I had an idea for a blog post with a cool analysis showing the changes in radio listening because of the COVID-19 pandemic. It would show, through a bunch of number-crunching, that Canadians turned away from music radio stations as they stopped going to work, but kept in touch with news-talk stations.

Unfortunately, the data didn’t have my back here. I compared average minute audience measured by Numeris from this spring (March to May) versus last spring, and looked at the relative change in audience. While some news-talkers did well (98.5 and CJAD in Montreal), others did badly (CBC Radio One here and in some other cities).

There were some undeniable trends, though, and they aren’t terribly surprising:

Sports radio: Without sports, there’s much less interest in hearing it or talking about it. Every sports-talk station in Canada’s five largest markets lost audience, between 50% to 72%. Hardest hit was Montreal’s 91,9 Sports.

All-traffic stations were also hit, but because there are only two of them in Canada and they have very low audience, it’s hard to really quantify that.

Less listening overall: Montreal’s total average-minute audience was 202,600 a year ago, and 167,400 this spring, the lowest level since Numeris began publishing overall AMA numbers in 2015. Across Canada, the same deal, with each of the five major markets losing between 10 and 18% of its average audience.

So with that out of the way, here’s how the ratings break down by city:

Montreal

Total average minute audience, spring 2020 (vs. spring 2019):

1. 98,5fm: 38,900 (up from 32,000)
2. Rythme FM; 20,200 (down from 22,000)
3. ICI Radio-Canada Première: 18,700 (down from 21,800)
4. CJAD: 14,500 (up from 14,100)
5. CKOI: 12,300 (down from 19,000)
6. CHOM 97.7: 12,100 (down from 15,900)
7. The Beat 92.5: 11,600 (down from 17,200)
8. Rouge: 11,100 (down from 19,700)
9. Énergie 94,3: 8,300 (down from 11,700)
10. Virgin Radio 95.9: 6,700 (down from 9,700)
11. ICI Musique: 4,100 (down from 5,100)
12. CBC Radio One: 3,900 (down from 6,100)
13. CBC Music: 1,400 (down from 1,700)
14. CHRF AM 980: 1,400 (up from 500)
15. TSN Radio 690: 1,200 (down from 2,500)
16. 91,9 Sports: 900 (down from 3,300)
17. Radio Circulation 730: 100 (down from 300)

Of the 17 measured stations, only three (which I’ve bolded here) saw ratings increases from a year ago. One is CHRF, which has since shut down. The other two are commercial talk stations.

Anglo average minute audience:

1. CJAD: 13,500
2. The Beat: 6,800
3. CHOM: 5,600
4. CBC Radio One: 3,600
5. Virgin: 3,100
6. CBC Music: 1,200
7. TSN 690: 1,100
8. 98,5fm: 900
9. ICI Première: 700
10. Rythme: 600
11. Énergie: 600

Things got so bad for TSN Radio it dropped below CBC Music in terms of audience share, both among anglos and overall. Meanwhile, Virgin Radio is still behind CBC Radio One and less than half the audience of The Beat. “Montreal’s #1 Hit Music Station” is going to have to do more than replace its morning team to fix this disparity.

Self-congratulations

• 98,5fm: Top-rated station in Quebec
• Radio-Canada: 5 shows in the top 10
• Rythme FM: Top-rated music station in Montreal, #1 at work
• CKOI: Top-rated music station among adults 25-49
• Rouge: Top-rated French-language show in Canada
• Énergie: Top-rated music station among men 25-54
• 91,9 Sports: (Nothing)
• The Beat: #1 among adults 25-54, top rated shows in middays, afternoons and weekend afternoons
• Virgin: (Nothing)
• CHOM: (Nothing)
• CJAD: (Nothing)
• TSN: (Nothing)

Toronto

Biggest gains:

1. Jazz.FM91: 28%*
2. Q107: 22%
3. CHFI: 17%
4. CBC Radio One: 14%

Biggest losses:

1. TSN Radio 1050: 67%
2. Sportsnet 590: 67%
3. G98.7: 53%*
4. Virgin Radio: 48%
5. Jewel 88.5: 48%
6. Energy 95.3: 43%*
7. Zoomer AM740: 41%

*Station-specific issues probably had a bigger role in these changes: Internal turmoil at Jazz FM and G98.7, and a format change at Energy (formerly Fresh 95.3).

Calgary

Biggest gains:

1. CBC Music: 38%
2. 101.5 Today: 32%
3. Funny 1060: 25%

Biggest losses:

1. Sportsnet 960: 50%
2. 90.3 AMP: 50%
3. Virgin Radio: 36%

Edmonton

Biggest gains:

1. 840 CFCW: 39%
2. CBC Radio One: 10%

Biggest losses:

1. TSN 1260: 61%
2. Kiss 91.7: 37%
3. CISN Country: 35%
4. 95.7 Cruz FM: 34%
5. 102.3 Now!: 32%

Vancouver

Biggest gains:

1. CBC Music: 57%
2. Peak 102.7: 48%
3. JRfm: 37%
4. Global News Radio: 37%
5. BNN Bloomberg: 33%*

Biggest losses:

1. Sportsnet 650: 71%
2. AM730 (Traffic): 70%*
3. Rock 101: 34%
4. CBC Radio One: 33%
5. TSN 1040: 23%

*Stations with very low audience will see exaggerated relative changes.

Numeris has released its top-line PPM ratings data for Nov. 25 to Feb. 23.

The numbers for Montreal show little change from the previous quarter, or the past few years, really, with CJAD at the top among anglophones and CHMP-FM 98,5 ahead among francophones.

This lack of change is bad news for Virgin Radio 95.9, which spent a lot of effort promoting its new morning show hosted by Vinny Barrucco and Shannon King. We’re two full quarters into this change and The Beat still has twice the audience of Virgin. The sacking of program director Mark Bergman (who’s now at The Beat) and Freeway and Natasha haven’t moved the overall numbers.

Meanwhile, down the hall at CJAD, the long-term trend continues downward. In 2015, the average minute audience overall (averaged over 24/7) was 15,000. Now it’s around 12,000.

The Beat, CBC, CHOM and TSN 690 have kept about flat over that time, and haven’t shown any major change this winter.

Numeris PPM quarterly radio ratings are out. Montreal anglo market share (12+):
CJAD: 24.6%
The Beat 92.5: 20.8%
CHOM 97.7: 11.3%
Virgin 95.9: 9.3%
CBC Radio One: 8.2%
TSN 690: 3.9%
Rythme FM: 2.3%
Énergie: 2.1%
CBC Radio Two: 1.9%https://t.co/Lbj0ecDno3

— Steve Faguy (@fagstein) March 4, 2020

On the francophone side, Rythme FM is continuing to re-establish itself as the dominant music station after facing more competition from Rouge, and 98,5fm is holding off Radio-Canada.

Horn-tooting

• CJAD: Most listened-to station in anglo market
• The Beat: #1 among anglos 25-54, more than twice Virgin’s ratings in major categories
• Virgin: (silence so far)
• CHOM: (silence so far)
• TSN 690: (silence so far)
• 98,5fm: Highest-rated radio station in Quebec
• Rythme: #1 francophone music station in terms of weekly reach, #1 music morning show, #1 noon show
• Rouge: Véronique et les Fantastiques is the most-listened-to afternoon drive show
• CKOI: 2.1 million listeners a week, better than Énergie
• Énergie: #1 among francophone men 25-54

Meanwhile, in Toronto, TSN 1050 finally beat Sportsnet’s 590 The Fan with its morning and afternoon shows (among men 25-54 anyway), which Toronto Sports Media notes has a lot to do with how unstable The Fan’s lineup has been.

Numeris released its quarterly ratings report for metered markets on Wednesday, and for Montreal the only surprising thing is how much The Beat continues to dominate over Virgin Radio. With a 21.5% share, it has more than twice the average listeners than Virgin Radio at 9.4%. And not only it it the fourth straight quarter that The Beat has been more than twice Virgin’s share, it’s the third straight where Virgin has fallen behind CHOM for third place among English music stations.

The 21.5% share is The Beat’s highest since it launched in 2011, and less than four points below perennial leader CJAD 800. Could we see a future where The Beat isn’t just the most popular music station and the most popular among that advertiser-friendly 25-54 audience, but among all ages and formats as well?

The book is more bad news for Virgin Radio, which tried to turn things around by letting go of program director Mark Bergman (he’s now at The Beat) and morning hosts Freeway Frank and Natasha Gargiulo and stealing Vinny Barrucco back from The Beat to lead its new morning show. The Beat’s morning show, headed by Vinny’s former co-host Nikki Balch, is still ahead. It’s still early — this is the first full book with Barrucco hosting the morning show with Shannon King — but they have a lot of ground to cover, and Virgin has lost a lot of ground that it has to make up.

TSN 690 is at the bottom of the anglo commercial radio pack, but it had its best share since 2017. CBC Radio One, meanwhile, which had good numbers from 2017 until this spring, has fallen back below 7% in market share.

On the francophone side, the top line hasn’t changed much, except for a rebound for CHMP-FM 98.5 (which always tends to dip in the summer with replacement hosts and less news), and a drop for CKOI 96.9.

Bragging rights

• The Beat 92.5: “Our best results ever!”
• CJAD 800: “#1 station & 7 of top 10 shows”
• 98,5fm: “L’équipe la plus écoutée à Montréal!”
• Rythme FM 105,7: Highest reach, top music station
• Rouge 107.3: #1 among adults 25-54
• Énergie 94,3: #1 music station among men 25-54
• CKOI 96,9: Top-rated music morning show among 25-54
• Radio-Canada: 3 of top 5 shows, morning show up 9%

Numeris came out with its quarterly metered market radio ratings last week. Here’s the top-line data.

I’ll start by pointing out that this is the winter period, covering the Christmas holidays, when radio listening habits are a bit out of the ordinary. But even if you do a year-over-year comparison, two changes are noteworthy.

On the anglo side, The Beat is continuing to pull away from its main competitor Virgin Radio. Among anglophone audiences, The Beat had a higher average audience this winter than Virgin and CHOM combined.

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Numeris released its quarterly ratings for the Montreal market last week, covering the period of Feb. 26 to May 27. There isn’t much new among the anglophone or francophone markets in terms of market share, but the numbers give us another data point to look at some longer-term trends.

Continue reading →

Market share (% of listening hours) in Quebec City’s central market (data by Numeris)

It shouldn’t come as big a surprise as some are making it, but ICI Radio-Canada Première is the top-rated station in Quebec City, both in terms of listening market share (above) and total listeners in the central market, according to data released by Numeris on Thursday.

Three talk radio stations — RadCan, Cogeco’s FM93 and RNC Media’s CHOI Radio X — have been battling for top spot for the past few years, and FM93 has come out on top recently. But in this ratings period (measured Feb. 26 to April 22), it suddenly drops to third. RadCan, meanwhile, climbs to first while CHOI remains mostly stable.

Among the music stations, another sudden shift means Leclerc Communications’ WKND jumps to top spot ahead of Bell’s Rouge FM, which seems to be in a long, slow decline. The remaining stations’ shares are mostly the same as they have been. (Note that, as in Montreal, Radio Classique stopped reporting Numeris ratings after last spring.)

Continue reading →

Numeris has released its top-line data from diary radio markets (mid-size cities that aren’t big enough to be measured by electronic meters). Here are some highlights:

Quebec City

Overall market share:

1. FM93: 14.9%
2. CHOI: 13.7%
3. ICI Première: 13.5%
4. Rouge: 9.7%
5. WKND: 7.6%
6. Énergie: 7.4%
7. M: 7.3%
8. Pop: 6.1%
9. Blvd: 5.7%
10. ICI Musique: 4.1%
11. CBC: 0.4%

By owner:

1. Cogeco: 22.2%
2. RNC Media: 19.8%
3. CBC/Radio-Canada: 18%
4. Bell: 17.1%
5. Leclerc: 13.3%

Compared to the spring, FM93 and Radio-Canada have lost some ground and CHOI has regained it to climb into second place overall. There was some shifting of the order, but the biggest change was to RNC Media’s Pop 100.9, which doubled its share. The last ratings period came just after they switched from rock to pop, which caused a dramatic decrease in ratings. Now they’re better than the 4.8% share they had a year ago as a rock station.

More coverage from the Journal de Québec and Le Soleil. Among the details noted, CHOI continues to do better in the suburbs while FM93 reigns in the central market, Jeff Fillion has the highest-rated noon show, and FM93’s move to all-talk weekends has had a negative impact on their ratings.

Sherbrooke

1. Rouge FM: 22%
2. Énergie: 18.5%
3. ICI Première: 16.4%
4. 107,7fm: 11.2%
5. Rythme FM: 8.1%
6. ICI Musique: 3.5%

Bell continues to dominate this market with its 40% share, double that of Cogeco, but Radio-Canada’s main network saw a bump.

Trois-Rivières

1. Énergie: 19.7%
2. Rouge FM: 16.8%
3. Rythme FM: 12.2%
4. ICI Première: 9.3%
5. FM 90,5: 9.0%
6. 106,9fm: 5.8%
7. ICI Musique: 4.6%

Another Bell-dominated market. But the story here is CKBN-FM (FM 90,5), a community station on the south shore covering the Bécancour region, which has climbed above Cogeco talk station 106,9 to claim fifth place in the market.

Saguenay

1. Rouge FM: 23.4%
2. KYK Radio X: 21.0%
3. Énergie: 18.7%
4. ICI Première: 11.5%
5. ICI Musique: 4.2%

Radio X is no longer king in blueberry country as Bell’s Rouge FM takes the lead. Énergie is also up, pushing Bell’s share from 38.5% to 42.1% since the spring.

Drummondville

1. Rouge FM: 30.8%
2. Énergie: 22.7%

The only two stations reporting in this market are both owned by Bell Media, so there isn’t much competition to talk about. But Rouge FM has pulled well ahead of Énergie after being a couple of points behind.

Ottawa-Gatineau

Anglo top 5:

1. CBC Radio One: 21.3%
2. Hot 89.9 (Newcap): 9.2%
3. CFRA 580 (Bell): 8.7%
4. CHEZ 106.1 (Rogers): 6.6%
5. Majic 100.3 (Bell): 6.0%

With more than 20 stations in the region, only CBC cracks the 10% share in English. Newcap’s Hot 89.9 leads the music stations and CFRA leads the commercial talk stations, but beyond that it’s a very tight battle.

Torres Media, which owns CIDG-FM, sent me (unsolicited) some numbers showing the station’s growth since it changed frequency from 101.9 to 101.7 and increased power. An 82% increase in the adults 25-54 audience is impressive. But the station still has only a 2.9% share overall.

Franco:

1. Rouge FM (Bell): 21.1%
2. ICI Première: 15.4%
3. Énergie (Bell): 8.5%
4. 104,7fm (Cogeco): 7.8%
5. ICI Musique: 5.1%
6. Hot 89.9 (Newcap): 4.8%
7. WOW (RNC): 4.5%
8. Pop (RNC): 3.6%
9. CHEZ 106.1 (Rogers): 3.5%
10. Jump 106.9 (Corus): 2.5%

At least the top five stations are all French-language ones among francophones. But RNC’s one-syllable pop music stations are down with the top-rated English music stations.

Elsewhere

• In Sydney, N.S., community station The Coast 89.7, licensed to Glace Bay, has been added, and reports a 13% share, good for fifth place out of eight stations (six plus CBC).
• In London, Ont., CKOT-FM (Easy 101), which was purchased by Rogers a year ago, has started reporting ratings even though it’s licensed to Tillsonburg, 40km away. Numeris shows it’s the top-rated private station in the market, behind only CBC. In the spring it was behind Bell’s country station BX93 and Virgin Radio.
• In Hamilton, CHTG-FM (92.9 The Grand) in Haldimand has begun reporting in that market after being bought by Durham Radio and switching from country to classic hits. It scores only a 1.2% share as a spill station.
• In St. Catharines/Niagara, CIXL-FM (Giant FM) has taken the lead from Bell’s EZ Rock, gaining five share points in a year while EZ lost four. Bell’s 97.7 HTZ also saw a bump from 5.6% to 8.0% in a year, but we’ll see if that survives the recent layoffs at the station.
• In Sudbury, Ont., which last year had four stations within 1.3 share points of the lead, KICX Country has climbed on top with a 20% share while the others fell below 15%. KICX is in the process of being purchased by Bell. Rogers’s 92.7 Rock jumped from sixth place to third by increasing its share by more than 50%. The market has six stations with shares above 10%.
• In Winnipeg, Corus’s rebranding of Fresh Radio as Peggy 99.1 has had only a modest effect on ratings, going from 1.6% to 2.1%. ChrisD.ca and the Winnipeg Free Press have more analysis of Winnipeg ratings.
• In Prince George, B.C., Vista’s CIRX-FM (The Goat) has climbed into a commanding lead with a 25% market share compared to second place with 19.7% a year ago. All five stations have at least a 14% share.
• Castanet has details on ratings in Kelowna, B.C.

Total audience listening share percentage among anglophones in Montreal, from Numeris top-line ratings.

Numeris has released the summer ratings for Montreal radio stations, and though there isn’t much new here, it’s more good news for The Beat 92.5. Its 21.1% share of tuning hours among anglophones is the best it’s gotten since the station launched out of the ashes of The Q in 2011.

The new report widens the lead it had over direct competitor Virgin Radio 96, which appeared to narrow slightly in the spring. As the chart above shows, Virgin hasn’t been ahead of The Beat in this category by any significant margin since 2012.

For much of that time, Virgin did claim the lead among the adults 25-54 and women 25-54 demographics that appeal to advertisers. But The Beat has since won in those categories, too. Steve Kowch has some numbers compiled from Bell Media that show The Beat winning in every demographic.

Of course, The Beat can’t claim to be Montreal’s most popular radio station (that would be 98,5 fm), its most popular station among anglophones (that would be CJAD, though its lead has dropped off significantly), or its most popular music station (that would be Rythme FM).

It also can’t claim to have the most popular morning show, so it did the next best thing and claimed to be the fastest growing one:

Bell Media did something similar on the French side, claiming Rouge FM 107,3 is the most improved radio station over the summer. But among all francophones, Cogeco’s Rythme has 50% more listening hours.

Like Virgin, CHOM is also experiencing a long-term downward trend from its high in 2013.

In commentary online, it seems the station anglos want to talk about is TSN 690, predicting doom over a drop from the spring as well as last summer that is certainly rock-solid evidence that the on-air personality they don’t like is awful and should be fired. I don’t know why the ratings are down (though the P.K. Subban trade probably had people tuning in last summer), but the station’s ratings fluctuations don’t seem out of the ordinary for me.

As usual, take these numbers with a grain of salt. Summer is different from the other quarters, there’s less news and no Canadiens games, so CJAD, CBC Radio One and TSN 690 usually dip while the music stations peak.

Among francophones, talk radio actually did better during the summer, with 98,5fm still ahead at an 18.6% overall share, followed by Rythme FM (13.6%), ICI Première (12.7%), CKOI (10.4%), Rouge (8.8%), The Beat (6.3%) and Énergie (5.8%).

The new kids on the Numeris block, CHRF 980 and CIBL 101.5, are about the same, with 900 and 100 average listeners a minute, respectively.

91,9 Sports had a 2.3% overall share among francophones, its best result since launching that format, putting it just behind ICI Musique and Radio Classique in terms of listeners.

There are a couple of stories that can come out of the Quebec City page of the latest Numeris radio diary report released Thursday: One, that CHOI Radio X is no longer the powerhouse it once was (in large part because other stations in the market have copied its populist talk format), and two, that despite the “radio poubelle” reputation of the city’s stations, Radio-Canada’s ICI Première station is doing quite well.

Here’s how it breaks down (numbers are for 12+ listeners, 5am-1am for the whole week, Feb. 27 to April 23, 2017):

As you can see, ICI Première is in a statistical tie with FM93 in terms of audience in all age groups (among advertiser-friendly demographics it’s another matter). Radio X is in third place, followed by the two Bell Media stations, and the two Leclerc Communication stations behind that.

CHXX’s change from rock-based Radio X2 to pop-based Pop has resulted in a drop in market share, but the company is optimistic it can rebound.

Le Journal de Québec breaks down the ratings for specific shows in various time slots. Le Soleil gets reaction from Radio X, which notes it does well among 25-54s, though some of their on-air personalities aren’t so diplomatic, taking shots at the competition.

Le Journal also notes that a host at Énergie wants Gilles Parent of FM93 to give him his house as promised, and Parent in turn took a swipe at BLVD’s Nathalie Normandeau. Other on-air statements are compiled here.

Here are what Quebec’s other markets look like. (Montreal is a metered market, and its next quarterly report is June 7.)

Sherbrooke

Bell owns the Sherbrooke market pretty well, with the top two stations representing more than 40% listening share. Cogeco’s two stations combined have half that. La Tribune notes there’s a decrease in overall listening over last year.

Trois-Rivières

Bell also tops in Trois-Rivières, though the lead is not as large.

Saguenay

Radio X regains the lead in the heartland, after being in third a year ago. The Bell stations are also doing well there.

Ottawa-Gatineau (francophone)

Little change here over last year: Bell also has the two top private stations for francophone listeners in the national capital, while RNC Media’s new single-syllable music stations are more than a point behind the anglophone music station. (I’ve left out the remaining anglo stations.) Nevertheless, Le Droit notes that CFTX-FM’s change from Capitale Rock to Pop has meant a huge increase in ratings, from a 0.5% market share in September.