No More Burger for Me

This past week, Hubbard Broadcasting fired Kevyn Burger from FM107.1. I am extremely sad that she is gone. What is surprising me is that I'm upset enough to not want to listen to the station anymore. I mean really, this isn't life or death (at least it's not for me.) The problem is that I really like many of the other programs. The Lori and Julia show (LoJ) is my least favorite and I don't care if I miss it -- but that's hard to do since they rerun it constantly.

FM107.1 announced it to the fans of the station via a posting on their Facebook Fanpage – the quotes below are taken from that announcement.

So now the focus of the station I’ve enjoyed listening to for the past five or six years is going to be focused on frivolity:

“In the early evolution of FM107.1 she reflected perfectly - who we were and who we tried to be. It was Real. Life. Conversation. During the past two years FM107.1’s ‘flavor’ has changed – or more precisely – evolved. FM107.1 has and will continue to evolve toward a radio station that is defined by words like ‘pop culture’, ‘celebrity news’ and ‘gossip.’ . . .”

I feel insulted by the dumbing down of the station. I am smart and intelligent woman and I don't care what new face-lift, botox or boy-banging is going on in Hollywood. Especially not so much that I want another two hours of my radio listening time to go to that. And I, personally, enjoyed having Sheletta on Kevyn's show. She lightened things up a bit and she has a great outlook on life. I thought the two of them worked very well together.

I read an article in the StarTribune written by Neal Justin, which states that Kevyn’s contract went through the end of this year and that the station won’t actually replace Kevyn but expand the existing programs. So the station will still be paying Kevyn (I assume that’s part of the contract) but won’t be playing Kevyn. I’ll be interested to see how they do this as Jason Matheson can’t go on-air at 9:00. Perhaps Colleen and the Boys will move to 9:00.

I really like Jason and Alexis’ show (although it is called the “Jason Matheson” show – it’s really the two of them.) Yes, it's a Hollywood focus -- but they spend a lot of time poking fun at Hollywood and don't seem to be too much into the drooling over Hollywood. Colleen and the Boys just ignore the Hollywood and gossip nonsense and come up with their own stuff. The Balanced Breakfast has a good focus on news events and weird news. Ian does a good job of putting a new spin on the news. Lori and Julia are OK -- but they are a bit too obsessed with outer beauty and not enough on inner beauty and character. (At least that's the schtick they present.)

I get that this is about ratings.

I’ve read a lot of comments on-line about how people can’t believe they’re getting rid of Kevyn and keeping Lori and Julia. (Many commenting that the two of them can barely talk in complete sentences. Which isn’t 100% accurate – but I would make it at least 25% accurate.) FM107 is not going to get rid of Lori and Julia. The last I knew, it's their best rated program. Meaning, it's probably the one show that actually makes money. Part of that could extend from the fact that the show is on during drive time and people are more likely to be able to actually listen. The reason they replay it all the time is because it's the best rated show.

This could be changing now that they've introduced Jason Matheson. I wouldn't be surprised if Jason's show isn't garnering ratings the same or better than LoJ. This would also make station management see doing a Hollywood gossip and pop culture format as being more profitable. They added a Hollywood gossip and pop culture program and it's garnering good ratings.

The thing that is kind of strange in all this is that FM107 ratings really just suck. I don’t know the ratings for the individual shows – I couldn’t find them on-line. I did find the overall Arbitron station ratings for the station. The September 2009 (the most recent one available) ratings put Fm107 (WFMP) tied at 19 with The Current (KCMP.) They have a 2% market share and that’s an increase from each of the past two months (1.7 in July and 1.9 in August.) It’s hasn’t changed their over ranking in the market – they were 20th in July and August.

“This decision is not about professionalism. It’s not about hard work, or attitude. Kevyn performed in all those areas, and more. This decision is simply about fit. We do think you deserve an explanation. We don’t expect you to be happy about the change – we sure aren’t.”

This paragraph kind of blows my mind, but not really. They don’t expect us to be happy – they sure aren’t. Really? It’s my experience that people don’t do things that don’t make them happy.

And, based on the snarky little intro to the Perez Hilton clips -- “Love him or hate him -- it’s Perez Hilton exclusively on FM107.1. You’re welcome and we’re sorry.“ -- station management really doesn’t care about what their listeners think. They are listening to what we say – which I take must be pretty much a lot of negative feedback – but the message to the listeners is we really don’t care that you don’t want to hear this spot. We want to play it so we will. Apologies from station management are not sincere.

I'm anxious to learn where Kevyn lands. Perhaps WCCO830 could start punching up their female listening audience by giving Kevyn Burger and Jeanette Trompeter a show from, oh say, 9-11 Monday-Friday.