WHO DOES RADIO BETTER...L.A. OR NEW YORK?

[Indielover]

"It could be bias but I vote LA. From what I hear out of New York, it's nothing special, almost canned at times. If it was strictly based on talent, LA would be the number one market. NY is number one because of population. Ok, I admit, NY has some great talent too but LA talent is simply put "Legendary"!

With stations like indie and 100.3 the sound, LA is far superior to New York right now which only has WRXP (which isn't saying much)..the rest of the music stations however are nothing but cookie cutter crap.
As for AM/news/sports...WCBS and WFAN are decent stations...plus WABC musicradio on Saturday nights...

 

[davideduardo]

David Eduardo will correct me if I'm wrong, but I think L.A. radio overall, bills more than NY? So actually, the top money for radio is in L.A. !

You are very correct. LA has outbilled NY in gross revuenues since 1980 or 1981. And it's not a tiny bit... more like just over $1 billion in 2007 for LA and around $770 million for NYC in the same year.

And I could be wrong on this too, but in terms of population and market size, L.A., Orange County, Santa Clarita and the IE (not even counting Ventura, and parts of SD county)

The LA radio market is LA and Orange counties, including Santa Clarita and the Antilope Valley, but not including any part of the IE or Ventura or SD counties.

NY's metro is 20 counties and boroughs, and has about 6 million more persons 12+ than LA's 10.4 million.


comprise a larger radio audience than NY and it's surrounding metro? So technically, SoCal is a bigger market for advertisers than NY?

DE....please chime in?


[/quote]

 

[davideduardo]

This seems to me to be a bizarre comparison....
Both markets have good radio stations....LA has perhaps more "risk taking" formats since not as much is a stake financially...

LA bills about a third more than NY. The big stakes are in LA.

 

[airpab]

DE- Wondering? The IE receives most, if not all, of the Mt. Wilson signals...and, many of the L.A. stations show up (and some significantly, like KIIS) in "their" ARBS. Plus, L.A. radio stations regularly advertise IE businesses, events, etc.

So essentially, advertisers are getting a bargain and a ton of bang for their ad buck, if you will? They get to about 2 million more potential customers for the price of one? Right? Or do the L.A. stations account for this in their ad prices?

 

[davideduardo]

DE- Wondering? The IE receives most, if not all, of the Mt. Wilson signals...and, many of the L.A. stations show up (and some significantly, like KIIS) in "their" ARBS. Plus, L.A. radio stations regularly advertise IE businesses, events, etc.

Only one or two of the LA AMs has decent coverage of the IE, and about half the FMs get in at least partially. Much of the listening reported in IE Arbitron ratings is in car and at work listening by IE residents, but the listening takes place inside the LA market.

The western part of the IE such as Ontario, Montclair, Fontana is in netither metro and is a no man's land.

So most of the signals don't have total coverage, if any.

So essentially, advertisers are getting a bargain and a ton of bang for their ad buck, if you will? They get to about 2 million more potential customers for the price of one? Right? Or do the L.A. stations account for this in their ad prices?

The IE is not factored in to LA station rates for the most part. Radio is bought by the market, not by coverage. And for the stations that do reach the IE well, the additional AQH persons is generally only about 5% to maybe 6%. Not much... and buying is based on LA CPP, not the addition of the two markets.

 

[BACKnUSSR]

As for the wattage...YOU mentioned areas of the country...such as the "midwest"...not having "ever heard WABC"...although it wasn't a part of ratings per se..this station was very well known..not so for KHJ.

"As for Howard, he did very well in his music playing days at WNBC. He honed his act and developed the "shock jock" persona in DC and came to WXRK after 4 years in NYC. But whats the point there anyway?"

Huh?....as I said the "music playing days" were only half the time at WNBC..as for DC, AGAIN it was a STEPPINGSTONE..as was WNBC in some ways...these were development years of his act, which evolved to what it basically is today by the time he began mornings at WXRK...the POINT is NEW YORK is where his career took off..

Very few people living in the midwest ever "heard" WABC. They had about as many listeners in Chicago as WLS had in New York (which you could also get skipping at night).

And I understand your point about Howard, but I would suggest that a #1 show in DC suggests it had already "taken" off.

 

[Indielover]

"Very few people living in the midwest ever "heard" WABC. They had about as many listeners in Chicago as WLS had in New York (which you could also get skipping at night).

And you have of course done a "survey" and know this to be fact...just like many of your other "facts"...please

 

[davideduardo]

And you have of course done a "survey" and know this to be fact...just like many of your other "facts"...please

Even in the 60's, radio listening at night was a small fraction of the daytime levels. Few Top 40 listeners were going to change from their local daytime choice to a distant station.

Further, in the areas for hundreds of miles around Chicago and Detroit, WABC was a rough catch due to WBBM and WJR on the two adjacent channels, and in NY, 890 was blocked by 880 WCBS and the canadians on 900.

While a few people did listen, the Midwest and Northeast had tons of good Top 40's from KQV in Pittsburg to WIXY in Cleveland to WIFE in Indy to WROK in Rockford or KSTT in the Qhad Cities to KSO in Des Moines to WHB in Kansas City to CKLW in Detroit and so on that there was no need to listen to a staiton 600 miles away... unless you were in a very rural area.

 

[Indielover]

It doesn't change the fact that WABC is typically first to be mentioned and remembered when refering to top 40 AM's...

 

[davideduardo]

It doesn't change the fact that WABC is typically first to be mentioned and remembered when refering to top 40 AM's...

That may well be in radio circles or around the Northeast. Just by statistics, WABC covered well day and night about 10% of all Americans in the 60's, while WLS or KHJ or KLIF or CKLW or KTSA or KOMA or KIMN or WQAM o covered vastly less. So it is a question of familiarity. All of these and many more actually did top 40 as well as or even better than WABC. But they were not in the most populated area in the USA.

I was half way between WLS and WABC, and I always preferred WLS. Yet when I had to do my own station's first jingle package in 1964, I picked the WABC one... each had its strengths, but much of the way we differentiate has to do with what was right for the local market at the time they were big stations.

 

[BACKnUSSR]

"Very few people living in the midwest ever "heard" WABC. They had about as many listeners in Chicago as WLS had in New York (which you could also get skipping at night).

And you have of course done a "survey" and know this to be fact...just like many of your other "facts"...please

Yeah a survey. Like Pulse. Produce one Chicago ratings period where WABC had any significant showing.

 

[Marv-L.A.]

Tere was no reason for anyone in Chicago or the entire Midwest to even try to pull in WABC, since WLS's signal covered plenty of the Midwest very easily.

The fact that ABC & WLS were both owned by ABC was an albatross for both stations, and being hamstrung by having to carry non-music programming, which was totally in contradiction of the 'less talk more music' mandate of KHJ & the other Drake-Chennaut powerhouses.

 

[BACKnUSSR]

Tere was no reason for anyone in Chicago or the entire Midwest to even try to pull in WABC, since WLS's signal covered plenty of the Midwest very easily.

The fact that ABC & WLS were both owned by ABC was an albatross for both stations, and being hamstrung by having to carry non-music programming, which was totally in contradiction of the 'less talk more music' mandate of KHJ & the other Drake-Chennaut powerhouses.

Early on. The ABC programming mandate was gone by the mid sixties. In fact for many years WABC's slogan was "The Most Music".
And I agree, the influence of WABC was not very dominant outside of the northeast. Although that might be very hard for some folks growing up in its core area to fathom....unless of course you preferred "97 DJ",,,lol

 

[Marv-L.A.]

There's no doubt in my mind that the launch of KHJ in May of 1965 not only reinvented top 40 radio, but subsequently led to the introduction of various practices at many other formats over the years.

 

[Indielover]

"Yeah a survey. Like Pulse. Produce one Chicago ratings period where WABC had any significant showing.

I never said they had ratings outside the northeast, however WABC is typically first to be mentioned and remembered when refering to AM top 40's overall....to many it was the biggest and best of the era...and not just those who grew up listening to it.

 

[BACKnUSSR]

"Yeah a survey. Like Pulse. Produce one Chicago ratings period where WABC had any significant showing.

I never said they had ratings outside the northeast, however WABC is typically first to be mentioned and remembered when refering to AM top 40's overall....to many it was the biggest and best of the era...and not just those who grew up listening to it.

You asked if there was proof or a survey that WABC did not impact Chicago.

And you have of course done a "survey" and know this to be fact...just like many of your other "facts"...please

So yes, in essence there were many surveys done that proved WABC did NOT have many listeners in Chicago.


Where is that typical? My point is that it is NOT typically the first to be mentioned and remembered outside of the NY area.
In Chicago, its typically WLS. In LA, its typically KHJ, in Seattle its typically KJR, in Boston its typically WRKO,
Detroit.....CKLW, SF...KFRC,Atlanta....WQXI, and so on and so on......

As for nationally, the Drake format influenced far more stations than WABC did.

With that said, WABC was a fine radio station....

 

[Indielover]

"Where is that typical? My point is that it is NOT typically the first to be mentioned and remembered outside of the NY area.
In Chicago, its typically WLS. In LA, its typically KHJ, in Seattle its typically KJR, in Boston its typically WRKO,
Detroit.....CKLW, SF...KFRC, Atlanta....WQXI, and so on and so on......"

In most reports I've read on the subject, generally speaking WABC typically IS the first to be mentioned....but of course each particular market remembers their own first and foremost..

 

[davideduardo]

In most reports I've read on the subject, generally speaking WABC typically IS the first to be mentioned....but of course each particular market remembers their own first and foremost..

Just not true.

If there is any single station that influenced more other stations it has to be KLIF from the 50's into the 60's. After 1965, definitely KHJ and the Drake style of saying more in fewer words was the major influence on CHR, with the difference that it affected pop hit radio outside the US more than any other station and concept for the next half decade.

 

[War Of Attrition]

If there is one thing for sure, it is that New York has the most aggressive audio processing of any market in the country. It is amazing how loud it is without being distorted. The engineers must have figured out how to turn the Omnia up to the mythical "11" position.

 

[davideduardo]

If there is one thing for sure, it is that New York has the most aggressive audio processing of any market in the country. It is amazing how loud it is without being distorted. The engineers must have figured out how to turn the Omnia up to the mythical "11" position.

I think the "low" power of the NYC stations is being overcompensated for via processing. While in LA, a Mt. Wilson station might be 30 or so KW from nearly 5000 feet above the LA basin, in NY we have stations with under 7 kw at 1300 feet... and when you add the fact that NY is filled with high density buildings, the signals are indeed often inadequate for in home and at work listening. Solution? Create square waves.