:: Radio correspondent Steve Hochman looks into independent radio station owner Saul Levine's decision to flip his two AM radio stations to a country format:
Beginning Friday KKGO-AM (1260) in Los Angeles also will be carrying the programming. For now, that's a combination of nationally syndicated shows and automated segments, but after Jan. 1, the stations will offer a mix of local and national programming, some featuring former KZLA personalities.
"I began to get dozens if not hundreds of telephone calls from country fans saying, 'You're the last one who can save it,' " says Saul Levine, president and general manager of Mt. Wilson FM Broadcasters, which owns XSUR and KKGO. "This kept going on and I thought, 'These were really nice people.' "
These also were more desirable people — at least to advertisers — than KKGO was attracting with the "standards" format the station had for the last two years.
Surprisingly, the story doesn't mention the Inland Empire's KFRG-FM 95.1 ("K-Frog"), which has posted strong ratings in Los Angeles since KZLA went off the air -- even though KFRG isn't even meant to be heard in L.A. proper. Given a choice, I think listeners will choose to listen to their country music on an FM station -- even with some static -- than on an AM station.
Especially because K-Frog's signal is actually pretty strong into Los Angeles. K-Frog posted a 0.8 rating (among listeners 12+) in the most recent Arbitrons -- ironically, better than Movin 93.9 (KMVN), the station that replaced KZLA, which did a 0.7!
:: File this under "Lucky we live Southern California." In some parts of the country, a fast food joint like El Pollo Loco would still be considered exotic. (Keep in mind that El Pollo Loco doesn't even sell fish tacos, which still confounds people back East.) The paper writes that El Pollo Loco hopes to break into the East Coast market, even though questions of whether consumers will be confused by the chain (Is it chicken? Is it Mexican?) remain:
El Pollo Loco — "the Crazy Chicken" in Spanish — derives 85% of its sales from Southern California. Its fusion of flame-grilled, marinated chicken and Mexican fast food has worked well in an environment in which the lines between mainstream and ethnic food are blurred.
As the company attempts to satisfy the East Coast palate, the challenge will be to promote its dual identity as giving customers two reasons to check it out, analysts and company executives say.
This month the chain opened at the Foxwoods Resort Casino in Mashantucket, Conn., its first restaurant east of Chicago. The franchise group that owns the location plans to develop 24 more in six Northeastern states. El Pollo Loco also recently announced franchise agreements to build 61 stores in Arizona, Georgia, Missouri, Virginia and Utah. The deals will give the 353-unit chain a wider reach, placing it in 16 states....
Stephen Carley, a former Taco Bell marketing executive who is El Pollo Loco's chief executive, is confident that the chain can compete with established national fast-food brands.
"I remember when we took Taco Bell to the East Coast and people asked what a 'take-oh' was and pronounced the L in tortilla," Carley said. "When they ordered a burrito, they got out a knife and fork, cut it open and ate the insides out."
Two decades later Americans have developed far more sophisticated tastes and are more adventurous in their eating habits, he said.
I hadn't come to appreciate El Pollo Loco until recently. Besides hitting the In-N-Out Burger, my parents make sure to hit the 'Pollo Loco whenever they visit from the midwest. (And that's just a chain. Could you imagine life without L.A.'s taco stands? Nope.)
:: Where did that quirky name "Inland Empire" -- the catch-all used to describe Riverside, San Bernardino and vicinity -- come from? The L.A. Times ventures to the 909 to find out, but comes up empty. Even the debate over where the Inland Empire starts and ends isn't clear:
The origins of "Inland Empire" are as obscure as its boundaries. A portion of the region, namely Redlands and Riverside, used to be known as the Orange Empire or the Citrus Belt when fruit groves carpeted the foothills, said Burgess, director of the A.K. Smiley Public Library in Redlands.
Some local newspaper columnists and historians have attributed the designation to the marketing genius of an area bank or bygone radio deejays. The San Bernardino Sun ran a lavish illustration bearing the appellation "Inland Empire" in 1920, featuring cities from Upland and Ontario in the west to Beaumont and Banning in the east.
Late Riverside history buff and columnist Tom Patterson declared in a 1992 column that the Press-Enterprise first inked "Inland Empire" as early as 1914.
The Los Angeles Times began throwing the term around less precisely between 1910 and 1920 to alternately describe Fresno, Kern, San Bernardino and Imperial counties plus swaths of Western states — any place considered rich with agricultural or development potential.
:: Time for the annual "The Hollywood Christmas Parade is a pathetic shell of its former existence" story. Bob Pool and David Pierson note the sad roster of D-listers who now make up the bulk of the parade... which continues to be seen by smaller crowds:
Over the last few years, officials has been trying to breathe new life into the parade. Johnny Grant, Hollywood's honorary mayor and former longtime parade organizer, wrote an open letter to Hollywood begging big-name entertainers to participate. Last year he made Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa grand marshal as part of a strategy to lure young Latino families.
"The A-list stars are not around and not in the community to give back like the old stars were," Grant said Monday. "Show business has changed because of television and the Internet. You have so many things going."
In the past, big-name stars were required by their studios to participate in parades and other events to generate publicity for their movies. These days the top actors and actresses work on independent productions where studio heads have less clout, he said.
Others believe that today's younger generation of superstars simply don't have the same fond feelings about parades, seeing them more as a throwback than a civic event.
To be fair, the story goes on to note that many of the "High School Musical" castmates were in the parade... sure to delight most 9-year-olds in attendance. Who, in turn, were probably less than thrilled by grand marshalls George Lopez and Regis Philbin.
Meanwhile, check out Tony Pierce's take on the parade here.
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