I am in Yakima and here are my thoughts about the sale of the cluster here. My fear, probably an irrational fear, is Stephens will switch HOT 99.7 from rhythmic to mainstream. I think HOT is a gem of a station. Having a rhythmic in a smaller market like this is really cool and one of the great things about the Yakima radio landscape.
I say irrational fear because HOT is a popular station. #1 overall the last few ratings periods. I am sure they are very strong in 18-34..although Ingstad was too cheap to pay for Nielsen and looking at Stephens markets like Tulsa and Rochester NY, they won't pay for it either ( I do realize it is very expensive). Anyway, usually when a station is successful the new owner doesn't fix what isn't broken...but of course that isn't unheard of either. The press release where Stephens likes the diversity of formats is encouraging. Maybe I read too much into that but it makes me think rhythmic will survive the sale on HOT.
Maybe I will be surprised and HOT will actually become more hip hop than it is now. I say that because under Ingstad HOT shifted more mainstream...pretty much straddling the fence. At the same time KFFM became more rhythmic sounding and there is now less musical difference between these two competitors than I remember. I am unusual in that I like current hip hop product even if as a middle aged white guy I am totally out of the demo. I like a lot of the electronic based young pop as well.
As for CHERRY FM my fear is they will young it up too much. I love the mix of music they play...it is 70s/80s based while most classic hits stations these days are 80s/90s. IMO when a classic hits gets too new it starts sounding like a bad Hot AC. Anyway I like the music on CHERRY so much that I would stream it if I lived outside of Yakima. I like their tempo of music too...it's a nice mix...not all uptempo like most classic hits these days. Since there is no AC here, the music on CHERRY seems perfect to be an office station. I do in fact hear them playing in more offices than any other
station, although I also hear less terrestrial radio in workplaces than ever before.
As for KXDD...they have a lot of heritage and that has been a protective factor for them. No matter how many
budget cuts Ingstad made they have stayed the top country station, although the BULL definitely tightened the race up.
My opinion is the HAWK is a great classic rock station...they play a big variety and it never seems burned which isn't always easy to do in that format.
Hot AC BIG seems like it is there to take away just enough KFFM listeners to keep HOT on top. I would like to hear more personality on that station but am not sure if its worth it on a translator station like that.
I know Ingstad made a LOT of cuts over the past couple of years to make the cluster more attractive to sell. I would like to see Stephens undo this to some degree and actually staff up these stations more.
So those are my thoughts for what their worth. It will be fun to see what, if any, changes Stephens makes both here in Yakima and in the Tri Cities.
