Louisville Radio Ratings 12/2025 WHAS is #7

[radiofan502]

Here is the latest ratings for Louisville. I'm shocked (not really) to see WHAS 840 at #7. IMO the station is but a shell of what it used to be. There are no longer any shows where you can call in to discuss local issues. And now they are passed in the ratings by WQMF and WSFR just to name a couple. YES the mighty 840 is no more.

Louisville

radioinsight.com

 

[TheBigA]

My take is it's an AM station with no FM translator in a market where all of the viable stations are on FM.

They could do local talk all day, and I doubt the numbers would be a lot better.

 

[WildcatGuy]

I'm told that insiders were lobbying nearly 20 years ago for 840 WHAS to start simulcasting on 100.5 FM. That frequency once hosted The Fox, but it was sent reeling with the loss of Howard Stern. The Clear Channel / iHeart corporate brass consistently said "no" to the idea.

In the years since, the 100.5 dial position has featured a variety of different music formats, none of them lasting for very long. Meanwhile, the AM audience continued to dwindle and die.

Now, it's too late.

Other big AM stations like WTOP in Washington, WSB in Atlanta, and WINS in New York successfully migrated to FM. Even KMOX in St. Louis finally got a full market FM frequency.

For WHAS, the revenue is gone, the programming is largely irrelevant, and the remaining audience is quietly slipping away. Out with a whimper, not a bang.

 

[radiofan502]

My take is it's an AM station with no FM translator in a market where all of the viable stations are on FM.

They could do local talk all day, and I doubt the numbers would be a lot better.

WHAS recently started simulcasting on WAMZ HD 2 but that's not going to help

 

[radiofan502]

My take is it's an AM station with no FM translator in a market where all of the viable stations are on FM.

They could do local talk all day, and I doubt the numbers would be a lot better.

WHAS recently started simulcasting on WAMZ HD 2 but that's not going to help

 

[LouRadio]

I have no idea what the ratings are like at different parts of the day but I feel like Terry Meiners is probably the one doing a lot of heavy lifting for those numbers. He did sign a contract through 2029, but is it realistic to think he'll want to keep working much past that? He'll be in his early 70s and the corporate landscape of radio has changed so much in 50 years (and will likely change a lot more in the next 4), I'd think he'd want to start looking at retirement.

 

[oxford777]

I have no idea what the ratings are like at different parts of the day but I feel like Terry Meiners is probably the one doing a lot of heavy lifting for those numbers. He did sign a contract through 2029, but is it realistic to think he'll want to keep working much past that? He'll be in his early 70s and the corporate landscape of radio has changed so much in 50 years (and will likely change a lot more in the next 4), I'd think he'd want to start looking at retirement.

Terry has said on air he turned down a longer (10 year) contract when he signed the one that goes through 2029.

 

[boiseengineer]

In Boise Idaho, Townsquare just finished up moving 580 KIDO to the 6-tower Vertical Bridge owned site that competitor 670 KBOI (Cumulus) used to own and still uses.
Diplexed with KBOI 50 kW DA Night (6-towers) NDA Day.
KIDO was 4 towers 5 kW DA Night NDA day. Now 4.4 kW DA night (6-towers) and 20 kW NDA Day.
Townsquare owned the 4-tower site that's from 1940's. Probably got big $$$ for it. They were in a hurry to vacate the site.
Still wondering why they went to all this trouble.
KIDO has a 99 watt translator at 2500' HAAT.
KBOI has a full Class C FM simulcast at 2500' HAAT.

 

[hotpatrick2004]

I remember when it was always either whas or wamz usually wamz was number 1 and whas number 2 and once wdjx was number 3

 

[jb_ky]

In the years since, the 100.5 dial position has featured a variety of different music formats, none of them lasting for very long. Meanwhile, the AM audience continued to dwindle and die.

Now, it's too late.

Well at this point why not try it and move it to 100.5. WBT-AM just moved over to 107.9 in Charlotte, NC so can't hurt to try and see if it helps. NewsRadio 1005. WHAS doesn't sound too bad.

Maybe it was dropping the "84" branding years ago.

 

[Calhoun]

In those pre-internet/pre-ESPN days of the late 60s/70s, every autumn Saturday afternoon/evening WHAS had a call in show to get up-to-date college football scores. "Tell A Score, 84." I remember one guy in particular who called every week to get the score for Wyoming games. Not that any of us had money on those games.

Trying to find college football games/scores back in the day is how I started DXing. I spent many a Saturday night sitting in my Dad's Buick listening to WWL/LSU, WHO/Iowa, WBAP/TCU, WSB/UGa, etc.

 

[Gregg.]

I'm shocked (not really) to see WHAS 840 at #7. IMO the station is but a shell of what it used to be. There are no longer any shows where you can call in to discuss local issues. And now they are passed in the ratings by WQMF and WSFR just to name a couple. YES the mighty 840 is no more.

I'm confused. There's "Kentuckiana's Morning News" from 5 to 9 a.m. I assume that's an information and interview show, not really an all-news block. Then there's Tony & Dwight 9 a.m. to noon and Terry Meiners from 3 to 6 p.m. How much more local programming would you like in Market #58? Unless I'm missing something. Talk stations in larger markets often don't have ten hours of local programming each weekday.

However, it is surprising to see WHAS down to #7. In recent years, it would be #2 or #3, just behind co-owned WAMZ and maybe another station. Never as low as #7. Although with Christmas music kicking in, all talk stations see a drop. If an FM station is playing Frank Sinatra and Andy Williams in hot rotation, a talk station's mature audience will migrate there for the holidays.

 

[radiofan502]

I'm confused. There's "Kentuckiana's Morning News" from 5 to 9 a.m. I assume that's an information and interview show, not really an all-news block. Then there's Tony & Dwight 9 a.m. to noon and Terry Meiners from 3 to 6 p.m. How much more local programming would you like in Market #58? Unless I'm missing something. Talk stations in larger markets often don't have ten hours of local programming each weekday.

However, it is surprising to see WHAS down to #7. In recent years, it would be #2 or #3, just behind co-owned WAMZ and maybe another station. Never as low as #7. Although with Christmas music kicking in, all talk stations see a drop. If an FM station is playing Frank Sinatra and Andy Williams in hot rotation, a talk station's mature audience will migrate there for the holidays.

What about WLW 700 in Cincinnati? They have local shows all day long.

 

[ted chittenden]

I'm confused. There's "Kentuckiana's Morning News" from 5 to 9 a.m. I assume that's an information and interview show, not really an all-news block. Then there's Tony & Dwight 9 a.m. to noon and Terry Meiners from 3 to 6 p.m. How much more local programming would you like in Market #58? Unless I'm missing something. Talk stations in larger markets often don't have ten hours of local programming each weekday.

However, it is surprising to see WHAS down to #7. In recent years, it would be #2 or #3, just behind co-owned WAMZ and maybe another station. Never as low as #7. Although with Christmas music kicking in, all talk stations see a drop. If an FM station is playing Frank Sinatra and Andy Williams in hot rotation, a talk station's mature audience will migrate there for the holidays.

I note that the Louisville market is too small to have cume numbers though in bigger markets (such as my hometown of Phoenix), the cume for news/talk stations is usually quite a bit less than that for music outlets.

I also don't think that WHAS is in any real danger right now of being turned off or changing formats. Even though it's 4.2 for the October-November period, I would wait to see the December-January numbers (released in February) before I would consider any major station changes. AM may be dying but unless some people do something stupid (I'm pointing at you, Elon Musk!), that death will be a relatively slow one.

 

[ted chittenden]

What about WLW 700 in Cincinnati? They have local shows all day long.

Keep in mind that Cincinnati is a much larger market than Louisville and that IHeart has two AM talk stations there (as it does in Los Angeles and San Diego). For many years now, the company has been putting its national content on WKRC (the station with the weaker signal) and putting its local content on WLW. (In fact, given what has recently happened at both Los Angeles' KFI and Denver's KOA, I would expect more downsizing at WLW than I would at WHAS right now.)

 

[radiofan502]

Keep in mind that Cincinnati is a much larger market than Louisville and that IHeart has two AM talk stations there (as it does in Los Angeles and San Diego). For many years now, the company has been putting its national content on WKRC (the station with the weaker signal) and putting its local content on WLW. (In fact, given what has recently happened at both Los Angeles' KFI and Denver's KOA, I would expect more downsizing at WLW than I would at WHAS right now.)

iHeart has two talk stations here too. They could put the syndicated shows on WKJK 1080 (like iHeart does with WKRC 550 in Cincinnati) and have local talk on WHAS (like WLW) If I remember, WLW was #1 in Cincinnati recently.
Cincinnati is market #33 and Louisville is #55. Not that much of a larger market. Only about an 80,000 population difference.

 

[hotpatrick2004]

iHeart has two talk stations here too. They could put the syndicated shows on WKJK 1080 (like iHeart does with WKRC 550 in Cincinnati) and have local talk on WHAS (like WLW) If I remember, WLW was #1 in Cincinnati recently.
Cincinnati is market #33 and Louisville is #55. Not that much of a larger market. Only about an 80,000 population difference.

But Cincinnati has a TV show named after it Louisville does not🤣🤣🤣

 

[Great]

In those pre-internet/pre-ESPN days of the late 60s/70s, every autumn Saturday afternoon/evening WHAS had a call in show to get up-to-date college football scores. "Tell A Score, 84." I remember one guy in particular who called every week to get the score for Wyoming games. Not that any of us had money on those games.

Trying to find college football games/scores back in the day is how I started DXing. I spent many a Saturday night sitting in my Dad's Buick listening to WWL/LSU, WHO/Iowa, WBAP/TCU, WSB/UGa, etc.

great post!