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Could WGST go all-news on an FM?

W

wpb1999

We have figured out by now that WGST is not doing well with their Beck-Rush-Humphries model, so is it possible that they go to an all-news station and simulcast it on a CC FM?

WSB owns talk in this town, WGST does not. I think all news could work.
 
Somebody is going to carry Rush and Beck in this town. Both are syndicated by Premiere, which is owned by CC. CC will see to that, even if it is WGKA 920 (or--gasp!--WSB--see Hannity, Sean--also syndicated by Premiere jointly with, I guess it would be Cumulus now).

But CC is going to take first crack at it with the facilities they have. I think the reason they don't carry Hannity on WGST is because of WGST's PM drive signal in the winter.

I could see WGST going all-news but still keeping Beck and Rush. More likely, CC will bite the bullet and put WGST on a real FM. If THAT happens, WGST will snag back Hannity the first chance they get.

Part of me wonders if all CC is concerned about is having Beck and Rush on the air in ATL to please the national buyers, and mailing in the rest. But if that's the case, why not let Salem or Cox do the heavy lifting with actually putting them on the air (for some additional money to boot).
 
RoddyFreeman said:
If THAT happens, WGST will snag back Hannity the first chance they get.
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Are you sure WSB's contract doesn't include a right of first refusal?
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I don't know the actual terms of the K, but I would imagine that Premiere/CC would have given themselves an out should they decide to carry the show in the future, maybe with some kind of notice period (see the Dave Ramsey-WGST mess; hopefully Premiere is smarter than WGST management).

Now, having said that, there could have been some legacy language in the K from the ABC Radio days that might have imposed that. And I could see Cox demanding that language, although I can't see Premiere/CC (vs. ABC Radio) giving that to them.

secondchoice said:
CC & Cox had the Delilah deal for several years so anything is possible.
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CC didn't (and doesn't) have a direct competitor to B98.5 since Peach/Lite flipped to Bull, which is when Delilah moved to B98.5.

Heck, Cox's Bulldog 103.7 carries (or used to carry) Cumulus's Red Eye Radio overnights, and WGST carries Cumulus's Mark Levin. But Cumulus doesn't have a newstalker in the area.
 
Just remember, WSBB does not reach the western and southwestern burbs well at all. CC has a few FM options on this side of town. I do see an option here. Lots of red meat conservatives in this section of Atlanta metro. The ALL NEWS idea is interesting but I still don't see anything matching up to the heritage WSB. I have some far left wing liberals as friends and they consider WSB the number one stations because of the successful traffic reporting by people who know Atlanta and Mr. Slade.
 
Does CC or Cox have any all News operations? I know CBS and Radio One (the new 20 hour operation in Houston is close to the All News so I will give them the benefit of the doubt) have them. CC & Cox both have talkers, but I just can not recall any of CC's or Cox's All News. I do not think with the labor costs and lack of "experience" either will do all news. Would CC "blow up" 96.1 for all news? NO. CC "officially" (per Rodney Ho) is happy with it's Atlanta Cluster. IMHO Based on the physical size of this market, it would be hard for a "non" downtown C0 or C1 FM to make it in all news. IIRC there are only 8 of them. Supposedly 1010 AM is going to get 25KW at night, If they could get 50KW 24 hour "market covering" signal for less than a couple million bucks in land and equipment etc., signal they could be an "economy" LMA for someone to do all news, based on the cost of an FM C1 in Atlanta.
 
secondchoice said:
Supposedly 1010 AM is going to get 25KW at night, If they could get 50KW 24 hour "market covering" signal for less than a couple million bucks in land and equipment etc., signal they could be an "economy" LMA for someone to do all news, based on the cost of an FM C1 in Atlanta.
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It all depends on what kind of pattern they can do at night, and where the tower array is located. That has been the problem with every other AM in ATL with a directional night signal. The net result tends to be weak to nonexistent signal to the north of the city, particularly to the northeast and northwest, due to tower arrays too close in with strong nulls protecting stations to the northeast and northwest (e.g., WCNN, WQXI, WAOK). If you can't get the northern suburbs (Cobb, north Fulton, Gwinnett), forget it.

My guess is that they could go northwest of town and aim the pattern east-southeastward. In terms of night coverage with a DA signal, WDWD probably has the best location and pattern. See http://www.radio-locator.com/cgi-bin/pat?call=WDWD&service=AM&status=L&hours=N . If you could build an array in, say, north Paulding County or south Bartow or Cherokee, and shoot a similar pattern ESE, you could cover most of the juicy part of the market with a pattern that doesn't let too much signal go northwards.

Question for the technical folks: How feasible is it for multiple AMs to use the same array? I know that tower heights are "tuned" for the frequency being used. I also know that 1690 was using one of the 1420 sticks for a nondirectional signal for a while. If so, someone could build an array that could serve multiple AMs, maybe those clustered around 1010 like 920, 970, 1080, 1160, and 1190 (no, I haven't checked any of these stations for interference), spreading the costs and adding viable AMs to the ATL dial.
 
I can't see all-news on 96.7 only. It'd have to be in conjuction with 105.7 and I don't know if CC is willing to blow up Wild or even commit to an all-news format.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but is Atlanta the only top-ten market without an all-news format?
 
KRLD Dallas is not "all news." Just news all day, 5am-8pm
I dont think Houston has "all news' either. Not sure if the new Radio One News 92 is 24/7 or not.
Remember, all news is VERY expensive to operate. So, unless you are pulling some serious numbers (like NY, Washington, Chicago, etc) it's not likely you will be keeping that format very long.
 
I believe there's only one problem with your theory: WSB owns radio news in Atlanta, too. For a "talk" station, they have one hell of a news department, and their morning block with Scott Slade is one of the highest-rated programs in the market. And, with their affiliations with Channel 2 and the AJC, they have additional resources that WGST really can't match.

When there's breaking news (or severe weather) in Atlanta, everyone turns their radio to WSB. It's a habit borne out of years of ratings dominance, and Cox allocating the resources needed to run a first-class radio news organization. Getting listeners to break that habit would be difficult, if not impossible, as WGST would learn (and as CBS is about to discover in Washington, D.C.). As an all-news FM outlet, I can't see WGST doing much better than they are right now, and I don't think CC would make the investment required for a long-term all-news station.
 
CC IMHO will not go all news with when or if they put WGST on one of their FM signals. They most likely will put the emphasis on the talk part of news talk. I do not have the "money" demo's but just looking at the 6+ and playing with the numbers, I find it hard to believe 96.1 is winning any demo. There might be enough dollars in one of the sub 30 demo's that a second or third would be lucrative, but would Rush on FM bring in more money?

The all news issue in DC is not as clear as a lot of folks make it out to be. The old WTOP AM 1500's (now WFED) signal was really poor in Western part of the market at night:

http://www.radio-locator.com/cgi-bin/pat?call=WFED&service=AM&status=L&hours=N

and not all that great in the west part of the market during the day:

http://www.radio-locator.com/cgi-bin/pat?call=WFED&service=AM&status=L&hours=D

Kind of reminds me of 640's signal. Should be great, but not covering all the market at night.

When a station is #1 for a long time in a competitive market, someone will take a shot at them. How many stations went after parts of V103's audience? If WSB dominates the advertising dollars for a couple of ratings period, somebody will make a run at them with either news talk or all news.
 
You'd think Atlanta would be ripe for an All-News station. With Radio One putting an All-News station on in Houston a few months ago, Atlanta is the only Top 10 market without an All-News station.

But for some reason, All-News does poorly in Sunbelt markets. There is no successful All-News station in any Sunbelt market, with maybe the exception of KNX Los Angeles, which hovers around #9 or #10 in the LA ratings.

CBS clearly knows how to do All-News. Except for Washington and Seattle, all the successful All-News stations are owned by CBS. Yet KRLD 1080 only ranks around #25 in the Dallas market. They don't even try to do All-News 24/7 as most of the other CBS All-News stations do. They run syndicated and paid programming nights and weekends. What's wrong with Dallas? it's a Market #5. KRLD has a great 50,000 watt signal. Yet it always underperforms.

How about other large Sunbelt markets? No All-News station in Miami, San Diego, Phoenix, Tampa, Orlando, San Antonio, New Orleans, Jacksonville or Atlanta. They can all support major league sports teams but not an All-News station. And Houston only got an All-News station a few months ago, so there's no info on how well its being received

With Clear Channel owning the rights to so many of the nationally-syndicated shows that air on WGST, I don't think they'll consider flipping to another format, even though Talk is underperforming.

Gregg
[email protected]
 
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