The Southern Ontario/WNY Radio-TV Forum / I Like WECK Buffalo But...

**Posted by RadioActive** June 15, 2025 2:32 pm

I've been listening to WECK Buffalo the past few days both online and now that they're on the old WHLD 1270 frequency. Their playlist is pretty good for an oldies station, and there seems to be a lot of variety and songs you don't always hear anymore.

But if I have one beef with WECK (pun almost intended) it's the length of the commercial breaks. Yes, every station has to have them and yes, they're always intrusive. But it seems like WECK's are incredibly long and almost endless. The breaks last at least 4-5 minutes (or more) every half hour, which by itself is actually fairly reasonable. But because they're clustered together one after another after another after another, they feel a lot longer than that.

It's hard not to tune it out knowing how long they're going to be going on.

I think I'd prefer shorter commercial clusters and more pauses if it came to that. It makes it hard to stay tuned knowing you're about to hear 5 minutes of back-to-back spots every time there's a break. Otherwise, a very good sounding little station. Glad it comes in here now so I can hear it when I'm not near a computer.

**Posted by Easily Amused** June 15, 2025 2:49 pm

If you read Ostrander's musings over at the Buffalo / Niagara Falls / Rochester subforum of 'Radio Discussions', he's the only person who knows how run a radio station. He'll tell you himself. From his ramblings, I don't know if he wants to be a station owner, or the Batman villain the Riddler. 🤔

**Posted by RadioAaron** June 15, 2025 3:09 pm

Years ago, Corus did an experiment and replaced the 2x4 min ad breaks with more, shorter breaks. Listener consensus was overwhelming that the stations were now playing more commercials.

I believe some US stations in the PPM era tried a similar tactic and it ended up hurting ratings.

**Posted by Binson Echorec** June 15, 2025 3:16 pm

RadioAaron wrote:
Years ago, Corus did an experiment and replaced the 2x4 min ad breaks with more, shorter breaks.

Corus moved from 3x4mins per hour to 6x2mins per hour and the audience timed those breaks and complained they were longer than two minutes because:

#1 - They were timing and counting the :10 splitters that aired going into and out of each break.
#2 - Corus made the easy mistake of putting copy in the splitters that promoted: "You're never more than two minutes away from more music"; which led to why point #1 was happening.

The audience thought they were being fooled and/or lied to...because they're unaware that splitters and such are treated as separate elements from a programming perspective.

**Posted by DOPEfm** June 15, 2025 3:37 pm

My weekend program on Classic 1220 has 3 blocks of commercials and currently equals 6 minutes 30 seconds.

I like the shorter, spread out breaks.

I also host a college radio program on CFMU, and I'm thankful, only a few commercials in a year (but because it's community based radio, no pay either. But all the creative freedom.

**Posted by paterson1** June 15, 2025 3:43 pm

I timed a commercial break on WBEN AM on a weekend about five months ago. Over 7 minutes of commercials and promo, and then into a two minutes newscast.

**Posted by RadioActive** June 15, 2025 4:24 pm

I still think 680 handles its commercial load the best of any station in the city. One break in front of a scheduled feature, like gas prices, headlines, sports, business etc. Never more than two spots at a time. They get them all in during the hour, but because there's content - even a 15-30 sec. story in between - it never seems too much.

But it's a specialized format, of course, and not everybody else could do it. In fact, it would sound awful on a music station.

**Posted by RadioActive** June 15, 2025 4:26 pm

Waiting for the inevitable commercial cluster on 1270 makes me anxious.

You might say I'm a nervous WECK...

**Posted by mace** June 15, 2025 4:46 pm

I still can't figure out why I am geo-blocked from WECK on Tune-in even with Nord VPN set to the U.S. Yet If I try them on my phone or laptop with the appropriate VPN setting, I can listen just fine via the World Radio Map,

**Posted by Paul Jeffries** June 15, 2025 4:48 pm

100% commercial-free classic hits on my station, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. And pretty damn good variety to boot, if I do say so myself.

PJ

**Posted by RadioActive** June 15, 2025 4:52 pm

Paul Jeffries wrote:
100% commercial-free classic hits on my station, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. And pretty damn good variety to boot, if I do say so myself.

PJ

Definitely worth a listen!