Radio is slowly dying

[davideduardo]

David....

I'd like you to share your numbers, and the year you earned them, in the last market you did an English Language Talk Show in a Top-5 market.

I have done an AM talker in LA in Spanish that tied KFI in 25-54... and got multi-page coverage in R&R and other trades relatively recently... 3.8 25-54 in one book. Top 10 in LA, a market where non-Hispanic whites are the minority.

I've worked with a talker in the second largest market in the Hemisphere that got 15 to 18 shares while I was associated, 1999 to 2005.

I've done a talk startup in a top 15 market that was consistently Top 5... within the last decade, too. And in a US market where English is not the primary language.

Language makes no difference... reaching listeners does. The LA MSA has over 5 million Hispanics... you can't dismiss it. Geoscape gives a Census prediction of 53.8 million Hispanics in the US and the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico (And Geoscape works with Arbitron on population and demographic matters).

 

[jondavidvox]

Excellent....

But actually, I was talking about you doing an English-Language Talk Show....As the host.

Sorry for the confusion.

J-D
TWR

PS: There are 18 Spanish Language stations in LA, out of over 60 signals. That leaves over 48 stations completely out of your competitive universe. And 41% of LA equals Atlanta....with half the stations.

 

[davideduardo]

But actually, I was talking about you doing an English-Language Talk Show....As the host.

I don't do airshifts or shows in either language... although I have done a few of those awful "ask the manager" things over the years and a few fill-in shifts for the heck of it.

PS: There are 18 Spanish Language stations in LA, out of over 60 signals. That leaves over 48 stations completely out of your competitive universe. And 41% of LA equals Atlanta....with half the stations.

There are 93 stations licensed inside the LA metro. There are 14 in Spanish serving the LA Basin / center of population, and one limited to Orange County and one in the High Desert. When the simulcasts are eliminated, that leaves 64 serving the non-Spanish speaking population... including stations in Farsi, Korean, Vietnamese, and a number with multiple Asian languages on them. LA is 42% Hispanic, but is also 8% Black, 12% Asian and has about another 12% first generation not-born-here residents who are Persian, Russian, Armenian, etc.

Atlanta has more non-viable signals that nearly any other market. 92 total licensed in the metro, 19 considered viable (80% of market covered day and night). LA has 27.

Dallas has 88 licensed stations, $300 million in revenue and also has 27 viable facilities.

LA has $750 million in revenue; Atlanta has a third of that.

 

[TexasTom]

As a follow up, in January 1929 there were 570 stations on the air.
In April of 1933, there were 525.
In January of 1935, there were 550.

So, after over four years of the Deperession, there were fewer stations than when it started

But during this period, the FRC (and the FCC, starting in 1934) were actively culling down the AM broadcast band, which is why the number of stations declined.

That's not to say that radio had it easy during the depression...I've read stories of some stations where they traded air time for services because the advertisers literally didn't have enough cash to pay any other way. It was a brutal time for everyone...but it's also the era that formed the business models that sustained broadcast radio (and TV) in the US for the next 60 years.

 

[davideduardo]

So, after over four years of the Deperession, there were fewer stations than when it started

But during this period, the FRC (and the FCC, starting in 1934) were actively culling down the AM broadcast band, which is why the number of stations declined.

I gave a number from early 1929, quite a time after the FRC began regulation... my figure is from about 10 months before Black Friday. The band had already been reorgainized and there was no culling.

Similarly, the creation of the FCC caused some frequency moves, but no significant elimination of stations as a pre and post examinatin of Radex issues from the period shows plainly.

That's not to say that radio had it easy during the depression...I've read stories of some stations where they traded air time for services because the advertisers literally didn't have enough cash to pay any other way. It was a brutal time for everyone...but it's also the era that formed the business models that sustained broadcast radio (and TV) in the US for the next 60 years.

The business model was pretty much defined when the first network was created, and local advertising took the place of station ownership to self promote the sale of radios or a department store, etc. That was in the 1926-1928 period.
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[newsmark]

But during this period, the FRC (and the FCC, starting in 1934) were actively culling down the AM broadcast band, which is why the number of stations declined.

During this period, weren't there a lot of "shared time" stations? So maybe a given city went from 5-6 stations on 3 frequencies to just 3 or 4 stations on 3 frequencies? It still would probably have been both depression-related and FRC/FCC-related, but though there were fewer "stations" on the air, the average American may have had access to about the same number of active frequencies.

 

[davideduardo]

But during this period, the FRC (and the FCC, starting in 1934) were actively culling down the AM broadcast band, which is why the number of stations declined.

During this period, weren't there a lot of "shared time" stations? So maybe a given city went from 5-6 stations on 3 frequencies to just 3 or 4 stations on 3 frequencies? It still would probably have been both depression-related and FRC/FCC-related, but though there were fewer "stations" on the air, the average American may have had access to about the same number of active frequencies.

That change, eliminating most of the shared channels, happened several years before the Great Depression. If you look at a 1926 list at http://www.davidgleason.com/Whites_Master_Page.htm vs. a 1929 one, you can see that the changes took place in the interval between them.

The Radex for September, 1928 shows the "before" list and the frequencies after 12/10/1928 and has an interesting article about the change. http://www.davidgleason.com/Archive Radex/Radex 24 October 1928.pdf

While there were still shared time stations, they were signficantly reduced in number. Some lasted another 40 years or more, like 1330 and 1280 in the NY metro, the Sunday sharing of 1480 in Richmond, Va, 580 in KS, 1240 (three of them!) in Chicago, etc. The most interesting was the WBAP / WFAA sharing or 570 and 820 in the Dallas Ft Worth area.

 

[amisdead]

It's still impossible to sell well and consistently unless there are people listening.

That reminds me of something Randy Michaels used to say (and probably still does): It's easier for the worst sales person in the market to sell a 10 share than the best to sell a 1 share.

 

[grantchester]

Ha! Try selling a station with a '0' share... I did, once, for about four months. I'm not bragging, but I met my quotas and goals. I wouldn't want to do it again, but it can be done, if you know your clients needs and have something to offer.