The New River Valley market in Virginia (formerly Blacksburg/Christiansburg) is led by Mel Wheeler's AC WSLQ & Country WSLC from Roanoke, both tied at #1 with near a 20 share. Top local station is #5 with a 3.9 share. That's dominance.
WFGY enjoys a signal that's better than a normal Class B FM--"Super-B" or "B+" coverage, courtesy of being grandfathered by the FCC at an ERP and antenna height dating back before the commission got around to setting limits for FM stations; i.e., pre-1960. So it gets out a few extra miles. More to the point, its tower site above Altoona provides line of site coverage to most of Centre County and a 60 dbu signal to the southern half, where most of the people live. Most importantly, they have no format competition.
In most rural PA markets there are around 20 shares of 12+ Country listening floating around (see Altoona, Johnstown, Williamsport, Chambersburg); they hang around a 10 in State College, but it's enough to stay near the top since every other format (rock, CHR, AC) is chopped up by several players.
Froggy is a good, solid Country station but--formatically--nothing to write home to mom about. It's a great brand, but they do very little to market the brand. And many listeners tolerate the annoying frog stuff only because they have no option. It was cute 15 years ago, but it wore off in about 10 minutes.
Country formatics aren't a big mystery. Nothing against these folks (honest), but sucking up the share that's there just because you're the only game in town doesn't make a station great. It makes a station lucky.
> > Does anybody know of another market the size of State
> > College which is
> > dominated by an outside station like Froggy?
> > Should the local stations be embarassed by the current
> > situation, or
> > concede to Froggy's regional #1 status, and just try to be
>
> > the #2 non-
> > public station in the market?
>
> With their powerful signal and their marketing, NO ONE
> really thinks of Froggy as an "outside station". Froggy was
> designed from the top down to be a REGIONAL powerhouse and
> indeed they are. They show up in the darndest
> places...Altoona, State College, Hickville and beyond. The
> small towns and the larger cities for parades, promotions,
> etc.
>
> Thats kinda tough to beat don't you think? Froggy does not
> seem out of market. They act local, they live local. That
> is why it works. They are Central PA's hometown station to
> a degree.
>
> And, with their signal strength and built up reputation over
> the years as THE country outlet, you'd be a fool to take
> them on. No way you could win. Same reason Froggy in
> Pittsburgh has not managed to kill off Y108. They were
> there first and they just have the rep for being THE country
> choice.
>
> Hitman
>
