Adult CHR it is for WNFN

[firepoint525]

Re: Bad news

I am REALLY REALLY OLD if The River is a heritage station, which I guess it is. So I guess I am.

Well, they DO carry "Backtrax"! ;D

 

[firepoint525]

Well, think about it. 107.5 has been doing Top 40 for a long time. First as the super successful Y-107, and since 95 as The River. That's 14 years now that it's been known by that name.

Which is basically the entire lifetimes of their current listeners (teenagers).

Even though Hot AC doesn't seem to do well in Nashville (as opposed to Clarksville that has Q-108), an Adult Friendly/Leaning CHR/Pop station does have potential, and Cumulus seems to specialize in those kind of CHRs. So I-106 has potential.

What would you consider WHOP 98.7 in Hopkinsville? They are AC, but they play an almost entirely different playlist than Mix 92.9 (but both carry Delilah). Q-108 is definitely hot AC, but I believe they are "hotter" AC than anything we have had in Nashville lately. To me, 98.7 in Hoptown is closer to what we had with V-102.5 ("Venus") and Star 97 before that. And that hot AC is what I have been missing here for the last year or so.

One of the problems I've noticed both I-106 and 102.5 The Party face is signal issues in some of the key zipcodes. Drive through some parts of Brentwood or Bellevue and you'll come across signal problems for both stations. They also have some signal issues in Rutherford County (second most populated county in the metro area), especially in Murfreesboro (then again so does 101.1 The Beat). Unlike The Party though, it should be easier to pick up I-106 in Wilson and Sumner counties. The Party can also be picked up loud and clear in Clarksville and Hopkinsville, but that's a seperate market.
I-106 has brought on a good PD from Columbia, SC - he programmed 104.7 WNOK, and did a pretty good job. I'm sure they'll be hiring some DJs soon.

106.7 sounds like crap out here in Pegram, but I picked them up just fine by around Bowling Green on I-65 driving back home from Chicago yesterday. But I could probably pick up 106.7 just fine on my car radio, even here at home.

 

[CHRles]

The River has a very large following. They're likely bigger with 18-34 year old females than they are with teens, and they also pull in some good numbers with the 25-54 cells due to their morning show.
You're not likely to see a station like Star 97 or V-102.5 pop up again anytime soon for an obvious reason - those stations had very poor ratings. A Hot AC doesn't need to be the number one station in town (though they're among the top cuming stations in markets that have already converted to PPM) but being among the lowest rated FMs is not an option either.

 

[Tibbs4]

I think Q-108's signal has really faded away from south Nashville over the last year. It even
showed in the arbs a while back. I also think it's lost it's focus a bit and the playlist is not as
good as it was.

Some of RQQ's lighter current rock is better than Q-108.

Yeah, it would have been pretty crazy if Crums had had the Rooster to become Y-107. I and Y sound the
same on there anyway. They better fork over the FCC payola to flip the calls to something other than WNFN.
I'd say they will pick any combination from the alphabet other than the letter "I".

 

[firepoint525]

Since nearly every major city has at least one interstate loop bearing a three-digit number, "I-106" sounds like the name of an interstate! ("Major traffic back-up out there on I-106!") ;D Maybe they should just go all the way with this, and have a logo that looks like an interstate sign, you know, the familiar red and blue shield! ;D Of course, then every truck driver coming through would think it is some classic country station playing truck driver songs! ;D After all, this is Nashville!

 

[firepoint525]

You're not likely to see a station like Star 97 or V-102.5 pop up again anytime soon for an obvious reason - those stations had very poor ratings. A Hot AC doesn't need to be the number one station in town (though they're among the top cuming stations in markets that have already converted to PPM) but being among the lowest rated FMs is not an option either.

Those stations haven't exactly burned up the ratings books no matter what format they were programmed with! : And the weak signal of 102.5 has been well-documented, although they come in well out here.

 

[rubberchicken]

http://web.archive.org/web/20011129041320/http://www.wvti.com/

There's one from a few years ago in Grand Rapids, Michigan, where I-96 runs thru the city.
I personally enjoyed the imaging on competitor WSNX
"Construction (i-96), backups (i-96), road kill...so THATS why they call it I-96!"

 

[onetake]

Sad thing this nothing is that unique or interesting, just safe. But at least it's not another classic rock or country station.
Nashville just isn't a stunning radio market these days. About all we can say it "it's better than Chattanooga or Knoxville"

 

[briancraig]

"About all we can say it "it's better than Chattanooga or Knoxville"

But it as not as good as Memphis.

During the 1960s and 1970s, I'm not sure any market could beat Memphis for great radio, but I always thought Nashville had better radio than Memphis during the 1980s and 1990s mainly because they had more signals during that era.

Today, I think Memphis radio is far more interesting than Nashville.

 

[rubberchicken]

From the "Ross On Radio" newsletter that you can sign up for here at the top of the page:

An interesting e-mail from CPR Promotions ninja Paige Nienaber on Friday, Nienaber writes, “The first five hours of a station’s life are the most important. You either debut with a bang or you ease into the traffic on the highway and are quickly lost in the field of cars jockeying for position.

“[KYLD San Francisco]? 90 minutes after launch I was at an ATM near the airport and the people ahead of me in line were talking about it. [WLLD] in Tampa? I returned to the hotel that night and was ambushed by the desk staff asking if I was a part of that new station. [WRDW] Wired in Philly? I was on a flight last year next to someone from Philly. I mentioned how I was involved when it started and she asked, ‘Were you Rocco who locked himself in the studio and played all the new music?’ And when we started Hot in Norfolk with [a fake all-Chinese format], the president of the company walked into a Starbucks there…and they were playing it. Chinese music.

“On the other hand, you can do what Cumulus did in Nashville [last week] with a flip to CHR [at WNFN, now I106.7]. 24 hours later I went to Opry Mills mall and asked about 150 18-34 year-olds, and no one had heard of it,” Nienaber contends.

Just wanted to bring it to everyone's attention in case you missed it.

 

[firepoint525]

Much as I hate to say it, it might be time for the first hispanic FM station in Nashville. Our population is 15.7 % black, and yet two out of the top three stations here are urban, including one that I can't even pick up here in Pegram.

Hispanics make up 4.7% of the population, yet don't have an FM station here. I believe that if one FM station with a relatively weak signal, but one that could be heard in south Nashville, were to go hispanic, they could have respectable ratings. If 106.7 is that station, then that would seem to be the perfect fit for them. But because hispanics are still a relatively small percentage of the overall population, they would need to have only one FM station for now. Two or more stations would slice the (ratings) pie too thinly.