Fresh 102.7 will not go Christmas since it programs in direct opposition to LiteFM and tries to grab listeners who might tune away from the HolidayLiteTM
;
usually to no avail, however.
It's been fairly well established over the last 5+ years (maybe longer) that WLTW usually turns on the HolidayLiteTM on the Friday before Thanksgiving (in 2012 on Nov. 16) at 5pm ET. Some years it's just for the weekend, then resumes on Thanksgiving - other years just straight through.
WCBS-FM has ramped up the holiday tunage in the 7pm-midnight shift in some previous years.
Otherwise, outside of The City, WALK Patchogue, maybe WKJY Hempstead plus some of the suburban NJ Adult Contemporary stations will go Christmas around the same date, give or take a week.
Basically most (if not all) NYC stations stick to business and let LiteFM have their fun with their 10-share for 5-6 weeks.
Whaddya gonna do when Rudolph runs wild on you?
As for 94.7...
In my opinion, it makes no sense to "stunt" a Christmas format before changing to an incongruous format afterwards, especially if it's a talk, rock or country format. I get the whole "flushing the audience" bit and trying to build up publicity for the new station (similar to what Merlin tried with the "FM New 101.9" Hot AC transition with the chocolate box prizes, etc.) but I'd think that Cumulus would like to get whatever the new format is going to be on the air ASAP (with the caveat that it's ready to go, unlike the WEMP disaster).
This point may be moot should the closing on the station sale not occur until mid-December.
