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AccuWeather, Inc. - Forecasting Success

The recent CEO change at one of Centre County’s most prominent businesses, AccuWeather, Inc., has garnered many news headlines for the local company. Started over 40 years ago by a Penn State student, Joel Myers, AccuWeather has become one of the most trusted and reliable names in weather prediction.

I recently had the opportunity to sit down with Mike Steinberg, Senior Vice President of AccuWeather, to learn more about the company’s unique beginnings and AccuWeather’s rise to the top in the world of weather prediction and forecasting. Mr. Steinberg joined AccuWeather as a meteorologist in 1978 and is now considered to be the in-house expert and resident historian of AccuWeather.

According to Steinberg, at the age of five, Joel Myers knew he wanted to be a meteorologist, and by the age of nine, he aspired to have his own weather forecasting company. Throughout his childhood, Dr. Myers experimented with various weather-measuring devices and instruments and was a youth weather observer for the state. After high school Dr. Myers enrolled at Penn State as a meteorology student and in1962, he secured his first client for his yet to be named weather business.

A local utility company, now Columbia Gas, was in need of someone to forecast weather for the upcoming winter months. The utility company went to Penn State’s meteorology department head, Charles Hosler, and Dr. Hosler referred the utility company to Dr. Myers. The utility company signed on to use Mr. Myer’s weather forecasting services for three months at a cost of $50/month.

During the early 1960’s, AccuWeather was a seasonal business. Dr. Myers was teaching at Penn State, was working toward his PhD, and had limited time to devote to his weather business. Despite the business being seasonal, Dr. Myers was able to secure another very important client in need of weather forecasts, the Penn State football team.

Then assistant coach Joe Paterno was looking for any weather information that could help the grounds crew and the coaches. Not surprisingly, Penn State football still relies on AccuWeather’s game-day forecasts, and AccuWeather now provides weather forecasts for Pennsylvania on the big screen during the fourth quarter of football games at Beaver Stadium.

AccuWeather became a family oriented business when Joel’s brother, Barry Myers, wrote the company’s first promotional brochure in 1964. A copy of this original brochure is still on file in Mr. Steinberg’s office. While working on the brochure, Barry was also pursuing a law degree. After obtaining his law degree, Barry returned to AccuWeather and, in September of this year, he assumed the role of AccuWeather’s CEO. In 1968, Evan Myers, the youngest of the three brothers, was hired. He now serves as the company’s COO.

AccuWeather’s first full-time employee, Elliot Abrams, was hired in 1967. According to Mr. Abrams, now a Senior Vice President, employees were required to wear many hats during the early years of AccuWeather. Working in the Deike Building on campus, it was common for Mr. Abrams to fetch lunch, specifically cheese dogs, from West Halls for Joel Myers.

After Dr. Myers completed his PhD in 1971, AccuWeather became a year-round business. Not only did Dr. Myers complete his PhD, but AccuWeather also reached many important milestones in 1971. A radio station in the Wilkes Barre/Scranton area began using AccuWeather’s forecasting services during their broadcasts. Lacking a name for the weather forecasting service, the radio station requested Dr. Myers name the business, thus the creation of the name AccuWeather.

Throughout the 1970’s AccuWeather continued to grow and evolve. All employees faced a very demanding work schedule. Since the government provided weather forecasts for free, AccuWeather had to tailor each forecast for specific businesses to make the forecast a sellable item. One example of such detail was being able to predict the exact temperature on a ski resort mountain to aid the resort in making snow. AccuWeather’s attention to individual businesses and accuracy with small details helped the company to secure long-term clients.

Today, AccuWeather’s Global Headquarters & Forecast Operation Center in State College employs 360 people, making AccuWeather one of Centre County’s top ten employers. Remarkably, over the past 46 years, AccuWeather has grown every year but one - the year of the dot.com Internet burst. AccuWeather currently employs 113 meteorologists and of these 113 meteorologists, more than half of whom have worked at AccuWeather for 10 or more years. Thirty of the company’s current meteorologists have been employed by AccuWeather for over 20 years.

During his 21-year tenure at Penn State, Dr. Myers would often hold weather prediction contests. Any student who could beat Dr. Myers in the contest would be offered a job at AccuWeather. Two former contest winners, Joe Bastardi & John Kocet, are still employed at AccuWeather.

The longevity of so many AccuWeather employees attests to the Myers brothers’ managerial style. According to Mr. Abrams, hard work and attention-to-detail was expected of all employees in the early years of the company and is still expected today. However, hard work was never overlooked and was rewarded by the Myers. Creativity was also encouraged and can be evidenced in Mr. Abrams’ radio weather forecasts. For those unfamiliar with his radio forecasts, all contain great amounts of enthusiasm, and many contain sound effects.

A long-time State College resident, Dr. Myers has maintained a strong relationship with the local & Penn State community since retiring from the university. Dr. Myers has been elected a Penn State Trustee for eight consecutive terms, an impressive feat that confirms the respect Penn State alumni have for Dr. Myers.

Numerous milestones and turning points have existed throughout AccuWeather’s history. Many of these milestones have been important factors in the company’s expansion.

In June of 1972, AccuWeather was the first weather service to predict major flooding in Pennsylvania from Hurricane Agnes. This not only gained AccuWeather national publicity, but it also showcased their accuracy. According to Mr. Abrams, AccuWeather was one of the first weather predicting companies to forecast what was going to occur with a major storm, not just what was happening at the moment. Hurricane Agnes also was the first storm that required Mr. Abrams to go live on the air every 15 minutes to give updates on the hurricane while monitoring the storm at AccuWeather’s office.

In 1972, AccuWeather provided weather forecasting services to their first television station, WPVI in Philadelphia. Today, AccuWeather owns and operates the AccuWeather TV channel, which airs in 50 markets currently and will be in 100 markets by the end of 2008.

While this may sound odd in today’s era of technology, a computer committee was formed at AccuWeather in 1979 to evaluate the pros and cons of purchasing the company’s first computer. In 1979, a computer was not a minor purchase. They cost six figures and were rather large pieces of equipment. Dr. Myers questioned those on the committee about what the company would do with the computer. Meteorologist Elliot Abrams, responded with "Don’t worry, we will find plenty to do with it."

Elliot Abrams’ prediction was correct. Today, AccuWeather relies heavily on computers to predict weather for 2.7 million locations across the globe.

In 1992, AccuWeather introduced the AccuWeather Forecast Engine, a digital forecast creator and database. The forecast engine would allow AccuWeather to predict weather over a 15-day span, broken down hour by hour. The National Weather Service did not introduce their similar forecast engine until 2004.

In 1996, AccuWeather.com was introduced to the general public. The website now averages 5 million page views per day. The website continues to evolve and offers daily blogs and weather videos from Mr. Abrams.

The success of AccuWeather is testament to the hard work, dedication, and accuracy of the Myers brothers, a staff of the world’s top meteorologists, and the dedicate work of many others who fulfill behind-the-scenes roles in IT, sales, Marketing, and administration. The hard work, dedication, and accuracy of many people have made AccuWeather one of the most successful, private weather forecasting companies in the world.