Those formats exist in markets where there are enough stations and enough advertisers to support them. But if we're looking at a future where companies have to cut back and do national formats, they won't be able to do all the sub-formats. As we know, all-news is only viable in a handful of places. All-sports is only viable where there are enough sports teams to make sense. During the pandemic, we're seeing that Hot AC and a few other AC formats are vulnerable. And of course the various Hispanic formats are only viable where there's a large Hispanic population, which leaves out most of the northwest. We're all noticing the music is starting to homogenize, so moving forward, we may not have as much hit music to fill the sub-formats as we used to. We're certainly seeing a contraction in the number of commercial FMs in major markets. The question is how will radio listeners in those markets respond.
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Entercom Changes in Seattle
- Thread starter TheBigA
- Start date
Those formats exist in markets where there are enough stations and enough advertisers to support them. But if we're looking at a future where companies have to cut back and do national formats, they won't be able to do all the sub-formats. As we know, all-news is only viable in a handful of places. All-sports is only viable where there are enough sports teams to make sense. During the pandemic, we're seeing that Hot AC and a few other AC formats are vulnerable. And of course the various Hispanic formats are only viable where there's a large Hispanic population, which leaves out most of the northwest. We're all noticing the music is starting to homogenize, so moving forward, we may not have as much hit music to fill the sub-formats as we used to. We're certainly seeing a contraction in the number of commercial FMs in major markets. The question is how will radio listeners in those markets respond.
I'm not sure if your remarks are directly applicable to the Seattle market. Bustos Media owns a handful of Spanish radio stations in the area, and I would hardly classify 99.3 and 102.9 as being unviable portfolio assets. To be fair, I think everyone can agree that these stations are not likely to be top performers in the ratings, but 99.3 surely has a loyal listener base, especially when you consider that its been on the air since 2005. On the topic of all-sports programming, isn't it true that many of these stations remain very profitable without any local sports coverage? In Seattle, KJR 950 airs very little local play-by-play content, but they continue to do well with advertisers. I can't recall the thread or member, but someone else mentioned on this board that all-sports content is the perfect embodiment of "guy talk" on terrestrial radio. I fully agree with your commentary on the direction of music. Even the casual listener can probably recognize that many musical genres are beginning to blend.
If the above example was just a one-off, I'd probably let it go, but on the iHeart stations, you can very clearly tell when they're not local, because they don't even make the effort to blend in with the local clock. You will hear much more content from DJs when they are local. Three examples:
1. I was listening to KFOO from Spokane online just after the cuts came down, and the DJ on promoted an expanded tour from Rage Against the Machine. Usually in that case, the jock will direct listeners to the station's website, but in this case she directed listeners to the website of the band.
2. I was on the bus going over to Redmond a week or so later listening to KUBE. I don't even remember what was said, but it was a very quick in and out break, not something a local jock would do.
3. The example cited in my first post happened on Saturday on K103. I would probably let that one go ordinarily, but with iHeart only running two mic breaks per music set, they should be maximizing them and making sure that the listeners are getting original content.
Re: music. Yes, genres are blending, which could cause format problems, I already feel like that's happening with AAA. The problem radio is having is something Shawn Ross talks about almost every time he writes about CHR, and that is that radio is adopting new music at glacial speed in the world of streaming. BTS is a good example. I first heard about them when I was browsing the iTunes charts maybe a year ago, where they had several songs in the top 50. Apparently, one of their songs made it to like #27, but I never heard it. I hadn't heard anything from BTS until a couple weeks ago, when Live 95.5 played Dynamite, which they must already have in power.
I can give you similar examples from local DJs. It's not a function of where they are. It's the format, daypart, and talent (or lack of) from the DJ.
There are a lot of bad DJs. It doesn't matter where they are. People are paying money to hear radio with no local DJs. That doesn't encourage companies to keep them.
Scott Roddy in Portland will oversee The Wolf in Seattle. Leslie Scott at KNDD is regional PD for alternative:
http://www.insideradio.com/free/pro...cle_78c9ce66-f6be-11ea-a1a5-c771f4b3fcd1.html
http://www.insideradio.com/free/pro...cle_78c9ce66-f6be-11ea-a1a5-c771f4b3fcd1.html
Big companies like iHeart and Entercom overpaid for vast portfolios of radio stations that they cannot manage. I do not think they will ever emerge profitable on the other side of this radio recession. More likely, they will have to sell the stations one-by-one at discounted prices. Perhaps the prices will be so low that smaller enterprises will be able to afford them again and we will see a gradual return to local or regional ownership of radio stations.
In Seattle there are duplicates of many formats. Two classic rockers, for example, two alternative stations (a commercial one and a non-commercial one that gets ratings), three varieties of pop, at least two stations that play AC, two country stations, two news stations on FM (an all news and a new-talker), two rhythmic stations (one of them classic), and even two NPRs. And now, since a few months ago, we have two Hispanic stations as well. And all of this doesn't include fringe FMs and college stations, as well as HD channels available. The handful of religious stations aside, Seattle area listeners have multiple choices for the music or other programming they want to hear.
So how are several religious broadcasters having a negative impact on the dial? As for intended purpose of the public airwaves, there's been religious radio probably since the birth of radio. At least as far back as the 1930's. That's 90 years if there wasn't religious radio before then.
The only 'trouble' for radio appears to be revenue, and no regulation can fix that. The religious networks, as pointed out already, are listener-funded for the most part.
Hahaha. I read this from dreamers all the time. Prices go low, and EMF or some other religious broadcaster comes in and buys them. Just last week, a group of stations was sold from the Ocean Trust. Did you put in a bid? It's all wishful thinking, that some local company will buy radio stations, hire a full staff of local DJs and play great music with large playlists. It never happens. Unless YOU do it, no one else will. Anyone who has some extra money isn't going buy radio stations. They're going to buy Amazon stock. Which some might view as overpriced.
I competed against Leslie Scott in one of her first radio jobs. One of the few bright sides of these changes at Entercom is that a few good people got rewarded. She’s definitely one of the good ones.
Quite true. To Entercom's credit, many times before the January cuts, I couldn't tell at all whether a station was tracked from out of market or not, I knew that because I follow the industry. As for revenue concerns, this brings up an interesting question. Does overall market revenue increase if a station is serving an audience that has never been served before? Here in Portland, the first couple of stations that moved in took formats that hadn't been done before, Contemporary Christian and Spanish. K-Love has been here for years, but that wouldn't take any revenue away from commercial operators. It's only recently that it seems there's an overkill of Christian radio down here, and there's still only the one commercial station.
Now we know. RadioInsight.com reports:
KSON San Diego afternoon host Kimo Jensen has been teamed with former “95.1 K-Frog” KFRG Riverside CA midday host Heather Froglear. The duo will air on those two stations plus 107.9 KMLE Phoenix, “99.5 The Wolf” KWJJ Portland, and “100.7 The Wolf” KKWF Seattle.
You're absolutely correct, revenue is the biggest issue impacting radio, and K-LOVE certainly isn't going to have a negative impact on that. My frustration with K-LOVE stems from the lost positions that result when major stations (like WPLJ in New York City) are sold off, leaving all of their employees high and dry. Unfortunately, sudden job losses are a sad reality of the radio business (and have been for many years).
Advertisers don't buy formats specifically; if they buy radio, they buy an audience group that they believe would patronize their business or buy their product or service.
An advertisers does not abstain from promotion because there is no station with a particular format. They simply buy the stations that offer their kind of listener.
Advertisers, in fact, may even buy without being familiar with the format. For example, when KLVE in LA shot to #1 in the market in 1995, we'd get many buys that sent English copy or produced spots. We'd call back and say that we'd be glad to translate and produce material in Spanish; some would cancel (very few) and others would either have their creative department do Spanish material or they would green light our local production.
Of course, there may be local direct accounts where the owner buys the station or stations they like. That's not always the station that reaches the most potential clients, but buys like that happen a lot, particularly in smaller markets.
On the other hand, K-Love figured out that they could do a national network across a half dozen time zones with no problem. They have been doing that for decades, and commercial radio has yet to fully realize that for most music formats, a national approach may be an ideal solution for declining revenue while, at the same time, being the best way to maximize streaming.
Operationally speaking; EMF really has it down. They literally have a warehouse full of pre-built racks of equipment each wrapped in plastic and sitting on a pallet. Right after closing, they call their shipping company to deliver the rack to the station or transmitter site. It's literally plug and play. They can control the transmitter, monitor and run EAS, switch program feeds, and monitor the station back at their NOC. All the legacy studio or other gear is scrapped, sold, or donated.
Brilliant.
Before the virus, I was working on a project to build a new FM network in a South American nation. The project was to assemble several kinds of kits in the home city for different power levels. Each month, a half dozen or so additions to the network will be added until there are about 65, covering about 85% of the population of the country.
The kits have a transmitter at the appropriate power level, and a rack with all the other gear along with a satellite disk and reels of cable, wire, etc. If not on a downtown building, a local contractor puts up a building, and a tower crew builds a structure for the antenna. The engineering crew comes in, connects and tests and puts it on the air.
If appropriate, the local station is fed directly to local alternative distribution systems, including cable TV and ISPs.
The difficulty with having several religious broadcasters dominating a radio band is it makes it less of an option for the secular masses. It hasn't worked very well for AM. And not everyone is going to jump into the baptismal pool. You can't force them there either. That's just the way it is.
And while I've heard "But look! We have Christian Rock, Christian Alternative, Christian Oldies, Christian Top 40, Christian Country, Christian Hip-Hop, Christian Classic Hits, etc" First, most people don't want to live in a ready-made bubble of unfamiliar music. And if that's where radio goes, it will lose the majority of it's listeners. That's all.
There has to be limits to that. Or local radio, being the universal, free (i.e. "people's") medium it traditionally is will essentially become a state-sponsored mouthpiece of organized religion. And that's terrifying. Because in spite of every intention, theocracies of all kinds really suck.
But to TheBigA's solution; "BUY A STATION!"
Dude, look around you. Everyone is BROKE right now. 20% of the nation is unemployed. Everyone is going out of business. There is a national rent moratorium. We're all barely just swinging limb to limb here. Everyone's savings have been wiped out or seriously depleted (gets that way when there has to be a national rent moratorium and gov't stimulus to just keep existing businesses going.)
KNKX and KEXP's buyers came in at the right time, the economy was rebounding, there was more cash. Life was different. This is not the right time, even in spite of the tumbling station prices tragically. The outlook is still very grim. It's going to take a few years to recover. And that's with a COVID vaccine, which we don't even have yet.
So if you're looking to the middle class for a quick, happy solution to this problem, you're honestly looking at the wrong people right now. And if things continue the way they are at this rate, we're all going to need a bailout.
And one more thing; If it's just the Jesuscasters that alarm y'all, imagine Radio Sputnik coast to coast.
It's now possible for foreign interests to own 100% of any US radio station. And how the hell are the rest of us going to compete with that too?
I mean, what's the point of fighting uphill in an avalanche of blood, sweat and tears to barely raise a million to buy the cheapest station when SERGEI over there can just plop down $10 million right now, right there, of Putin's pocket fluff for that same station?
And everybody here knows money doesn't talk in this business. It SCREAMS.
Bongwater quite eloquently summed up my thoughts on this topic. Obviously, there is plenty of room for debate on this subject, and nobody should ever write-off a format just because they don't like it. However, I still view these changes to our media landscape as being potentially problematic for the following reasons:
1. K-LOVE moving in to big markets across the country is taking away jobs. Of course, one could argue (and would probably be correct) that many of these jobs would have gone away with the pandemic anyway, but I still see this as being a bad thing for the radio industry as a whole. The broadcasting industry is changing whether we like it or not, and that is a fact, but the it seems like the K-LOVE (with pre-built equipment racks being shipped when a sale is made for plug and play use) is rapidly becoming a Walmart of radio. If the industry is going to change, what does this mean for the future? It does seem like national feeds are the way of the post-COVID industry, and I think it's worth it to have a conversation about how that will realistically look.
2. It sets precedent for other outlets. While all of know that there is nothing even remotely objectionable on a K-LOVE broadcast, who is to say that other outlets won't use this model to their advantage. Bongwater is correct in the sense that any group with the financial capability could technically start a national service if they were inclined to do so. This could potentially be something that we want to consider more carefully before we allow this to be the business model for ANY service with the resources to set up a network.
1. K-LOVE moving in to big markets across the country is taking away jobs. Of course, one could argue (and would probably be correct) that many of these jobs would have gone away with the pandemic anyway, but I still see this as being a bad thing for the radio industry as a whole. The broadcasting industry is changing whether we like it or not, and that is a fact, but the it seems like the K-LOVE (with pre-built equipment racks being shipped when a sale is made for plug and play use) is rapidly becoming a Walmart of radio. If the industry is going to change, what does this mean for the future? It does seem like national feeds are the way of the post-COVID industry, and I think it's worth it to have a conversation about how that will realistically look.
2. It sets precedent for other outlets. While all of know that there is nothing even remotely objectionable on a K-LOVE broadcast, who is to say that other outlets won't use this model to their advantage. Bongwater is correct in the sense that any group with the financial capability could technically start a national service if they were inclined to do so. This could potentially be something that we want to consider more carefully before we allow this to be the business model for ANY service with the resources to set up a network.
As has been discussed, the radio industry is evolving. A major portion of that evolution is cutting the number of FTE's needed to run any size market of station. Much of this has been accomplished through automation and low cost Internet-based audio transfer technologies. Add in the Commission doing away with a local studio requirement and the pandemic, and not only do you need less employees, but the few you have can work from home.
For many years religious broadcasters have relied on a national footprint, not local. Sort of like Internet-based businesses; reach is everything for religious broadcasters. Same content, geographically spread out over many markets.
A couple years ago when my wife and I were driving through Italy from top to toe, I found the same Italian Classic Rock station/format everywhere I drove with no interruption or having to change frequencies. To me as a listener, it was totally seamless. Each of the stations were running their version of RDS (RBDS) which had the ability to force-tune the radio to the next station it found with the same format. If I were you setting up a network of FM's or translators with the same format in South America, I'd totally explore that option. RDS will do the same thing, but here in the States, you're only allowed to force-tune radio's in the event of emergency.
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