I heard a couple of spots for well-known furniture retailers on WBZ this afternoon. One was for Marty's Furniture of Melrose, and the other for the Bernie & Phyl's chain.
The trouble is that the spots ran in the same stop set, and worse, right next to each other.
If I were an executive with either store and heard this I would be on the phone first thing Monday morning with my ad agency telling them to contact 'BZ and read them the riot act. Unless there is some type of stipulation in the advertising schedule contract that BOTH Marty's and Bernie & Phyl's agrees to, allowing them to be scheduled next to each other, then 'BZ violated an industry standard that has been observed since radio advertising began. I seriously doubt that both of these furniture retailers want their ad to run next to a competitor, especially since Bernie & Phyl's has one of their stores in Saugus, the community next to Melrose. And, of course, both would want to have their spots scheduled at least one stop set away from those of Bob's Discount Furniture, Cardi's, Rotman's, etc.
Newspapers have observed a similar standard forever, as well. Very few advertisers tolerate their display ad place close to their competitors. I have heard of several instances (in radio, TV and newspapers) where advertisers have been lost because competitors ads are not spaced far enough away from each other.
Mistakes (in scheduling) do occur, and I'm sure WBZ would do a "make-good" for each in such a situation, but, IMHO, it happens much to often nowadays in radio. Personally, I think it's a result of less frequent but MUCH LONGER commercial stop sets. It used to be much easier to keep competing businesses separate from one another when stop sets consisted of three or less spots each.
I'm sure there are lots of opinions on this subject, so let's hear them.
The trouble is that the spots ran in the same stop set, and worse, right next to each other.
If I were an executive with either store and heard this I would be on the phone first thing Monday morning with my ad agency telling them to contact 'BZ and read them the riot act. Unless there is some type of stipulation in the advertising schedule contract that BOTH Marty's and Bernie & Phyl's agrees to, allowing them to be scheduled next to each other, then 'BZ violated an industry standard that has been observed since radio advertising began. I seriously doubt that both of these furniture retailers want their ad to run next to a competitor, especially since Bernie & Phyl's has one of their stores in Saugus, the community next to Melrose. And, of course, both would want to have their spots scheduled at least one stop set away from those of Bob's Discount Furniture, Cardi's, Rotman's, etc.
Newspapers have observed a similar standard forever, as well. Very few advertisers tolerate their display ad place close to their competitors. I have heard of several instances (in radio, TV and newspapers) where advertisers have been lost because competitors ads are not spaced far enough away from each other.
Mistakes (in scheduling) do occur, and I'm sure WBZ would do a "make-good" for each in such a situation, but, IMHO, it happens much to often nowadays in radio. Personally, I think it's a result of less frequent but MUCH LONGER commercial stop sets. It used to be much easier to keep competing businesses separate from one another when stop sets consisted of three or less spots each.
I'm sure there are lots of opinions on this subject, so let's hear them.
