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What's Next for WNEW?

fang39 said:
Mr. Eduardo, could it be you have softened your position about Oldies/Classic Hits performing in this market? If I were on the board at CBS, I would be looking for the head of the consultant(s) who convinced me that dumping a format that produced a consistent 3+ rating for Jack, was a great idea!
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The approach of CBS-FM was doomed. It did not take any consultants to show that the market reveneues were up, while WCBS-FM was down... and dropping every year. All it took was a look at Miller Kaplan. And the bottom line.

The 25-54 numbers for Jack are, in Summer and the last two trends, now at the same level that the oldies format went away with. When you factor in the fact that every year CBS-Fm was losing about 10% of its 45-54 listeners, you can say that they have BETTER sales demos today than they did before.

The 12+ number is foolish to even look at. It was composed of mostly 55+ listeners. In New York, almost al business is transactional (based on CPP in the target demos) so the 25-54 or 18-49 listenership is all that counts. And Jack is doing better in the sales demos than CBS-FM would have done as the audience matured even more.
 
neo11 said:
Same applies to country...ad agencies won't touch that format and that's what matters in commercial radio, especially in market #1.
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There is no bias against country as a format.. if country in NY got a 4 share in 25-54, the responsible station would be billing over $30 million a year.
 
UncleBozzle said:
I couldn't agree with you more Jeff. If you have to be the cursed signal in NYC and have to resort to a format that is less viable than those of your competitors wouldn't you be better off taking a bit of a chance and play something entirely different than the others? In the current incarnation MIX battles with KTU and to some extent Kiss and Z-100. In the previous format known as Blink it was playing similar music to WPLJ and Z-100. They should finally give it up, show some desire and strength and either pick Country, Alternative Rock, or Standards/MOR. Maybe they will do no better, but maybe they will do alot better. The point is choose a format, execute it well, and plug away with it. No matter what format is picked from the ones that currently create a hole in NYC they would be able to own that niche. I'd rather get a 2.0 in the ratings consistently, knowing I can always count on that listener base, rather than get a 1.5 and fight for my life against other stations.
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That's very true ratings wise but the advertisers pay the bills and the above mentioned formats might pull in a 2.0 but not to the right demos. CBS would make no money and that is the problem at hand. WNEW pulls in more cash with their floundering KTU II format than they would with country, alt. rock or standards. AC is a different story but for the ac crowd the dials are set at 106.7 and will not move.
 
Jeffrey said:
UncleBozzle said:
I couldn't agree with you more Jeff. If you have to be the cursed signal in NYC and have to resort to a format that is less viable than those of your competitors wouldn't you be better off taking a bit of a chance and play something entirely different than the others? In the current incarnation MIX battles with KTU and to some extent Kiss and Z-100. In the previous format known as Blink it was playing similar music to WPLJ and Z-100. They should finally give it up, show some desire and strength and either pick Country, Alternative Rock, or Standards/MOR. Maybe they will do no better, but maybe they will do alot better. The point is choose a format, execute it well, and plug away with it. No matter what format is picked from the ones that currently create a hole in NYC they would be able to own that niche. I'd rather get a 2.0 in the ratings consistently, knowing I can always count on that listener base, rather than get a 1.5 and fight for my life against other stations.
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That's very true ratings wise but the advertisers pay the bills and the above mentioned formats might pull in a 2.0 but not to the right demos. CBS would make no money and that is the problem at hand. WNEW pulls in more cash with their floundering KTU II format than they would with country, alt. rock or standards. AC is a different story but for the ac crowd the dials are set at 106.7 and will not move.
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I have to disagree about a couple of things. First, AC dials will move from 106.7 if another station puts out a better product. With CC forcing Lite FM to air Delilah in the evenings, instead of a popular local jock in JJ Kennedy, I'm sure there's an audience out there that doesn't want to hear the middle American sap of Delilah. In fact, I feel that CBS should have taken advantage of that and Lite FM's Xmas music marathon to put on an AC last month and try and steal listeners who did not want to hear Delilah OR Feliz Navidad all day.

Some suburban markets are able to successfully support two or more AC's...look at Fairfield County, which really has three if you also consider 96.7 The Coast. Then there's Nassau County which gets WALK as well as K-Joy plus Lite FM from NYC. Suffolk County has WALK and much of it also gets WBAZ and Love 96.1, in addition to the stations from CT.

Alt. rock, if done right, might not score very highly in the ratings, but it would get good, young demos, demos that are underserved right now because these listeners might not be tuning in much to Z100 or the hip hop stations. There's also the suburbs to consider, and there's no new rock station there either.
 
The truth lies between this comment from UncleBozzle:
The point is choose a format, execute it well, and plug away with it. No matter what format is picked from the ones that currently create a hole in NYC they would be able to own that niche. I'd rather get a 2.0 in the ratings consistently, knowing I can always count on that listener base, rather than get a 1.5 and fight for my life against other stations.
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And the facts 'n figures from Dave Eduardo:
There is no bias against country as a format.. if country in NY got a 4 share in 25-54, the responsible station would be billing over $30 million a year.
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The answer is simple, but it sure as hell ain't easy. Could it be that launching a Country format ("that won't work in New York") and running it like a brite AC is the answer? Differentiation, to the extent that it isn't Lite, yet offers familiarity that makes it acceptable and even desirable to at-work listening would be key elements. I'm not going to pretend I know more than anybody else on this board, but whoever take the reins at WNEW better have the backing of the suits who decided on a format change and pay attention to the day-to-day DETAILS no matter what format is selected. Oh yeah, bring a truckload of cash to promote the new format.

Oh, one more thing... WNEW is a great set of call letters... as in NEW York and NEW Jersey. Like I said... I'm just a radio mutt, not a pedigree. So let's spin the wheel o' formats... again.

-9-

A guy who remembers The Good Guys, HOA, 99X as one of the hottest Top 40's in America, WPLJ as a tightly formatted AOR, WNEW-FM as a progressive rocker and WCBS-FM as one of the premier Oldies stations in America. Remembering the past, but definitely NOT living in it.
 
You hit the nail on the head Element. Country presented as a soft ac or even hot ac station is the execution needed to make the format work in NYC. If you give the listener a worthy product they will buy it, that is true in radio as it is in anyother business. A well presented store, newspaper, evening news, or even a radio station will have loyal listeners if the presentation is done correctly. You might also do the reverse of what Lite does in NYC and run some Hot AC hits mixed in with the Country Hits. Somewhat of a hybrid if you will. Call it something edgy, perhaps "The Twister" because you are "mixing" the format a bit. Regardless time ticks away. The time is now for this. Afterall Citadel might present us with "Cat Country 95.5" when they take over ABC Radio. Happy New Year all!!
 
neo11 said:
[I have to disagree about a couple of things. First, AC dials will move from 106.7 if another station puts out a better product. With CC forcing Lite FM to air Delilah in the evenings, instead of a popular local jock in JJ Kennedy, I'm sure there's an audience out there that doesn't want to hear the middle American sap of Delilah. In fact, I feel that CBS should have taken advantage of that and Lite FM's Xmas music marathon to put on an AC last month and try and steal listeners who did not want to hear Delilah OR Feliz Navidad all day.

Some suburban markets are able to successfully support two or more AC's...look at Fairfield County, which really has three if you also consider 96.7 The Coast. Then there's Nassau County which gets WALK as well as K-Joy plus Lite FM from NYC. Suffolk County has WALK and much of it also gets WBAZ and Love 96.1, in addition to the stations from CT.

Alt. rock, if done right, might not score very highly in the ratings, but it would get good, young demos, demos that are underserved right now because these listeners might not be tuning in much to Z100 or the hip hop stations. There's also the suburbs to consider, and there's no new rock station there either.
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I completely agree about Delilah being a sappy midwestern aimed program and not fitting at all with this market but LTW does well in it's day parts and Delilah doesn't air until evening so all those day listeners have probably never even heard Delilah so as much as I would like to see competition against what CC has decided upon for evenings at LTW, I'm not sure WNEW would ultimately compete well.
I do however agree that WNEW could have taken advantage of WLTW if they'd aired ac while LTW played jingle bells 10,000 times.

Also WPLJ is considered hot ac so in reality New York has 2 ac stations plus rim shot ac signals from the suburbs. They also have 2 urban ac's, WBLS/WRKS as well as WQCD, smooth jazz all of which compete for an office crowd. Another ac would be going after the same demos but what do I know?
 
The prroblem with Mr. Eduardo's theory ( and that is all it is ever, theory) is that CBS FM as an oldies station was billing thirty five million a year. Although the audience may certainly have been in jeopardy of dying off, they are billing nowhere near that with Jack.
 
TowerBuzz said:
The prroblem with Mr. Eduardo's theory ( and that is all it is ever, theory) is that CBS FM as an oldies station was billing thirty five million a year. Although the audience may certainly have been in jeopardy of dying off, they are billing nowhere near that with Jack.
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This is not theory: CBS-FM, at $34 million pre-Jack, had lost over 22% of its peak billing in 2000. The market went from $730 million in 2001 to $830 million last year, so the combined drop of CBS-FM was in the order of 40% vs. the market.

CBS corporate perhaps could have waited a few years more, but the revenue was declining and they were pretty much required to make a change. The change they made to Jack did not work as well in NY as it did in, for example, Los Angeles where its success has been phenomenal.

Moving from oldies was needed. They just did not hit a home run in the new format. On the other hand, they are billing now about what the oldies format would have billed had they not made the change, so they are better posiitioned for the future.
 
Not if they do not get numbers with jack theyre not. Let me also say im not an oldies purist who thought that jack was the end of the world, I just think that it was ill advised considering that Jack is still an unproven commodity. It has yet to be proven that Jack is not the next Jammin oldies which I thought was a great and sensible format but like the mighty stegasaurus could not adapt to life in our time.
 
Time will tell whether or not Jack lasts in NYC or nationwide, but there are many markets where Jack is doing quite well. NYC is not one of those markets, however, Jack is showing growth in the key 25-54 demo and as far as CBS Radio is concerned, that's a very good sign.
 
Really getting frustrated and upset.......I switched to 102.7 because I lost the CBS "good guys", then switched over to 106.7 for then and now tunes...now 102.7 has the "fever"...just want to wake up to jiggy music that serves better than an alarm clock - JUST LIKE BEFORE GUYS....have no where to go after this...PULEEZE give us listeners a fair chance and break....bring back the original format AND RANDY DAVIS......Lori B in Staten Island
 
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