Hollander comments on WHFS flip; Junkies moving to WJFK
More on yesterday's story on Infinity blowing up Alternative WHFS for "El Zol" Spanish Salsa/Merengue/Dance tunes (1/13 RBR #9).
First of all, WHFS's Sports Junkies ARE moving back to WJFK, and soon.
Says Infinity President/COO Joel Hollander on the format flip: "This was one of those things that NOBODY knew - - nobody knew in the company except for six people. We had a SWAT team, that was it. It was on the front of the Washington Post today, I couldn't believe it!"
Well, this market was underserving Hispanics, especially on the FM side.
Says Hollander: "Clear Channel was sleeping there."
What else might we be seeing from Infinity and Hispanic format switches?
"We're looking at anything that strategically makes sense in each market."
What about the HFS employees? We hear Tim Virgin is moving to WNEW-FM NY.
"We're trying to re-deploy them within the market or the company."
But wait, some good news for those in DC still looking for Alternative tunes. From DCRTV: "Empire Scrambling To Replace HFS - 1/12 - A well-placed source tells DCRTV that Steve Kingston, head of Empire Broadcasting, is looking to snatch up Mega's Spanish 94.3 FM, WBPS, in Warrenton and pair it with the 94.3, currently country WINX, in the Annapolis area for a relaunched alternative rock WRNR, now that WHFS has bit the dust. WINX would move to WRNR's current 103.1 FM Annapolis area frequency....."
Mega also airs that Spanish format on the 92.7 frequency in the DC area. The 94.3 frequency would cover a good chunk of the DC area....Go, Steve Go!!! We just hope that the re-launched WRNR would have a better and broader playlist than the HFS that just got blown up. Like more Indie tunes, more free-form in nature like the old school HFS.
The Washington Post quotes Damian Einstein (now on WRNR), a longtime original WHFS personality and son of Jake Einstein, who owned the original free-form progressive rock station on 102.3 FM some 30 years ago, re: the demise of HFS: "They really weren't interested in the music anymore. There really wasn't that much creativity there."
Are you reading this from a forwarded email?
