The "Mighty Mox" may not be as mighty as it once was, but it's back atop a quarterly ratings report in St. Louis for the first time since its nearly four-decade run of dominance ended in 2009. And the return of the Cardinals has led the charge.
KMOX drew 9.3 percent of listeners in the market ages 12 and above, according to Arbitron, during the spring ratings period (April-June). That coincides with the Cardinals' return to the station for the first since the team moved the broadcasts to KTRS (550 AM) six seasons earlier. KMOX (1120 AM) was significantly ahead of runner-up WIL (92.3 FM), a country music station that had a 6.8 share.
"The feedback I've had from listeners and advertisers in St. Louis and all over the country is that they love the move home to KMOX," said John Sheehan, who runs KMOX and CBS' other radio stations in the market. "Our goal was to give the fans what they wanted, assuming it made sense financially."
Still, KMOX is behind its stranglehold of the spring of 2005, the last year it had the Cards. At that time, KMOX's market share was 10.6. (KTRS was at 4.9 then and slid to 2.2 this spring).
Sheehan wouldn't address specific financial aspects of the impact of the Cards' return, but did say the arrangement has been profitable for the station.
"It's been good for business," he said. "It's important to meet listeners' expectations. As long as we do that, we have a great opportunity to succeed as a business."
590 rises, 101.1 slips
Since entering the sports-talk fray 21/2 years ago, WXOS has soared to the top in ratings for that format. But it has come back to the pack a bit while long-established KFNS (590 AM) has significantly increased its market share. That's according to Arbitron's spring survey for men ages 25-54, the group sports-talk targets, from 7 a.m.-6 p.m. weekdays. That's when they compete the most.
In the spring WXOS (101.1 FM) drew 6.3 percent of those men, down 10 percent from its 7 share last winter. Still, it was No. 3 in the market in that demographic among all stations regardless of format.
"To me it's not as much about the share as it is in where you're positioned vs. the competition in the other formats," said Jason Barrett, who was the station's program director during that period before leaving recently for a similar position in San Francisco. "You know spring and summer aren't going to be as strong" as the fall and winter, when more sports are taking place.
John Kijowski, who runs WXOS, attributed the dip to the NFL lockout and the paucity of football talk on a station that broadcasts the Rams and concentrates heavily on the sport. And he said the recent trends show ratings are on the upswing now that football is back.
"There's no concern, it's a normal dip with the lockout," he said. "Sales for Rams (broadcasts) are good. There's a lot of interest."
Meanwhile, KFNS had 3.3 share to continue a trend of improvement. It was at 2.4 in the previous quarter after being at just 1.3 a year earlier. All four KFNS shows increased their market share over last winter and the midday program with Frank Cusumano and Martin Kilcoyne was up the most, 89 percent — from 1.9 to 3.6.
"We didn't start paying for the (ratings) service, which is normally how you get a bump," KFNS President Dave Greene said. "So it must be because we are sticking to what works best." He said that formula is "first and foremost (to be) entertaining while also being informative and compelling."
But that growth continues to come at the expense of KSLG (1380 AM). Both stations are owned by Grand Slam Sports, which has put its emphasis on 590 in part because of its better signal.
KSLG again has just 0.1 percent of the target audience for the second quarter in a row after being at 2.1 when it was under different ownership a few years ago. No 1380 show did better than a measly 0.2 share this time. But at least there were no 0.0 ratings, which occurred in the previous quarter for the Evan Makovsky-Cory Mitchell and Jeff Gordon-Brian McKenna-Jeff Vernetti programs.
Gordon-McKenna-Vernetti are at 0.2 now and Makovsky-Mitchell are at 0.1, so mathematically they have had an infinite ratings increase — a percentage of change can't be calculated with a starting point of zero. That leads Makovsky to say in jest, "I am proud of our infinity ratings increase, and all the hard work the team has put in to make such an unprecedented leap possible."
The big picture
Individual shows continue to be clumped in the ratings according to the station on which they air. The top-rated programs are on 101.1, the middle rung is occupied by 590 and 1380's are at the bottom. The Bob Ramsey-Randy Karraker-D'Marco Farr afternoon drive program on WXOS leads the way again, but its share is down 12 percent from the last quarter.
The Big 4-0 in the Biz for Cards broadcaster Rooney
Cardinals broadcaster John Rooney celebrates his 40th anniversary in radio on Sunday, when he calls the Cards-Cubs' game in Chicago, and said something he recently realized "hit me like a ton of bricks."
That realization is that his first day in radio was on the 46th birthday of Jack Buck, the legendary Cardinals broadcaster whose spot Rooney now has in the booth.
"Listening to Jack and Harry Caray doing the Cardinals was mandatory in our house and car," said Rooney, who grew up near Kansas City. "So it was very special to me" to make the connection.
Rooney, who is from Richmond, Mo., was a high school student in 1971 when he approached the manager of a station in nearby Lexington about going on the air.
"I went into his office and said, 'I'm going to do sports,"' Rooney recalled. "He laughed his butt off but said I could tape a five-minute sportscast and if it was any good he'd put it on the air. It got on — after a lot of editing. I was a 16-yar-old kid scared to death, but I had caught the (broadcasting) bug."
And he's still going strong. "To make it 40 years in any business these days is a pretty good accomplishment," he said.
