Sunday Afternoon Odds & Sods

49° - light rain at 5:43pm. Left: downtown Lansing webcam. current image

Good afternoon from Michigan.

Late start on the blog today. I'm not quite sure why. I did wake early - for what is referred to in our house as a "Panera Run".

Panera a regional chain of excellent bakeries; a nice treat as the rest of the house awoke, especially on Mother's Day.

Promotions: Destination Zeppelin. Have seen a few promos for the new Hard Rock Park in Myrtle Beach, featuring the Led Zeppelin Roller Coaster. WAXQ/NYC here. KKFM/Colorado Springs here. Lee Arnold posted about Hard Rock Park here.

Second phase promos: WAOR/South Bend offering a "Flat Screen A Day In May". Here.

Gas: WTPA/Harrisburg is offering free gas here.

And from WBGG/Miami comes "Petty cash". Very cool name - and a very cool graphic. More here.

This is a very sleepy spring in terms of promotions, most likely due to the tight or non-existent budgets in the current economic climate. Fewer stations with "Workforce Cash". The "Harley Days of May" - once a classic rock staple, appears to be gone. Perhaps its time for change, but these promos appear to be replaced by nothing.

Around the blogs:

Seth Godin. Seth posts a great piece this morning (he says its ten years old) on "what every good marketer knows" that is very radio relevant.

Read here.

Wonderful stuff: Rick Kaempfer talks this week to the brilliant Ron Britian. Ron shares memories of WCFL/Chicago; and his own weekly "Subterranean Circus". It was my first real exposure to a lot of album rock...on a 50kw AM blowtorch!

Read Rick's interview here.

More tomorrow.

More Winners..

85° - cloudy at 5:30pm

Late day post today; busy day catching up on a few things including PC maintenance - plus starting a new outside project.

Spring numbers: 12-plus numbers released yesterday. Lots of wins in the classic rock world.

In Harrisburg: classic rock WTPA is up over a share and a half. In the same market -classic hits WRVV is up more than a point.

In Peoria: classic hits WPBG (using "The Drive" moniker) up almost a point and a half - good enough for second place. Great sounding radio station I heard a few months back on a trek to Missouri.

Classic Rock also up in South Bend: WAOR moves up from 6 to a tie for 4th 12+. Across town, WZOW - playing "whatever rocks" - is also up nearly two points.

In Ventura County: KOCP scored big - up over two points and their best performance in recent history. More numbers today in the usual places.

David Martin. Dave blogs today about a great radio station food drive in St. Louis. "Christmas in July" - a fabulous idea!

Scroll down on Dave's blog for a great piece on Chicago's Steve Dahl - who alone keeps one Chicago FM station alive with incredible numbers. I get something/learn something from David's blog almost everyday. Here.

More tomorrow morning.