Puerto Rico makes up the #13 radio market in the U.S. and is an important TV market as well. As David Eduardo tells us, the island's population is 90-something percent Spanish-speaking. Only about a third understand English above a basic level. It's 1000 miles from Miami and its population cannot vote for President, yet everyone is an American citizen. Wages aren't as good as on the mainland but are better than other Caribbean countries.
Puerto Rico counts as one market because most stations simulcast on several frequencies scattered around the island. The biggest stations are based in San Juan. All radio stations are Spanish-speaking except for two AM outlets, although many FM stations play English hits as well as Spanish international hits.
AM
On the AM side, it's virtually all talk on the lower two-thirds of the dial. 1030 WOSO, the one English-language talk station, carries CBS News on the hour and ABC News on the half-hour. When giving the legal I.D., the station calls itself "Radio Oso," Spanish for eye. A few commercials are in Spanish, I suppose in cases where the client has a produced spot that it wants aired on all the stations it buys. For a talk station, it has an interesting syndication line-up... mostly staying away from political shows.
It also sounds like modern radio formatics have not come to Radio Oso yet. The morning show takes the full 10+ minutes of the CBS World News Round-Up at 7 AM, which even CBS-owned stations usually don't air. WOSO also takes a good deal of CBS and ABC features rarely heard in most markets, like "Just A Minute" with Harry Smith. The morning show sometimes goes 15-20 minutes without its hosts being heard because of all the syndicated material. And in the afternoon, the 6pm hour is ALL syndicated features, with no host. With such a schedule, don't look for "traffic and weather together every ten minutes." Traffic reports and weather updates only come up every half hour and are long features, as might have been heard in the 1960s.
After the 5-9am local morning show, and a classified ads show from 9-10am ("I've got a dryer I want to sell for $100."), there's Dr. Joy Browne from WOR Networks. Following an open phones local show at noon, there's Dr. Dean Edell and Dr. Laura. In the evening there's Bruce Williams, Larry King and John Bohannan. Notice the trend is to avoid politically divisive shows. So if you're in San Juan, you're not going to hear Rush, Hannity or Ed Shultz. The only political show WOSO airs weekdays is Lars Larson overnight. I'm surprised they run him, a very conservative talker, tape-delayed, and not George Noory/Art Bell, since "Coast to Coast" fits the non-political talk concept.
Many of WOSO's advertisers are either aiming at tourists or the business community, since those are the two groups most likely to be English-speaking. So there are plenty of commercials for couriers and business machine sales companies, as well as beach-front condominiums and casinos.
The other English AM station is a Protestant preaching station, 1190 WBMJ. I understand at one time, there were more English outlets. In her autobiography, Sally Jesse Rafael says she got her start doing a talk show on an English station in San Juan, interviewing entertainers appearing at the many casinos. But eventually the owner switched the station to Spanish. She doesn't say the call letters.
The seven Spanish AM stations on the lower part of the dial are all talk. I wonder how they find the money and talent to do this since talk is an expensive format to run. Most talk stations outside large markets rely heavily on syndicated shows. But there are no syndicated Spanish talk shows I know of, other than ESPN Deportes, which doesn't have a San Juan affiliate. Five commercial stations plus WIPR-AM and the Catholic station have talk hosts around the clock (except two of the talk stations sign off overnight). The Catholic station, 810 WKVM, is San Juan's only fulltime 50 kW AM outlet. Most of the others run 10 kWs.
580 WKAQ and 630 WUNO are rated #3 and #5. They both sound like traditional AM Talk stations, using the phones sometimes or just having the host discuss a news article or interview a guest. The top independent TV station, WAPA, also has an AM station at 680 in San Juan and it sounds like a good talk station, but for some reason it doesn't make the ratings. Neither do talk stations 740 WVAC or 1140 WQII. My Spanish is limited so I couldn't tell you why WKAQ and WUNO score so well, while these other talk stations don't. A third talk station that makes the ratings, WSKN, is all the way up at 1320 on the dial. Again, I don't know what's special about this station whose signal is limited by its dial position, but it's #12. San Juan has about five other AM stations higher on the dial but they mostly do traditional Tropical music or religious programming in Spanish and are unrated.
As for DXing, one night 850 WFTL, West Palm Beach, was coming in strongly, carrying Michael Savage. Another night I could hear Radio Reloj from Cuba with its unmistakable tick, tick, tick of the clock. (I notice they sometimes have a staffer play the first few notes of the Cuban national anthem on chimes after announcing the time.) On my car radio by day, I could pick up an AM talk station from the Virgin Islands at 1000, WVWI, also carrying CBS News on the hour, as well as a rock station at 104.3 and a contemporary station at 95.3. I also heard American Country Countdown early one Sunday very low on the AM dial, but I'm not sure where that was coming from.
Gregg
[email protected]
Puerto Rico counts as one market because most stations simulcast on several frequencies scattered around the island. The biggest stations are based in San Juan. All radio stations are Spanish-speaking except for two AM outlets, although many FM stations play English hits as well as Spanish international hits.
AM
On the AM side, it's virtually all talk on the lower two-thirds of the dial. 1030 WOSO, the one English-language talk station, carries CBS News on the hour and ABC News on the half-hour. When giving the legal I.D., the station calls itself "Radio Oso," Spanish for eye. A few commercials are in Spanish, I suppose in cases where the client has a produced spot that it wants aired on all the stations it buys. For a talk station, it has an interesting syndication line-up... mostly staying away from political shows.
It also sounds like modern radio formatics have not come to Radio Oso yet. The morning show takes the full 10+ minutes of the CBS World News Round-Up at 7 AM, which even CBS-owned stations usually don't air. WOSO also takes a good deal of CBS and ABC features rarely heard in most markets, like "Just A Minute" with Harry Smith. The morning show sometimes goes 15-20 minutes without its hosts being heard because of all the syndicated material. And in the afternoon, the 6pm hour is ALL syndicated features, with no host. With such a schedule, don't look for "traffic and weather together every ten minutes." Traffic reports and weather updates only come up every half hour and are long features, as might have been heard in the 1960s.
After the 5-9am local morning show, and a classified ads show from 9-10am ("I've got a dryer I want to sell for $100."), there's Dr. Joy Browne from WOR Networks. Following an open phones local show at noon, there's Dr. Dean Edell and Dr. Laura. In the evening there's Bruce Williams, Larry King and John Bohannan. Notice the trend is to avoid politically divisive shows. So if you're in San Juan, you're not going to hear Rush, Hannity or Ed Shultz. The only political show WOSO airs weekdays is Lars Larson overnight. I'm surprised they run him, a very conservative talker, tape-delayed, and not George Noory/Art Bell, since "Coast to Coast" fits the non-political talk concept.
Many of WOSO's advertisers are either aiming at tourists or the business community, since those are the two groups most likely to be English-speaking. So there are plenty of commercials for couriers and business machine sales companies, as well as beach-front condominiums and casinos.
The other English AM station is a Protestant preaching station, 1190 WBMJ. I understand at one time, there were more English outlets. In her autobiography, Sally Jesse Rafael says she got her start doing a talk show on an English station in San Juan, interviewing entertainers appearing at the many casinos. But eventually the owner switched the station to Spanish. She doesn't say the call letters.
The seven Spanish AM stations on the lower part of the dial are all talk. I wonder how they find the money and talent to do this since talk is an expensive format to run. Most talk stations outside large markets rely heavily on syndicated shows. But there are no syndicated Spanish talk shows I know of, other than ESPN Deportes, which doesn't have a San Juan affiliate. Five commercial stations plus WIPR-AM and the Catholic station have talk hosts around the clock (except two of the talk stations sign off overnight). The Catholic station, 810 WKVM, is San Juan's only fulltime 50 kW AM outlet. Most of the others run 10 kWs.
580 WKAQ and 630 WUNO are rated #3 and #5. They both sound like traditional AM Talk stations, using the phones sometimes or just having the host discuss a news article or interview a guest. The top independent TV station, WAPA, also has an AM station at 680 in San Juan and it sounds like a good talk station, but for some reason it doesn't make the ratings. Neither do talk stations 740 WVAC or 1140 WQII. My Spanish is limited so I couldn't tell you why WKAQ and WUNO score so well, while these other talk stations don't. A third talk station that makes the ratings, WSKN, is all the way up at 1320 on the dial. Again, I don't know what's special about this station whose signal is limited by its dial position, but it's #12. San Juan has about five other AM stations higher on the dial but they mostly do traditional Tropical music or religious programming in Spanish and are unrated.
As for DXing, one night 850 WFTL, West Palm Beach, was coming in strongly, carrying Michael Savage. Another night I could hear Radio Reloj from Cuba with its unmistakable tick, tick, tick of the clock. (I notice they sometimes have a staffer play the first few notes of the Cuban national anthem on chimes after announcing the time.) On my car radio by day, I could pick up an AM talk station from the Virgin Islands at 1000, WVWI, also carrying CBS News on the hour, as well as a rock station at 104.3 and a contemporary station at 95.3. I also heard American Country Countdown early one Sunday very low on the AM dial, but I'm not sure where that was coming from.
Gregg
[email protected]
