by Joe Petro
Staff Writer
Times-Shamrock Communications changed the format of radio station 92.1 FM on Thursday September 16, 2010 to a ‘90s alternative based broadcast.
The station 92.1 FM also broadcasts on 102.7 FM and has changed their call letters to WFUZ-FM.
Prior to the reformat, WQFM was based around an Oldies genre playing artists from the 60’s and 70’s for its listeners. FM 92.1 plans for its demographic audience to span from the 25-44 age brackets in order to obtain a newer audience. The station created the slogan “More Music Less…Yada, Yada” to entice listeners by implying less interruption.
Along with the newly launched station, Times-Shamrock Communications owns The Times Tribune, Citizen’s Voice, various radio stations, and several other media publications. Although this newly formatted station may prove more effective for Times-Shamrock and generate a larger listening audience, the question is how does it affect the competing stations such as VMFM 91.7? Marywood University’s radio station VMFM 91.7 “Your Alternative” may face some competition in the market due to the same genre format. In addition the now two possible competing stations VMFM 91.7 and WFUZ 92.1 are closely placed on the radio tuner. However, thus far both stations stand independent and show no signs of conflict.
