Well, so much for taking Houston’s airways by storm.
Syndicated shock jock Howard Stern’s much-bally-hooed debut in the Houston market hasn’t captured listeners. Ratings for Stern’s show, which debuted on KIKK-AM (650) in late July, were so minuscule they didn’t show up in the Arbitron rankings.
Laura Morris, general manager of Infinity Radio’s four Houston stations, including KIKK-AM, predicts it will take another couple of ratings periods before Stern shows up in the ratings.
“People are still discovering that Howard is even on the air in Houston,” she said.
Ratings for Stern’s show are hampered by the fact that KIKK is a low-wattage AM station that barely registered in the ratings under its previous business-news format.
I can testify to the low-wattageness of AM 650. I listened to the Stern show for a few weeks, the all of a sudden my radio couldn’t pick up the signal any more. I got nothing but static. It’s got to be hard to get ratings when you’re broadcasting with less power than a bullhorn.
Maybe Stern’s rating will improve in the next cycle – he’s been on the air three months all together – but it seems to me that Infinity blew a lot of free publicity by not boosting KIKK’s signal strength. Why bother bringing Howard Stern to Houston if no one can hear him?
Another problem is that KIKK pushed his show back to 7AM (It started at 6am when it first came to Houston). Prior to that the staion hasdead air, so if you turn it on before seven you just get that scary AM hum that frightens dogs and cats alike.
Addionally KIKK often loses the feed or something. All of the sudden you’ll be listening, they’ll go to commercial, and when they come back on it will be the show from the day before. It’s a mess. I hope they iron it out because they only have 14 months left before Stern goes to sirius.
Actually, the 7 AM start may be what I experienced, since I was listening between 6 and 6:30. Still, with no notice, that’s a crappy way to build an audience.
I listen to him every morning for my hour-long commute. I even choose him over satellite radio. He’s funny. Thank god some radio station here finally wised up.
Signal seems dependent on the sunrise. I can pick it up only after the sun comes up.
There must be a way to boost the signal.
God bless ’em though!
I had forgotten how damn funny Stern was.
Ohhhhhhhhhhh Yeahhhhhhhhhh!
Stern rules, without question. Walton and Johnson are just loudmouth Democrat-bashers who tout the ultra-religious right wing agenda. Can’t they say one negative thing about a republican? Give me a break. Regardless, ground based radio is dying a slow dead…SIRIUS-ly. Good Bye to censorship.
KIKK’s new cnn radio format is patetic. They just broadcast CNN’s headline news off of TV. How boring is that?