I think it's time to blow it up. This is embarrassing the way executives are handling KROQ. how much lower are they going to allow KROQ to go. The morning show hasnt helped as well. Just my thoughts. David e has said anything lower than a 0.4 advertisers wont look at. And the way its trending it's going in that direction. Your thoughts?
If there was a money-making format opportunity that still hadn't been cracked in the market yet, Audacy would have flipped KROQ yesterday.
But format flips are expensive -- and it could be that KROQ at depressed ratings can still self-sustain itself and still be running at a profit. The alternative format still brings in younger listeners, which appeals to advertisers. Who knows for how long, but there is definitely a willingness to be patient.
KROQ in its current iteration is being run very lean. The station isn't hosting any events, they covered nights/overnights with two syndicated hosts from NYC and the morning show is likely a fraction of the cost of "Kevin in the Morning."
The other point I want to make is that Audacy and iHeart no longer want to be "radio companies." They want to be a "digital audio" companies, like Spotify. I'm sure 90%+ of Audacy/iHeart's revenue comes from radio ads, but that mix is likely to change in the future.
Advertisers have been shifting some of their dollars to podcasts and other digital audio platforms. Audacy/iHeart likely sees it as a huge opportunity to its business. While growing the core terrestrial radio business is important to Audacy, I think they're more interested in making investments in digital/podcasting, which also theoretically can help the company's stock price.
So if you asked David Field, would you rather spend $25M on acquiring a small podcast startup or $25M on format flips, I think you would know his answer.