Emmis Corporation has not sold WEPN-FM or WLIB-AM in New York.
And, that may not transpire for a while. Emmis, with the help of a veteran programming consultant, has moved both stations to the bilingual Spanish/English Adult Contemporary format pioneered by iHeartMedia in Miami.
At 6pm Eastern on Friday (1/10), “La Exitosa 98.7 FM/1190 AM” debuted. For WEPN, a “pop-up” Hot AC waved goodbye.
Mike McVay, who worked with Emmis on the station development and launch, is handling the on-air presentation. He noted the station’s primary audience. “The strong Dominican, Puerto Rican, Columbian, Mexican, and Ecuadorian communities in New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut are radio’s most passionate fans,” he said. “Delivering the popular hit music these diverse communities grew up listening to, will provide a unifying listening experience New York has never heard before.”
While Emmis has taken steps to sell its radio station portfolio, Emmis Chairman Jeff Smulyan called the launch of the station an easy decision.
“We’ve been trying to sell our last two stations in New York, but when ESPN/Good Karma moved to AM after the LMA, we thoroughly reviewed the New York market and saw a significant opportunity for a Spanish AC format playing English and Spanish hits from the 1980s to 2000s,” he said. “We believe the opportunity was too good to pass up and have spent several months preparing for the launch.”
Seems like it is trying to compete with not just WNEW primarily but also WKTU (since they play some Hispanic music, particularly Latin pop), numerous other Spanish stations and WLTW. It is unlikely they will go all-Christmas since all the other stations that have this format do not.
Seems like they are going to try to compete with the Spanish stations in the market and WLTW and even WKTU and WNEW. This might result in this station struggling to gain traction against the Spanish stations in the market and if the format doesn’t succeed they could try Alternative rock, CHR to compete with Z100 or Country (with Alternative rock or country to fill the gap in one of those formats).