Yes, and that's the standard operating model. In some cases, lease payments are deferred for years; in some cases the previous owner (the radio station) gets a discount until the station is sold, whereupon the monthly or annual lease payments increase dramatically for the new station owner. It's the responsibility of the (new) tower owner to paint, light and maintain the tower pursuant to FAA and FCC code. That no longer falls on the radio station. It's also the tower owner's opportunity to sell space on the tower to any number of companies, ranging from cellular to two way to digital transmission. A recently sold tower in my neighborhood has, in the last few months, added a stack cell antennas halfway up the stick. Some cell company is paying rent.
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January '24 Buffalo and Rochester trends
- Thread starter ckg279
- Start date
Or develop the property that surrounds the tower. As is the case with WLW's tower in Cincinnati.
Work Starts On $30 Million Development Under Iconic WLW-AM Tower
The big ones are gone. The huge trees which lined the driveway to WLW-AM's tower and transmitter were removed this week to make way for a $30 million…
www.wvxu.org
Audacy Lined Up $60 Million In Asset Sales Before Filing For Bankruptcy.
Audacy may be in the early stages of a chapter 11 bankruptcy proceeding but it already has aggressive plans to sell more land and office buildings. Since merging with CBS
If they want to be massive cheapskates, they could just sell the Hamburg land, turn in the WGR and KB licenses, and move the sports programming to 1400AM and 107.7 FM. Yeah it would be sad to see 550AM go silent but between 1400, 104.7, 107.3, 107.7, and 98.5HD2, I'd think most listeners wouldn't lose access. The 2 or 3 times per year the Sabres and Bills both play, just put one on WBEN.
Audacy has FOUR AM signals in Buffalo and only 1 full signal FM in 98.5. When they sold STAR, the company was essentially giving up on Buffalo. The bankruptcy makes it more likely Audacy won't be around for the funeral rites. I wouldn't expect that they would bother with the changes you suggested...
Not to be a snarkapottamus, but with all due R-E-S-P-E-C-T, that's ↑ not a workable, profit-making scheme. 1400 is a 745 Watt teapot that barely reaches the city limits at night, and stretches to reach the first ring suburbs during the day. It's translator at 107.3 is not much better, with less than 75 watts. Presently, 1400 does the right format for where its stick is, the urban core.
WGR's day signal reaches from Detroit to Syracuse, and solidly penetrates the two county Buffalo-Niagara Falls metro. Sports is a perfect fit for this AM frequency. WGR sells those daytime dayparts to the max and generates significant revenue. The WGR night pattern , bad as it is to the east, covers the north and south towns population centers. Much has been written here about the deficiencies of the 107.7 signal. No need to whip that dead horse. Yes, 107.7 had some decent ratings with a healthy assist from the Sabres when it was Sports WNSA. Could that happen again as "WGR-FM?" It's possible, but why take that risk when WGR-AM is a known, established brand and a rolling success? Not saying it won't or can't happen, but the likelihood at this writing is slim. Maybe Audacy does a simulcast, which has been suggested by a number of posters here, to fill in the AM nighttime nulls to the east.
The HD penetration in this market is negligible. Trading known penetration from a station like WGR for an unknown HD platform in which most users are disinterested is just too risky. If anything, streaming is the present-to-next alternative, which is probably where all this is going in the not-so-distant future, especially for sports stations like WGR.
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The sports contracts are with a station, not a company. They can't just move the contract to another station without triggering a clause in the contract, similar to what the Jets had with WEPN.
You are correct. From what I am hearing there will be “station swaps” and station sales over the next 12 months. I Heart is also looking to get into Buffalo, and there are rumors of a hostile takeover of Cumulus who is already planning their next chapter 11.
Spot sales are projected to keep falling. Digital and Podcasts have ebbed.
This goes with television as well, not just radio. A friend of mine in the top brass of CBS Television said sports are killing that company financially, and that the array of streaming tv services for free, like Roku, Pluto, etc are changing the game. You Tube TV is a huge threat.
You are correct. From what I am hearing there will be “station swaps” and station sales over the next 12 months. I Heart is also looking to get into Buffalo, and there are rumors of a hostile takeover of Cumulus who is already planning their next chapter 11.
Spot sales are projected to keep falling. Digital and Podcasts have ebbed.
This goes with television as well, not just radio. A friend of mine in the top brass of CBS Television said sports are killing that company financially, and that the array of streaming tv services for free, like Roku, Pluto, etc are changing the game. You Tube TV is a huge
I bet they'd love to add the Bills to their growing list of NFL teams that just added the NY Jets last month.
They'd also love to get their syndicated talk shows on WBEN. Neither situation is good for fans of local radio.
If I Heart acquired WGR and WBEN, what would change?
The Bills are the only thing that keeps WGR viable. The ratings drop substantially during the off-season. I'm skeptical that I Heart would be interested in any AM station in Buffalo. They might prefer 98.5 FM...
iHeart has no bias against AM. They've bought quite a few for their BIN. They generally don't simulcast AM & FM
But from what I can see, their emphasis has been about acquiring BRANDS, not stations. So in the case of Buffalo, they'd get the Bills and Sabres. With WBEN they'd get a heritage news/talk brand similar to KOA, KFI, or WLW. But, yes, I'm sure they'd love to have another KISS in the stable. And they'd love to get Bobby Bones in Buffalo. And they have a lot to trade. So sure, I can see them as players.
Do the agencies tell their clients that getting a "clear" for a morning show or a talk show on a station that's getting maybe 250-500 people listening at the time the show is on, maximum, is worth paying for or will help them get their product sold in that market? Or do the agencies play the advertisers for suckers, and the advertisers are too ignorant about radio to realize that they're paying to reach hardly anyone?
It's about getting another market clear. The fact that it's not a Top 50 makes it less marketable. The audience gets lumped in with all the other numbers into one bulk figure. They're buying reach, and filling in the coverage map is good. National audience is about tonnage, not specific customers.
As I always say, advertisers know what they're buying, and with iHeart, they get more than spots & dots, which is what makes them so effective.
What should happen with those swaps is to have a number of larger radio companies having 2 to 3 FMs in every market, right down to 150 and below. They could do, in the world model that has kept radio much more alive elsewhere, single formats nationally with star talent and major concerts and promotions.
That's a huge exaggeration. I lived up till I was 14 or 15 in Cleveland and was an avid DXer. WGR could be heard on "good days" on a good receiver (Mine was an HQ-180 with a loop antenna and RF preamp) but in the summer and on noise days the rest of the year, it was definitely a DX catch and not listenable on an average kitchen or car radio.
And that was in the early 60's when there was vastly less noise.
I don't recall hearing WGR in the daytime either, in Syracuse in the mid 1970s. I had a Zenith Transoceanic up in my top-floor dorm room, sitting up against the window, so there wasn't much I was missing on AM.
Radio is a frequency medium for clients, TV is a reach medium. I Heart get terrible results for clients. It’s a commodity buy. No strategies or ideas presented by them.
There is no evidence Audacy in Buffalo will keep Bills or Sabres. They lose money for those stations. They gain ratings, but not revenue. You may seems these teams looking for another home, or creating their own home
I do not want to get into a pizzing match over this, but I have a friend who lives in Euclid (OK, so it's technically not Cleveland) who listens to WGR OTA in his car, daytime of course. Lake Erie is a marvelous conductor. The reference to Detroit is an exaggeration, admittedly. As to Syracuse, Toyota stock radio, New York State Thruway, WGR to the 690 exit ... yes, that's short of Syracuse, but close enough for rock 'n roll. Maybe not always, and maybe not on your radio. Got it.
The point is, WGR a big AM signal that covers a lot of ground in the daytime. I think we can agree on that.
BTW, back in the day, 640 WHLO Akron could be heard in the daytime in Cheektowaga on the Philco in dad's Fairlane 500. Those days are long gone, of course. The Fairlane ... and the AM clarity. These days, 640 CFIQ Toronto holds that honor ... in a Camry.