Buffalo Do young people even know what radio is?

[SirRoxalot]

I thought that the idea of groups owning multiple stations in one market was supposed to be so they could appeal to multiple audiences while paring down the back-office, sales, and support numbers in order to justify overpaying for many of the stations they acquired post-1996. How many signals languish with a 1 or 2 share, acting a flankers for successful stations, instead of programming to an underserved audience in the market? Go back to the beginning of rock radio, and the target was teens. There was an awareness that they had money to spend too, just not as much as mom & dad. If everybody targets mom & dad, there's cash on the table that's going to go somewhere. That's where format-agnostic services like Spotify, Pandora, Amazon Music, YouTube Music and others serve up all kinds of music and develop algorithms to direct listeners toward either perceived preferences or what advertisers are pushing toward their particular demographic.

Radio's place in the market is to deliver content that adds value to pure-play music by creating content that relates to listeners. Sure, music can be part of it, but there are other relevant content options that are at their best when focused on a local or regional audience. Sports is a great example. In Buffalo, we want to hear about the Bills and Sabres, not so much about the NY Knicks or Philadelphia Eagles. With music, there's a much greater interest in Canadian content here at the border than there is in LA or NY. Seasonal changes here make LA radio sound out of sync with our experience.

There was a time when owners handed the reins of loser stations over to "kids" who were allowed to program to a younger audience with the hope of becoming self-sufficient. It's amazing how well that worked out at times, and created more than a few of today's "legacy" stations. It sure seems to me that it might have a better chance of being effective than another computer in a closet pumping out bland syndication to a 1-share audience.

 

[TheBigA]

I thought that the idea of groups owning multiple stations in one market was supposed to be so they could appeal to multiple audiences while paring down the back-office, sales, and support numbers

That assumes that revenue remains the same. Revenue for all media has been dropping, while costs have been going up. Something has to be done to make up for the loss of revenue. The benefits from consolidation are really only felt in the first few years. Once the synergies are absorbed, they simply become operating expenses. Now with falling revenues, those expenses become harder to meet.

Radio's place in the market is to deliver content that adds value to pure-play music by creating content that relates to listeners.

It only adds value if the customer perceives it as such. If all the customer wants is music, then the added content is an interruption. The fact that over 150 million people have chosen a music delivery service that provides no hosts demonstrates there's an audience for that kind of thing. If people want local hosts, they can listen to WECK, WGR, or WBEN. Lots of local hosts there. Every station doesn't have to do the exact same presentation. Plus we now have an entire generation that's grown up with unhosted music delivery. Radio companies don't create the music. The music, especially the older music, doesn't benefit by having someone speak the name of the song and artist. They audience knows those songs. That's why they listen.

In Buffalo, we want to hear about the Bills and Sabres, not so much about the NY Knicks or Philadelphia Eagles. .

Nobody is suggesting that would change. In fact Audacy just started new locally hosted sports stations in Miami and Los Angeles. The PD of the LA station was asked why he didn't add the syndicated Jim Rome show to the station. The PD said he wanted all of his hosts to be "in the building." So Audacy understands the value of local hosts in the sports format. They also see that value in talk, with WBEN, and in all news, with WINS or their other all news stations.

There was a time when owners handed the reins of loser stations over to "kids" who were allowed to program to a younger audience

The problem today is younger people don't own the device needed to listen. That was evident with Radio Disney, a format that aimed at children. It was a failure because those children were watching the Disney Channel, not listening to their parent's radio. Today's children want to have phones. Their parents give them to them because they can watch YouTube videos and they can use them for interaction. A radio can't do those kinds of things.

Look, there's no question everything was better for radio 50 years ago. Things changed. We can all cry in our beer about how things have changed, or we can adapt to it.

 

[Kent]

I thought that the idea of groups owning multiple stations in one market was supposed to be so they could appeal to multiple audiences while paring down the back-office, sales, and support numbers in order to justify overpaying for many of the stations they acquired post-1996.

The idea of groups owning multiple stations in one market goes back to before 1996, and it was to allow companies to better compete for advertisers in a market that saw the number of stations double over roughly a decade while the advertiser pool had shrunk. In order to do that, those companies had to compete for multiple audiences.

How many signals languish with a 1 or 2 share, acting a flankers for successful stations, instead of programming to an underserved audience in the market?

Most of the stations that do that are on disadvantaged signals that don't get a share higher than that no matter what they do. I'm sure you can find the occasional broadcaster that's programming stupidly and using a viable signal as a flanker, but that strategy has been accepted as one that usually doesn't work. I can think of a few examples where an audience for a specific format is large enough that the owner can be successful having multiple stations covering it and be successful, but it's not many.

Go back to the beginning of rock radio, and the target was teens. There was an awareness that they had money to spend too, just not as much as mom & dad. If everybody targets mom & dad, there's cash on the table that's going to go somewhere.

Radio stopped targeting teens in the 80's because the businesses that tended to cater to them and wanted to reach them got run out of business by the big box retailers. When I was growing up, there was a strip mall about a half mile from my house. It had an electronics shop, a music store, a comic book shop, a toy store, a pharmacy, and even a Casa Bonita (yes, part of the chain that was featured on South Park). It also had a Crystal's Pizza, which was similar to Casa Bonita but served a different fare. Some summers, I'd walk to that strip mall two or three times a week. My mom would send me with $5, enough for the Crystal's or Casa Bonita lunch buffet and to play a few video games. Today, that strip mall still stands but is pure blight. Crystal's closed in 1995, was replaced by a Dollar General, and even that went out of business. Casa Bonita went out of business about 20 years ago, briefly came back around 2009, and was replaced by a bar that became a hotbed for crime. The electronics, music, and toy stores were gone by the end of the 80's, and the pharmacy went out of business in the 90's when the owner retired. A few other bars, all seedy and with a reputation for crime, have replaced some while most of the other storefronts are vacant. The McDonald's on the outlot is still there. The Blockbuster Video that was built in the early 90's is now a liquor store, and the Wendy's that popped up in the late 80's is a local donut shop. The electronics, music, toy, and comic stores were businesses that advertised to teens on the Top-40 stations. When they got run out of business by Walmart, K-Mart, Target, and Venture (which opened across the street), nobody replaced them. The big box retailers either don't buy radio or only buy adult radio audiences.

 

[Buddy Shula]

I think people try to define the radio industry as “now vs. then”. Nothing in the world “now” is like it was “then”. Like anything, things morph and evolve, and much becomes extinct.

My thoughts are to look at something in the “now”. Radio stations have listeners, TV stations have viewers, Newspapers have readers…. Spotify has its fans, You Tube has its fans….

Yes, radio has changed. It’s not dead. It just changed. I focus on who still listens, because I am in the business of serving only those people. In my world there is no competition. I could care less what is going on outside of my stations. The focus is to be the best we can be, with what we have. I don’t have time to focus on what we don’t have.

I read posters on this board trying to figure out the “why’s”. There is no answer. None. Radio has changed, just like every single other thing. It will continue to evolve, and most likely will look a lot different 10 years from now. Not dead. Just different. Just because.

 

[davideduardo]

Radio is at its core, audio only content over the airwaves. In its heyday, it had only one rival which was TV which included audio plus video over the airwaves. Today, that content can be delivered through many different platforms. Many more choices and more fragmentation in the content. However, the key will always be compelling content that grabs the listener. If you have compelling content, it will be sought out on whatever platform exists.

Remember, what old timers call compelling content came from an age in which there were no cell phones, most telephone calls, or toll calls, and less very local, and sometimes even then metered, and our circle of friends revolved around our work, neighborhood, and school.

Today our circle of friends is worldwide and communication is universal and is free after paying a rather minimal monthly charge for the Internet. People do not need to be talked to by radio DJs because they can talk to all their friends, or text them, whenever they want. What used to be entertaining on the radio is intrusive now for at least the three youngest generations.

 

[davideduardo]

Radio stopped targeting teens in the 80's because the businesses that tended to cater to them and wanted to reach them got run out of business by the big box retailers.

No station ever purely targeted teens. In some markets where there was just one top 40 station in the 50s and 60s, they could get up to 50 shares. Teens do not compose 50% of any market. Those stations were getting a lot of teens, but they were also getting plenty of people between 18 and about 35 to 40.

Also consider that not all teems listened to the top 40 station. In markets where there was a large black population, they usually listened to the R&B station. And in markets where there was a growing Hispanic population, they frequently listened to a station in that language. Top 40 was not just exclusively for teens.

What was well known was that teems could be trendsetters. So when a new top 40 station went on the air, it often had very tight rotations and a very teen focused playlist with the idea that they could grab the teens and then expand through a bit larger playlist or departing to include younger adults.

 

[flybynight]

Are you talking about a specific device known as a radio? Because that device is becoming less common. The last statistic I saw was that about half of the adult population has a radio in the house. Younger people are less likely to own radios than older people. That's why a lot of radio station owners are pushing their apps and streaming sites.

The term "radio" is used for a lot of things. Sirius considers what they do to be radio. iHeartRadio considers it's streaming service to be radio. So the term isn't exclusive to a specific device. Radio companies aren't in the device business. But they're dependent on people owning those devices in order to hear their stations. They've realized they can't assume 92% of the people own radios anymore.

But as you point out, radio doesn't have an exclusive in music delivery anymore. That's another reason why radio owners are focusing on news, talk, and sports,

I knew there was trouble when I went into a radio shack years ago....and couldn't find a radio. It was mostly a phone store at that point.

 

[TheBigA]

Let's talk about content for a second. We all hear the phrase that content is king, and people will tune in for content that relates to them. I've been looking at some radio social media pages. They post their best local bits about things happening in their towns. Those bits get a handful of interactions. Maybe a few likes or comments. Then they post a national gossip story about stars spotted at Taylor Swift's wedding, and the interactions shoot way up. Instead of five or six interactions, they get thousands or even hundreds of thousands. What does that say about the content, and which content is really king?

 

[flybynight]

Let's talk about content for a second. We all hear the phrase that content is king, and people will tune in for content that relates to them. I've been looking at some radio social media pages. They post their best local bits about things happening in their towns. Those bits get a handful of interactions. Maybe a few likes or comments. Then they post a national gossip story about stars spotted at Taylor Swift's wedding, and the interactions shoot way up. Instead of five or six interactions, they get thousands or even hundreds of thousands. What does that say about the content, and which content is really king?

I've said for years that local talkradio and TV news make a mistake by force-feeding a local angle to a big story. Sometimes the local angle just isn't as interesting.

 

[darcyh]

Most of them can't read a map, operate a vehicle with a manual transmission or calculate basic arithmetic. Just keep paying for the latest smart phone and multi-subscriptions... get some more tattoos. They wonder why they're broke.

 

[KC8UOK]

Here's another angle. Spotify is great for music but try adding anything else, you can't.

I tried creating one of their AI playlists and it works for things like 80s or 90s music which I listen to. But I can't insert news headlines in and use it like automation software. I wanted to do a music/podcast mix where I got news and tech podcasts mixed in with the music but it's simply not capable of it. Really the only way would be to create my own personal online radio station and use more standard automation software but that requires having actual downloads of tracks which I've not had in years and a good chunk of people in their 20s probably don't even have a CD player or have ever owned an MP3

 

[radiofan2023]

Most of them can't read a map, operate a vehicle with a manual transmission or calculate basic arithmetic. Just keep paying for the latest smart phone and multi-subscriptions... get some more tattoos. They wonder why they're broke.

They can't:

Afford houses
Find an entry level job
Afford new cars
Afford to start a family
Afford to pay back student loans


But what they can do is call you out on your bullshit generalizations. This is one of the many reasons I'm a huge fan of Taylor Swift, because she calls out bullshit too!

 

[kwthom]

There was a time when owners handed the reins of loser stations over to "kids" who were allowed to program to a younger audience with the hope of becoming self-sufficient. It's amazing how well that worked out at times, and created more than a few of today's "legacy" stations. It sure seems to me that it might have a better chance of being effective than another computer in a closet pumping out bland syndication to a 1-share audience.

Been noted in dozens of threads on this very forum - nobody in your age group you are trying to reach in your fantasy is listening to radio.

Full stop.

 

[radiofan2023]

Been noted in dozens of threads on this very forum - nobody in your age group you are trying to reach in your fantasy is listening to radio.

Full stop.

I can't even tell what age group @SirRoxalot is referring to.

 

[kwthom]

I can't even tell what age group @SirRoxalot is referring to.

Anyone under...90?

80?

Does it matter?!

 

[radiofan2023]

Anyone under...90?

80?

Does it matter?!

 

[davideduardo]

They can't:

Afford houses

If you bring in 20,000,000 new residents in two decades, not having available housing would be totally normal.

Find an entry level job

There are jobs. Either not in the field some applicants want or not in the place they want to live.

Afford new cars

I'll defer to our car expert here, but my own car acquisitions seemed to have doubled in price in part due to new regulations.

Afford to start a family

Related to the "entry level job" issue. And it is amazing that where there is "family starting" and where we still have larger families is among Blacks and Hispanics. There is more to this issue than "afford to start a family".

Afford to pay back student loans

What we have is a nation with too many 16th Century English Lit majors with enormous debts and no skill that businesses need.

But what they can do is call you out on your bullshit generalizations. This is one of the many reasons I'm a huge fan of Taylor Swift, because she calls out bullshit too!

I can think of very few entertainers... who live in a surreal world... whose opinions on anything I care about. Taylor Swift, who built a career on songs about ex-boyfriends and the like is not one of them.

 

[davideduardo]

The idea of groups owning multiple stations in one market goes back to before 1996, and it was to allow companies to better compete for advertisers in a market that saw the number of stations double over roughly a decade while the advertiser pool had shrunk. In order to do that, those companies had to compete for multiple audiences.

Consolidation was predominantly and overwhelmingly due to the fact that, following Docket 80-90, over half of all stations were not profitable. The move of listening to FM in the 70's had increased the stations that were viable in each market to be about triple the prior figure with no increase in radio revenue.

Docket 80-90 did to most smaller markets what FM did to the big ones.

In the early 90's, radio ad revenue had not declined. It was at its highest ever, but there were too many seats at the table.

Radio stopped targeting teens in the 80's because the businesses that tended to cater to them and wanted to reach them got run out of business by the big box retailers.

Local merchants seldom bought radio to reach teens. The teen money came from national accounts, and they moved to consolidated national buys, whether for Toys 'r Us to Wrigley's gum.

When I was growing up, there was a strip mall about a half mile from my house. It had an electronics shop, a music store, a comic book shop, a toy store, a pharmacy, and even a Casa Bonita (yes, part of the chain that was featured on South Park). It also had a Crystal's Pizza, which was similar to Casa Bonita but served a different fare. Some summers, I'd walk to that strip mall two or three times a week. My mom would send me with $5, enough for the Crystal's or Casa Bonita lunch buffet and to play a few video games. Today, that strip mall still stands but is pure blight. Crystal's closed in 1995, was replaced by a Dollar General, and even that went out of business. Casa Bonita went out of business about 20 years ago, briefly came back around 2009, and was replaced by a bar that became a hotbed for crime. The electronics, music, and toy stores were gone by the end of the 80's, and the pharmacy went out of business in the 90's when the owner retired. A few other bars, all seedy and with a reputation for crime, have replaced some while most of the other storefronts are vacant. The McDonald's on the outlot is still there. The Blockbuster Video that was built in the early 90's is now a liquor store, and the Wendy's that popped up in the late 80's is a local donut shop. The electronics, music, toy, and comic stores were businesses that advertised to teens on the Top-40 stations. When they got run out of business by Walmart, K-Mart, Target, and Venture (which opened across the street), nobody replaced them. The big box retailers either don't buy radio or only buy adult radio audiences.

In your final sentence you got to the real issue. Local small merchants died as the big box stores expanded When you got a Best Buy or Circuit City, those little TV and stereo stores and those independent appliance stores closed. And the big box stores did not, generally, buy local radio. Rinse and repeat for every business from department stores to office supplies to pet shops.

 

[michael hagerty]

I'll defer to our car expert here, but my own car acquisitions seemed to have doubled in price in part due to new regulations.

Well, you tend to buy Porsches and in their case, tariffs (none are built here), the desire to be first with cool tech, a desire to preserve market exclusivity and no small amount of "Mal sehen, womit wir durchkommen" ("Let's see what we can get away with") are the primary drivers.

Porsche 911’s Crazy Price Hikes Make Corvette and AMG Rivals Hard to Ignore

Last month, Porsche said it would be increasing prices of new cars by up to 2.9%, depending on the model. This move comes as a result of the Trump administration’s tariffs. Porschealready increased prices at least twice in 2025, and this latest price hike is now evident in the staggering...

autos.yahoo.com

As for the market at large, most of the average new car price of $49,000 (ish) (half cost more, half cost less) can be attributed to Americans' taste for well-equipped pickup trucks and SUVs.

https://www.kbb.com/car-news/average-new-car-price-drops-20k-car-likely-dead/

There are 18 models that have sold more than 100,000 units so far in 2026. Three of the top four (Ford F-150, Chevy Silverado, Ram 1500) are pickups that, popularly equipped, go for between $60,000 and $80,000. The fourth of the group is the Honda CR-V that starts at $30,920 and tops out at $42,550).

After that, the cars selling more than 100,000 units are either reasonably-priced vehicles like the Toyota Camry, Toyota RAV4, Nissan Rogue, Honda Civic, Toyota Corolla, Hyundai Tucson, Chevrolet Equinox, Chevrolet Trax and Subaru Forester, or more expensive trucks and SUVs like the Tesla Model Y, Toyota Tacoma, Ford Explorer and Jeep Grand Cherokee.

Of those ten reasonably-priced cars in the top 18, base prices have not gone up dramatically in the last five years. Annual price increases of $300 to $500 have pretty much been the industry standard for decades.

 

[radiofan2023]

After that, the cars selling more than 100,000 units are either reasonably-priced vehicles like the Toyota Camry, Toyota RAV4, Nissan Rogue, Honda Civic, Toyota Corolla, Hyundai Tucson, Chevrolet Equinox, Chevrolet Trax and Subaru Forester, or more expensive trucks and SUVs like the Tesla Model Y, Toyota Tacoma, Ford Explorer and Jeep Grand Cherokee.

Of those ten reasonably-priced cars in the top 18, base prices have not gone up dramatically in the last five years. Annual price increases of $300 to $500 have pretty much been the industry standard for decades.

But how many dealerships even have base models of the ones you listed consistently in stock? From what I've seen with the type of car I've been looking for (base model AWD Camry hybrid) a lot of them are either being built and are sold already and the dealership's just waiting for them to land on the lot, or they're in transit and a pending sale. From what I understand, dealerships don't make as much money on base models as on loaded ones.