The Phoenix metro area is one of the fastest growing areas of the United States. Why isn't the radio dial reflecting that? You would think Phoenix is some small town radio market judging by its stations. Is there really a need for TWO country stations, TWO FM stations that don't even play music as well as FOUR Top 40 stations? Why aren't any of these corporations implementing new formats since the metro is getting more diversified? What about an Urban AC format? Rhythmic CHR or even Smooth Jazz? Phoenix isn't a small town, it is a big city. Why doesn't it have big city radio?
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Why is the Phoenix radio landscape so boring if the population is booming?
- Thread starter thepumpin1
- Start date
Phoenix has a 5% African American population. Urban AC has been done in the past on an AM and a rimshot FM. It earned a 0.8 share at best.
Back in the 1990's, which was the last time Urban AC was tried in the market, it was a 2% African American population. That's not enough growth to change the outcome of attempting the format, which is failure.
The only way you can make Urban AC work in this town is if you have a signal that you don't have any other viable format options for and you have other stations in the group that subsidize the operation. EZ Communications and Sundance made Kiss 1230 work because its other stations in the building paid the rent on the studios and paid the light bill, so the station's only real expenses were me (a college student at the time working really cheap), two sales people, and the transmitter site electric bill (1kW AM, cheap). Down the street, Majic 107 tried to make a go of it with a full staff and no other stations to bring in revenue. It was sink or swim and they sank. Phoenix isn't Houston or Atlanta - the billing just isn't there for an Urban format. There's a reason Radio One has never tried to enter the market.
The only ethnic formats that work in Phoenix are those that appeal to Hispanics, because that's who lives in the metro.
KYOT was at one time a huge Smooth Jazz station in the 1990s. Like all Smooth Jazz stations around the country, the format died. It moved to a Rhythmic AC format in 2011 and floundered. It took on its current Variety Hits format in 2014 and now performs well.
As for Rhythmic CHR, KKFR still reports as Rhythmic, as does KNRJ. KZZP and KZON have flirted with Rhythmic in the past, but the musical trends have shifted them back to mainstream over the years.
But to answer your question as to why stations program what they program: they do what makes them money. And while the city is growing, the demographics are staying more or less the same; a low African American population, a good sized Hispanic population, and a majority white population. Radio reflects this: stations either target the white audience, the Hispanic audience, or they build a coalition of whites and Hispanics. Everyone else is just along for the ride. Because that's who lives in Phoenix.
Sure, you could flip any of the stations in the market to Urban AC or Smooth Jazz tomorrow if you wanted to. It would be financial suicide, which is why people don't do things like that. You will make more money as the fourth country station than you will being the first of either of those formats.
"Who" is listening to radio the most these days? Based on the many
posts I see on this site, that would have to be people over the age of 45 or so. Younger
people simply aren't interested in radio when they can stream all the exact music they
wish to hear. So we have programmers programming music that few want to listen to
because advertisers covet the younger people even though they don't have the disposable
income older people do. Advertisers wishing to target a younger crowd best avoid radio
altogether. Metro Phoenix has a huge older, retiring/retirement population that continues
to grow. A non scientific survey done recently, in the N.W. valley, showed a large number
of vehicles tuned to: KBAQ and KAHM. These days, with radio seeming to die a slow death,
the smart money would be on a format appealing to those devoted listeners........
posts I see on this site, that would have to be people over the age of 45 or so. Younger
people simply aren't interested in radio when they can stream all the exact music they
wish to hear. So we have programmers programming music that few want to listen to
because advertisers covet the younger people even though they don't have the disposable
income older people do. Advertisers wishing to target a younger crowd best avoid radio
altogether. Metro Phoenix has a huge older, retiring/retirement population that continues
to grow. A non scientific survey done recently, in the N.W. valley, showed a large number
of vehicles tuned to: KBAQ and KAHM. These days, with radio seeming to die a slow death,
the smart money would be on a format appealing to those devoted listeners........
Smooth Jazz is a dead format everywhere. It aged out of the sales demos.
Uban AC, with only one exception in the whole country, is a format that needs a large African American population to sustain it as it depends on over 90% of the audience being Black.
Stations do formats that can achieve a large, salable audience. Smooth Jazz can not attract listeners in the sales demos, and Urban AC can not attract a large audience.
In the last book, 91% of 18-34 persons used radio weekly, and the average 18-34 year old (including in the average non-users) spent 11 hours and 4 minutes a week with radio. By contrast, persons 55+ listened 11 hours and 34 minutes on average.
The top 18-34 stations are KZON, KKFR, KMXP, KZZP, KESZ, KMLE, KSLX. All big billing stations.
As examples, KZON reaches over 800 thousand people weekly, KZZP reaches 900 thosuand and KKFR reaches nearly 600 thousand. KZZP reaches 25% of the total poulation 12+ weekly.
So there is big business running stations targeting 18-34. In fact, the highest billing music station in the country is KIIS in LA, which is a CHR station.
The smart money is on appealing to some part of the 18 to 55 year old spectrum. Advertisers reject 55 and over. The median age in Phoenix is 32.2 which is 6 years younger than the US national average. If anything, the myth of Phoenix being a retirement community is almost as long gone as the idea that you "went to the desert if you were sick" which prevailed well into the 70's. The fact is that Phoenix is one of the youngest metros in the US.
Seniors are not good responders to advertising. They require more impressions to make the sale, and that means that the profit on each sale is lower or non-existent.
KAHM, in the last book, got a 0.2 share in the Phoenix MSA. KBAQ, which barely broke the 1 share barrier in the last book, ranks as well in 18-34 as it does in 35-64.
Obviously, the results in Sun City will be different. But there are only 34,000 people in Sun City. That is the equivalent of about 1/3 of the enrollment of ASU!
A LPFM in south Tempe -- say, if a station were to rent space on one of the KDUS towers -- would cover much of the Black population in SE Phoenix and eastern Ahwatukee. Roughly the 85042, 85044, and the eastern half of 85048 ZIP codes. Especially Ahwatukee, where the Black population is close to 15% east of 40th St. (25% in some census districts), the population is young, and is increasingly affluent. Mountain Point HS student population is 27% African-American. That says it all right there.
A Class A commercial station in that location would be much better, and I think it could work, but there's no place on the dial to put one.
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The assumption that all African Americans will listen to one format is not factual.
Of roughly 200,000 African Americans in Phoenix, when we look at those over 18 and under 55 we are talking of a potential cume of around 125,000 if every single on listened. That would rank that hypothetical station at 24th in cume. But a more realistic calculation of the potential for any particular format might be a cume reach of half of the population, or a cume of about 60,000. That would not even get you in the top 30.
Maybe, as you say, a good place for a non-commercial LPFM in certain areas. But as a commercial format, not very likely unless it was broad enough to be principally used by Hispanics while still appealing to African Americans.
Or, it just means that there are a lot of people 45 and older who use this message board to discuss radio. Remember, the predecessor to this board is older than most millennials.
Younger people may be using different media to discuss radio, if they are discussing it online at all (as opposed to consuming it).
John, I understand radio does what makes money. I also understand that the African-American population in Phoenix is low. But can't programmers come up with a way to cater to African-American listening audiences in Phoenix without alienating White and Hispanic listeners? You mean to tell me there aren't ANY white or Hispanic listeners who like artists like: Joe, Tyrese, Ledisi, Floetry or Lalah Hathaway? It CAN be done, it would just have to take some thought. Maybe instead of straight ahead Urban AC, what about Smooth AC? You could mix Urban AC artists with mainstream artists such as: Sam Smith, Ed Sheeran, Santana and War. Just like 94.7 The Wave in Los Angeles. I personally listen to Top 40, some Alternative music, House Music and Hip-hop, but sometimes I want to listen to the latest R&B hits as well. Which Phoenix stations don't provide. It just doesn't seem fair that we are an after thought in the Phoenix market. What would it take to change that? There are more and more African-Americans moving to the valley (not like Atlanta or Houston) but we do exist. We may not have as much spending power in the valley, but we still have it.
If Iheart radio had kept KYOT as a Smooth AC station rather than try to flip it to Rhythmic AC, it probably could have survived (in that particular format). It wasn't straight ahead Urban AC, but it was a good alternative for those who liked to hear R&B music mixed with mainstream AC.
Don't get me wrong, I love the Valley of the Sun, but that is one of my major pet peeves. African-Americans living there were usually low on the pecking order of things when it came to media representation.
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Except The Wave doesn't play Joe, Tyrese, Ledisi, Floetry, or Lalah Hathaway. I do see a UAC category looking at the KTWV playlist online, but it's filled with dusty staples like the Isley Brothers and Patrice Rushen. The Wave is playing stuff more people know. But most of those songs are 30+ years old. The problem with the artists you cite (Joe, Floetry, et al) is they're largely unfamiliar outside of the UAC audience and people gravitate to the music that they know.
I saw this up close and personal during the early days of KYOT. When Nick was given free reign and told to be out of the box he was playing stuff in Portuguese. The station did okay but had room to grow. When Broadcast Architecture came in and had him tighten things up with more familiar tunes, the station grew. No matter what format you program, unfamiliar music kills radio stations. People don't listen for an education. Even though we in the building dug the Portuguese love songs more than Gino Vanelli, you program to the audience. [a lesson that took longer for KZON to learn...]
Before they flat out blew the station up and went to "Eva" the station was Smooth AC. It tanked.
Speaking of which, is there anyone besides The Wave having anything resembling success with Smooth AC? It didn't work at KIFM. It didn't work at KYOT. It didn't work at KHJZ.
Rhythmic AC did not do much better. That surprised me but didn't surprise me. There's a generation of females who grew up with Rhythmic CHR so they should roll into Rhythmic AC as they get older. But a good chunk of them still get their fix from the CHR. The dividing line between what mothers and daughters listen to is much fuzzier than it was 25 years ago.
Urban radio has a huge community aspect to it; it's more than just music. The upside of filling the hole is you will have a very loyal audience. The downside is you will have a very small audience. I think we had an 8 hour TSL once on Kiss 1230. That's loyalty. Can you monetize it? If someone can, they should try brokering out one of the leased time AMs and giving it a go, because it's more likely to come from within the community than outside of it. For the right price you could probably put The Rhythm of The City back on 1060...
And we have a "this just in"...the call letters for 101.5 were changed to KALV-FM, as of 06/01.
Tom Taylor had the item this morning.
My understanding is KYOT did very well with the format early on. In the last few years the ratings did decline, but the new way of coming up with ratings (CUME) did them in. Smooth Jazz is a relatively cheap format to run, so a lot of stations tolerated the decline for a certain amount of time. I do believe it could still work (and does in other markets), perhaps as a translator or HD2 of another station.
Not in a major market. Too much money at stake. It's not about cost, it's about return. What killed the format was lack of growth in the music. This was a case of building a station around music rather than a audience. Once the music stagnated, the audience went away. Sure there's a dedicated fan base for the format, just as there is for klezmer music, but there are lots of other formats that could get a better return.
David, you are missing the point. No one is saying all African Americans listen to the same type of music. What I am saying is, they should actually have a choice if they want to listen to actual R&B (not just hip-hop) on Phoenix radio whether it be old or new school. There is obviously some sort of market for it in Arizona or you wouldn't have acts such as: Floetry, Miguel, Charlie Wilson or Mint Condition doing shows at the celebrity theater or at casinos around the metro Phoenix area.
Actually The Wave has played Joe and some of the artists I have mentioned. I think if you combine the music with some Sam Smith, old school Hall and Oates, Gino Vanelli, Justin Timberlake, etc. Artists that have dominated pop as well as Urban charts, a Smooth (slight Urban leaning) AC could work in the valley. You just have to have a good programming mind as well as the dollars. This format would have to be specially catered to the Phoenix market and not cookie cutter, which is what radio tends to do. That will be the only way the format could be successful.
It isn't about the seating of the venue. My point is the artists are coming to the valley. There is obviously somewhat of a demand. Why not capitalize on it? I am not saying put on a full fledged Urban AC like WBLS. Just saying, someone needs to get on the ground floor. You have to start somewhere.
A few thousand who fill a venue is not a valid measure of the popularity of a format which, in Phoenix, must cume in excess of 400,000 to be in the top 15 stations.
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