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WEPN's Cume Already Higher Than WFAN's
- Thread starter Barry
- Start date
Turnpike Tuner said:
It'll be even more interesting at the end of this baseball season when both the Mets and Yankees radio deals are up with WFAN and WCBS-AM. If WEPN-FM wants the Yankees, are they prepared to cater to them? The Yankees have never been on a sports talk station. IINM, they are not willing to be moved to another station for any Giants or Jets game, pre-season or regular season. The same would apply to Knicks and Rangers playoff games early in baseball season.
If WEPN-FM really wants the Yankees, they will have to risk losing the Jets, Knicks and Rangers.
The other thing is that the ESPN Radio Network has national deals with the NBA and MLB for regular packages. Would the corporate folks be willing to lose a NYC clear on their national package so the local station can air a local game? That's not as easy as it sounds. It works tonight because tonight's game is the Mets & Cardinals. But next week it's the Indians and Cardinals. How much liberty will the network give the local station over 165 game schedule? That leads me to believe that ESPN might prefer to get a limited package of local games rather than the entire schedule, and split the teams (and the cost) with CBS.
TheBigA said:
I don't think the Yankees or the Mets will agree to that, especially the Yankees! Also, WCBS-AM is losing $$$$ on Yankee games, incredible as it may seem! The Yankees get $13MM per season from CBS. The Boston Red Sox get $18MM from Entercom. Whoever gets the Yankees in 2013 is going to have to overpay for those rights.
radioguy39nj said:
The goal for any rights holder is to get multiple outlets for your content. And the goal for content users is to minimize the rights fee. That's why I think either team would agree to split the rights between both ESPN and CBS Radio. That way, the team makes more money and reaches more people, and the stations each get content on certain days of the week to sell without the commitment for the entire season. The teams have already agreed to split the rights for national TV coverage on Fox, ESPN, TBS, and MLB. So it makes sense to do the same for radio.
reelyreal said:
If anyone is going to do things differently, it's probably going to be one of these two teams. And I think once they do, everyone will see why it makes sense. Rights fees are too expensive to be absorbed by one station. They won't be getting cheaper, and in this marketplace, it's unlikely that advertisers will pick up the expense.
>>>Rights fees are too expensive to be absorbed by one station. They won't be getting cheaper, and in this marketplace, it's unlikely that advertisers will pick up the expense.<<<
Like every other price in a free market, rights fees are determined by what a buyer is willing to pay, and what a seller is willing to accept.
If CBS is losing millions a year on baseball broadcasts in the New York market, it's hard to understand why they would want to pay more and lose more by bidding even higher, or why competitors would bid big so they could lose big money too. At some point there has to be an equilibrium price that makes some kind of sense for the broadcasters.
Some other professional sports teams buy their own radio time and sell their own spots, which guarantees a profit for the radio stations. And look at the problems the NY Islanders have had finding a good radio signal for game coverage, at different times in recent seasons they have been heard on a daytime AM, a low power local commercial FM, and an even lower power non-commercial college station.
At some point, the teams have to realize that while the prestige of being a particular team's radio affiliate may help promote the station brand, if the stations consistently wind up losing millions as a result that, kind of, defeats the station's reason for existing. You can't eat "prestige" or pay your bills with it either, and radio stations have bills to pay from electricity to employee salaries.
Splitting the "pain" of losing money on game coverage across multiple outlets in a market doesn't make sense. It's hard to imagine Bloomberg Radio 1130, or Salem's WNYM caring a bit about carrying sports if they can't be paid up front with a guaranteed profit on the coverage. Both stations provide backup sports coverage, and neither station relies on Arbitron ratings to sell advertising on its regular programs.
It will be interesting to see how much of a cume boost WEPN gets from being on FM when the numbers come out soon. If the FM numbers are large WFAN might have more incentive to go after the cume boost that being the Yankees affiliate could provide next year. However, looking at the WCBS numbers, it appears the Yankees provide a boost of only about 500,000 listeners to station cume, and that may not be near the size of the boost that being on FM could bring. Remember the top music stations have a weekly audience that is ten times that size. It's going to be an interesting few months for sports radio in New York.
Like every other price in a free market, rights fees are determined by what a buyer is willing to pay, and what a seller is willing to accept.
If CBS is losing millions a year on baseball broadcasts in the New York market, it's hard to understand why they would want to pay more and lose more by bidding even higher, or why competitors would bid big so they could lose big money too. At some point there has to be an equilibrium price that makes some kind of sense for the broadcasters.
Some other professional sports teams buy their own radio time and sell their own spots, which guarantees a profit for the radio stations. And look at the problems the NY Islanders have had finding a good radio signal for game coverage, at different times in recent seasons they have been heard on a daytime AM, a low power local commercial FM, and an even lower power non-commercial college station.
At some point, the teams have to realize that while the prestige of being a particular team's radio affiliate may help promote the station brand, if the stations consistently wind up losing millions as a result that, kind of, defeats the station's reason for existing. You can't eat "prestige" or pay your bills with it either, and radio stations have bills to pay from electricity to employee salaries.
Splitting the "pain" of losing money on game coverage across multiple outlets in a market doesn't make sense. It's hard to imagine Bloomberg Radio 1130, or Salem's WNYM caring a bit about carrying sports if they can't be paid up front with a guaranteed profit on the coverage. Both stations provide backup sports coverage, and neither station relies on Arbitron ratings to sell advertising on its regular programs.
It will be interesting to see how much of a cume boost WEPN gets from being on FM when the numbers come out soon. If the FM numbers are large WFAN might have more incentive to go after the cume boost that being the Yankees affiliate could provide next year. However, looking at the WCBS numbers, it appears the Yankees provide a boost of only about 500,000 listeners to station cume, and that may not be near the size of the boost that being on FM could bring. Remember the top music stations have a weekly audience that is ten times that size. It's going to be an interesting few months for sports radio in New York.
TimeIsTight said:
Sure it does. As I pointed out, baseball and football already split rights fees among TV outlets. It's a system that works well for both the teams and the stations. Why can't radio do the same? The teams won't be cutting the rights fees, especially in NYC, and to be honest, there are too many baseball games for any one station to air. It's logical, and I expect it to happen.
Would you really expect big-time rivals WFAN and WEPN to be willing to "share" the Yankees coverage? It would not only be confusing to the listeners, it would require CBS and ESPN to each send out sales teams to compete against each other for spot sales. If the Yankees broadcasts are a money losing proposition now, what would they be then? And the stations would lose any exclusive brand identification with the team.
TV is a totally different animal, since the Yankees own their primary network and produce their own TV coverage of the games even when they are carried over-the-air on WWOR-TV. They could do the same thing with radio, and just lease air-time on radio stations, while producing their own coverage and selling their own spots like the Devils. Then the games could be carried on as many stations as the Yankees want, the radio stations would be guaranteed a profit, and the Yankees could make as much money as the advertising market has to offer. That might work best for all concerned but I don't expect that to happen either. We'll see.
TV is a totally different animal, since the Yankees own their primary network and produce their own TV coverage of the games even when they are carried over-the-air on WWOR-TV. They could do the same thing with radio, and just lease air-time on radio stations, while producing their own coverage and selling their own spots like the Devils. Then the games could be carried on as many stations as the Yankees want, the radio stations would be guaranteed a profit, and the Yankees could make as much money as the advertising market has to offer. That might work best for all concerned but I don't expect that to happen either. We'll see.
TimeIsTight said:
Somehow, big time rivals ESPN, NBC Sports, and CBS Sports share football. It's business. There's an easy way to handle sales that works for everyone. And "exclusive" doesn't matter when you don't actually OWN the team. The team has the exclusive. That's the situation with all rights holders, including music, sports, and other major events.
By the way, I believe the Yankees already get a certain number of spots to sell in the current WCBS broadcasts, and they also own and produce the broadcasts, so what you're talking about is already happening. That's why ratings matter to the Yankees.
I'm not saying this WILL happen, but I'm saying it's a good possibility. Especially if the teams want more money. Which they do. Radio can't afford status quo any more.
It's different on the radio. What good is it to me (a potential affiliate) if I can't sell season long packages and only select games? What good is it to me branding wise if half the time the fans are listening to the competition for the game?
Football is different in that every game is pretty much a national game on TV. Baseball on the radio is local to mainly the home market. Yes, I know the Yanks are in Florida too, but with their training camp in Tampa and so many ex-New Yorkers, it's the same as a home market.
Football is different in that every game is pretty much a national game on TV. Baseball on the radio is local to mainly the home market. Yes, I know the Yanks are in Florida too, but with their training camp in Tampa and so many ex-New Yorkers, it's the same as a home market.
WNTIRadio said:
Not to veer too much off topic, but the Yankees' radio network is quite extensive, and stretches well beyond just Florida. They have affiliates in Las Vegas, Mass, NH, NC, RI, VT, and even NM.
http://newyork.yankees.mlb.com/nyy/schedule/radio_affiliates.jsp
The Yankees fan diaspora is far and wide, with ex-pat New Yorkers all over the place, a kind of "America's top team" appeal for many other baseball fans. That allows the Yankees to have this radio network that stretches all the way to Alaska, and some Yankees affiliates are well within the regular signal area for WCBS.
The one thing that should be remembered when comparing this arrangement for Yankees baseball with Giant's and Jet's football coverage on TV is that the NFL makes the comprehensive league wide TV deals with ESPN, NBC, CBS and Fox NOT the local teams, and the commercial TV spots are mostly sold to big national and regional advertisers with a few local avails plugged in.
On the other hand, the radio deals are made by the individual teams and are local, as are the spot sales. This particular Yankees network is put together by the team. It's cheap to do, and promotes the Yankees brand outside the immediate NYC area, and also provides revenue. Local radio spots can easily be inserted on each affiliate, and its a much different business and advertising model than the major TV networks have with the NFL. The difference is more than Apples and Oranges, its Apples and Hot Dogs.
By the way, some of these radio affiliates, in Connecticut and New York, are well within the WCBS-AM signal area. The list also needs editing since it shows the FM station in Belvidere, NJ that serves the Easton, Pennsylvania market as being in New York.
B
Bob1370
Guest
"They would if they could trade old Betsy in for a set of shiney wheels on the FM dial "
Not going to happen, first because the ratings and revenue numbers for WFAN show it ain't broke, therefore don't need fixing; and second, because the CBS cluster of FMs appears to be profitable to the point that shaking up the programming mix may cost a lot more than it'll gain them.
Besides, the wheels on FM may not be so shiny as they seem. Leaving aside the more limited range of a class B FM (there are no class C signals in New York, which would be a more equivalent signal to a 50 KW AM clear if one existed in the tri-state area) the sound from a Walkman, car radio, desktop radio or portable radio is equally tinny on either band. So why change for a perceived benefit that isn't really there?
Not going to happen, first because the ratings and revenue numbers for WFAN show it ain't broke, therefore don't need fixing; and second, because the CBS cluster of FMs appears to be profitable to the point that shaking up the programming mix may cost a lot more than it'll gain them.
Besides, the wheels on FM may not be so shiny as they seem. Leaving aside the more limited range of a class B FM (there are no class C signals in New York, which would be a more equivalent signal to a 50 KW AM clear if one existed in the tri-state area) the sound from a Walkman, car radio, desktop radio or portable radio is equally tinny on either band. So why change for a perceived benefit that isn't really there?
Unfortunately for WFAN-AM, it may be just days away from being defined as "in need of an FM upgrade." That will come when the May PPM numbers come out if they show the new ESPN Sports Talk FM with a much bigger cume, better younger demos or ratings trending higher than WFAN. The free market competition will really decide.
That said, CBS will probably think long and hard before it trades the superior AM signals on 660 or 880 for an FM, because those non-directional powerhouses may someday become very valuable again, if and when, the AM medium wave band is converted to full power digital, and they will likely stay among the most valuable and useful AM signals in the meantime. But, with ownership caps and shorter term competitive considerations in mind, if CBS needs to move its news or sports talk to FM it, will. It has already done that in places like Philadelphia where the competition moved Sports Talk to FM first, and in Chicago, when a new all news FM was seen threatening WBBM's ratings leadership position.
B
Bob1370
Guest
The situations in Chicago and Philly are different. In Philly WIP was coming up against the limits of its 5 kW power authorization and its directional pattern. In Chicago CBS had an FM property that was basically out of gas in ratings and revenue potential, so they had little to lose. In both cases the expected return in increased audience has yet to materialize...like a lot of AM heritage stations which have opened up FM simulcasts and so far haven't significantly budged the ratings needle in either 6+ or the prime demos.
In New York CBS has nothng but profitable properties without significant signal issues on both AM and FM, so there's a high cost in terms of flipping a profitable separately programmed FM with younger demos to a simulcast of an AM just to get a small slice of those demos (while the rest of them move off to a competing music station, or wind up cannibalized by one of your own cluster's other stations). What's more, it's highly likely that the total audience for ESPN will rise very little as a result of the simulcast on 98.7. Only when AMs face big signal pattern problems within their market area, do they gain by either a flip to FM or a simulcast, and not always even then--the experience of WTOP hasn't been repeated often, not even by WMAL in the same market with its own simulcast.
In New York CBS has nothng but profitable properties without significant signal issues on both AM and FM, so there's a high cost in terms of flipping a profitable separately programmed FM with younger demos to a simulcast of an AM just to get a small slice of those demos (while the rest of them move off to a competing music station, or wind up cannibalized by one of your own cluster's other stations). What's more, it's highly likely that the total audience for ESPN will rise very little as a result of the simulcast on 98.7. Only when AMs face big signal pattern problems within their market area, do they gain by either a flip to FM or a simulcast, and not always even then--the experience of WTOP hasn't been repeated often, not even by WMAL in the same market with its own simulcast.
Bob1370 said:
WIP has more people in its 5 mV/m contour than either KYW or WPHT. It's directional pattern actually is a nice fit for the dimensions of the market. Its problem is being AM, not coverage.
Successful AMs that move to FM or add FM simulcasts are almost universally successful when doing so. The success lies not with coverage issues, but with being FM; many people will not listen to AM even if they like the programming because it is noisy, has low quality audio, and has an image of being your grandfather's band.
WMAL was not a particularly successful AM. It added FM, but without programming that was compelling. WSB did the same thing, with compelling programming... and even thought they added an FM with lesser coverage than the AM, they shot up in 25-54... just as stations as diverse as WOKV and KSL have done with FM additions.
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