A little over a year ago the folks over at CHUM announced they were switching to an all-sports format. When confronted with the fact that such a small group of potential listeners already had the FAN590, CHUM noted they were confident they would win this war because they had a network of stations across the country and popular syndicated programs from the United States. The fans weren’t just interested in Toronto teams, they were interested in Canadian teams. And Americans loved Jim Rome, so therefore Canadians would love him too. As one of the few people (by FAN590’s Program Director’s personal admission to me via e-mail once) who will listen to sports radio for hours on end (like news, most tune in and out throughout the day) I was consistently barraged with opinions of those around me that my precious FAN590 was going by the wayside. A small Toronto-centric station could not compete with the CHUM power house.

I noted that had CHUM done some research, and learned from the FAN590, they would know that Toronto fans are interested in Toronto sports. They don’t care about the Vancouver Canucks. They don’t care about the Montreal Expos. They sure as heck don’t care about the Saskatchewan Roughriders or the Florida Marlins. They also don’t care about the opinions of radio jocks from Los Angeles – they care about Toronto teams and Toronto radio jocks. They care about Toronto. It’s rule one of marketing – know your market. Just because you love something you’ve created does not mean everybody else will. A little simple research could have saved CHUM a ton of cash, as they called it quits today on their all-sports experiment, have dismantled their network, and are returning to an oldies music format. Too bad, because there was plenty of great local talent in the Toronto area that might have allowed TEAM to give FAN a run for its money. But when you’re throwing Jim Rome up against Gord Stellick you can’t honestly expect to win – just ask The Fabulous Sports Babe.

Cheers!