CJPM-DT's studios and transmitter are located on Rue du Mont Sainte Claire in the former city of Chicoutimi.

Its owner, John Murdock, who died on October 2 of that same year, soon realized that he didn't have the revenue to challenge Radio-Canada affiliate CKRS-TV (now CKTV-DT) on his own.

Along with Quebec City's CFCM-TV (owned by Télévision de Québec, a consortium of theatre chain Famous Players and Quebec City's two private AM radio stations, CHRC and CKCV, which joined the group in 1964 after disaffiliating from Radio-Canada), this collective of independent stations was the forerunner of TVA, though the network wasn't formally created until September 12, 1971, with CJPM as one of its three charter affiliates, alongside CFTM and CFCM.

It became a TVA owned-and-operated station when Télé-Métropole bought majority control of the network in 1990.

CJPM-DT signed on its digital signal on August 29, 2011, from a temporary antenna at Mont Sainte-Claire.