WCXI Cool1160

[Casey]

AM radio is on death's doorstep. The days of 1130 or 1270 being relevant have long since passed. Those stations will never score more than a 0.3 or 0.4 share regardless of format. Both 1130 and 1270 have terrible nighttime signals.

I doubt anyone under the age of 60 even regularly scans the AM dial

I’m 71 and heavily into internet radio. AM is only scanned to see how bad it’s becoming. As I have mentioned before I give AM 5 years or so. The land that most AM stations towers are on is worth more money than the station itself is. Birach needs to seriously find a way to purchase the next available FM in Detroit and sell or shutdown all AM stations and sell the land that houses the towers.

I think Birach's only way of truly surviving in the long run and really compete with the big guys is to start phasing out their AM stations and replacing them with full power FM's. They need to get out of the stone age quick as looking at their website and station list they don't have a single full power FM station in their posession. Not being on FM (locally aside from WNZK's new 93.5 translator) means most people have no clue they even exist.

I'm sure in this market if they can obtain a full power commercial FM, with IBOC, they could effectively use it to replace one AM station, shut it down, and simulcast the other 3 on the HD-2,3,4 channels and wait and see if something else opens up, and repeat the process until all of their AM's are gone. I would say *if* that happened they would possibly move the ethnic format of WNZK to FM and move one of the other 3 stations to 690/680 for a better AM signal and shutter one of the others.

There is no way Birach can ever afford 4 full power FM's one at best is doable, Birach is not iHeart. The one that would end on FM would be WNZK. Can you truly imagine how much money would be needed to obtain 4 FM's in Detroit? Also how much money is actually being lost on these AM stations? I bet they're hemorrhaging.

I brought that up in the essence of it being a pipedream for Birach to have all their stations be full power FM's. It would literally come down to a full blown corporate collapse and unraveling of Audacy/Cumulus/iHeart/etc with dispersion of all of their assets for several full power FM's to become available around here (and just how high could the price tag be?). Being in a top 15 market with tight gripped corporate conglomerates and cross border frequencies makes that vision of all FM's quite near impossible.

I agree with Casey:They may very likely only ever get one FM station here and there's no guarantee that one would open up, not to mention if one did that they could even be able to pay for it. I recall the small 93.5 translator W228CJ and the $450,000 price tag on it. A full power FM here would be well into millions.

I know HD-2's won't generate much revenue but used as a repeater they may help open the door for some spotty translator usage (if one became available or another filing window occurs) and have the translator be for the HD2 signal and not the AM originating station, since I believe somewhere in the rules there are restrictive rules on AM with FM translator separation distance and also for coverage. A move like that could generate listenership but in my opinion they really should do that and FM translators for the most options areawide. At least get on analog FM in more places (via cookie cutter translators) if absolutely nothing else.

Likewise with WFDF and WOMC HD2, it at least gets your foot in the door of being on a full power FM. Yes you need a special reciever to pick it up (which most people don't have) but you get 24/7 consistent areawide coverage.

W292DK 106.3 broadcasting Air1 is probably the best translator in SE Michigan/Detroit Metro area for widespread translator coverage without being tied to an existing AM station (W224CC 92.7 , W232CA 94.3 came to mind regarding this point) but I quite highly doubt K-Love/ EMF will want to let it go easily or at all without Air1 being on the analog FM band.

If and when the next FM is up for sale guaranteed it will be a K-Love purchase and Air 1 will have a full power FM in Detroit.