I can only imagine the marginal cost of running alternative on KVIL is pennies compared to what Entercom/Audacy used to spend prior to the flip. The only reason radio exists, save for public broadcasting, is selling ads. And let's face it, as an advertising-vehicle, radio was circling the drain even before COVID was a thing. Even the strongest ratings now yield mere fractions of the advertising dollars they used to. So as revenues drop, costs must also decrease. The fallacy that several folks on this thread seem to be doing is comparing KVIL's ratings to stations where iHeart spends many multitudes more than Audacy spends on KVIL. The ratings for KVIL might not look like much, but if it can help sell nationwide ads for Popeye's chicken out of a consolidated New York City sales office then the format isn't going anywhere. Especially not when the "alternative" to alternative is an expensive staff-heavy station that would involve tons of customization.
Having said that, I will never understand why they tweaked the format since the launch of alternative. When the format launched, it was a very female-friendly / almost "Alternative AC" format that harkened back to the days of Modern AC. There was more AAA and acoustic rock like Flora Cash "You're Someone Else", even some pop/EDM sprinkled in between songs such as Mr. Probz "Waves". It was a fun, current-leaning format. The unknown-to-me female voiceovers and liners were a great match.
Then, a little over a year ago, Audacy abandoned everything that made the station an earlier success and went the other direction, to a very hard male-leaning / aggressive modern rock lean -- complete with an aggressive 90's era Modern Rock station voiceover/liner package. It didn't work for iHeart's 102.1 The Edge -- why on earth would they want to emulate that direction? They copied everything that bothered me about The Edge -- the annoying modern rock covers of 80's music on heavy rotation (e.g., Alien Ant Farm's "Smooth Criminal", Ataris "Boys of Summer"), an over-reliance on Blink 182, Linkin' Park, and the harder side of the alternative format that is commonly heard on KEGL. Plus -- the younger listeners (especially), who the alternative format depends on, are already aware of a *commercial free* version of the Edge resurrected on 102.1 HD2. I've noticed several Lyft/Uber drivers with that station on. It just doesn't make any sense to me why they would move that direction.
My guess is that it gets back to what I said earlier. They look at the spreadsheet and figure the loss of a few listeners is worth purging the payrolls of a music director who would tailor the playlist to what works in Dallas. I understand the business side of this -- they are running this station on the cheap and must be satisfied enough. But as an alternative fan who enjoyed the first iteration of "Alt 103.7" when it launched, the current version is a mess.
