Arbitron has announced it is adding Wenatchee, Wash., to the fall 2007 radio ratings survey as part of its Qualitative Diary Service, ranking it as market 177 for the period with an estimated 220,700 persons age 12 and older.

"We designed the Qualitative Diary Service to help local radio broadcasters communicate with home-town advertisers in terms they can understand," said Arbitron senior VP of sales Carol Hanley. "This service provides radio stations the ability to understand where customers are and how they listen to a particular station -- which ultimately helps boost station revenues."

Accredited by the Media Rating Council (MRC), the Qualitative Diary Service is used by more than 1,500 advertising agencies and advertisers across the U.S.

I am wondering where they are coming up with 220,700 12+. Chelan and Douglas Counties together are a little over 100,000 TOTAL population. If you include Kittitas County, it still comes nowhere near that figure. Something doesn't add up here.

You mean the figures seem "Arbitrary"?

larger than South Bend?

Arbitrary indeed. If you want to do that, then you have to shake up the whole rankings and combine all markets, Tacoma isn't a stand alone market, and you can certainly make a case that South Bend could be included in Chicago market.

177 seems a bit high...........

Maybe they're including all the illegal immigrants who aren't on the census.

"SWAG"

sounds like they've got a subscriber in the market!! shocking!

Oh and the census does count illegal immigrants by the way.

The Census bureau has recently ask ICE to stop their activity during the upcoming census so they can get an accurate count of illegals...

wouldn't want to intimidate anyone you know...

especially helpful if you are gerrymandering.

Douglas & Chelan County demographics:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Douglas_County,_Washington

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chelan_County,_Washington

If enough stations want to buy in Apple City, USA (Wenatchee), Arbitron will most certainly oblige. I just challenge this market ranking of #173, and a 12+ population of 220,000+. Just isn't right. In all reality, Wenatchee stations reach just two main counties, (Chelan and Douglas), and are questionable in Kittitas. Even combining the three you come up with about 140,000 in total population, 12+ would be significantly lower than that. This would more accurately rank them at the bottom of the ARB rankings, my estimate would be around #250-#260.

To put it in another way, are you telling me that Medford and Tri-Cities and Yakima are smaller markets than 'lil old Wenatchee, WA?

I just cut and pasted the R&R story. Nothing on ARB website. I suspect its a badly written or edited story and Wenatchee's being added to the Tri-Cities or Yakima markets for Qualitative diary sweeps. That would move them up to about 171. This is strictly a guess.

Terry, on Monday this appeared on All Access:

--Arbitron Welcomes Wenatchee, WA To The Fall Book--

Arbitron has announced that it will add WENATCHEE, WASHINGTON to its Fall 2007 Radio Ratings Survey. With a 12-and-over population estimated to be 220,700, WENATCHEE will rank as market #177 in the Fall book.

too high.

thats bigger than Yakima and the Tri Cities!

Maybe this means they have added Wenatchee into the Yakima book??

Gee notalent, I wish I'd thought of that (at 9:39 last night)

snarky comment noted.

time to stop posting before coffee.

N.T. Now that you have been put in your proper place,
I hope you will restrict your posts to what a lovely day we are having and leave radio oriented comments to the perfessinals.

ya...wah he dun saeid purrfreshional peoplez likey djffresh okey dokey to pozt

add....nice day ay

I subscribe to Tom Taylor's newsletter from Radio-Info.com... His missive today includes the fact that Arbitron defines the Wenatchee market as 5 counties, stretching over an area of 140 miles east-to-west by 250 miles north-to-south.

About the only station in the area to cover that much real estate would be KPQ! I'd hate to try and compete with a 1kw peanut roaster on AM.

Not having visited there, I have no clue how well the FMs cover the area, and freely concede that point!

And then that means that the Wenatchee market will have KXLE in Ellensburg as a ranked signal now? And send diaries to Stevens Pass, Cle-Elum and Roselyn?

Gee we might as well include Ritzville, Warden, Mattawa and Othello while were at it ! Geez Louise !

Mark...does the note mention if there will be a "metro" defined area and a "TSA"? My guess would be most of those diaries will go to the one county with the most population. Otherwise every subscriber better be using MaxiMiser to create custom trading and rating zones!

Nothing of that detail was revealed in Tom Taylor's daily newsletter. I'd like to assume that would be so, but you know what happens when you "assume"...

What he DID point out was that Arbitron and Eastlan define the market considerably different (as apples and oranges, no doubt!)... Arbitron's Wenatchee market, according to Taylor, "...is so broad, it actually touches the outlying areas of Spokane, Seattle and Yakima."

Oh, yes... Wenatchee happens to be the home of Eastlan CEO Mike Gould. Touche'!

Sounds something like what happened down here in northern Arizona a couple of years ago: They combined the Flagstaff and Prescott markets into a single combined survey area when Arbitron got a paying subscriber in the area. Only a couple of Flagstaff area FMs cover most of that territory. None of the AMs has a signal that reaches the other trading area, except for KAZM Sedona's daytime coverage...and they weren't the subscriber.

Totally nuts from reality... That'$ dollar$ talkin' for ya...and Wall Street can't be blamed for this one!

Funny thing is subsequent ratings reports for Flagstaff-Prescott, AZ have been embargoed by Arbitron after the first report for the new market came out!

Embargos are instituted by Arbitron at the request of a subscriber, who usually believes that other stations in the market are using or benefiting from the results without subscribing.

With an embargo (no publication permitted) it is easier to prosecute those quoting or referencing ratings they don't pay for.

Diary placement is always targeted to exactly match each county's population vis a vis the total Arbitron-Defined Metro population.

Counties which have HDHA or HDBA zip codes within them are then subdivided into sub-counties (Bronx HDBA, Bronx HDHA, Bronx Balance) with each zip code within a county assigned to one or more of the sub-counties. Diary placement within the subcounties are targeted based on the sub-county's ethnic population. Enhanced diary placement and retreval methods are used in the HDHA or HDBA sub-counties and ethnic weighting is used.

In any county which has not been designated HDBA or HDHA, No Ethnic Weighting is used.

There's something rotten in Wenatchee and it ain't tha apples!

The question is:

Will this translate into significantly more revenue for the group paying Arbitron to subscribe?

Will this also mean more buys for other stations performing well in a desirable demo though not subscribing to the book?

Notalent: On Q1, possibly...although the cynic in me says, considering a market of this size, be careful what you wish for!

On Q2, I doubt it, for the reasons Tdanner cited, above.

(Thanks, Terry!)

It almost sounds like a Neilsen market. By the way, does anyone remember why Roslyn WA is famous?

TV series "Northern Exposure" was partly filmed in Roslyn.

ding ding!

Question

What market are Cowlitz, Lewis, and Skamania counites in? When I travel in those counties I still pick up quite a few PDX stations.

Here is a very handy webpage to bookmark and keep:

www.arbitron.com/ad_agencies/reference_marketinfo.htm

Under "Arbitron Radio Metro Map" on that page you'll find a US Map which shows which metro every US county is in. Other headings will let you select and individual market and survey period and see every county by Metro & TSA; or populations and market rankings for each market.

And the Anwser Is: Non-Metro TSA for all three. Thanks for the info, I was just curious.

Arbitron's announcement was regarding a change taking effect for the Fall 2007 survey for Wenachee. They didn't have the Fall data info on line when I posted the link this morning. Doublecheck your info Dark.... you may be looking at un-updated data. You'll need to wait until Fall 2007 is added to the "Market Survey Definitions" list.

(addendum - Yup. Doublechecked and map states it's Fall 2006 market definitions. The "Market survey Definitions" list should be updated no later than the first day of the fall book in a few weeks. The actual map may take a bit longer to update. ARB makes changes in various individual market definitions on an almost continuous basis, so the map is only updated annually.)

Oh...OK....i'm ignorant in these things. I was just looking at the map. TY

Cowlitz county is growing so fast I would expect it to be grouped in with Clark county in the not to distant future.

As a rule, Arbitron follows the U.S. Census bureau's lead in defining "Metro" areas. It is only when broadcasters or advertisers can present a clear and convincing argument for Arbitron to stray from the Census "Metro" that they will do so. And to my knowledge the Census bureau has never considered radio coverage as a criteria for Metro definition.

Anglo radio stations in L.A. have tried for literally decades to get Arb to add Riverside-SanBernadino county to the L.A. Metro from the TSA- radio coverage is excellent, and commuting patterns from the area into L.A. are pretty convincing. It would also dramatically increase shares for the Anglo radio stations, since the county is predominantly non-ethnic. ARB has resisted because it would be a non-conforming metro (non-census bureau match). Obviously, certain L.A. stations and groups have opposed such a re-definition with as much vigor as those arguing for the change.

Wouldn't it hurt all the Inland Empire stations if they had to compete directly with LA stations without the benefit of a full signal to the majority of the population?

Absolutely!

The TSA more than likely is Chelan, Douglas, Kittitas, Okanogan and Grant Counties. Total 00+ Population (not 12+) 251,700.

Arbitron has announced the new market rankings, and as mentioned at the start of this thread, Wenatchie has been added. It has already been up'd to market #175!

METRO counties include Chelan, Douglas, Kittitas, Grant, and Okanogan.

thats a big market.