through their websites, social media and or for email promotions etc... .
    It was the most work I have ever done on anything! Period. And that's saying a lot if you know what I've done in the past. But it was a labor of love and these businesses can now use this content for as long as they have a business.
    There's some truly special episodes here and some amazingly candid and insightful conversations about entrepreneurship, life and all things following your passion into your career.
   These episodes were filmed and edited at a break-neck pace over a short period of time, with one day for filming and one for editing and mastering.
    Due to that fact, they all mostly have their production flaws as there was simply only so much time I could dedicate to each one without ending up in the hospital, which actually happened through overworking myself to death through this production period, but that's another story.
    I think the quirks of these shows just add to their home-spun charm and the very real experience of what it's like to own and operate a small business in this day and age when your back is always against the wall.
    You'll find all sorts of styles of shows here including the aforementioned, long-form interviews, full operational walk-throughs, narrated cinematic profiles or just a simple but still awesome, straight-up, single camera, one-shot, in-depth conversations about life and business and all manner of things.
    At the time, shows that simply filmed two people in deep conversation for a few hours (ala the Joe Rogan Podcast... or any Podcasts now) weren't all that popular and I was heavily criticized by the local WNY media and pretty much everyone I knew (and didn't know) for broadcasting simple, deeply personal conversations for a full half hour. But, I have since, now, been proven to be 100%-spot-on-correct with my gut intuition that this was in fact the way forward to the future of mass-media content.
    I knew then, as everyone has since suddenly "discovered" (pun intended), that all you need to do is to let the conversation go and flow, see where it takes you, film it all, try to stay out of the way in editing and send it out to the Universe. ~A.A.

TV & Web
COMMERCIALS

Loading Videos...

A BIT
ABOUT THE
COMMERCIALS

    This is where the germ for the idea to expand the show sponsorships into half hour profiles truly began.
    These sponsorship ad account campaigns ranged from simple multi-carded "call-outs" at the end of the PBS episodes or at the start and end of the commercial shows to eventually morphing into full-fledged, half hour programs profiling local WNY "Mom & Pop" businesses through interviews, business and full operational walk-throughs, narrated cinematic profiles or just a simple but awesome straight-up, single camera, in-depth conversation above life and business and all manner of things for a full half hour.
    It's a who's who of regional WNY small businesses in these commercials and you can still catch some of them online of Facebook, YouTube and even on some local TV channels. ~A.A.

​© 2025 Great Small Towns