KCOR now KXTN (AM)

[davideduardo]

KCOR-1350 AM dropped the Univision Deportes feed (still on a KROM HD channel) and is now simulcasting KXTN 107.5 and appears to have requested change in calls to KXTN.

The change happened around 6 PM Wednesday.

 

[saradio1]

KCOR-1350 AM dropped the Univision Deportes feed (still on a KROM HD channel) and is now simulcasting KXTN 107.5 and appears to have requested change in calls to KXTN.

The change happened around 6 PM Wednesday.

Thanks for the update.

Curious on your thoughts- Is this to simulcast 107.5 on 1350 AM or to move the Tejano format to 1350 and launch a new format on 107.5?

BTW, I noticed the RDS in my car reads, 107.5 as a "Top 40." Of course, that doesn't mean much.

 

[davideduardo]

Curious on your thoughts- Is this to simulcast 107.5 on 1350 AM or to move the Tejano format to 1350 and launch a new format on 107.5?

My crystal ball is under an NDA.

Seriously, this is one to watch and see if anything further happens.

 

[saradio1]

This would be huge, if 107.5 were to flip.

And if they do, I hope they stunt before flipping. Univision is not known for stunting before flipping

 

[b-turner]

Interesting. I don't recall if KCOR has a translator or if it's in a good spot. That could be a factor in what happens.When David's crystal ball is under DNA, that has me thinking this may be more than just a simulcast.

 

[AnyHuman]

We can only speculate but I'm guessing a change is coming for the FM.

 

[saradio1]

Interesting. I don't recall if KCOR has a translator or if it's in a good spot. That could be a factor in what happens.When David's crystal ball is under DNA, that has me thinking this may be more than just a simulcast.

Same here.

https://radioinsight.com/headlines/175936/kxtn-adds-am-simulcast/

 

[Mediafrog+]

Trying to remember how long KXTN and its Tejano format have been around. I do remember the previous KBUC-FM Country incarnation on 107.5.

The 1350 signal has been KCOR since it signed on in 1946, so a longtime call disappears, at least on AM.

Edit to add: Wikipedia has the Tejano format on FM starting in 1991. I had forgotten about KZVE which followed KBUC and was eventually swapped with 1310. Many years ago!

 

[davideduardo]

Trying to remember how long KXTN and its Tejano format have been around. I do remember the previous KBUC-FM Country incarnation on 107.5.

The 1350 signal has been KCOR since it signed on in 1946, so a longtime call disappears, at least on AM.

Edit to add: Wikipedia has the Tejano format on FM starting in 1991. I had forgotten about KZVE which followed KBUC and was eventually swapped with 1310. Many years ago!

The Tejano format started out on 1310, with an "International" pop ballad format on the FM when Tenaglia and crews took over. When the AM debuted with higher numbers than the FM, they flipped the formats.

 

[b-turner]

I'm not sure 1991 is accurate. I worked for the guy that had worked the old KBUC (when it was country) and later ran KTSA & KTFM before buying the AM & FM Combo in Del Rio in 1987. I left in 1991 after about 5 years and went to be the GM in Eagle Pass for a very short time. The Eagle Pass stations had been Top 40 during the day and Tejano at night a good while before I got there. The reason they went Tejano at night was because of KXTN's established ratings success in San Antonio. I suspect it might have been around 1989 or so. I even handled a couple of accounts from agencies that also bought KXTN and I recall those buys were prior to 1991.

I can tell you the format took the region by storm. It was as if people woke up one day and it was the music that spoke to their souls. Many had been lifelong top 40 and rock listeners but as adults,hearing Gary Hobbs, Latin Breed, Selena, and others,it was as if they found the music they longed for all their lives. In my short stint, Eagle Pass was a regular stop for many of Tejano's top names.

The oddity of the format in my opinion, is while the lyrics are rarely in English, the jocks tend to speak English with a Spanish word or two here and there. Like Spanglish, whatever is easier to say when you compare the two languages. For example, in Houston KQQK identified with call letters in Spanish but dial position in English because it flows better.

 

[davideduardo]

I'm not sure 1991 is accurate.

The FM changed from KBUC to KZVE in September, 1988 (Typo corrected). The AM became KXTN.

The format flip, putting Tejano on 107.5, happened in early 1991 during the Winter book. The FM had been a mid-1 level station all during 1990 as a Spanish AC, but in Winter 1991 it jumped to a 3.9 and then in Spring it hit a 7.4, good for 3rd overall in SA.

In 1993, the combo was sold to Tichenor.

 

[saradio1]

"IF" 107.5 does change formats, will they target the English or Spanish market?

From Radioinsight.com-
INSTANT INSIGHT: Is this the prelude to a new format coming to 107.5? KXTN-FM registered a 3.1 share in the February 2019 Nielsen Audio ratings but skews very old. Tejano has vanished from FM in many other of its former hotbeds but continues on AM in places like Tucson.

 

[Kent]

It was definitely 1991 when KXTN 1310 and KZVE 107.5 flipped spots. I was in San Antonio in August 1990, and I remember hearing "Que Suave" on 107.5 while 1310 was encouraging you to "Lock it in, and crank it up!"

The call letter change on 1350 to KXTN was granted today. Aside from a screw-up either at Univision or the FCC, 1350 hadn't known any calls other than KCOR before today. Those calls were in the market since at least the 1940's, and were used on both the first full time Spanish-language FM in the States as well as the first full-time Spanish-language TV station (which is KWEX today). Apparently, the KCOR calls are headed to KNIC. They're already on its repeater in San Antonio. Not sure if they're on the way to the main station or not, though.

 

[davideduardo]

"IF" 107.5 does change formats, will they target the English or Spanish market?

More a question of targeting. SAT is over 50% Hispanic, but well under 20% of Hispanics are Spanish dominant... it's a very assimilated market in the linguistic sense.

KXTN is targeted at English speakers today...

 

[Mediafrog+]

The FM changed from KBUC to KZVE in September, 1998. The AM became KXTN.

Obviously a typo, should be 1988.

I recall that when Houston's "Super Tejano 108" KXTJ was launched in 1993, it was patterned after KXTN, which had been on the air for a few years. That was when Houston had rival Tejano stations on FM (KQQK 106.5 had launched a few years earlier.)

 

[davideduardo]

Obviously a typo, should be 1988.

Yes. The sale of KBUC was at the tail end of 1988, followed by putting the AC format on FM and Tejano on AM. The Spanish language soft (and horribly focused) format did not work at all on the big FM channel, so they figured out the two formats should be inverted.

Putting such a format on FM was quite radical thinking, as the thinking at the time was that a mass appeal format in Spanish on FM would not work. So we found highly under-performing stations on FM in Spanish... like KLVE in Los Angleles... because owners did not see the potential and programmers applied the wrong formats.

San Antonio in 1991 and KLAX in LA in 1992 proved that idea to be wrong, and FMs in Spanish began popping up in many markets.

 

[Mediafrog+]

Yes. The sale of KBUC was at the tail end of 1988, followed by putting the AC format on FM and Tejano on AM. The Spanish language soft (and horribly focused) format did not work at all on the big FM channel, so they figured out the two formats should be inverted.

Putting such a format on FM was quite radical thinking, as the thinking at the time was that a mass appeal format in Spanish on FM would not work. So we found highly under-performing stations on FM in Spanish... like KLVE in Los Angleles... because owners did not see the potential and programmers applied the wrong formats.

San Antonio in 1991 and KLAX in LA in 1992 proved that idea to be wrong, and FMs in Spanish began popping up in many markets.

There seemed to be a lot of misfires with Hispanic targeted FMs in that era. In mid 1980's Houston the old KXKX 106.5 had what could be called an international hits format, but there was a total disconnect with the local Hispanic audience. The subsequent mishmash of English language Rock and Spanish language pop (after the call change to KQQK) didn't go anywhere, either. It wasn't until the flip to Tejano that the station finally caught on.

Even KLTN in its initial 93.3 incarnation seemed to start out heavy on international Spanish language pop before morphing to Regional Mexican music. And there were numerous short lived Hispanic targeted formats on 104.9 in Houston that completely missed the mark. Must have been quite the learning experience for those involved; or maybe they should have listened to the programming experts first...?

 

[Kent]

There seemed to be a lot of misfires with Hispanic targeted FMs in that era. In mid 1980's Houston the old KXKX 106.5 had what could be called an international hits format, but there was a total disconnect with the local Hispanic audience. The subsequent mishmash of English language Rock and Spanish language pop (after the call change to KQQK) didn't go anywhere, either. It wasn't until the flip to Tejano that the station finally caught on.

Even KLTN in its initial 93.3 incarnation seemed to start out heavy on international Spanish language pop before morphing to Regional Mexican music. And there were numerous short lived Hispanic targeted formats on 104.9 in Houston that completely missed the mark. Must have been quite the learning experience for those involved; or maybe they should have listened to the programming experts first...?

When KLAX shocked the nation and went to #1 in Los Angeles after getting rid of a Spanish-language hits format, the general perception was that regional Mexican formats were sleepy and not really suited for the younger audience that preferred FM. KLAX made everybody do a double take and start thinking about a new formula for Spanish-language programming on FM.

I believe the best KZVE 107.5 ever did was in the mid 2 share range. In Fall '89, it had a 2.2 while KXTN was in the mid 1 share range. KCOR 1350 was around a 5 and the second highest rated AM in the market behind WOAI. KCOR also beat about half of the FM's.

 

[davideduardo]

When KLAX shocked the nation and went to #1 in Los Angeles after getting rid of a Spanish-language hits format, the general perception was that regional Mexican formats were sleepy and not really suited for the younger audience that preferred FM. KLAX made everybody do a double take and start thinking about a new formula for Spanish-language programming on FM.

That was not quite the reason.

The belief was that regional Mexican was a blue collar format, and that the listeners did not have FM radios. This belief was "inherited" from Mexico where FM was for "better" music, ranging from jazz, classical and instrumental to English language rock, pop and AC formats. This, of course, was in part due to the true fact that regional Mexican (correctly called "grupera" in Mexico) had appeal mostly in D and E socioeconomic classes, not a desirable demographic for advertisers.

Age was not a consideration. Regional Mexican music, when programmed in Mexico, appealed mostly to the younger demos. But that was in part because the population of Mexico had a very young average age... more than a decade younger than the US average.

So in the US, the few FMs in Spanish tended to be AC stations. They also tended to be condemned to very wide playlists with little focus. In LA, both KLVE and KSKQ on FM played very deep libraries, ranging from salsa (anathema to a mostly Mexican audience) to Spanish rock along with pop and ballads. In other words, they were highly dreadful formats to begin with, and this never got above the two share range despite, in the case of KLVE, being on one of the market's best signals.

KLAX was not a surprise to some. In San Juan, in 1979, WSRA, a beautiful music station, morphed into WZNT, an all salsa FM... using a format that "everyone" said would not be right for FM. It went from a 4 share to a peak of 42 share in its first year on the air with a format that most predicted would only attract "a low class of listener". The station became the highest billing station in the market within 90 days of going on the air.

But it took over a decade for that evidence to be employed at a predominantly Mexican targeted station, KLAX. The obstacle was the perception that the format, on FM, would not appeal to an advertiser-friendly audience.

An amazing cultural event was the real trigger for the KLAX format switch. The morphing of the traditional banda sinaloense music form into "quebradita" which was a faster paced, very danceable, form using keyboards and slightly different orchestrations, was huge success. Clubs sprang up all over LA, and new banda groups formed to record. In many senses, quebradita was like the disco phenomenon of the 70's. KLAX was the WKTU of that music.

In fact, the original quebradita format went on KALI, an AM in LA, first. Then WSKQ under programmers Amalia Gonzalez and Joaquin Garza, took KSKQ-AM that direction. Soon, the owners of KSKQ decided to put the format on FM and it went on the air at midnight on August 1, 1992 with the song "Agarra La Onda Lupe". So KLAX was no surprise... it was just the move of a rapidly rising AM format to FM.

And, while quebradita was part of Regional Mexican as a format, KLAX was less "Regional Mexican" than a dance format based on one style of regional music.

 

[davideduardo]

There seemed to be a lot of misfires with Hispanic targeted FMs in that era. In mid 1980's Houston the old KXKX 106.5 had what could be called an international hits format, but there was a total disconnect with the local Hispanic audience. The subsequent mishmash of English language Rock and Spanish language pop (after the call change to KQQK) didn't go anywhere, either. It wasn't until the flip to Tejano that the station finally caught on.

Even KLTN in its initial 93.3 incarnation seemed to start out heavy on international Spanish language pop before morphing to Regional Mexican music. And there were numerous short lived Hispanic targeted formats on 104.9 in Houston that completely missed the mark. Must have been quite the learning experience for those involved; or maybe they should have listened to the programming experts first...?

As I mentioned in my prior post, the AC stations that were tried in the Southwest were very badly done. Big playlists, no real hit rotations, sloppy or non-existent formatics. The format was commonly called "International" because the core artists were from all over Latin America and Spain.

A good example is the first significant Southwestern FM in Spanish, KLVE in LA. It began in 1978 and for its first 17 years it played all kinds of music except anything that sounded authentically Mexican. Salsa, Spanish rock, pop, ballads. But at the beginning of 1995 it was reformatted with a team of skilled programmers, limited to true AC songs, developed strong formatics and imaging. Within a few months, research showed the compatibility of "Mexican ballads", meaning soft regional Mexican songs, and following their inclusion in the format the station jumped to a 7.2 and absolute #1 in the market.

So, as you say, the issue was indeed lousy programming. The music was there, but the proper formatics and execution and research were not observed. I'd been doing Spanish CHR and AC for 30 years when I got to KLVE in 1995 and it had indeed been one of the most horrible radio stations I'd ever heard.