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Cap City Communications Shaking Things Up

K

KYradioJake

I turned on the radio this morning and was surprised to find the long-running AC known as "Star 103-7" no longer exists at 103.7 in Frankfort. I was even more surprised to hear that the folks over at Cap City Comm. turned the station into a simulcast of WKYW 1490 AM and its translator at 93.5, which have an oldies format. They are playing 60's, 70's and 80's and branding themselves "Passport Radio". A quick check of the Star 1037 website explains to listeners the reasoning behind the format change. They claim they are no longer able to program 3 distinct stations with the current state of the advertising market in the Frankfort area. Anyone care to elaborate on this surprising change?
 
I think we're going to see more and more stories like this. The media and advertising landscapes have changed, and continue to change, dramatically.

I don't believe those changes will accrue to the ultimate betterment of traditional broadcasters, either radio or television.
 
New calls are apparently WFRT. I get it. It's supposed to be for "Frankfort," but that wasn't the first thing that came to my mind!

Small town radio has been suffering for decades. What's more surprising is that they held out this long.
 
I agree and am also surprised they have been able to make it as long as they have with 3 separate stations/brands. But I find it odd they chose to continue on with Passport Radio instead of Star, their "heritage" AC/Hot AC. They say Passport has had "unprecedented success" since its debut several years ago, but I figured more people listened to Star than a tiny translator & AM oldies combo. One other thing I've noticed is that they seem to be promoting Passport's new, larger coverage area and mention "from Louisville to Lexington" in some of their IDs.
 
KYradioJake said:
I agree and am also surprised they have been able to make it as long as they have with 3 separate stations/brands. But I find it odd they chose to continue on with Passport Radio instead of Star, their "heritage" AC/Hot AC. They say Passport has had "unprecedented success" since its debut several years ago, but I figured more people listened to Star than a tiny translator & AM oldies combo. One other thing I've noticed is that they seem to be promoting Passport's new, larger coverage area and mention "from Louisville to Lexington" in some of their IDs.
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Give them credit. They made/maintained a significant investment for quite some time in a small market saturated with signals from Louisville and Lexington. So I too am surprised 3 formats lasted this long. But I'm also surprised they ditched Star rather than just put the former Passport on the bird. Don't get me wrong-I listened to Passport a lot and hadn't listened to Star in a decade or more (you could probably come pretty close to guessing my age!). So I personally am glad they did this the way they did. Lost at least one voice, couple of others had their air slots trimmed, ditched Dick Clark reruns, but the Star jocks sound good on Passport. Other than the occasional "what the heck was that?" song, their transition from 50's to 80's works for me. Theoretically the 103.7 signal is much better, but I could carry 93.5 to Keeneland, Shelbyville, Owenton so it wasn't bad. They said in the Frankfort paper they had been planning this for over a year. But I have to think that, after a transition period, 1490/93.5 will go in a different direction or just sign off. Those 2 frequencies are really redundant now.
 
oxford777 said:
But I have to think that, after a transition period, 1490/93.5 will go in a different direction or just sign off. Those 2 frequencies are really redundant now.
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I agree. I don't see them keeping 1490 and 93.5 on the air with the same format in the long run. It just wouldn't make any sense. If they are trying to save money and be efficient radio station operators in 2019, they will probably surrender the licenses to 1490 & 93.5 or at the very least, run a full-time satellite fed format to make them as cheap to operate as possible.

The Passport format is not a bad one from what I've heard out of them so far. However, I do wish they'd pull from their entire 60's library rather than just mid-60's on, and maybe throw in a more well-known 50's song once or twice a day (just to make things interesting...I know they are 60's-80's now). The 103.7 signal does well in Lexington, so I wouldn't be surprised if they have picked up some listeners there.
 
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