May 28, 2020
WINNIPEG — It’s hard to draw any conclusions on whether the COVID-19 pandemic has had an effect on what Winnipeggers are listening to on the radio these days.
The latest Spring ratings book released by Numeris this week maintains CBC Radio One, 680 CJOB and QX 104 as the city’s top three stations in the market.
“Radio programmers should spend about 10 minutes looking at this and move on,” said Matt Cundill, president of the Soundoff Media Company and former Power 97 program director, noting the ratings were compiled without sampling from the COVID-19 period.
“Across North America over the last few weeks, we have seen declines in peak listening periods like morning and drive home shows but increases in time spent listening in some day parts,” Cundill noted.
“News stations have seen growth as have feel-good formats like country and classic rock. However, overall tuning of radio is down and listening patterns are largely disrupted and scattered. Radio is going to have to find new ways to capture streaming and smart-speaker listening in the future.”
CBC Radio One and 680 CJOB dipped slightly with their share, while QX 104 increased 0.2 of a share.
Bell Media’s 103.1 Virgin Radio and TSN 1290 were also down minimally, while 99.9 BOB FM increased their share from the same period last year.
KiSS 102.3 and 92.1 CITI — both Rogers stations — both improved their performance during the measuring period, while Peggy @ 991 (Corus) was up 0.9 of a share.
The below data is for the 12+ demographic, with the Spring 2019 ratings in parentheses for comparison.
SPRING 2020 RADIO RATINGS
- CBC Radio One — 13.9 (14.1)
- 680 CJOB — 10.7 (11.3)
- QX 104 — 8.4 (8.2)
- 99.9 BOB FM — 7.7 (6.7)
- 94-3 The Drive — 5.3 (5.8)
- KiSS 102.3 — 5.3 (4.2)
- 103.1 Virgin Radio — 5.2 (6.3)
- 92.1 CITI — 5.2 (5.1)
- Power 97 — 4.3 (4.6)
- CBC Radio 2 — 4.0 (3.8)
- TSN 1290 — 3.8 (5.2)
- Energy 106 — 3.5 (3.3)
- Peggy @ 991 — 3.5 (2.6)
- Hot 100.5 — 2.0 (2.4)
Source: Numeris
