STATION MILESTONES

Quite a few public radio stations are celebrating anniversaries this year. Today we are saluting a few of them.

KCLU, Thousand Oaks, California [link] has accomplished a lot during its first 25 years.   

When the station began operations on October 20, 1994, thE first broadcast originated from a tiny studio in dormitory on the campus of California Lutheran University. 

Today KCLU is a powerhouse just northwest of Los Angeles. According to Nielsen Audio, the station has over 100,000 estimated weekly listeners. KCLU has expanded its service to Santa Barbara and San Luis Obispo. Mary Olson, who helped launch KCLU, is still General Manager.

KCLU’s 25^th anniversary is being celebrated this week with events in Santa Barbara and Thousand Oaks.

Things kick off with a live edition of NPR’s Ask Me Another this Saturday (10/19) at the Lobero Theatre in Santa Barbara. The event also features former Doobie Brother Michael McDonald. Also on Saturday KCLU is hosting a live taping of NPR’s Politics Podcast the Kavli Theatre, Thousand Oaks Civic Arts Plaza.

WYSU, Youngstown, Ohio signed on October 23, 1969 as a fine arts noncommercial station. The station was a charter NPR member in the mid 1970s.

WYSU is marking 50 years of service with several free events including a multi-media show – WYSU’s 50^th Anniversary at the Ward Beecher Planetarium” on the Youngstown State campus on November 17^th.

WRVO, Oswego/Syracuse, New York celebrated the big five-oh with an open house and a live taping of the nationally syndicated show Says You.

WMOT, Murfreesboro/Nashville, Tennessee turned 50 in October with a live three hour broadcast featuring indie-folk artist A.J. Croce, Memphis roots rocker Liz Brasher and soul country songwriter Adam Wakefield. 

The event was carried live on WMOT and streamed on VuHaus.

WDET, Detroit, Michigan turns 70 this year. 

Current and former employees appeared on WDET’s signature show Detroit Today to talk about how WDET and Detroit have changed and a few things that have stayed the same.

WWV, Fort Collins, Colorado turned 100 on October 1^st. WWV claims to be one of the world’s oldest continuously operating radio stations. The always-reliable WWV is operated by The National Institute of Standards and Technology.

APM DEBUTS ‘ROOTS BEYOND RACE’ INTERACTIVE DATA TOOL • PACIFICA’S DEATH RATTLE CONTINUES

American Public Media’s Research Lab has made available a new interactive tool – Roots Beyond Race - a data visualization that portrays Americans' identity through the lens of racial and ethnic backgrounds in every state.

According to a press release from APM, the interactive tool is intended for use by newsrooms and reporters for insights and context for news reports and storytelling. Roots Beyond Race is also helpful to station management for ascertainment and to programmers to better the background of their listeners.

Sample slide from Roots Beyond Race

Roots Beyond Race is based on data from the U.S. Census Bureau’s 2017 American Community Survey.

APM says Roots Beyond Race will be exclusively available to APM affiliated stations until November 12, 2019. After that date it is available to all noncom stations.

You can see the demo for Roots Beyond Race here.

PACIFICA’S DEATH RATTLE UPDATE

Public Media’s most dysfunctional and embarrassing organization – the Pacifica Foundation – is in self-inflicted chaos following a recent takeover attempt of WBAI. According to multiple news reports, last Sunday (10/13) the Pacifica National Board (PNB) voted to restore WBAI’s local programming.

John Vernile

The standoff began Monday (10/7) when a handful of PNB members, led by interim Executive Director John Vernile, pulled the plug on WBAI’s local programming, fired almost the entire staff and even took the station’s EAS monitor. Vernile locked out WBAI’s management and staff and told them they were fired as of that moment.

On Tuesday (10/8), a group volunteers and members of WBAI’s local board filed a lawsuit in New York state court to reverse the takeover by Vernile. New York State Supreme Court Judge Frank Nervo issued a temporary restraining order that blocked Vernile’s actions.

The legality of the takeover will possibly be decided this coming Friday (10/11) at a hearing by the New York State Supreme Court.

Vernile said the reason he, and members of the PNB, took the action was because WBAI’s huge debts are exposing the Foundation to insolvency. Last week we opined [link] that Vernile had acted properly. We urged others at Pacifica the back Vernile’s efforts.

After publishing the story, we received an email from a person (who we will not name) who is a longtime Pacifica insider:

“Sorry, I have to disagree with you about Vernile. He is completely aligned with the Berkeley faction. He is not an honest broker. He will carry out Berkeley’s plan to break up the network in whatever way suits Berkeley.”

“And he’s doing it all in the dark with a few, giving everyone else the middle finger. Whoever you spoke with for your article is on the Berkeley side of this and sold you on the national programming “solution.”

“These Berkeley people have never been honest brokers with an interest in Pacifica being successful and it is one of the main reasons WBAI was targeted for destruction.”

The email shows why Pacifica is in this mess. Pacifica’s system of governance is like science fiction combined with Soviet-style planning. There is no consideration of the common good. Pacifica is all about short term, ego-driven, power plays. Mission doesn’t matter. Good broadcasting doesn’t matters. Serving an audience doesn’t matter. Like bratty children on a playground, the only thing that matters is self service bullying.

THE “WOW FACTOR” IS CHASING OLDER RADIO LISTENERS • WMKV IN CINCINNATI TARGETS “THE OLDEST GENERATION”

Recently a new commercial radio station – KOAI in Phoenix – debuted a new radio format The Wow Factor. Longtime radio programmer John Sebastian (not the guy from The Lovin’ Spoonful) designed the format to reach Boomers, who are thought to be an under-served audience.

From 30,000-feet, The Wow Factor [link] looks like it could be a big hit. After all, there are 75.4 million people of Boomer age in the U.S. But media and marketers are now increasingly ignoring this group. Is this a good strategy?

According to Sebastian, the failure to make Boomers a target audience is based on myths and stereotypes. 

Boomers are often perceived as monolithic group with similar tastes, interests and brand loyalty.

Consultant, researcher and blogger Fred Jacobs opined on his blog in 2018 [link] that Sebastian’s format “is proudly trumpeted as a new 55+ targeted format, guaranteed…to rocket to the top of the 6+ ratings rankers.” 

Ever the realist, Jacobs added that Sebastian’s format may succeed in attracting an audience but it is unlikely to generate enough revenue to pay the bills.

We see another format-factor that may limit the life of The Wow Factor: “Wow” oldies burnout quickly.

Let’s say you are a fan of The Doors. You hear their hit song Hello, I Love You
 on KOAI and you think “Wow, what a great blast from the past.”

Then you hear Hello, I Love You
 two days later and you think, “Great song but do they play any other songs by The Doors?

Then, three days later you hear Hello, I Love You” again and you think “Been there, done that. Goodbye.”

WMKY TARGETS THE "OLDEST DEMOGRAPHIC"

Some people might say that public radio already has an older demo format: Classical music. 

Plus, the average age of a NPR News listener is now 50+ and is rising every day.

George Zahn

One station that is targeting the oldest demos is WMKY in Cincinnati. The station is operated and programmed by former WVXU PD George Zahn. The result has been so successful that Zahn wants to take it national.

Zahn describes WMKV this way on the station Facebook page [link]:

“WMKV 89.3 FM is member-supported public radio serving Greater Cincinnati. WMKV is hip, cool, and classic!”

“Founded in 1995, WMKV has been a national leader in big bands, the Great American Songbook, standards, classic radio comedies and dramas, and oldies, plus important information and weather.”

WMKY is owned by  Maple Knoll Village [link], a Cincinnati-based non-profit organization that had $46 million in revenue in 2017.  Maple Knoll is involved with housing, real estate and health services.

Zahn is one of four full-time employees at WMKY. The total station budget is said to be around $300,000.

So, how is WMKY doing?

According to Nielsen Audio’s PPM ratings for September 2019, WMKY had a 0.1 AQH share and 1,700 estimated weekly listeners.