WHATS UP WITH ALTERNATIVE IN SA?

[BackWhenRadioWas]

WHY NO ALTERNATIVE FROMAT IN SA?

 

[Kent]

(1) Alternative has been on a steady decline for several years. You don't find many operators willing to pick it up right now.

(2) San Antonio has a relatively small number of stations. Also, it has more Spanish dominant Hispanics than most markets. Fewer stations plus more viable options equals fewer niche formats.

 

[saradio1]

Posted by: Kent- 2) San Antonio has a relatively small number of stations. Also, it has more Spanish dominant Hispanics than most markets. Fewer stations plus more viable options equals fewer niche formats.

??? That's not true. There's plenty of radio station in S.A. The real problem is that there's four major owners- Clear Channel, Univision, BMP and Cox.

 

[oldtimer4radio]

All four of the BIG three only play safe radio and are unwilling to take any chances!!!

 

[saradio1]

Posted by: oldtimer4radio- All four of the BIG three only play safe radio and are unwilling to take any chances!!!

I completely agree.

Posted by: Kent- Also, it has more Spanish dominant Hispanics than most markets

This is the most recent book that came out-
18-49 KISS, KBBT, KCYY, KAJA, KXXM, KJXK, KROM & KZEP tied for 7th, KONO and KQXT

KROM was the only Spanish station that was in the Top 10. Even though there's more Hispanics living in San Antonio, English is our primary language.

 

[Kent]

??? That's not true. There's plenty of radio station in S.A.

Depends. The number of stations in San Antonio is relatively average for a market of its size. It has three more stations than Cincinnati, the next market up, and fourteen fewer than Salt Lake City, the next market down. However, regional Mexican is a mass appeal format in San Antonio; it's not in most markets its size. In many markets in a similar situation, there are far more stations. As an example, BIA says San Antonio has 52 stations. It shows Houston as having 68 and Dallas/Ft. Worth with 82.

This is the most recent book that came out-
18-49 KISS, KBBT, KCYY, KAJA, KXXM, KJXK, KROM & KZEP tied for 7th, KONO and KQXT

KROM was the only Spanish station that was in the Top 10. Even though there's more Hispanics living in San Antonio, English is our primary language.

First of all, there are more English dominant Hispanics in San Antonio than most other markets. There are also more Spanish-dominant Hispanics in San Antonio than most other markets. I believe Dallas/Ft. Worth and Houston have more Spanish-dominant Hispanics than San Antonio, but the number in San Antonio is still pretty sizeable. Yes, English is spoken more than Spanish, but enough speak Spanish that regional Mexican is a better venture than alternative, a niche format that's getting smaller everyday.

Secondly, you're essentially combining two demographics, often with wildly different listening habits, to try to prove a point. Most of the Spanish-language stations target 25-54, not 18-34. You're always going to have more stations targetting the 25-54 crowd because that's the money demo. Regional Mexican does better in that age group than it does in 18-34. Hence, regional Mexican has more potential. The only Spanish language station that goes after the younger audience, KRIO-FM 104.1, doesn't do well. Small wonder!

The real problem is that there's four major owners- Clear Channel, Univision, BMP and Cox.

I'm not necessarily a big fan of big radio corporations either (though I don't hate them nearly as much as many people on these boards). However, I don't think the data supports that conclusion. Clear Channel and Cox operate alternative stations elsewhere. In fact, Clear Channel offers alternative in both Houston and Dallas, among many other cities. Cox offers it in Tampa and Richmond. There's no reason to think they wouldn't offer it in San Antonio if they felt it was viable. As for Univision and BMP, I'm not aware of them offering alternative stations anywhere, but they don't seem to stop other operators from going alternative. They also only have five Spanish-language FM's between them, which wouldn't be a problem if there were more stations available!

 

[saradio1]

It shows Houston as having 68 and Dallas/Ft. Worth with 82. You can't compare the number of radio stations to San Antonio. Those two cities are much larger than S.A.

Yes, English is spoken more than Spanish, but enough speak Spanish that regional Mexican is a better venture than alternative, a niche format that's getting smaller everyday.

I disagree. The problem is that the companies like Cox and Clear Channel dont want to ruin the success of there other stations such as Cox flipping Magic to compete with KISS or Clear Channel flipping one of there other stations to compete with Mix 96.1.

Regional Mexican does better in that age group than it does in 18-34. Hence, regional Mexican has more potential. The only Spanish language station that goes after the younger audience, KRIO-FM 104.1, doesn't do well. Small wonder!

hmmmm, so why doesn't La Ley have the same success? La Ley is Regional Mexican with a strong morning show yet not very successful.

 

[Kent]

I disagree. The problem is that the companies like Cox and Clear Channel dont want to ruin the success of there other stations such as Cox flipping Magic to compete with KISS or Clear Channel flipping one of there other stations to compete with Mix 96.1.

Again, I haven't seen any data that supports that conclusion. All you have to do is go a few hours up I-35, and you'll find Clear Channel operating a CHR in KHKS and an alternative station in KDGE. They do the same in Oklahoma City with KJYO and KHBZ-FM. While Cox does segment stations a little more than Clear Channel, they offer two country stations that are very similar in Birmingham. They also offer two classic hits stations in Louisville as well as an AC that has a lot of gold on the playlist.

hmmmm, so why doesn't La Ley have the same success? La Ley is Regional Mexican with a strong morning show yet not very successful.

La Ley has two problems. The first is the signal; it barely covers half the market. The second, and bigger problem, is that La Ley, quite frankly, isn't very good. BMP offers "La Ley" in every market where it has stations, and it gets its head handed to it in most markets where it has a solid competitor. In San Antonio, that's KROM and KCOR-FM. Look at what happened in Austin. La Ley 98.9 got waxed by KLQB "La Que Buena 104.3," which is very similar to KROM, almost instantly despite having both heritage and a better signal. Finally, keep in mind that I didn't say regional Mexican was a guaranteed recipe for success in San Antonio; I said it had better money making potential than alternative. A poor product is not likely to succeed in any format.

 

[sdh483]

Alternative was once available in the northeastern part of San Antonio in the 90s via DXing 101X in Austin, but since they moved the tower, that went away.

 

[daypart]

(1) Alternative has been on a steady decline for several years. You don't find many operators willing to pick it up right now.

Isn't one of the problems with the format the aging of the audience? I'd figure that once most of the Gen Xers started reproducing, they grew less interested in listening to NIN and Marilyn Manson with kids in the car.

 

[Drunken_Easterbunny]

Radio is a business... not a public service.

The point of radio is to sell ads.

What age demographic does alternative appeal to? white, teenage males.

Do white, teenage males have disposable income? no.

I don't care how "good" the station is. They can have the best promos... the sharpest playlist... the most cutting edge stuff.

It's a niche market... and wouldn't survive.

The only.... ONLY... way an alternative station would bill enough to sustain itself... would be if Howard Stern returned from satellite.

The morning show would bill enough to prop up everything else. Maybe. Even Then It's a long shot to make a buck... which is what radio is all about.

 

[upstate29651]

Not so sure about that anymore. Houston's "Buzz" is very female-friendly (especially mornings), and I "fear" this may be a trend, if CC is convinced they must lean "girly" to save the format, overall. Let all the hormone-filled male teens get their dose of angst & anger out of an Active rocker instead, along with more attractive demos (18-43...46?).

Be very glad SA has a successful active rocker. Houston is stuck without one.

G

 

[texasskywatcher]

KDGE in Dallas isn't that Alt either anymore. Unless you count leaning to the Adult Alt crowd of 25-54. About 81% of their playlist consists of Golds from the 90s and 19% currents. Nothing is broken in on the station anymore. Chalk it up to Clear Channel's centralized programming policy and music accounting. If you really want to know why the alt format is on the decline, you have your answer here.

The Alternative format was never meant to be governed by a bunch of auditorium music tests, weekly call out, and perceptuals to tell you what to play and what to think. It was never meant to be CHR, Classic Rock, Spanish, AC, or Country. Yet that's what CC, Cumulus, and every other Corporate machine attempted to do to it and did.

 

[Kent]

KDGE in Dallas isn't that Alt either anymore. Unless you count leaning to the Adult Alt crowd of 25-54. About 81% of their playlist consists of Golds from the 90s and 19% currents. Nothing is broken in on the station anymore.

That sounds about right. This is a problem plaguing alternative stations nationwide. There's almost no mass appeal product in the format.

Chalk it up to Clear Channel's centralized programming policy and music accounting. If you really want to know why the alt format is on the decline, you have your answer here.

I doubt it's that simple. If it were, it would only be Clear Channel's alternative stations struggling with that issue. However, we're seeing even smaller stations leaving the format. In fact, in Little Rock, Clear Channel ran the locally owned alternative station out of the format about 4 years ago. The local guys really tried to make it work and compete against Clear Channel, but the listeners preferred the Clear Channel product. In Bryan/College Station, KXCS went Jack FM despite having the market to itself in a college town.

The Alternative format was never meant to be governed by a bunch of auditorium music tests, weekly call out, and perceptuals to tell you what to play and what to think. It was never meant to be CHR, Classic Rock, Spanish, AC, or Country. Yet that's what CC, Cumulus, and every other Corporate machine attempted to do to it and did.

In a sense, I agree with you here. Alternative could never have become as big as it did were it not for grunge and Lillith Fair artists gaining mass appeal status. Corporate radio picked it up as quickly as possible, and they weren't concerned that the boom wouldn't last. They played those mass appeal artists into the ground. There weren't many alternative stations before that happened, and most of those stations did poorly as they were running a very tightly niched format. As CHR, Hot AC and active rock picked up on the "mainstream alternative" artists, they were no longer alternative. In fact, today you'll likely hear more new alternative-friendly product on those formats than you will alternative stations. Modern AC was really the beginning of the end for alternative as a big mainstream format. Some programmers got the idea that some of the alternative artists weren't so female-friendly and that they could do a female-focused alternative format. It worked for a few years (until that product dried up, too), and alternative began breaking apart. As it broke apart, it was no longer the mass appeal format it was a few years earlier and no longer had the audience to sustain it. It's really the classic "chicken and egg" question. Alternative became big because big radio backed it. However, big radio also squeezed the popular artists out and segmented the format to death.

 

[texasskywatcher]

KXCS' problem is that they started following the same blueprint that most other alt stations followed. They started listening to the advertisers and consultants. KXCS kept drifting further and further away from the alt format, adopting a more active format. By that time this occured, they had already alienated most of their hardcore alt fans and the switch to Jack was more about money than anything else.

Clear Channel isn't the only company that follows the centralized programming concept. Cumulus does as well. Of course, Cumulus owned heritage 99X (99.7 WNNX) in Atlanta, GA before they swapped frequencies with their CHR Q100.5 (WWWQ) station and changed it into an Active Rocker


WFNX in Boston is one the only true alt stations left.

 

[Kent]

KXCS' problem is that they started following the same blueprint that most other alt stations followed. They started listening to the advertisers and consultants. KXCS kept drifting further and further away from the alt format, adopting a more active format. By that time this occured, they had already alienated most of their hardcore alt fans and the switch to Jack was more about money than anything else.

You bet the flip to Jack was about money! That's what drives business! What it goes back to as to why KXCS started listening to the advertisers and consultants is that alternative isn't the mass appeal format it once was. They felt they had to do that to get their audience up to a sustainable level. It didn't happen, but it wouldn't have had they stayed as they were either. That result, unfortunately, is typical.

Clear Channel isn't the only company that follows the centralized programming concept. Cumulus does as well. Of course, Cumulus owned heritage 99X (99.7 WNNX) in Atlanta, GA before they swapped frequencies with their CHR Q100.5 (WWWQ) station and changed it into an Active Rocker

I've worked for Cumulus. I know their programming strategy all too well. While Cumulus does a lot of things well, strong local programming isn't one of them. In fact, Clear Channel isn't even close to Cumulus when it comes to centralized programming. At least in the recent past, there was a good amount of local control over programming at Clear Channel stations.

WFNX in Boston is one the only true alt stations left.

And it's not doing very well. It's been struggling at around a 1 share for over a year now. It really reminds me of the alternative station I knew in the late 80's, 1340 KTOW in Tulsa. KTOW lost money consistently as an alternative station because it was too tightly niched to get enough audience to attract advertisers. I hope WFNX is doing better.