Weekly Spots

POSTED: December 5, 2011

(White Plains, NY) December 5, 2011 - According to Arbitron, Chicago, IL is the 3rd largest radio market with a population of 7,762,900.

• Often called “The Windy City” because of the strong winds that come off Lake Michigan, Chicago street lingo has also referred to that same wind in the winter as, “the hawk.”

• The name "Chicago" is the French rendering of the Miami-Illinois name shikaakwa, meaning “wild leek but etymologically, the sound /shikaakwa/ in Miami-Illinois literally means 'striped skunk', and was a reference to the wild leek, or the smell of onions.

• Begun in 1836, Chicago’s first railway, Galena and Chicago Union Railroad, opened in 1848, a year which also marked the opening of the Illinois and Michigan Canal. The canal allowed steamboats and sailing ships on the Great Lakes to connect to the Mississippi River.

• The Great Chicago Fire of 1871 destroyed a third of the city, including the entire central business district. The Chicago Water Tower is one of the few surviving buildings.

• With two baseball teams, the first thing most Chicagoans ask another Chicagoan when they meet, “Cubs or White Sox?” But they have some other professional teams: Chicago Bears NFL Football (1 Superbowl win), Chicago Blackhawks, one of the six original teams of the NHL (4 Stanley Cups) and the Chicago Bulls NBA Basketball, (6 Championships).

• Second City, the legendary Chicago comedy “factory” has produced some of the most amazing talent in the more than 50 years of its existence. Here is just the short list: Dan Aykroyd, John Belushi, John Candy, Steve Carell, Stephen Colbert, Rachel Dratch, Chris Farley, Tina Fey, Bonnie Hunt, Eugene Levy, Adam McKay, Bill Murray, Mike Myers, Bob Odenkirk, Gilda Radner and Betty Thomas.

CHICAGO SPOT TEN

In the Windy City the #1 radio advertiser last week was MCDONALD’S with 1,538 spots. STATE FARM stepped up to #2 with 1,154 ads, while GEICO checked in at #3 airing 1,097 spots. MENARDS took #4 with 1,002 ads and EPSON printed their way to #5 running 848 commercials. WAL-MART leaped from #19 to #6 with 843 spots, while THE HOME DEPOT landed at #7 with 759 spots. MEIJER was #8 with 704 announcements and JEWEL-OSCO moved from #14 to #9 with 647 ads. OVATION CELL THERAPY expanded from #61 to #10 with 634 spots.

COMPUTER HARDWARE/SOFTWARE STORES SPOT TEN

NATIONAL STATISTICS -

The #1 radio advertiser in this category was CYBERDEFENDER with their 2,955 spots. Coming in #2 last week was BARRACUDA NETWORKS with 2,362 ads, while DELL ranked #3 with 938 spots. GOTOMYPC linked into #4 with 894 spots and NUANCE was #5 with 848 commercials. CUDATEL (part of Barracuda Networks) was #6 with 554 ads, while WEBROOT was #7 running 292 spots. AOL COMPUTER CHECKUP landed at #8 with 232 spots and ASUS held steady at #9 airing 191 announcements. INTERNETSAFETY.COM was #10 with 169 spots.

NATIONAL SPOT TEN

NATIONAL STATISTICS -

GEICO and the gecko are back on top at #1 with 42,268 commercials on radio. STATE FARM moved from #3 to #2 with 35,205 ads, while WAL-MART held #3 with 31,546 spots. MCDONALD’S was #4 with 26,304 spots and VERIZON reenters the top five with 25,534 spots. (Of note: THE HOME DEPOT dropped from #1 to #8 with 19,052 spots).

Posted: December 5, 2011

Carnival Cruise Lines (NYSE:CCL) is a British-American owned cruise line, based in the Doral suburb of Miami, Florida in the United States. Originally an independent company founded in 1972 by Ted Arison, the company is now one of eleven cruise ship brands owned and operated by Carnival Corporation & PLC.

Their maiden voyage was the TSS Mardi Gras in 1972. In 1984, Carnival became the first cruise line to advertise on network television with the premiere of a new advertising campaign starring company spokesperson Kathie Lee Gifford.

In 1990, the 70,367-ton Fantasy - the first and namesake vessel in the highly successful "Fantasy-class" entered service as the first new ship ever placed on a three- and four-day Bahamas cruise program from Miami. Eventually, Carnival constructed eight "Fantasy-class" vessels, the most cruise ships in a single class.

In 1996, Carnival introduced the first passenger vessel to exceed 100,000 tons, the 101,353-ton Carnival Destiny, at the time the world's largest cruise ship. No stopping there, in 1999, they launched the 102,000-ton Carnival Triumph, Carnival's second "Destiny-class" vessel. And adding another bigger line, in 2002 a 110,000-ton ship, called the Carnival Conquest was then followed by the 113,000-ton Carnival Splendor in 2008. And finally, in 2009 they launched 130,000-ton vessel, the Carnival Dream, the largest "Fun Ship" ever constructed

The company has the largest fleet in the group, with twenty three vessels currently in operation. Executive control of the company is provided by the North American division of Carnival Corporation, headquartered in Doral, Florida.

Carnival was a pioneer in the concept of shorter, less expensive cruises. Its ships are known for their Las Vegas-style decor and entertainment. The line calls its ships “The Fun Ships”, and there are a wide range of activities offered on board. Its trademark is the funnel, which is red, white and blue and shaped like a whale's tail.

The mascot for Carnival is "Fun Ship Freddy", a character in the shape of Carnival's distinctive funnel.

According to public records, they produced revenues of $14.47 billion in 2010, with a net income of $1.98 billion, which represented a 10.0% growth in sales. They have 89,200 employees.

On Cable, Carnival ran 21,922 spots in the last 12 months. Their biggest month as May with 5,559 spots.

Radio is not an important media for them with only 1,304 spots in the last 12 months. Once again, May was their biggest month with only 398 spots nationally.

They seem to be using a bit of a different strategy with TV, running the most spots last month with 8,392 ads. They totaled 26,999 spots in the last 12 months on TV.

POSTED: December 5, 2011

Wal-Mart Stores, Inc (NYSE:WMT) is a chain of large, discount department stores. Founded by Sam Walton in 1962, it was incorporated on October 31, 1969.

Sam Walton, a businessman from Arkansas, began his retail career when he started work on June 3, 1940, at a J.C. Penney store in Des Moines, Iowa where he remained for 18 months. In 1945, he purchased a Ben Franklin variety store in Newport, Arkansas; the store was a franchise of the Butler Brothers chain. It was here in this first store that Walton pioneered many winning concepts such as making sure his shelves were consistently stocked with a wide variety of goods.

Walton was extremely successful in running the store in Newport. When the lease came up for renewal, he opened a new Ben Franklin franchise in Bentonville, Arkansas, but called it "Walton's Five and Dime." There, he achieved higher sales volume by marking up slightly less than most competitors.

Walmart's operations are organized into three divisions: Walmart Stores U.S., Sam's Club, and Walmart International. The company does business in nine different retail formats: supercenters, food and drugs, general merchandise stores, bodegas (small markets), cash and carry stores, membership warehouse clubs, apparel stores, soft discount stores and restaurants.

According to their 2010 annual report, they created revenues of $418.95 billion with a net income of $15.36 billion, which represented a 3.4% growth in sales. They employ 2.1 million people.

Target (NYSE:TGT) began when George D. Dayton opened a Goodfellows in downtown Minneapolis in 1902. The company was called the Dayton Dry Goods Company.

By 1922, they had changed their name to be just the Dayton Company and they created WBAH radio, one of only six radio stations in Minneapolis and the first one to be operated by a department store in the Twin Cities.

By 1956, they had expanded into the suburbs of Minneapolis with shopping centers; in fact, their Southdale Mall was the nation’s first fully enclosed shopping center.

The Dayton Company moved away from the department store model and entered mass market discount merchandising with the opening of its first Target store in Roseville, Minnesota on May 1, 1962. Four years later, they opened their first Target store outside of Minnesota and they picked Denver as the location.

In 1967, they had grown into five autonomous divisions: Dayton department stores, Target stores, B. Dalton booksellers, Dayton Jewelers and Dayton Development Company. In 1968, The Target bull’s eye logo was redesigned to its current appearance.

In 1969, they joined forces with the J.L. Hudson Company of Detroit to create Dayton-Hudson Corporation. In 1978, they purchased Mervyn’s of California. In 1990, they purchased Marshall Field’s in Chicago.

In 1995, the first SuperTarget® store was opened in Omaha, Nebraska. Marshall Field’s was sold to Macy’s in 2004 and also Mervyn’s was sold to an investment group and then subsequently went bankrupt.

Target grew and eventually became the largest division of Dayton Hudson Corporation, culminating in the company being renamed as Target Corporation in August 2000.

Target’s slogan is “Expect More. Pay Less” and after 19 years of being known for "Always Low Prices," Wal-Mart, the world's largest retailer, recently changed its slogan to "Save Money. Live Better.”

According to Target’s annual report, they produced revenues of $67.39 billion and delivered a net income of $2.92 billion, which represented a 3.1% increase in sales growth. They have 355,000 employees.

On Local Cable Target ran 241,891 spots in the last 12 months against Wal-Mart’s 395,081 ads. Target ran 61.23% as many spots as Wal-Mart. Targets biggest month on Cable was last December with 39,550 spots, while Wal-Mart ran hottest last month, November 2011, with 114,233 spots.

On Radio, Wal-Mart is clearly out-performing Target. Wal-Mart ran 1,022,879 spots in the last 12 months, while Target ran 112,910 ads. Wal-Mart’s biggest month was last month with 173,543 spots and Target’s big month was also last month with 34,543 spots. Perhaps these two large retailers understand that things are getting better in America.

On TV, Wal-Mart ran 290,823 spots against Target’s 266,599 in the last 12 months. Target’s biggest month was last December with 51,914 spots, while Wal-Mart ran hottest last month with 57,250 spots.

Posted: December 5, 2011

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