by Myron Love
LASALLE, Man. – A friend’s 40th birthday party eight years ago was the trigger for Howard Kroeger’s epiphany, an epiphany that has led the former director of operations for CHUM’s Winnipeg radio stations to become the go-to guy for ’80s music for radio stations throughout the United States.
“When I arrived at the party, my friends were listening to a competing radio station,” Kroeger recalls. “They were apologetic. They said they just wanted to listen to the music that we grew up with. While some of the songs were from the ‘80s, others were from the ‘60s. We were way too young to appreciate the music of Jimi Hendrix and the Doors. Our musical icons were Tom Petty, Boston and Kansas.”
It occurred to Kroeger that no radio stations were focusing on the music of the ’80s. Kroeger notes that those people born between 1960 and 1966 are the largest population cohort today and no radio format was directly addressing that audience. So he researched all the Billboard Top 100 charts from 1971 on – his and his contemporaries’ formative years – and put together a list – of 100 singles – which he took back to CHUM.
“CHUM had recently purchased (Winnipeg radio station) Magic 99.9 and we were trying to decide whether to continue the Magic format or try something different. At CHUM, we were encouraged to think outside the box. We tested our new Variety Hits featuring ’80s music and got a tremendous response. We went on air with BOB FM on March 4, 2002.”
A few months later, JACK FM went on the air in Vancouver with a similar format.
And a company of years after that, Kroeger developed HANK FM, a country version of BOB, focusing on the Country movements of the ’80s such as the Urban Cowboy and Outlaw trends. “The Class of ’89 – with the debut of stars such as Garth Brooks and Trisha Yearwood – was the big year,” Kroeger says.
Kroeger has been in the radio broadcasting business since 1981. He started with CISV Radio in southern Manitoba, moving to CHUM in 1984. “CHUM was a great company to work for,” he says. “Management was always open to new ideas.”
Because of the success of BOB, Kroeger decided three years ago to leave the security of CHUM and strike out of his own. Working from his home in La Salle, a town just south of Winnipeg, Kroeger has become the programmer for 20 stations throughout the United States. (Kroeger Media Inc. is the owner of the HANK trademark in Canada and the U.S. and the BOB trademark for the United States.) He provides the play lists and daily schedules for his clients and also does voiceover work for HANK. His staff consists of a voiceover man for BOB and a producer in Florida.
“American radio stations have been hard hit by the recession,” he says. “Many of them are now owned by the banks. The stations are struggling to find a successful product and be cost effective. A lot of radio stations are looking for guidance.”
Kroeger notes that he owes Kroeger Media’s success largely to the Internet. “I couldn’t have done this even five years ago,” he says.
What truly amazes Kroeger is the effect that digital music file sharing has had at breaking down musical barriers. “You have young people discovering Miranda Lambert and Tammy Wynette at the same time,” he says. “My 13-year-old son downloads Hank Williams senior, Led Zeppelin and Franz Ferdinand.
“My hunch is that eclectic approach to music will be good for radio,” Kroeger says.
Myron Love is a Cartt.ca correspondent in Winnipeg.
