HO HO HO . . . Merry Christmas!

[David]

With 60 days to go until December 25th, Christmas has come early to the Youngstown, OH radio market. This may be a record for the earliest start date of an all Christmas format. I don't recall any Salt Lake stations ever flipping before Midnight on October 31st:

radioinsight.com/headlines/181315/christmas-music-season-starts-in-youngstown/

[amanuensis]

In 2006, a Salt Lake station flipped in September. www.deseret.com/2006/9/16/19974100/radio-dial-oasis-christmas-tunes-not-bad-for-september But my recollection is that they switched to something else several weeks before Christmas day.

[CAwasinNJ]

Oct 25, 2019 21:24:44 GMT -6 amanuensis said:

In 2006, a Salt Lake station flipped in September. www.deseret.com/2006/9/16/19974100/radio-dial-oasis-christmas-tunes-not-bad-for-september But my recollection is that they switched to something else several weeks before Christmas day.

More like several months before Christmas Day. That was a stunt that ran for about 2 1/2 weeks. They then went to a Contemporary Christian format and didn't go all Christmas again that year I don't believe.


Frankly I think the idea of going all Christmas this early doesn't make a lot of sense unless your name is Tim Burton. I get staking out your claim as the first to flip, but this is ridiculous. It seems like most stations have backed off starting this early which I think is a good thing. In the case of WWIZ it actually makes more sense then the average station. The key is in Cumulus' press release where it says "formerly programmed as “Z104, The Valley’s Goodtime Oldies” station." I'll bet that means they're blowing out the format and it really doesn't matter what the ratings are for the next month, either good or bad.

[David]

Some further reading about what goes into a station's decision about when to flip to all Christmas:

www.insideradio.com/solving-the-riddle-of-when-to-flip-the-christmas-switch/article_9d796234-fedb-11e9-828b-4b79d577ff68.html