Radio Letter to Santa - Your ideas wanted!

[radiolover78]

From David Citron (aka 954)

Three years ago, the South Florida Radio Pages included
a Letter to Santa, with more than two dozen requests to
make radio here in south Florida better. For example:

WDNA needs much more power while WLRN needs much less
of its politically-correct NPR talk and more of the music
that made it so popular.

Craig Crossman could really use a station that will feature
his ComputerAmerica show LIVE in the same weeknight timeslot
used everywhere else.

Please bring WMXJ a better definition of oldies.


All of these will still be on the 2006 Christmas list.

I'm sure David would love to add your requests to the Letter to Santa list.

To make your requests, just go to http://www.radiopages.net/radio/ and click on the Radio Letter to Santa link on the right side of the page.

 

[bat manny]

Dear Radio Santa, ;D

I would love to have an all 90's hits station, Coast 97.3 and Lite FM are both fighting for whos better 80's and or whos softer... the majority of 90's music is ignored largely. I dont want it to be adult based just want to hear all the hits from the 90's.

Do we really need *4 Hip Hop/R&B based stations in Miami? Power 96, 99Jamz, 1035 The Beat and Hot 105. I think 2 would be just fine. One station playing the currents and the other station playing the classics, just think of how much more variety on the FM dial we would have.

I would love a Dance only ( free fm not hd2 ) music station, that plays nothing but the best Dance,Trance, Freestyle, Techno etc..
after all Miami is dance/club music based. not hip hop.

and 949 flipped from english another spanish station ? there are many english formats that could have done better in this market.
we dont need more spanish music we need more english format variety

 

[The-Major]

I would love to have an all 90's hits station, Coast 97.3 and Lite FM are both fighting for whos better 80's and or whos softer... the majority of 90's music is ignored largely. I dont want it to be adult based just want to hear all the hits from the 90's.

I so totally agree with you. The 1990s were a fantastic decade (my favourite) for TOP 40 music, and aside from the HOT-A.C. stations (around the nation) that occasionally cull safe pop and rock material from the decade most of it is pretty much ignored nowadays.

This past week up in the Jacksonville (Florida) area I did not listen to 'The Big Ape' or even 'Kiss'. I listened to (essentially) an all (mostly)-1990s hit music station in the form of 'Movin-100.7'. That's right - it's one of those so-called new 'Rhythmic-A.C.' stations. It's a station that played some of the hardest dance music of the decade including hot tracks of the time by C + C Music Factory, AB Logic, 2 Unlimited, Real McCoy, Salt-N-Pepa, En Vogue, House Of Pain, and Naughty By Nature. This station totally surprised me. It more like shocked me. I wouldn't even consider it to be 'Rhythmic A.C.'. It's more like 'Retro-CHR'.

How did I discover this station ? My 61-year-old mom listens to it all the time !

I was sad when I lost its signal prematurely in Flagler County Florida (driving southbound on my return trip back home). It's actually based out of Brunswick Georgia, and its 62,000 watt signal originates from a real tall (1,470 foot) transmitter near I-95 just north of the Florida border.

We need a 'Movin' station just like this one aqui en Miami ! If they were to do it like they do it in Jacksonville then you can count on me to be a loyal 'Mover' !

MOVIN' WITH THE MAJOR

 

[The-Major]

Do we really need *4 Hip Hop/R&B based stations in Miami? Power 96, 99Jamz, 1035 The Beat and Hot 105. I think 2 would be just fine. One station playing the currents and the other station playing the classics, just think of how much more variety on the FM dial we would have.

One (such as myself) could (and will) argue that Y-100 is the 5TH (and far-lowest-rated) Hip-Hop / R & B station here in this eclectic radio market. They are saturated by 'urban' hit music. I like Nickelback. I like Hinder. I like The Fray. I like all kinds of hit music. Y-100 needs more variety (more pop and more rock) in its hit music. I think that its continued and deepening slump into the ratings basement (see the latest Fall trends) further cements the fact that Y-100 needs to rediscover itself musically. TOP 40 music is about all kinds of hit music.

THE MAJOR

 

[radiolover78]

Great ideas batmanny and the Major!

This is turning into another interesting discussion!



By the way Major, I was wondering if I could contact you through email. I have a question.

Thanks in advanced.

 

[CapeFish]

I'm bilingual, but I listen to English radio. Why? Because most Spanish-speakers in South Florida are young and therefore English-dominance is usually the case instead of Spanish-dominance. With that said, why would Clear Channel flip 94.9 to Spanish when the market has some very good Spanish language stations with niche programming formats and genres of music?

Also, is 790 going to stay sports or not? Will 560 get Neil to stay beyond 2008? Will the Seminoles ever land back on 790? Will 640 ever become the major player that a signal that big should be? Will 610 get itself back on track along with 940 towards news? Where will the Dolphins land? Will 1360 get a better signal?

On the FM side, when will an FM talker come to Miami? Who will it be....here in Tallahassee we have 2 (Tally lacks AM signals though) and they are not too bad except they are almost entirely syndicated.

Overall, South Florida Radio isn't as bad as some want to paint it...but it can't all be in Spanish. They will kill that goose and be in big trouble if anymore stations flip to Spanish.

 

[bat manny]

I'm bilingual, but I listen to English radio. Why? Because most Spanish-speakers in South Florida are young and therefore English-dominance is usually the case instead of Spanish-dominance. With that said, why would Clear Channel flip 94.9 to Spanish when the market has some very good Spanish language stations with niche programming formats and genres of music?

Overall, South Florida Radio isn't as bad as some want to paint it...but it can't all be in Spanish. They will kill that goose and be in big trouble if anymore stations flip to Spanish.

yes i agree with you on that we now have 6 Spanish FM's, two of which were once english 106.7 and 94.9.
Two of the spanish FM's have idenentical formats 107.5 and 106.7 ( spanish romance )
Thats much like Power 96, 99Jams and 1035 The Beat with Hip Hop. The redundancy of overlapping formats in this market is insane and totally unessessary.

 

[The-Major]

yes i agree with you on that we now have 6 Spanish FM's, two of which were once english 106.7 and 94.9.
Two of the spanish FM's have idenentical formats 107.5 and 106.7 ( spanish romance )
Thats much like Power 96, 99Jams and 1035 The Beat with Hip Hop. The redundancy of overlapping formats in this market is insane and totally unessessary.

We've got a diverse market that's nearly two-thirds Hispanic and African-American (combined). After HOT-105 the next 3 top-rated stations are Hispanic stations (including AMer WAQI). The 3 Hispanic stations are sandwiched by HOT-105 and 99-JAMZ. And there's your TOP 5 with a combined Arbitron rating of nearly 29 ! The top-rated radio stations here in South Florida reflect the diverse audience that's listening.

One could argue that there are not enough Hispanic and Urban stations here in South Florida.

THE MAJOR

 

[The-Major]

I'm bilingual, but I listen to English radio. Why? Because most Spanish-speakers in South Florida are young and therefore English-dominance is usually the case instead of Spanish-dominance. With that said, why would Clear Channel flip 94.9 to Spanish when the market has some very good Spanish language stations with niche programming formats and genres of music?

Clear Channel essentially wanted a piece of the action. They saw a TOP 12 Miami-Ft. Lauderdale radio market that's nearly 50% Hispanic, and they had no station to serve that MASSIVE audience. They made a smart decision. MEGA is obviously not getting the ratings that they expected, but they at least got their foot in the door and tried it out. With TOP 40, Urban Contemporary, Classic Rock, Smooth Jazz, News-Talk, and Talk already covered what other format could they have flipped 94.9 to besides Hispanic ?

On the FM side, when will an FM talker come to Miami? Who will it be....

Allow me to answer my own hypothetical question above. They could have (and could still) flip 94.9 to FM Talk (or even News-Talk). How about restoring the heritage WINZ-FM call letters to 94.9 and call it I-95 ? It's like I've stated over and over again. FM Talk (and News-Talk) is sweeping the nation as a wildly successful format. It can also sweep South Florida. This is a news-hungry market.

THE MAJOR

 

[The-Major]

By the way Major, I was wondering if I could contact you through email. I have a question. Thanks in advanced.

SURE - I can be reached at {themajor} at {the name of my web site} (which you can link to down below via my tagline comments).

THE MAJOR

 

[CapeFish]

Clear Channel essentially wanted a piece of the action. They saw a TOP 12 Miami-Ft. Lauderdale radio market that's nearly 50% Hispanic, and they had no station to serve that MASSIVE audience. They made a smart decision. MEGA is obviously not getting the ratings that they expected, but they at least got their foot in the door and tried it out. With TOP 40, Urban Contemporary, Classic Rock, Smooth Jazz, News-Talk, and Talk already covered what other format could they have flipped 94.9 to besides Hispanic ?

My only beef with Clear Channel and 94.9 is what is MEGA? Why should I listen to 94.9 as a bilingual?

Allow me to answer my own hypothetical question above. They could have (and could still) flip 94.9 to FM Talk (or even News-Talk). How about restoring the heritage WINZ-FM call letters to 94.9 and call it I-95 ? It's like I've stated over and over again. FM Talk (and News-Talk) is sweeping the nation as a wildly successful format. It can also sweep South Florida. This is a news-hungry market.

A proper newsradio on FM would be interesting. WINZ-FM being like the old 940 WINZ was. Then you leave 610 WIOD with its current right-of-center talk/news and 940 WINZ with its current left-of-center talk/news. But that might bleed money no?

 

[The-Major]

A proper newsradio on FM would be interesting. WINZ-FM being like the old 940 WINZ was. Then you leave 610 WIOD with its current right-of-center talk/news and 940 WINZ with its current left-of-center talk/news. But that might bleed money no?

I tend to believe the same general way - that a proper all-news FMer on 94.9 would benefit our radio market better than a news-talk hybrid or even a 'Free-FM' format would. There's always 'breaking news' going on in Miami-Dade and Broward Counties. Of course CBS-4, NBC-6, WSVN-7, and LOCAL-10 frequently go overboard and sensationalize what they consider to be 'breaking news'. I know that I personally tune-in to NBC-6 at 87.7 FM whenever real 'breaking news' occurs on a national or global scale (such as a 9-11 or a Hurricane Katrina). I think that a 'WINZ-FM NewsRadio 95' would garner respectable if not spectacular ratings if Clear Channel made such a flip, but then again I'm not so sure that they want to give up their only avenue to the majority Hispanic market. As far as making money with an all-news format the age demographics would obviously climb substantially from the current Latin Hurban format, but it seems like they would attract a much more affluent audience with all-news. A perfect case study of how a wildly successful all-news format works brilliantly on FM is the heritage WTOP out of Washington D.C. It was at 1500 AM with its all-news format for a couple of generations before it recently made the switch to a richer and more powerful 103.5 FM signal that blankets the D.C. area. It's consistently one of the TOP 3 stations overall in that market (along with two or three Urban Contemporary stations).

THE MAJOR

 

[radiolover78]

An FM all news station would certainly be worth a try for WMGE.

 

[donmeadows]

The problem with radio news is that it is a people intensive format. In order to have a GREAT local news station you need a staff of 20-30 people to do it right and no one is going to spend that kind of money in order to have 24-7-365 local news. When I was at CKLW, a music station with a very big news department we had 20 people, and that was just to do news around the clock at 20 after and 20 before the hour. At it's peak WINZ/WIOD News had a 16 person news department not counting Peter Bolger or Lori Shepard. When you pay 20 to 30 people salaries and benefits it runs into serious money. It is a lot cheaper to have five or six people playing music which reaches a larger overall audience. Don't hold you breath for local news on radio.