Radio Money Makers

From Tom Taylor's NOW column...

In the Chicago-market 2014 revenues, BIA/Kelsey places all-news WBBM at #1. That agrees with the 2014 estimates from Miller Kaplan, and in fact a comparison of the Miller Kaplans (January 23 NOW) with the BIA/Kelsey numbers shared by Chicagoland Radio & Media shows the two services agree on the entire Top Ten, station by station. The biggest variance between them might’ve been their assessment of 2013 (prior-year) billing for talk WGN. But let’s get to the BIA/Kelsey numbers - #1 is CBS Radio’s all-news WBBM/WCFS (780/105.9), down from $42 million in 2013 to $39.2 million in 2014. #2 is Hubbard’s hot AC “Mix” WTMX, down dramatically from an estimated $37.5 million to $30.9 million. #3 is Tribune’s talk WGN, down from $29.2 million to $27.3 million. (Miller Kaplan had WGN up two-tenths of a percent, to $29,266,000.) #4 in BIA/Kelsey is CBS Radio’s rhythmic “B96” WBBM-FM, off from $25.3 million to $22.7 million. #5 is CBS all-sports “Score” WSCR, off from $24.8 million to $22 million. #6 is yet another CBS property, giving that company four of Chicago’s top six. It’s country “US99.5” WUSN, at $21.2 million this time. #7 is iHeart’s top 40 “Kiss” WKSC at $20.2 million. #8 is iHeart urban AC “V103” WVAZ at an estimated $19.5 million. #9 is Univision’s regional Mexican WOJO at $18.5 million. And #10 is iHeart’s urban WGCI at $18.2 million. Note the ground rule for BIA/Kelsey about revenue – they don’t include off-air revenue such as concerts and other live events.