Weekly Spots

POSTED: August 8, 2011

(White Plains, NY) August 8, 2011 – According to Arbitron, McAllen-Brownsville-Harlingen, TX is the 59th largest radio market with a population of 880,500.

• McAllen didn’t quite begin to develop until the 1850s when John McAllen became manager of what is now called McAllen Ranch (previously called the Santa Anita Ranch). In 1861, McAllen married the widow, who owned the land and began expanding the ranch, which eventually became McAllen.

• Between 1910 and 1920, the town experienced a major population boom from just a few hundred to between 5,000 and 6,000 people. By 1930 the population had grown to 9,074 people because of the new businesses involving oil exploration, factories for the canning process, a winery, woodworking areas, and tortilla plants.

• In 1940 there were 430 businesses. The McAllen-Hidalgo-Reynosa International Bridge was the second ‘port of entry’ from the United States into Mexico in 1954. McAllen is only 11 miles from Reynosa, Mexico.

• McAllen is home to South Texas College with three of its five campuses located in the town. The other two campuses are situated in Weslaco and Rio Grande City.

• The McAllen Convention Center hosts many basketball games played by the Rio Grande Valley Silverados basketball team. The Silverados are centered in McAllen and are a professional basketball team and member of the Continental Basketball Association.

• Famous people from the McAllen area include: actor Valente Rodriguez, Hee Haw’s Cathy Baker, Senator Lloyd “You’re no Jack Kennedy” Bentsen, actor Thomas Haden Church, singer Freddie Fender, movie director Catherine Hardwicke (Twilight), singer/song writer Kris Kristofferson, NFL great coach Tom Landry, actor Rachel McLish and actor Nick Stahl.

MCALLEN-BROWNSVILLE SPOT TEN

For the McAllen-Brownsville market, last week the #1 radio advertiser was GOBIERNO DE LA REPÚBLICA with 644 spots. LAW OFFICES OF MANUEL SOLIS was #2 with 505 spots, while JOHN MILTON took #3 with 383 ads. JCPENNEY was #4 airing 318 announcements and SENADO DE LA REPÚBLICA rolled into #5 with 299 spots. CÁMARA DE DIPUTADOS ran 296 spots to land in #6, while TEXAS DEPT. OF STATE HEALTH SERVICES was #7 with 292 spots. ARAGÓN MUSIC HALL leaped to #8 running 273 spots and SECRETARÍA DE SALUD connected at #9 with 272 spots. And coming in #10 MCDONALD'S was #10 with 267 spots.

MEDICATED PRODUCTS SPOT TEN

NATIONAL STATISTICS -

National numbers on medicated products are in: #1 was AMBEREN going all in with 8,376 spots. SUSTENEX placed at #2 with 2,263 spots and ICY HOT arrived at #3 airing 2,025 announcements. GOLD BOND rolled into #4 with 1,648 spots, while UNISOM landed in the #5 spot with 1,512 spots. ALLEGRA came in at #6 with 976 spots. CORTIZONE-10 took the #7 place with 931 spots. QUIETUS landed #8 position with 586 spots and PREPARATION H held #9 with 488 spots, leaving SEBACLEAR at #10 running 472 spots.

NATIONAL SPOT TEN

NATIONAL STATISTICS -

GEICO is on top with 42,954 spots. THE HOME DEPOT went to #2 with 33,673 spots, while MCDONALD'S got to #3 with 26,099 spots. FORD LINCOLN MERCURY was #4 with 23,423 spots and VERIZON was #5 with 20,139 spots.

Posted: August 8, 2011

Yum! Brands, Inc., based in Louisville, KY., is the world's largest restaurant company in terms of system restaurants with more than 38,000 restaurants in over 110 countries and territories and more than 1 million associates.

Yum! Brands include KFC, Pizza Hut, Taco Bell and Long John Silver's, which are the global leaders of the chicken, pizza, Mexican-style food and quick-service seafood categories. Yum! also includes A&W All-American Food Restaurants.

Yum! began on October 7, 1997, as Tricon Global Restaurants, Inc. an independent company. It was a spin off from PepsiCo to keep its restaurant businesses together as a separate entity. In 1977 Pepsi had bought Pizza Hut and one year later, Pepsi purchased Taco Bell. Then, in 1986 Pepsi bought Kentucky Fried Chicken.

In March 2002, Tricon acquired Yorkshire Global Restaurants, which possessed Long John Silver's and A&W All-American Food chains. That same year Tricon changed its company name to Yum! Brands, Inc.

The future growth of Yum! Brands is targeted mainly at other countries; China in particular has a large population and is enjoying increases in income. The Yum! China Division, based in Shanghai has been growing since 2005. And last year, the Company opened more than 500 new restaurants in mainland China.

Since 2006, Yum! Brands has served as the corporate sponsor of the Kentucky Derby. Last year, YUM! Brands delivered revenues of $11.34 billion with a net income of $1.16 billion. They employ 52,920 people.

On Cable in the last 12 months, Yum! Brands ran 961,197 spots. They ran hottest in January with 104,030 ads and April with 106,801 spots. In fact, 58.7% of all their spots ran on Cable.

On Radio, their collection of eating establishments ran 433,172 spots in the last 12 months. The biggest month was last August 2010 with 50,646 spots cleared that month.

On TV, Yum! Brands ran 244,267 spots in the last 12 months with high points in November (31,589) and last June (42,048).

POSTED: August 8, 2011

Mercedes-Benz is a German manufacturer of automobiles, buses, coaches, and trucks. It is currently a division of the parent company, Daimler AG (formerly DaimlerChrysler AG), after previously being owned by Daimler-Benz. The first Mercedes-Benz brand name vehicles were produced in 1926, following the merger of Karl Benz's and Gottlieb Daimler's companies into the Daimler-Benz company. By 1927 the company had created approximately 8,000 cars. The three pointed star on the Mercedes-Benz first started in 1909 and was not patented until 1928.

Mercedes-Benz has introduced many technological and safety innovations that have become common in other vehicles several years later.

Mercedes-Benz was the first to introduce pre-tensioners to seat belts on the 1981 S-Class. In the event of a crash, the pre-tensioner tightened the belt instantaneously, preventing the passenger from jerking forward in a crash.

In 1959, Mercedes-Benz patented a device that prevents drive wheels from spinning by intervening at the engine, transmission, or brakes. In 1987, Mercedes-Benz applied its patent by introducing a traction control system that worked under both braking and acceleration.

Mercedes-Benz also invented the adaptive high-beam assist system which automatically and continuously adapts the headlamp range to the distance of vehicles ahead or which are oncoming.

Mercedes has had very strong ties to the racing community since the beginning. Today they have a team in Formula One called the Mercedes GP Petronas Team. Their cars are known as the ‘silver arrows’. The team drivers are Michael Schumacher and Nico Rosberg.

In their 2010 company report, Daimler reported Industrial revenues of more than $120 billion and a net profit of $5.87 billion. Today the Mercedes-Benz USA has 348 dealerships around the United States.

Bayerische Motoren Werke AG (BMW) is a German automobile and motorcycle manufacturing company founded in 1916 and is known for its performance and luxury vehicles. They sell light trucks as well.

BMW also produces the MINI brand, and is the parent company of Rolls-Royce Motor Cars.

After World War I, BMW was forced to cease aircraft engine production by the terms of the Versailles Armistice Treaty in 1919. The company consequently shifted to truck and boat engines as well as farming machinery. BMW’s first motorcycle engine was made between 1920 and 1922, and by 1928 BMW had introduced its first car.

The circular blue and white BMW logo or roundel is often alleged to portray the movement of an airplane propeller, to signify the white blades cutting through the blue sky - an interpretation that BMW adopted for convenience in 1929.

In 1941, all BMW car production ceased because of World War II, but resumed in 1951.

In 1965, BMW sold its engine plant, thus withdrawing from the jet engine sector of business. BMW decided to focus more on cars and motorcycles.

BMW invested a lot in their research and development for car technologies and in 1979, a microcomputer was developed to coordinate both the fuel injection and the ignition. This technology conserved fuel, helped engine operation, and lessened car emission and came to be known as Digital Motor Electronics.

BMW bought the British Rover Group in 1994 (consisting of the Rover, Land Rover and Mini brands as well as the rights to other brands including Morris, Austin, Riley, Triumph, and Wolseley).

And they enjoy sport with their team in Formula One called the Mercedes GP Petronas Team. Their cars are known as the ‘silver arrows’. The team drivers are Michael Schumacher and Nico Rosberg.

The BMW US Manufacturing Company in Greer (Spartanburg), South Carolina is BMW's only US production facility. It was built to serve the demand of BMW automobiles directly in the US. The Spartanburg plant does not actually assemble all BMW vehicles sold in the US market; instead, the plant serves as the only X3, X5, and X6 production site in the world. Hence, all models of these vehicles exported worldwide originate from BMW Spartanburg.

The BMW Group reported revenues of $84 billion and a net profit of $4.5 billion in their 2010 Annual Report.

On Cable, the war between the two German car manufacturers gives a slight edge to Mercedes in the last 12 months. Mercedes-Benz ran 177,853 spots against BMW’s 151,282 spots. The biggest month for BMW was May 2011 with 22,203 spots, while Mercedes pushed the pedal to the metal in August a year ago with 30,780 spots.

On the Radio, another close battle: Mercedes-Benz ran 145,529 spots and BMW ran 136,070 spots in the last 12 months. Mercedes biggest radio month was August 2010 with 27,442 ads, while BMW ran hottest in December with 21,456 spots.

On TV, these two carmakers do not run as much as they did on Cable and Radio. Mercedes-Benz ran 99,896 spots against BMW’s 64,180 ads.

Posted: August 8, 2011

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