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CBS moves all news to FM?

F

FLjack2

So what if CBS decided to move one their all-newsers to FM. Which would it be? WINS or WCBS? Both do well in their own ways/demos, etc. So how would they decide?

More importantly, wouldn't that final decision put a nail in the coffin of the other station? (Okay, not really a nail. More like a splinter right now, but over time it would get worse.) It would show the company supports one over the other.

Thoughts?
 
Well WCBS and WINS could go the HD route that KNX 1070 did they put KNX on HD-3 of KTWV or they can follow KCBS 740 and put it on analog FM. But they should buy 94.7 FM and put WCBS News there. a second route is for CBS to sell WINS and get Cumulus to buy it and put it on the HD-2 or HD3 of WPLJ. But that is all dead end thinking based on other markets.
 
Please, no. WCBS has many, many faithful listeners outside the metro because of its monster signal. I'm two hours away in northwest CT and it's one of my presets. If WCBS went to FM and stopped broadcasting on AM not only would I lose the news, but the Yankees would also go away because no station up here carries their games. Yes, I realize that "distant listening" doesn't add to the bottom line.
 
WCBS is already on 101.1 HD3 and WINS is on 102.7 HD3. The problem is that there are just too few HD radios out there and the range of HD3 stations is limited. You can pick up either one of them on internet radio wherever you are.

Bruce
 
They have no reason to blow up any of their FM properties in NYC to simulcast all news. 880 and 1010 both make a boatload of cash, and don't have any ratings issues (the blip this past month on 880 will be an anomaly I'm sure).

What would they do? Blow up CBS-FM? Nope. We all saw how Jack worked out when they did that. People would again be throwing bricks at CBS. And it makes money.

Blow up Fresh?? Nope. That makes money too, and is a cheap format as far as having not having mega-buck talent and 2 or 3 people on the air at the same time.

92.3 now? I don't think so. Every month this station ticks up another tenth of a point in the 6+... without seeing the 18-34 numbers, I couldn't tell you how it does there. I would imagine fairly well, and it bills solid. I think the Nick Cannon thing was a dumb idea, to take a non-radio person and throw them into market #1, but the station is still doing well.

The question becomes: Can they make enough in increased billing to offset the loss of billing from nuking one of their FM properties? In NYC, I don't see this as the case. CBS has 6 well performing stations.

"FM-News 101.9" isn't a serious threat to either all news station. Or to WALK, WKJY, WBLI or even WEPN as far as overall audience goes. They have cleaned up their act quite a bit, but time will tell whether there is an audience for a third all news station when there are two of the best ones in the country here already.

I think Mr. Michaels over-estimated the NY audience's willingness to give up their all news favorite on AM for another lesser competitor on FM. A local NYC based news/talk would have been a much better route to go... pick the ripe fruit from WABC and WOR by focusing on NYC--market #1. It still amazes me that I can't turn on the radio most times and hear tri-state area centric talk. Lesser markets have much better talk radio.
 
Bud_Wilkinson said:
Please, no. WCBS has many, many faithful listeners outside the metro because of its monster signal. I'm two hours away in northwest CT and it's one of my presets.
Click to expand...

You don't matter to WCBS's advertisers.
 
WNTIRadio said:
I think Mr. Michaels over-estimated the NY audience's willingness to give up their all news favorite on AM for another lesser competitor on FM. A local NYC based news/talk would have been a much better route to go... pick the ripe fruit from WABC and WOR by focusing on NYC--market #1. It still amazes me that I can't turn on the radio most times and hear tri-state area centric talk. Lesser markets have much better talk radio.
Click to expand...

It amazes me too, but I suspect the reason is that making that investment is too big a decision, given other alternatives. I was wondering, with the recent format change of KGO, which wasn't entirely Bay Area-focused talk but was at least local, what other large markets have locally-produced or locally-focused talk stations?
 
icybluelake said:
WNTIRadio said:
I think Mr. Michaels over-estimated the NY audience's willingness to give up their all news favorite on AM for another lesser competitor on FM. A local NYC based news/talk would have been a much better route to go... pick the ripe fruit from WABC and WOR by focusing on NYC--market #1. It still amazes me that I can't turn on the radio most times and hear tri-state area centric talk. Lesser markets have much better talk radio.
Click to expand...

It amazes me too, but I suspect the reason is that making that investment is too big a decision, given other alternatives. I was wondering, with the recent format change of KGO, which wasn't entirely Bay Area-focused talk but was at least local, what other large markets have locally-produced or locally-focused talk stations?
Click to expand...

Boston, with WBZ (news by day, talk by night) and WTKK.
 
Don't forget WRKO and WXKS as well, so that makes 3 talkers in Boston. WBZ is quasi-talk. All news plus talk at night, so I don't consider it a true "news/talk" station. It's more like "mostly news, with a sprinkling of talk". But, all 3 full time talkers have LOCAL drive time shows. WRKO is local during the day except for Laura Ingraham in mid mornings. WTKK is local weekdays except for Smerconish 12-3. WXKS is local drive times.

In NY, your options are Gov. Patterson (zzzzzzzz) and Curtis Sliwa shift #2 from 5-7 on 970 if you want local talk. In a metro with 14 million people, there's barely any local talk. In the morning you have Gambling and Curtis Sliwa, and... um... and... well, that's it. So your options are Curtis Sliwa and two other people for drive time local talk in NYC. And Curtis is on a station with no listeners, so who even knows he's there?

I seriously think a real FM talk station (NOT hot talk, i.e. titties and beer talk) that is NYC centric could kick the crap out of WABC and WOR. Rush is Rush and has his audience... but something focused on NYC issues up against Joan Hamburg?! On FM? How can that even be a contest.
 
WNTIRadio said:
A local NYC based news/talk would have been a much better route to go... pick the ripe fruit from WABC and WOR by focusing on NYC--market #1. It still amazes me that I can't turn on the radio most times and hear tri-state area centric talk. Lesser markets have much better talk radio.
Click to expand...

I think advertisers thought 101.9 would be a local NYC based news/talk. Such a station on FM would seriously impact WABC and WOR. I agree that lesser markets have far superior talk radio than NYC. That's disgraceful! :mad:
 
CTListener said:
icybluelake said:
WNTIRadio said:
I think Mr. Michaels over-estimated the NY audience's willingness to give up their all news favorite on AM for another lesser competitor on FM. A local NYC based news/talk would have been a much better route to go... pick the ripe fruit from WABC and WOR by focusing on NYC--market #1. It still amazes me that I can't turn on the radio most times and hear tri-state area centric talk. Lesser markets have much better talk radio.
Click to expand...

It amazes me too, but I suspect the reason is that making that investment is too big a decision, given other alternatives. I was wondering, with the recent format change of KGO, which wasn't entirely Bay Area-focused talk but was at least local, what other large markets have locally-produced or locally-focused talk stations?
Click to expand...

Boston, with WBZ (news by day, talk by night) and WTKK.
Click to expand...

Don't forget WTIC Hartford with local talk AM and PM drive.
 
CTListener said:
Bud_Wilkinson said:
Please, no. WCBS has many, many faithful listeners outside the metro because of its monster signal. I'm two hours away in northwest CT and it's one of my presets.
Click to expand...

You don't matter to WCBS's advertisers.
Click to expand...

Yes, you do matter. We have advertisers in CT. Thank you for listening!
 
WNTIRadio said:
They have no reason to blow up any of their FM properties in NYC to simulcast all news. 880 and 1010 both make a boatload of cash, and don't have any ratings issues (the blip this past month on 880 will be an anomaly I'm sure).

What would they do? Blow up CBS-FM? Nope. We all saw how Jack worked out when they did that. People would again be throwing bricks at CBS. And it makes money.

Blow up Fresh?? Nope. That makes money too, and is a cheap format as far as having not having mega-buck talent and 2 or 3 people on the air at the same time.

92.3 now? I don't think so. Every month this station ticks up another tenth of a point in the 6+... without seeing the 18-34 numbers, I couldn't tell you how it does there. I would imagine fairly well, and it bills solid. I think the Nick Cannon thing was a dumb idea, to take a non-radio person and throw them into market #1, but the station is still doing well.

The question becomes: Can they make enough in increased billing to offset the loss of billing from nuking one of their FM properties? In NYC, I don't see this as the case. CBS has 6 well performing stations.

"FM-News 101.9" isn't a serious threat to either all news station. Or to WALK, WKJY, WBLI or even WEPN as far as overall audience goes. They have cleaned up their act quite a bit, but time will tell whether there is an audience for a third all news station when there are two of the best ones in the country here already.

I think Mr. Michaels over-estimated the NY audience's willingness to give up their all news favorite on AM for another lesser competitor on FM. A local NYC based news/talk would have been a much better route to go... pick the ripe fruit from WABC and WOR by focusing on NYC--market #1. It still amazes me that I can't turn on the radio most times and hear tri-state area centric talk. Lesser markets have much better talk radio.
Click to expand...

I could not agree more! I have to continually remind myself, it's not about ratings. It's about billing. :)
 
Good point from Tom Taylor today: with the purchase of WLNY, CBS is at current FCC ownership limits, with 2 TV, 3 AM, and 3 FM. Without a change in the ownership limits or a waiver, CBS would not be able to buy another FM property if one were to become available.
 
icybluelake said:
WNTIRadio said:
I think Mr. Michaels over-estimated the NY audience's willingness to give up their all news favorite on AM for another lesser competitor on FM. A local NYC based news/talk would have been a much better route to go... pick the ripe fruit from WABC and WOR by focusing on NYC--market #1. It still amazes me that I can't turn on the radio most times and hear tri-state area centric talk. Lesser markets have much better talk radio.
Click to expand...

It amazes me too, but I suspect the reason is that making that investment is too big a decision, given other alternatives. I was wondering, with the recent format change of KGO, which wasn't entirely Bay Area-focused talk but was at least local, what other large markets have locally-produced or locally-focused talk stations?
Click to expand...

Chicago's WGN/720 is live-and-local 24/7. So is WLW/700 in Cincinnati.

And KMOX/1120 St. Louis and WCCO/830 Minneapolis are live-and-local throughout much of the day... KMOX does carry Rush, while both KMOX and WCCO share CBS' in-house overnight show with Jon Grayson (which ALSO bombed on WBZ after it replaced overnight legend Steve LeVeille, who was brought back to 'BZ less than a month later).

Most recently, WBAL/1090 Baltimore has been going more local throughout the day, taking more of the classic KGO model... news intensive throughout morning and afternoon drive, and local talk in the middays and evenings.
 
reelyreal said:
With the purchase of WLNY (Channel 55), CBS is at current FCC ownership limits, with 2 TV, 3 AM, and 3 FM. Without a change in the ownership limits or a waiver, CBS would not be able to buy another FM property if one were to become available.
Click to expand...

I would love to see Clear Channel take advantage of CBS' maxed-out ownership and blow up one of their FM's for an FM news/talk station, wouldn't you? Alas, CC is in a good position right now with all five of their FM's.
 
Let's go through this again, this time with CC. Which station would they blow up?

- Z-100: Not going to happen! The station makes a ton of money and is consistently in the top 3 ratings wise.

- WKTU: Currently the #4 station. Bills great. It's staying put.

- Q-104: Bills great in the money demo and has great numbers 25-54. Also #5, right behind #'s 3 and 4 listed above. They're not touching this one.

- WWPR: Maybe. A long shot maybe. Not at the top like it used to be, but still gets decent numbers. Don't know what the billing is on this one.

- Lite: In a Bizarro world, that's about the only place this would get a format flip. #1 for the past decade plus, makes TONS of money and is pretty cheap to run. No high priced morning show here either. Just ratings and billing rolling in, quarter after quarter.

Again, follow the money more than the ratings. All of these stations are profitable. And ratings wise, all in the top 10, with 4 in the top 5. So I don't think CC is in a good position to rock their boat and take on an expensive format that takes time to build.
 
At this point, it would behoove CC to get an AM blowtorch just to get a foothold in the news/talk format in New York. Then, as soon as one of the five FM stations tanks (and it will happen at some point) they'll transfer the AM news/talk format to FM.
 
DToTheJ said:
At this point, it would behoove CC to get an AM blowtorch just to get a foothold in the news/talk format in New York. Then, as soon as one of the five FM stations tanks (and it will happen at some point) they'll transfer the AM news/talk format to FM.
Click to expand...

I think CC was interested in purchasing WOR but Buckley refused to sell. Too bad! Perhaps CC could've made WOR into a New York version of KFI. :)
 
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