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Interstate I-70 splashes through a vast swatch of the nation.
From Maryland to Utah, I-70 is just over 2,000 miles of blank pavement originally designed as a rapid throughway to assist military movement.
I-70 is also the very first Interstate in our land.
Vehicles today – including my beloved Subaru Forester Touring Edition – contain an audio function where you can seek and develop a playlist of local radio.
On an important mission to visit grandkids, I traveled from my native Indiana to Columbia, Missouri, the center of the state. The 365-mile one-way trip exposed us to around 100 different radio stations.
As low-level research and a random experiment, we built random Subaru playlists through every country we traversed.
Once in radio, it was said that every quarter (15 minutes) should tell a story of your brand. Imaging – talent – contests.
With the average occasion of listening across radio stations measured by PPM data ranging from 8 to 12 minutes – you know, a quarter-hour – we thought it would be fair to hear just one-quarter hour at each station we landed.
Still with me?
Each product would tell US what they stood for – in a 15-minute window.
You are the first to hear the unofficial – official – results of this vastly unfunded research project.
Ready?
Indianapolis
As we traverse from the north side of Indy, around the waistline of Indianapolis on 465, you hear Marion County-based and collar county stations.
With the assistance of a construction delay and a near full-stoppage of traffic on westbound I-70, a generous six quarter hours were consumed on the first leg of this cross-country listening session.
The three Cumulus brands found in the search – Country 95.5 WFMS – Top 40 99.5 WZPL – Classic Hits 104.5 WJJK – were all contest heavy with zero local mentions.
Dozens of LOCAL homecomings, festivals, and Oktoberfest’s crowded the pending weekend. Yet LOCAL TV weathercasters had no ‘usage’ language for the listener on these brands.
The stations share LOCAL traffic. None of the traffic casts noted the I-65 to I-465 construction slowdown nor the I-465 to I-70 two-car incident which slowed our journey. It was useless to us.
IHeart’s Legendary Q95 WFBQ – home to “The Bob and Tom Show” and a brand that shaped me as a talent – is a shell of what it once was. The brand, sadly, is a well-researched jukebox outside their entertaining syndicated morning show. Local mention occurs only in local spot copy.
Urban One’s 93 WIBC is hyper-locally focused. For a quarter-hour, the audio focused on Indiana’s Governor’s race and the characters involved. Good on them—funny and engaging!
As Indy appears in our rear-view, we were surrounded by typical Indiana landscape and a dotting of rural towns mostly determined by Lincoln’s mid-1800’s railroad planting.
With names like Plainfield, Cloverdale, and Brazil, the landscape is typically dominated by corn and soybean fields – in this case, in full harvest.
During this stretch, you can hear brands out of Bloomington, and the home of my first station – Sound Management’s B97 to the south and Forcht Broadcasting’s Crawfordville brands to the north.
While the DXing was spotting, nothing LOCAL came from the speakers, and dated material on their digital assets reflects little attention is invested in the local effort.
Terre Haute
During the cruise through the west side of Indiana, we gave our three quarter hours to three different brands.
Terre Haute holds a nation-leading Country Brand beast. Hi-99 WTHI – formerly shepherded by Emmis Communications and now Midwest Communications – was (in their heyday) a full-service brand that happened to play Country music. This particular 15-minute session held a bloated stop set followed by a LOCAL TV Weather expert with no LOCAL color.
A flip down the dial to another well-assembled Midwest Communication brand landed us on 98.5 The River WRRV. This is a good, hit-packed product that utilizes LOCAL talent. However, nothing LOCAL came through the radio.
Crossing the scenic Wabash River and over the Indiana-Illinois state line, the changing leaves reflect the changing season, as does my radio destination.
The Mother Road – US-40 – nearly as long, yet not as famous as her sister road Route 66 – cuts through the center of Marshall, Illinois.
Just beyond the only traffic signal sits a local family-owned radio station that shares its bottom floors with a local family-owned Mexican Restaurant.
Before his retirement, Magic Hits 105.9 (WMMC) was once owned by fellow radio comrade J.D. Spangler. This Major Market Programmer built a LOCAL legend in his hometown.
There’s no way around knowing THIS brand super-serves their community.
WMMC airs or streams three different LOCAL High School sports teams and talks about those teams with great frequency.
In this particular 15-minute session, LOCAL weather mentioned an event in nearby Paris, Illinois and the afternoon host described – with detail – a LOCAL fundraiser at the American Legion.
That. Is. LOCAL.
Effingham
Along Illinois this stretch of America’s 5th longest interstate, the flat farmland continues, with expansive skies and occasional patches of woodland.
On the approach to the can’t-miss 198’ foot ‘Cross At The Crossroads’, we land on 97.9 XFM WXEF – one of two LOCAL brands from Premier Broadcasting.
The talent is coming off an all-day Chamber Radio Days event where the station highlighted LOCAL Chamber businesses throughout the day and detailed the benefits of being a member.
As a former LOCAL Chamber President, my thoughts?
Brilliant. Steal this.
Further west, as we approach Illinois’s first capital – Vandalia – we stumble on Olney, Illinois’s Freedom 92.9 – another offering from Forcht Broadcasting. Unlike their Crawfordsville property mentioned earlier, their LOACL news contained local boys’ soccer, water system updates, and farm news. Bravo!
St. Louis
As we approach the confluence of the Mississippi and The Big Muddy, urban sprawl starts to pick up. We catch a glimpse of The Gateway Arch crossing The Mighty Mississippi into Missouri.
As a 14-year veteran of this market, my ears are highly tuned to hear who’s winning the ‘Battle of the Brand’ in this once-competitive market.
The first two quarter hours focused on the Country Battle between Hubbard’s 92.3 WIL and iHeart’s 93.7 The Bull. This back-and-forth has raged for decades.
Still – nothing surfaced as a marked differentiator among these brands. Having witnessed focus groups on the St. Louis Country Battle, in the listener’s mind, they certainly remain identical. What stood out in these sessions is that WIL has dropped the frequency from a vast majority of their imaging(?).
Early nights included syndicated drop-ins from an outside-the-market generic talent. On the iHeart side, that was 15 minutes wasted on a bloated stop set and (literally) a four-second weather time/temp update with a sponsor open and spot close. Nothing LOCAL. Did NOT hear a late-PM Drive talent on 92.3 WIL.
Former frequencies that I’m hyper-familiar with include Audacy’s Y98 (KYKY) and Hubbard’s 106-5 The Arch (WARH), having programmed each during my decade and a half in the market.
Certainly, they are ‘packaged’ well, and slick presentations are the order of the day. Each pipe their late PM drive programs from out-of-town. Kansas City’s Ponch and Nikki on Y98 and the syndicated Greg Beharrell Show on 106-5 The Arch.
Four once blue-chip brands that – after 6 pm on a Thursday – are simply jukeboxes that are easily beaten by Spotify or your iTunes list.
You’ve heard the radio chants in convention sessions over the past decades.
We Are Local.
The purpose of this audio review ‘unfunded research project’ is to intently HEAR LOCAL in the over 100 signals that hit us plowing through the belly of America.
As we head away from The Gateway City with towns like Warrenton, Wright City, and Columbia in our windshield, this stretch is rural, with billboards promoting Lake of the Ozark attractions, Mid-Missouri wineries, and local small businesses.
There IS great news when it comes to fantastic LOCAL radio.
LOCAL is alive!
More from that journey in the future.
