91.7 WVXU | By John Kiesewetter
PublishedOctober 7, 2024 at 4:03 PM EDT
Let’s get this out of the way first: Just because WCPO-TV has assigned Taylor Nimmo to the consumer beat doesn’t mean that John Matarese is retiring after a quarter century of “Don’t Waste Your Money” segments.
”As long as our great viewers continue to appreciate my work, I’m not going anywhere soon,” says Matarese, a Channel 9 reporter for more than three decades.
Some days “25 people or more are asking for help or advice with a consumer issue,” says Matarese, a nationally recognized consumer expert whose reports air on 40 Scripps stations from coast to coast. He gets inquiries in emails, phone calls and Facebook messages.
“It’s a lot of volume, and that’s why over the past year, we talked about bringing someone else aboard to help with all the consumer topics that are out there, giving me more time to dig deeper on some stories,” he tells me.
In the summer, I noticed that Nimmo was helping Matarese report on the cost of back-to-school supplies.
Jeff Brogan, WCPO-TV vice president and general manager, says the station this year was “doubling down on pocketbook and consumer issues” as part of Channel’s 9 content strategy.
“This is the kind of reporting that helps viewers live their lives better. We receive so many consumer story ideas and questions every week, it is great having Taylor working alongside John helping our viewers,” Brogan says.
Nimmo, an Anderson Township native, was hired in June 2021, two years after graduating from Ohio Unviversity.
The Turpin High School alum worked two years as a multimedia journalist and weekend weather forecaster at Sinclair’s WPBN-TV/WGTU-TV in Traverse City, Mich., before coming home. During her summer break from OU in 2017, she interned in the sports department at Sinclair’s WKRC-TV. (By the way, she told me in 2022 that she was not related to Bill Nimmo, WLWT-TV's first TV star in the late 1940s and early 1950s, and Bill’s son Geoff, who worked at WEBN-FM, WNOP-AM, WSAI-FM and WSKS-FM.)
“Taylor was excited about getting involved, and in the past three months, it has been great to have someone else to help cover all the pocketbook issues affecting people these days," Matarese says. "And I love that she brings the female perspective to the table. It is such a wonderful and important addition."
Materese produces five “Don’t Waste Your Money” segments every week exposing scams, rip-offs or great bargains. Three of them are fed to 40 other Scripps stations from New York to Tucson, and from Baltimore to Bakersfield.
After studying Shakespeare at the University of Vermont, he worked at a Vermont radio station and a Maine TV station before being hired by WCPO-TV in the late 1980s. He started “Don’t Waste Your Money” segments in January 2000.
“I have been doing 'Don’t Waste Your Money' for 25 years now. It’s hard to believe, because I remember the first meeting in the old WCPO building Downtown, when we came up with the segment and the tag line. No one quite remembers who came up with the term ‘Don’t Waste Your Money.’ It was a combination of me, our news director at the time, and our promotions department,” he says.
“Little did I know that it would become such a success that it would become one of WCPO 9’s top franchises over the next two decades.”
On his Channel 9 bio, Matarese says he is “most proud of (and thankful for) my ability to use my position here to help people who have been taken advantage of unfairly. Some of the most gratifying moments of my day are when I can do little things that help people that never even get on the air.
“For instance, helping a family get their water or electric turned back on, or explaining to people how to fight a car repair rip-off or other injustice. When I see a business or website taking advantage of people, I'm not afraid to say 'Doesn't that stink?' and let folks know what I think of them separating hard working people from their money.”
For now, there’s no separating the hard-working Matarese from his job.
“A number of people have asked me if I am retiring soon, after producing what I roughly estimate to be more than 6,000 TV stories over those 25 years. But for now, I will quote Eminem, who said: ‘I got no plans to retire, if I’m still the man you admire.’ ”