Why Power 106 is failing is not about the lack of black talent. There are plenty of Hip-Hop stations across the country that have no black talent, but yet still do well. Q95.9 in Ventura and Hot 94.1 in Bakersfield are a couple of examples.
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Los Angeles Radio Ratings: January 2024
- Thread starter pjc1961
- Start date
You must be California based. If there was a Spanish station with gringos or any other non-Latin person yet spoke perfect Spanish, how do you think it would do? And why isn’t there one now? And also Ventura/Bakersfield doesn’t have nearly the Black population as a major metropolitan like Los Angeles. Where there’s a clear and present Black demo. Yet lack of representation on the Hip-Hop stations. Don’t be dense with this.
And in both of those examples, we are dealing with markets with tiny Black populations and immense Hispanic groups.
Bakersfield (the radio market, not the city) is 5.7% Black but 55.7% Hispanic.
Oxnard/Ventura is 45% Hispanic and 2.0% Black.
If you mean as announcers, it could do fine. That would be dependent on their having the right vocabulary and accent in Spanish, though.
Just as you would not hire a Puerto Rican to be a jock on a regional Mexican format you would not hire anyone else as talent unless the were well entrenched in the culture and lifestyle and language of the listeners.
Remember, there is a saying that Latin America is "20 nations divided by a single language" and that is because the accent, vocabulary and usage is so different. The Ecuadorian word for "bugs" is the Puerto Rican vulgar term for the penis.
Two percent Black in Ventua/Oxnard vs 45% Hispanic. And in Bakersfieeld, 5.7% Black and almost 56% Hispanic.
LA does not have a significant Black population, either. Just 6.6% in fact. But given that the market is well over ten million, that is a significant enough Black population nationally to warrant agency buys.
Even then, a significant percentage of the listening to the "Black" stations in LA comes from Hispanics.
Unlike Latin, Hip-Hop is a way more universal genre, meaning a station with that format could survive anywhere with or without black talent. Power 106's failing ratings is not race-related in any way. It's because Power 106 has been struggling for nearly a decade to find a new proper identity for itself after rival Real 92.3 swiped Big Boy away from them. Also, the loss of Felli Fel (a Latino DJ and longtime staple of Power 106) is not currently helping matters for the station either.
I used to think like you until I had an African-American comrade in the industry really break it down to me. And now I truly understand his frustration. It’s about representation. Us radio geeks can talk about panels, percentages, market numbers, whatever. But it’s all about representation. The Black culture, more than any other culture, make their culture popular to the masses, yet are always told by people outside of their culture what their culture is. That’s why Power and to a lesser extent Real are suffering. At least Real is smart enough to make Big Boy the face of the brand, even if he is the only prominent AA talent there, yet still have the Latin jocks everywhere else. That’s the genius of Doc Wynter.
Again, the market has about 8 times the number of Hispanics as it does Blacks. And not all Blacks like the music of each of the stations that target Blacks along with Hispanics and the general market. So one can expect that, given the fact that a Black-only format would have a hard time surviving, that such stations will predominantly target the Hispanic population and much of the air talent will be Hispanic
As I said in a previous response to you, Real 92.3 is doing just fine where it's at. If anything, I'd blame the stations having lower ratings compared to before on the fact that many people nowadays (especially the youngsters which are Power's and Real's target audience) don't listen to FM radio like they did 10-15+ years ago and instead use streaming platforms such as YouTube and Spotify to listen to music. Meanwhile, non-Hip Hop stations like KIIS FM, KOST 103.5, KBIG 104.3, K Earth 101, and 94.7 The Wave continue to do so well due to the benefit of those stations being played day in and day out in public settings such as various stores and restaurants.
Remember, "share" is based on cume persons and how long they listen. Public place listening results in very low numbers or quarter hours. While increasing cume, it reduces the average amount of listening per person which decreases share.
Over 80% of shares comes from about 50% of the cume. The rest are occasional or accidental listeners who reduce the averages and contribute nearly nothing to share.
Exactly today’s youth have easy access to the latest music through streaming. Radio is damn near obsolete now.
Except that 89% of adults listen to radio every week.
That's down about 5% isn't it?
I do still listen to the radio via streaming but not on a regular basis.
With a generation heading into adulthood that has no habit of consuming "radio."
My daughter is about to turn 21, living in market #1, and the only time she hears radio is if it's on in the bodega while she's shopping.
There's no radio in her home, no "radio" apps on her phone, no smart speaker to point at Audacy or iHeart or WFUV.
She loves music, but she gets it from Apple, Spotify, YouTube or Tok. And she is very typical of Gen Z.
However, the right way to look at "radio" is as a source of audio. It does not have to be via AM or FM transmission.
The challenge for ad and listener supported radio is to remain relevant and attractive versus on-demand services that play "what you want when you want".
Assuming that radio's only purpose is as their only source of music. HINT: It's not.
What the studies show is people use both radio and other sources.
I notice you view old threads of Power 106 and other radio stations from back in 2010-2011. I thought I was the only one. I often do this on my free time, reading posts from years ago while listening to music LOL.
That’s me all the way.
I do. Even KIIS FM gave that song some spins back in the day.