Danville......

[amfmxm]

Still, the burning questions: Does the Neuhoff cluster basically take nearly every dime of Danville radio ad revenue, nowadays? Is 99.1 a competitive factor? And who will tell the LPFM guys to stop selling ads before they lose their license?

In other words, are any present-day Danville area radio people reading this thread?

Things are so good in Danville that WKZS has petitioned to move to Thomasboro; and it will probably take the FCC to get the LPFM guys attention!

Thomasboro? What--do they have a deathwish? Just what Champaign-Urbana needs: another radio station! They might want to chat with Jim Glassman first and hear how well his cluster is doing.

Danville may not be paradise, but they've got a fraction of Champaign's radio competition and no "local" TV competition. There may be three times the retail sales in C-U, but there's 10 times the competition for the ad dollar. In Champaign, the local advertiser says "Okay, I'm in the News-Gazette, I'm on Channel 3, Channel 15, WDWS, WLRW & WIXY... and underwrite on Channel 12 and WILL-AM/FM. And these guys from WKZS want me to cut which one to make room for them?"

When you subtract those 42,000 students from the population, Chambana ain't that big a town--and the students stopped listening to radio in Junior High School.

 

[radio_radio]

Danville may not be paradise

I met recently with the Mayor of Danville. Of the 33,000 residents 11,000 are section 8. Thomasboro is better, even with all the stations you mentioned as competitors.

The nice thing about a single stick in a market like Champaign/Urbana...it forces you to focus vs. the unfocused world of a cluster of stations. Saga runs good stations. WDWS and it's FM trainwreck sister station are living on both borrowed time and a trust fund (no real urgency). The rest (glassman et. al.) are vulnerable and disorganized.

I think Weatherford is making the right decision.

We fooled around with putting the 102.1 transmitter on the WICD tower 25+ years ago and naming it The Chief...I see someone finally took the idea and ran with it...at least formatically. Back then Champaign was under-radioed. Damn 80-90 drop ins. Ruined radio. Both AM and FM.

 

[amfmxm]

Danville may not be paradise

I met recently with the Mayor of Danville. Of the 33,000 residents 11,000 are section 8. Thomasboro is better, even with all the stations you mentioned as competitors.

The nice thing about a single stick in a market like Champaign/Urbana...it forces you to focus vs. the unfocused world of a cluster of stations. Saga runs good stations. WDWS and it's FM trainwreck sister station are living on both borrowed time and a trust fund (no real urgency). The rest (glassman et. al.) are vulnerable and disorganized.

I think Weatherford is making the right decision.

We fooled around with putting the 102.1 transmitter on the WICD tower 25+ years ago and naming it The Chief...I see someone finally took the idea and ran with it...at least formatically. Back then Champaign was under-radioed. Damn 80-90 drop ins. Ruined radio. Both AM and FM.

There is indeed some wisdom in your single-stick theory. I've got both--a single stick in an otherwise consolidated market, and a dominant cluster in a separate market nearby--and the standalone does very well, though being attacked on 3 or 4 fronts at once is no fun. We've had to be very nimble and flexible with the standalone--constantly making adjustments to avoid getting blasted.

And that would be the risk for Weatherford in entering a market where several of the players are capable of tossing one or two of their lesser FMs against them specifically with the intent of driving them out of biz.

If you're trying to run commercially--that is, selling spots in the conventional sense--and have two FM competitors lined up in the same format (one a little hotter than yours, the other a little softer--younger/older) but running commercial free for a year or two. No jocks, no spots--just music.

This stuff really happens. More often than you'd think.

You sound like an old Danville GM or station owner. Engineer? PD? All of the above?

 

[radio_radio]

You sound like an old Danville GM or station owner. Engineer? PD? All of the above?

Many oif the above. AMFMXM look in your Radio-Info inbox for my contact information. Let's talk one day...and swap Danville stories.

 

[ProVergent Media]

Whatever happened to Tim Drake? Went to SIU with him before I moved to work in Danville at WITY and later for the Suns baseball team.

You must remember Bill Craig, Bent Marlin, Russ Bredholt, Tim Drake? Are you in Indy? I looked at some of your previous posts. We may know each other. I was at WDAN/WDNL or WMBJ from 1976 to 1985 in some fashion or another either part time in the early years 77-80 and full time 80-85.

We should meet for coffee, how do you propose we do that without revealing true identities to the rest of the radio-info world?

 

[amfmxm]

It's always a kick to see "Danville" pop up as a "topic" on this thing.

So, how are things back in the "WITY City?" (Props to the clever SOB who came up with that one, down on Hegeler Lane. No, no one outside the Great 98 building has ever called Danville the "WITY City.)"

Has WKZS finally traded Covington for Champaign? Is WIXY-Too sounding any better in their Country Oldies format? Is the Urban LPFM still selling commercials? Is Fowler Connell still the Sports Editor of the Commercial-News?

What's happening?

 

[rbrown]

It's always a kick to see "Danville" pop up as a "topic" on this thing.

So, how are things back in the "WITY City?" (Props to the clever SOB who came up with that one, down on Hegeler Lane. No, no one outside the Great 98 building has ever called Danville the "WITY City.)"

Has WKZS finally traded Covington for Champaign? Is WIXY-Too sounding any better in their Country Oldies format? Is the Urban LPFM still selling commercials? Is Fowler Connell still the Sports Editor of the Commercial-News?

What's happening?

WKZS has not gone to Champaign yet. Fowler Connell is retired from the Commercial-News and is a commentator during WDAN's sports broadcasts. He also co-hosts DAN's Saturday sports program with Harry Eisenhauer.

 

[umfan]

Is Harry Eisenhauer related to Scott Eisenhauer, the Mayor of Danville who used to be Manager and morning host at WDNL?

I was an avid listener of Scott and Bob Benson on that station in the early 90's.

 

[rbrown]

Is Harry Eisenhauer related to Scott Eisenhauer, the Mayor of Danville who used to be Manager and morning host at WDNL?

I was an avid listener of Scott and Bob Benson on that station in the early 90's.

Harry is Scott's dad. Scott does DHS play-by-play for football and basketball.

 

[umfan]

Well, he's a class act who has been quite an asset to that community. I wish GM had never pulled out. Danville was a great place to live.