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Hammond lands at the Q

Good move on Journal's part. I think Stage One is in play, hire away a WIVK Veteran PD/Operations Manager. Stage Two. Switch 93.1 over to Star in around one year. Stage Three. Put the Q on 102.1 and watch the blood pressure of Cumulus Knoxville Cluster bigwigs as the sucking sound of No.1 Arbitron ratings become Journal or South Central Media's. Put on your seat belts gentlemen, we are about to have competition in the once quiet and staid Knoxville market. Gonna be a wild ride.
 
Watching this could be fascinating. There are a LOT of variables in this new equation. If you're Star, do you give up something profitable to risk it for a run at the frog? How much money do you give up in the transition? Mike had substantial influence at Old Kingston Pike. On Amherst, he's the PD of the lowest rated FM in the building, and he has to answer to an OM and a GM.

And Mike was THE guy who made frog sound the way it did. If he uses what he knows at The Q, will it come off as a copy of WIVK? And which would you rather listen to... WIVK or the station that wants to be WIVK? I'd love it if they played George Jones, but then they'd just be perceived as trying to be Merle. And most of their listeners are under 30. How do they attract and keep the 45 year olds?

If he can come up with a winning strategy, he'll be a super hero. If he makes one mis-step, he winds up in the same category as Ed Brantley.
 
With the present format, Star will do no better than Third Place in the Knoxville Market. South Central's B 97.5 will be good for at least Second Place reliably. Like I have said earlier, Star's youth based format is not in the Money demographic. Q on a good stick has superior odds of becoming a Money demo favorite and being real competitive. With Mike Hammond at the PD slot, Q can be WIVK's nemesis on that superior stick. You can't have a Top Knoxville market CHR without being a Gold Based Listen At Work station, B is, Star is the youth CHR.
 
Can 93.1 upgrade now that 92.9 Newport is gone?

On the demo issue, 18-34 is the desired advertiser demo now. 25-54 ruled when the Baby Boomers were in that demographic, but now that they have aged out of it, advertisers would rather spend the money on the more impressionable younger demo. I'm talking about national advertising by the way. I'm not sure if more local Knoxville ad dollars go 25-54, but if they do, then obviously that demographic still has some importance here.
 
I'm sort of surprised Pirkle didn't make a run for Hammond after he left the Frog Pond. Surely he's got to concede the whole NewsTalk thing on 100.3 has been a disaster. We all know 100.3 has the watts to go after the Frog with Country. In fact, if had been Pirkel, I would have gone Country the moment I took over 100.3 two years ago.
 
Kent T said:
With the present format, Star will do no better than Third Place in the Knoxville Market. South Central's B 97.5 will be good for at least Second Place reliably. Like I have said earlier, Star's youth based format is not in the Money demographic. Q on a good stick has superior odds of becoming a Money demo favorite and being real competitive. With Mike Hammond at the PD slot, Q can be WIVK's nemesis on that superior stick. You can't have a Top Knoxville market CHR without being a Gold Based Listen At Work station, B is, Star is the youth CHR.
Click to expand...

Let's be realistic. Even with Cumulus gutting the Frog, another full-market country station will never be any better than second. Simply put, the Frog isn't going to rock bottom, even if it loses audience share. Getting enough of that share to not only vault over the Frog but also B-97.5 just isn't likely. Getting a second country station to rank any better than third, let alone second, is going to take a long time, even with Hammond running the show at Journal's country station.

So, the question becomes whether it's worth the risk to move Star to a lower power station. From one standpoint, the potential 25-54 numbers a country station could pull in are very attractive. From the other, 93-Q has been flat since it signed on, and it was well-programmed under Paul Orr. Yeah, the signal's average, but Star got roughly double the ratings 93-Q's been getting when it was on 93.1 Star's a known quantity, and it used to pull in better 25-54 female numbers than you might think. After all, 70% of 18-34 listeners are also in the 25-54 demo. I can't tell you how it does today, but it seems like it's doing well enough for Journal as they've only made minimal changes to the station. Does the benefit of having a bigger signal to attract potential country listeners outweigh the risk of moving your existing cash cow to a lesser stick? I don't know. We can armchair quarterback it all we want, but I don't think any of us can effectively decide it as it's not our money.
 
Kent said:
We can armchair quarterback it all we want, but I don't think any of us can effectively decide it as it's not our money.
Click to expand...

Ahem.... Mr Kent T. (if that's your real name) this, sir, IS the forum for self-appointed media experts. If you continue with this particular line of logic, we will request that you tell us what you do with YOUR money so that we may inform you of what WE would do with it.
 
Yes, this could get interesting. Moving country to 102.1 came to my mind as well, but is that really worth the risk? CHR is an incredibly strong format across the nation at the moment, and is pulling not only the traditional 18-34 demo, but is also doing better than ever with the 30/40 something's.
Also, if Journal did do this, they are opening the door to losing their CHR dominance. If Star moves to a weaker signal, you can bet money someone else will flip & go after it (hmmm hmmm, Pirkle...100.3). If Star moves from 102.1, Pirkle could go back to 100.3's former CHR format & completely own that demo (it would be an even better prospect for him than being the 2nd country station if he'd chosen to go after WIVK).

So yeah, it could get very interesting in Knoxville. Also, not mentioned yet, but why did Hammond's son Jack Ryan go to Merle & his dad to Q? Kinda odd that they'd choose to compete. Maybe Journal could buy Merle & do both new & classic country to attack on both ends. Just a possibility. Journal isn't at their ownership cap and I think locally owned signals like 96.7 & 106.1 could eventually be scooped up by someone else.
 
BRH is right about the viability of CHR as he stated here and on the other thread. Therefore it would be a mistake to take Star back to an inferior signal. I think a great solution would be for Journal to strike a deal with Johnny to either buy or lease 100.3 and create Q100. Then take 93.1 to classic hits so it can shave a few ratings points off of B97.5.
 
CHR is a good viable format. But the East TN market is not a hip hop/rhythmic past the young adult demos. We're a more conservative CHR market. So, that is why B 97.5 will continue to be the higher rated CHR for at least a few more years. Eventually the current younger based Star 102.1 more energetic CHR will filter up to the older demo. I love Journal as a company, well engineered and good air talent and PD staff, and corporate doesn't micromanage them so they tend to be a more responsive, nimble company. East Tennessee is the quintessential Country market as the dominant format though.
 
Streamed the Q today

And the promos Hammond is airing are hilarious... "Corporate Man".. etc. and his personal announcements about the Chesney show in Nashville in Sept. and the request to listeners/artists for new music are clearly directed at the new regime at the former DBC stations. Apparently Hammond has an upper hand on the tix situation and he's exploiting it.
 
Re: Streamed the Q today

Enigma said:
And the promos Hammond is airing are hilarious... "Corporate Man".. etc. and his personal announcements about the Chesney show in Nashville in Sept. and the request to listeners/artists for new music are clearly directed at the new regime at the former DBC stations. Apparently Hammond has an upper hand on the tix situation and he's exploiting it.
Click to expand...

So "Corporate Man" is supposedly a Cumulus suit? So they got rid of him? Problem solved, WIVK is still playing what it wants? Or is Corporate Man a Journal suit that they don't listen to?

So far they've freshened up their rhetoric and added some twang to their imaging.
 
Great, the station imaging has gone to crap, and Q doesn't sound nearly as slick anymore. I knew this would happen when they hired Hammond. I always thought 'IVK sounded sloppy and "old school" under him. (at least Cumulus has improved 'IVK's imaging & sound since taking over).
Anyway, I loved Q93 under Paul Orr because I prefer a young country format with all new music, and CHR style jingles & sweepers. Looks like Hammond is set to demolish that. I don't know why. The only chance Q has is to go for the younger end with a music intensive type format. On that signal, they cannot go head to head with 'IVK for an older audience. If I was Journal, I would've saved the big price tag of paying Hammond and let Rich Bailey & Journal corporate program Q as a music intensive, voice tracked, young leaning country format. Hiring Hammond & more jocks is a waste of cash unless they do intend to move Q to a larger signal. (Man, I hope not. If they bump CHR for being the 2nd country outlet in town, they're nuts).
 
Really? Really?? Q's imaging was STALE months ago before Mike Hammond arrived. At least he's changed it up. You can only beat the less-commercials in-your-face drum so much before even THAT becomes unlistenable. I'm not a regular Q listener, but the new voiceover guy at least sounds more affirmative.

With that said, WIVK's new voiceover guy sounds better these days versus the one they had a few months ago.

BTW, Paul who? That's not to slight the man....praise be I suppose to anyone who can go from being an unknown in market 72 to running a former legendary stick in Birmingham. My how radio has chaaaaaanggged
 
I have to agree with BRH, I much preferred the CHR sound and new country of the Q better than what they seem to be transitioning to now. If I wanted to listen to WIVK I would choose WIVK. I liked the Q better.

Star started on 93. I still have a Star 93 t-shirt so I don't believe moving back would be beneficial to them for several reasons. Of course, if they did, that would leave an opportunity for I-100 to return... continuous hope on that front...
 
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