October 2009 Ratings are in!

[DavidEduardo]

WQXR is not a Univision station... it is operated by the same entity that operates WNYC public radio.

thats what i hear when i tune to 96.3, they say, an univsion radio station.. maybe we all going nuts lol

WQXR and its classical music format moved from 96.3 to 105.9 on the 8th of November, when La Kalle ceased to exist.

The WQXR numbers in the October book are for 105.9 in week 4 of the book.

Univision has never operated WQXR on any frequency.

[Jeffrey]

Seeing this and the debut week of X 96.3 at a 3.6, you realize how truly horrible the 105.9 signal is.

Not as horrible as the 87.7 signal.

You wouldn't be so happy if Pulse 87 moved to 96.3 and got a 3.6 rating in the first week. That would not be impossible if the WNYZ cume didn't tune out because of static.

agreed 100%. well stated.

[DavidEduardo]

You wouldn't be so happy if Pulse 87 moved to 96.3 and got a 3.6 rating in the first week. That would not be impossible if the WNYZ cume didn't tune out because of static.

First, Pulse is dead. They failed.

Second, nobody is going to put a full dance format on a full B signal. The track record and body count around the country is too high...  even in dance-receptive Miami, Party peaked briefly and then faded. Note that Pulse was down 200 k in cume and off about a third in share as it came to an end.

Third, FM has no static.

Fourth, at present the contemporary stations are covering the party and dance tunes with mass appeal; this does not expand the genre, but, rather, quells the urge to seek it out. See Sean Ross' column from last week about rhythmic / dance hits in CHR.

[neo11]

You wouldn't be so happy if Pulse 87 moved to 96.3 and got a 3.6 rating in the first week. That would not be impossible if the WNYZ cume didn't tune out because of static.

First, Pulse is dead. They failed.

Here we go again.  If they were such a failure, then why would JVC broadcasting take the risk of going on 87.7?  If they were such a failure, then how do you account for the 1.0 and cume of a million (or just shy of a million, if you want to nitpick) on a peashooter signal on a frequency no one knew about?  Would La Que Buena have done better on that frequency???

Third, FM has no static.

Poor reception doesn't count?

[musicfan101]

You wouldn't be so happy if Pulse 87 moved to 96.3 and got a 3.6 rating in the first week. That would not be impossible if the WNYZ cume didn't tune out because of static.

First, Pulse is dead. They failed.

Second, nobody is going to put a full dance format on a full B signal. The track record and body count around the country is too high...  even in dance-receptive Miami, Party peaked briefly and then faded. Note that Pulse was down 200 k in cume and off about a third in share as it came to an end.

Third, FM has no static.

Fourth, at present the contemporary stations are covering the party and dance tunes with mass appeal; this does not expand the genre, but, rather, quells the urge to seek it out. See Sean Ross' column from last week about rhythmic / dance hits in CHR.

Dude, there are many things wrong with what you just said? Pulse failed? I don't even live in NYC and I know how well Pulse did on a limited signal and on a signal that most people can't even get in their cars!

Track record???!!??? Most PD's or owners say, "Well since it didn't do well in Miami, it MUST NOT work in Seattle (for example), I have divine power saying it won't!"

FM has no static?!!!??? Dude, don't you live in L.A.? Remember 103.1, TONS of static!

CHR stations are "covering the party"?!!!??? Let me know when Pharell, Snoop Dogg, Sean Kingston, or anyone (besides David Guetta) on any Rhythmic CHR (inculding AMP) are dance artists!!!!

David, I'm not mad at you, I think you are a great radio guy - but can you PLEASE pass some of that weed over to me!!!!

[Nick]

Pulse 87 did NOT fail. The Mega Media Group went bankrupt because of debt they had from before Pulse 87 launched. Why would another company bail out the dance format by taking over 87.7 when Pulse went bankrupt? They are now playing a lot of dance on 87.7 because THAT'S WHAT THE LISTENERS WANT TO HEAR!

87.7 FM had more signal problems than just static. The frequency itself couldn't be heard on some radios because the FM band starts at 88.1. It's obvious you never listened to 87.7 while driving around the area because there is static on 87.7 even in Manhattan. There was a powerful pirate station on 87.9 in Newark that was overmodulated and splattered on to 87.7.

It's a miracle that Pulse 87 even got a 1.0 and a million peak cume on the 87.7 frequency. That might be the best any format can get on that frequency, simply because of the limitations of 87.7.

If La Kalle got a big ratings boost going from 105.9 to 96.3, about a 10 dB signal boost, imagine how much Pulse 87's ratings would have improved if it had even the 105.9 dial position.

[DavidEduardo]

Here we go again.  If they were such a failure, then why would JVC broadcasting take the risk of going on 87.7? 

JVC has the economy of scale of having a station that already does the format. Speaking of  which, the JVC format is different enough to lead the new LMA holder to believe they have a chance.

As an aside, there are many histories of stations that fail over and over and always get bought or transferred to someone who thinks they alone can make it work. Every so often, one of them pulls off a little miracle, but usually the story repeats itself.

I would also bet that JVC got a much better LMA lease fee than Pulse was paying, and is going to operate the station in a very different and much more frugal way... the things you learn out in Suffolk where billing $80 k a month is a big deal, while in the City some stations bill that in a week and have a different outlook on expenses. These factors might just allow the new format to have a moderate amount of success.  

If they were such a failure, then how do you account for the 1.0 and cume of a million (or just shy of a million, if you want to nitpick) on a peashooter signal on a frequency no one knew about? 

The 1.0 share was not the norm... only two of the 7 rated months showed that, while the last several months were on a downtrend. The cume only once passed, by a tiny bit, 900,000, and it ended well below that level.

Considering that the population density of the WNYZ coverage are is so high, that's not a particularly amazing acheivement, even at the peak.

Would La Que Buena have done better on that frequency???

Que Buena would not do appreciably better on Lite FM's frequency... it is limited by a chain of factors. The station would only be listened to by Hispanics who are Spanish dominant who are Mexican and like Regional Mexican. That brings the cume potential down to about what the station is currently doing.

Third, FM has no static.

Poor reception doesn't count?

Poor reception is not "static" and generally static affects amplitude modulated signals. Static is defined as electrical interference. Lack of signal is not interference, but just the inability of a receiver and antenna to capture reliability a signal. What one hears in such a case is the receiver attempting to capture the signal, and often simply amplifying other stations on the same or adjacent channels... not static.  

[DavidEduardo]

Dude, there are many things wrong with what you just said? Pulse failed? I don't even live in NYC and I know how well Pulse did on a limited signal and on a signal that most people can't even get in their cars!

The station never even reached a million cume, in a market where nearly any English language station can... so saying it did "well" is on the exaggeration side of things.

As to cars, NY has the loowest use of radio in cars of any market in the country, around 24%... so that alone is not the determining factory anyway.

Track record???!!??? Most PD's or owners say, "Well since it didn't do well in Miami, it MUST NOT work in Seattle (for example), I have divine power saying it won't!"

First, formats are determined by listener research, not the opinions of PD (who are generally hired after a change anyway) or owners. And the country is littered with dance stations that failed... Chicago, LA, Phoenix, Las Vegas, Denver, etc. Miami was the one that proved that even on a big signal, the format would peak and then quickly drop... and never be truly salable.

FM has no static?!!!??? Dude, don't you live in L.A.? Remember 103.1, TONS of static!

Zero static. Just a weak signal, and radios trying to capture and getting 103.5 or 102.7. But no static.

CHR stations are "covering the party"?!!!??? Let me know when Pharell, Snoop Dogg, Sean Kingston, or anyone (besides David Guetta) on any Rhythmic CHR (inculding AMP) are dance artists!!!!

As I said, see Sean Ross' article on this site about the rhythmic and dance songs that are popping up on CHR.

[oldies76]

I hope that the next couple of years, CBS-FM will be adding 90's music on this station and phasing out 60's music, that means no more Beatles, no more Motown and no more of this 60's stuff, maybe it will phase in 90's music to make the station younger. This will happen probably around 2010, 2012 to 2014. In addition to that, they will add Guns & Roses "Welcome to the Jungle" and "Paradise City", maybe some 90's songs like Atlantis Morrisette's "You Ougtha Know" and REM's "Losing My Religion".

Really??

90's music is not even classified as classic hits and won't be for quite sometime...probably after 2020.
There were just not enough good songs in that decade to justify losing all the key 60's music and phasing out the 70's.

What might happen is a few key 90's songs might be mixed into today's mix and probably stay that way for the next 10 years. "Welcome to the Jungle" played right after the Supremes "Come See About Me" just won't fly... and it won't work!

[neo11]

Dude, there are many things wrong with what you just said? Pulse failed? I don't even live in NYC and I know how well Pulse did on a limited signal and on a signal that most people can't even get in their cars!

The station never even reached a million cume, in a market where nearly any English language station can... so saying it did "well" is on the exaggeration side of things.

And most of those English language stations have a full class B signal from the Empire State Building, in the actual FM band, instead of a peashooter from the top of the "big blue building" on 87.75 FM.

Then again, we're equating NYC stations with the NYC market, when the NYC market includes many of the surrounding suburbs as well...not many English-language stations hitting a cume of one million there either.

Even with a cume of 750,000 on 87.7, Party FM is going to reach more people than it could ever dream of with 105.3 and 101.5 combined.

By the way, what is an English station anyway?  Is it a station from England?

As to cars, NY has the loowest use of radio in cars of any market in the country, around 24%... so that alone is not the determining factory anyway.

The loowest?  Really?  Well what about the percentage of the market that can't receive the station at all for any of the following reasons:  weak signal (and yes, static, as in the hissing sound your radio will hear instead of an actual radio station), bad building penetration, much smaller signal footprint than the major NYC stations, obscure frequency below the non-commercial band that many radios do not tune to, zero promotion, etc.  It's more than just cars...in fact, the low use of cars in the market probably HURT 87.7 more than anything, because car radios (those that tune to 87.7 anyway) seem to have less trouble receiving the signal than most stereos used indoors in homes, offices, etc.