Re: Clear Channel expands in New England

["Jerry Decker" <radiobuzz@lycos.com>]

Mr. Strassberg :

WFAN may not the nation's top biller after this
year is over. The station's revenue likely will drop for this year, because it is now leasing airtime to MSG(Knicks and Rangers) instead of keeping the ad revenue from selling its own ads. So, for 2000 WFAN could bill less, but make more. 

In Boston, WBZ and WBCN are 1 and 2, not WEEI.
Again, looking at billing figures sometimes isn't
100% accurate because the number of ads(20 spots per hour on most Infinity or CC stations) and the rates are way up, particularly during sports broadcasts on stations like WEEI or WFAN. I'd like to see the net figures after all the rights fees, production and marketing costs are subtracted. I'm sure FM stations which don't have sports programming and cater to the loveable 25-54 demo would be #1 in profits...

Also, CC is heavily invested into XM. If listeners
will be running away from conventional FMs, CC
is likely to meet at the other end of the tunnel...

NYC '99 figures courtesy of Duncan's report :

1. WFAN, $67.5 million 

2. WXRK, $54.4 million  

3. WLTW, $51 million  

4. WINS, $44.9 million 

5. WCBS-FM, $42.9 million 

6. WSKQ, $39.5 million  

7. WKTU, $39 million 

8. WCBS-AM, $37.8 million 

9. WQHT, $36.1 million 

10. WHTZ, $33 million 

11. WPLJ, $32.9 million 

12. WRKS, $28.2 million 

13. WQCD, $23.8 million 

14. WOR, $23.5 million 

15. WABC, $21.3 million 

16. WBLS, $18.9 million 

17. WAXQ, $15.9 million 

18. WPAT-FM, $14.3 million 

19. WTJM, $13.9 million  

20. WQXR, $13.4 million 

21. WNEW, $12.8 million 

22. WBBR, $11.8 million 

23. WCAA, $9 million 

24. WADO, $6.9 million 

25. WLIB, $4.5 million 

Jerry


On Wed, 19 Jul 2000 07:35:51  
 Dan Strassberg wrote:
>Is that so? Then how is it that the two top-billing stations in this market
>(WBZ and WEEI) and the top-billing station in the US (WFAN) are AMs?
>Moreover, these stations are not complete anomalies. Take a look at the rest
>of the ten top billers in New York. You'll find WINS, WCBS, and--I
>think--WABC and WOR on the list. Similar situations exist in other large
>markets, such as Philadelphia and San Francisico Bay. Mel and his opposite
>numbers at Clear Channel and some of the second-string groups (especially
>Salem and Beasley) are more than happy to take a buck wherever they find
>it--and to pay handsome sums for the cash flow that major-market AMs still
>generate. And though I don't have statistics, I'd be surprised if there
>weren't dozens of small and medium markets in which an AM is the #1 or #2
>biller.
>
>If you take XM Satellite Radio and its competitor, Sirius, seriously, I
>think you'll have to acknowledge that these companies pose a greater
>potential threat to FMs than to AMs. Most FM formats are generic enough to
>be supplanted by similar formats from direct-broadcast satellites. On the
>other hand, the successful news/talk formats have too much local content for
>satellite broadcasting to replace them--at least until the technology finds
>a way to deliver fresh local content to moving vehicles without using local
>stations.
>
>--
>
>Dan Strassberg, dan.strassberg@worldnet.att.net
>Phone: 1-617-558-4205, eFax: 1-707-215-6367
>



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