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WFLL has gone country

J

Jerryk

Guest
Sounds like a recurrent mix of 70-90's material. No jocks, just liners and jingles. Good selection of artists and songs not getting any play in the market these days.
Got to do better than being the 5th sports station.
 
I went to the last website to listen to the stream. It tells me it's in black-out mode until 11:59 pm tonight. Have they launched a new website?
 
I hate to say it because that station will always remain dear to me. It's like seeing a family member on life support with no chance of improvement...it's time to pull the plug.

Ah what it used to be: www.WFTL14.com
 
Nice WFTL tribute website Mike, I remember most all of the names especially two of which I worked with, Tim Baxter and Dave Ryder, little known fact, Dave Ryder started the "900" telephone number business and made himself a serious boat load of money off that idea..

WFTL will always have a place in the hearts of any and all who worked in South Florida radio and
WFTL always had a name for it self.....
 
OMG...so now I put the preset back on 1400 ;D
 
Mike Sheridan said:
I hate to say it because that station will always remain dear to me. It's like seeing a family member on life support with no chance of improvement...it's time to pull the plug.

Ah what it used to be: www.WFTL14.com
Click to expand...

Mike - I enjoyed the tribute site. Thank you for sharing.
 
Thanks guys, Tim Baxter and Dave Ryder are still good friends of mine. I had been working as an automation operator at WAXY-FM when there was an opening at WFTL. Dave was nice enough to give my audition tape to the PD at WFTL.

I worked for Dave in the 976 / 900 biz. It was fun and Dave was very good about giving you what needed to be done and then he just turned you loose to do it anyway you wanted to. He was also very good to his employees.

There were lots of kind and very talented people at WFTL. I thought all radio stations were like that.

I came up with the idea to do the reunion, it was surreal. We laughed and talked like we had just seen each other the day before. The camaraderie was still there!

Without help I could never have done the reunion. It was difficult pulling all the details together. Some of the people helping me wanted to postpone it but I thought if we don't do it now it will never happen. How right I was! People came from as far as Seattle and Buffalo. It was the weekend of September 8-9 2001. We all know what happened the following Tuesday. In fact some of the people at the reunion got stuck in Florida for awhile.
 
cd637299 said:
This must be some sort of tax write-off or something.

cd
Click to expand...

Not sure about that, only the owner knows and probably the bookkeeper. I don't think any of the James Crystal stations are big money makers. WMEN 640, WFTL 850, or WFLL 1400. They refer to all three as WFTL and it still doesn't give them much market share.

Here's an idea for them. WFTL 850 is a West Palm Beach station. WMEN is licensed to Royal Palm Beach. Stop trying to be Fort Lauderdale/Miami stations and concentrate on Palm Beach county.

Part of what made WFTL 1400 successful was the station was very plugged in to the local community. They attended all the Chamber of Commerce breakfasts, did local news, and focused on Broward county. It was a good way to attract listeners and advertisers.
 
How does the population from the Hillsborough Canal to 595 or even Hollywood Blvd compare to the Palm Beach market?

Been listening to them too much since finding this thread. Seem to hear bigtime repetition mostly from, is it the 80's and maybe into the 90's?
 
In a way this thread reminds me of when Jacksonville's 50,000 watt powerhouse WAPE flipped to country in 1981. The format lasted only a year and was hilariously entertaining to listen to The Greaseman (leftover under contract from the Top 40 format) spinning country tunes every morning.
 
Mike Sheridan said:
Part of what made WFTL 1400 successful was the station was very plugged in to the local community. They attended all the Chamber of Commerce breakfasts, did local news, and focused on Broward county. It was a good way to attract listeners and advertisers.
Click to expand...

Mike, thanks so much for sharing the WFTL reunion website. I remember seeing WFTL reps at those Chamber of Commerce breakfast meetings. The times were so different and I miss them. Maybe a little sentimentality comes into play, but really I recall how business just operated on more of a higher ground than how most do today.

Before being gobbled up by banks than just kept growing bigger and bigger, I attended those chamber meetings to attract new clients and even keep the ones we had happy. Lots of times deals started right there with a handshake and a look in the eyes. I was never burned and for a long time time good, local radio wasn't either.

What I remember most was Craig Worthing and his board op - I think his name was Al Knight. Craig's talking over the fence to a neighbor style was perfect at times when my hectic day demanded nothing too heavy. You speak of local advertisers and to this day I can recall a restaurant I must have gone to at least 100 times and that was the Blu Grotto in Inverrary - now long gone. Craig was believable and made the pitch so well I couldn't resist it. I took clients there and they were impressed too. I'm sure for the amount of money the owners spent on advertising, they got lots in return.

I still believe there is room for a good local operator who invests in talent who are real and believable too. Apologies for my little personal trip down memory lane but sometimes it just helps keep me sane in this crazy world.
 
John, thanks for your note. Craig was a good communicator no doubt about that.

Radio used to be about people, now it's just about numbers. Ratings, revenue, etc.

Radio when it's good makes a personal connection. That goes for sales and programming. More so than TV and more than newspapers.
 
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