Rushin' The Season?

94.9 WHOM flipped to our “All Christmas Music” format around 8:30am this morning, prompting the phones to meltdown and my e-mail to heat up!

Obviously, the biggest question is….WHY SO EARLY!!!!?????

This was said in a variety of ways, some of which were….how shall we say…laced with profanity? And a “Merry Christmas” to you too!

To answer the question, I must preface with a couple of facts:

1) 94.9 WHOM was not the first station in the Portland market to go all-holiday music this year.
2) Stations in Boston (2), Providence (2) and MANY other markets around the country went all-Christmas weeks ago. Some flipped the day after Halloween (I’m not kidding)

So, that said, the logical question is still…..WHY SO EARLY!!!!????

To be perfectly honest, it is for competitive reasons. Just like all media, all radio stations compete with each other for listeners. The simple fact is that All-Christmas stations see their audience levels SOAR when they flip to All-Santa all the time. Whether you or I like it or even understand it, that reality is a simple fact.

People who complain all say to me---“But EVERYONE I know agrees with me and they HATE it this early!!” Hey, I get it—and I might even tend to agree with you….but my job as Program Director of 94.9 WHOM (yep, I’m the guy to blame) is to sustain, maintain and grow the audience of the station. Knowing what Christmas music does to the ratings makes the decision of WHAT to do easy. WHEN to do it?

Well, if I had my druthers, I would likely wait until the traditional day after Thanksgiving. However, once a competitor or multiple competitors make the switch, the decision of WHEN is automatically made. Why?

Well, if my competitor gets a week (or more) head start , then my going all-holiday will likely fail from an audience-growth perspective. Again, enough historical evidence out there to confirm that stubborn Program Directors who stuck to their guns and REFUSED to make the switch early (and thus giving another station or stations a big headstart) usually got their heads handed to them when the ratings came in.

So there you have it. That’s the reason.

94.9 WHOM is the #1 Station in Northern New England (Maine, New Hampshire and Vermont combined) The margin grows even wider during the all-Christmas music format. We are committed to our audience (who in numbers that continue to astound us love this music) and to our advertisers, who keep us in business by supporting 94.9 WHOM as we deliver their messages to a quarter million people every week

Of course, there is another reason THIS year…and that one is the economic news of late. With all the crazy financial stories out there, there are a lot of people who want to remember better times-and the Christmas/Holiday music (we use both terms interchangeably) makes them feel good-perhaps at a time when songs that bring back good memories are a comfort to our listeners.

Whenever we do anything, we get feedback—and I welcome it even when it’s not flattering. Most e-mail and voicemail tend to be critical…satisfied customers rarely voice their content-it’s usually the other way around. Even so, the feedback today has NOT been completely negative! There were many people who thanked us for going Xmas this morning.

While I know that we can’t please everyone, we do try our best to delight as many people as we can! We really held our breath that first year ( 5 years ago!), wondering if our commitment to all holiday music would drive the audience away. When the results came in, we were stunned-and pleased at the huge audience growth. The appeal of the music to the vast majority was beyond indisputable.

That said, if you are among those disappointed by our early “flip”, my apologies. I fully understand your feelings-and whatever listening decisions you make as a result. I still welcome your input—either as a comment to this blog below…or direct to my e-mail:

Tim.moore@citcomm.com

Have a safe and happy holiday season!