KVSC’S ANNUAL TRIVIA CONTEST IS A BRAND DEFINING EVENT

Media brands usually revolve around the key elements that users like and value the most. There is also high brand loyalty to things that are fun. Fun is what is happening at KVSC, St. Cloud, Minnesota [link]. Every year in February KVSC hosts their signature event Trivia Storm. The annual trivia contest for 2017 just ended this past weekend and, as usual, a good time was had by all.

Trivia Storm is now in it's 38th year. Thanks to KVSC’s streaming audio, teams from around the globe compete to answer approximately 450 mind-stumping questions. The contest runs over 50 consecutive hours starting at 5pm Friday and running through 7pm Sunday.

KVSC GM Jo McMullen-Boyer and Operations Director Jim Gray 

get ready for Trivia Storm (Photo courtesy St. Cloud Times)

According to KVSC’s GM, Jo McMullen-Boyer, players for this year’s contest came from New Zealand, Egypt and Sweden. The winners were locals, however. A St. Cloud team named It Just Doesn’t Matter, won top honors with 12,070 trivia points.  

KVSC’s staff and volunteers begin the prep for Trivia Storm in June and begin assembling Google-proof questions in August. The questions remind me of ones from the board game Trivial Pursuit such as life and times, film and literature, news and history, and, of course, music.

In October, KVSC staff starts selling sponsorships. Trivia Storm has become one of KVSC’s leading fundraising vehicles. KVSC also asks listeners for pledges during the contest. 

As many as 100 volunteers answer participant calls and messages during peak hours. It isn’t unusual for participants to stay awake for the entire 50 hours.

WAJC CAUSES RECEPTION PROBLEMS FOR KVSC LISTENERS

Last Friday we reported on WAJC 88.1 FM, licensed to the town of Newport, which is south and east of St. Paul. KVSC also broadcasts on 88.1 FM.  A SPARK! reader in St. Cloud sent this comment about WAJC and KSVC:

From Anonymous (edited for length and clarity:

"KVSC in St. Cloud regrets the loss of their Twin Cities coverage due to WAJC’s signal. Is WAJC’s presence beneficial? It's quite easy for one small new signal to destroy reliable reception of an existing station, which is what has happened.

[WAJC’s co-founder Jill Martin Rishe] can babble about our signal all she likes, but given it’s close proximity of KVSC, WAJC’s 60dBu signal doesn’t even reach the MSP airport.

Given that WAJC never should've existed, and it took a vibrant station like KVSC and totally shivved them in the back. Whenever KVSC approached them about buying out WAJC, they demanded an outrageously high.” purchase price.

KEN SAYS: So how do you really feel about it? The interference is not intentional by WAJC. The FCC “short spaced” 88.1 FM and the result is interference for two other stations operating on 88.1: KVSC and KRLX, Northfield.  The coverage maps for the three stations tell the story:

KVSC broadcasts with 16,500-watts from a good spot near the campus of St. Cloud State University.  

The station has lots of listeners in the I-94 corridor between St. Cloud and the northwest suburbs of Minneapolis. KVSC signed on in the early 1970s.

WAJC broadcasts with 5,520-watts from a short tower near the town of Coates, about 15 miles southeast of St. Paul. WAJC signed on in 2011.

KRLX [link] broadcasts with 100-watts from a short tower on the campus of Carleton College. They are a pretty groovy college station that once used the slogan Life Is Better When You Are On the Bottom. KRLX signed on in 1974.