New Seattle ratings - Puget Sound Radio®

Seattle spring arbitron ratings, KOMO, KTTH- up; KVI, KIRO, air america- not so much...

(finally posted Aug 3 by Michael Hood on his Blatherwatch blog ...where he's consistently anti-KIRO.)

"Make no mistake about it," says our source, "KIRO is a station in trouble. While air staff, positioning statements, commitment to traffic et al, may constantly change, its target demo ratings are consistently terrible."

The new Arbitron Spring ratings are out for the money demo: ages 25-54. These are the numbers that count to advertisers, which means: these are the numbers that count.

KIRO came in at 15th place overall in the Seattle Tacoma market. Air America's KPTK, which had been looking up, came in at a disappointing 22nd. KOMO ranked 11th overall. KTTH and KVI were tied for 18th.

With the exception of the Fall when it got a spike (which should have been sharper) from the Seahawks, KIRO has consistently placed in the teens- in its heyday, only a couple of years ago, it was consistently 3 or 4th in the market, and always no.1 in news talks. Winter '05: 13th; Spring '05: 19th; Summer '05: 14th; Fall '05: 9th; Winter '06: 12th.

(KIRO suits are probably spinning it as a "Baseball Book." (Fisher's KOMO stole the Mariners from KIRO a couple of years ago). But with the flat numbers throughout this year, that excuse won't work. In non-baseball books, Fall and Winter, KIRO only beats KOMO only by a few 10ths of a point. Even with the help of the Seahawks, in a Super Bowl year, KIRO is still less then a point ahead during those books. Add in the Mariners are a last place team and the proof is in the numbers).

In the morning, more people get their news from music stations than get their news from KIRO. It ranked 11th for morning drive, its worst ranking in a year. KOMO didn't fare much better, placing 14th.

(Sources say national ad buys are based on the top five or 10 stations in the advertiser's target demo. When you're selling locally, you can try to use your powers of persuasion to convince people to buy time on your station in spite of weak ratings, but national advertisers go straight by the book. Now with KIRO consistently out of the top 10 for more than a year that must be killing national sales, which certainly doesn't help the budget).

We're amazed, as is everyone else, that KTTH mornings (5-9a) with Sytman & Boze, (frequently the buttmen of jokes here at BlatherWatch) got the best ratings we can remember in that time slot including the tortuous years of predecessor, Mike Siegel. They jumped from 23rd to 16th, beating KVI's Kirby Wilbur who came in at 19th.

(As we marveled at that wonder of wonders, our radio source cautioned, "Keep in mind at that [low] end of the spectrum, the difference between absolute number of listeners between the two shows isn't all that great. Honestly, you're talking about KTTH getting one or two more diary mentions than Kirby.")

Stephanie Miller at Air America was down and disappointing at 22nd.

Dave Ross's return to mornings (m-f, 9a-12p) helped KIRO, they went from 16th to 12th, tied with Rush at KTTH, mid days (10a-3p).

Air America's winter spike with Thom Hartmann, looks like a fluke, he's back down to 16th in that time slot, close to its average for the past year. KVI, which still had Tony Snow in this book is 22nd in that time slot. ITAL(Snow has lept up to his level of incompetence with his new job as head White House 'splainer. The onset of the forgettable "Brian and the Judge," begs, demands, reconsideration by Fisher suits- it's given Rush Limbaugh (KTTH m-f, 9a-12p) new life in this market.

"The Commentators" with Carlson and Schram aren't doing anything for KOMO- it's still in 20th place middays.

The Dave Ross move, and Ron & Don's embarrassing drive-time show hurt KIRO in the afternoon, putting KIRO at 16th (3p-7p), its worst ratings in a year. KOMO was 8th. KPTK's Al Franken and KTTH's Michael Savage were tied for 20th.

KVI, with its mish-mash of two hours of John Carlson and the ever more tedious bad Lt. Bryan Suits, came in even last-er at 22nd. (It seems like Suits' ratings get worse as the foolish, ill-conceived, poorly conducted Iraqi war spins out of control and sinks deeper in the esteem of the American people. Suits' interminable militaristic screedos, knee jerk my-country-right-or-wrong songs and smug defense of conflict in general are probably not cume magnets just now).

Evenings: KOMO was first, which is directly related to the bad baseball team, which is slightly better, apparently, than KVI's ever-popular, ufological Coast to Coast with George Noory comes in second. No surprise that Little Orphan Vinnie on KIRO is a distant 23rd, and the snide Laura Ingraham was where you'd expect, a wretched 27th at KTTH.