2005: CHR's winners and losers

[TheMusicMan]

The thread below inspired this...let's discuss the past 12 months, the changes of the CHR landscape, who's soared, who's flopped, and all of that good stuff.

:: WINNERS::

- Most notably, KIIS-FM soared to the top of Los Angeles' ratings in the Spring Book and has yet to be dethroned. After all of the grief for taking Ryan Seacrest on in the AM, slanting towards rhythmic, etc... Ivey & Co. had the last laugh. A great victory not only for the station, but for the format as a whole - one of CHR's most influential stations going all the way, in addition to the continued success of Z100, FLZ, and so on, is evidence to the fact that CHR is still relevant.

- At the beginning of the year, Rhythmic upstarts in various cities seemed poised to take out heritage CHR outlets. However, fast forward tweleve months, and a number of the latter are holding steady in the face of their competition. A few semi-victories warrant mention.
- Q102/Philly: Fall Book '05 brought on a fairly large beating by Wired 96.5, and it appeared that a serious war was brewing between the two stations, and it seemed doubtful that various airstaff changes on the part of Q would help their cause. Yet, Wired's lead shrunk and disappeared, and while things are most definetely not over for Wired, Q102 seems to have the upper hand at the moment, so kudos to them for that.
- Kiss 95.1/Charlotte: Until 96.1 The Beat hit the Carolinas, it had been nearly unknown for Kiss to finish outside of the 12+ Top 5. Yet things changed, and The Beat took huge bites out of NKS...at one point, IBT had a share and a half lead in 12+. This situation concerned me, as Kiss has always been a personal favorite of mine. Just when things looked bleakest for 95.1, a rebound put Kiss back on top later this year. In the trend just released today, The Beat has a narrow lead on Kiss, but major props to Kiss are in order for making it obvious that they are a force to be reckoned with - the war in Charlotte will be very interesting to follow over the next few years. I know it's already making for some great radio up there.
- 98.9 Magic FM/Colorado Springs: Damn, doesn't this sound familiar? CC launches a CHR-leaning rhythmic to combat the perennial winner CHR, and you know the rest...Magic takes a dump thanks to Beat, but now the former is back on top, and the two stations are going to battle it out in the upcoming books.

- Other CHRs who had notably good years.
- KHKS/DFW: Wild's flip to Jack was bound to help the struggling Kiss out somewhat, but who knew that KHKS would be back in the Top 3 by the end of 2005? A lot of people underestimated these guys...they've got an excellent airstaff across the board. Great to see them doing well. Same for Channel 955 in Detroit. I know they'll get bitched out for being too rhythmic, etc, and how DRQ biting the dust helped them...but you can't deny a freaking Top 3 showing.
- Other random ratings winners, let's see... WNCI, still #1 in Columbus. WZEE, still #1 in Madison. 98.5 KRZ, #2 in Wilkes-Barre/Scranton, even with WBHT around. WNOK, #2 in Columbia. Two out of the top 3 in Syracuse are CHR - WWHT and WNTQ. WSTW, #2 in Wilmington. WRTS, #1 by far in Erie.

:: LOSERS ::

- Y100.7's dip. When I had a chance to listen for a while in May, I remember thinking that HYI sounded pretty damn good, so I'm not sure why they wouldn't be doing better in the ratings, especially given that they're the only game in town. If the ratings are this bad a few months down the road, we could see some pretty major changes down there.

- 97-1 ZHT in Salt Lake City. Last summer, they were at the top of their game. Not even a year and a half later, they've turned over nearly their entire airstaff and all but gone rhythmic (perhaps to combat competitor U92...the only rock on ZHT's playlist is Fall Out Boy's latest and All American Rejects), and they've been on the losing end of the battle with weaker-signalled U92, which just ended this past trend, thanks to U taking a sh&t over the past 4 months or so.

 

[CHRles]

Great thread.
Kiss 95.7 Hartford is finally moving back to the kind of numbers it possessed before Rhythmic and Urban radio stations popped up in the market. Kudos to WKSS for hanging in there, and for making a nice comeback.
Few people on the boards seem to have noticed, but Little Rock's Alice 107.7 is number 2 overall in the market with its highest ratings to date.
Atlanta's Q-100 had a major signal upgrade a few weeks ago, and that should undoubtebly have positive effect on its market rank in the coming books.

107.5 The River Nashville is expected to rise in the ratings now that its left as the only CHR in the market. Same is true for Tulsa, and hopefully for Kansas City as well.
In Jacksonville WAPE and 97.9 Kiss continue to battle it out, with The Big Ape in the lead, and is now also back up into the market's top 5 and above a 6 share.
Top 40 radio is also flourishing in Albany where Fly 92, similarly to WAPE, is the market's heritage CHR and is back in the top 5 with a great book. Rival Kiss FM also finally managed to move up from upper 2 shares it was stuck in for along time. There's also a great non-commercial CHR in Albany called 88.3 The Saint, so fans of CHR radio have a lot of choices.
The competition is extremely tight in Louisville (the city recently merged with its county and now has a population of over 700,000) where Kiss FM and DJX are neck to neck, with heritage 99.7 DJX still maintaining a tiny lead.
Despite all the hype sorrounding Dayton's Channel 94-5 about how its supposedly better then heritage CHR Z-93, Channel is still ranked lower. Both stations are not performing nearly as high as Z used to rank prior to Dayton have a Rhythmic and 2 CHRs.
In the past year Tower 98 has upgraded its signal, and moved its tower to better serve the Toledo market. This has also had a negative impact on the market's heritage Kiss FM.
The big winner in the CHR wars in Roanoke is WJJS, coming off a strong ratings surge good for third overall in the market. Meanwhile K-92 drops out of the top 5 to one of its lowest ratings in years.
Youngstown's Hot 101 and Kiss FM are both enjoying major ratings improvements.
The biggest loser of 2005 is probably B-97 and the New Orleans market in general, thanks to Katrina On the flipside, it could mean that nearby Baton Rouge, where 102.5 FMF is based, could see a major upsurge in market ranking.
It's been a good year for Sherveport's CHR, K-94.5. Its now tied for third in the market, and has posted ratings far higher then it was receiving at this time last year.