WLZW

WLZW
	Adult contemporary
Affiliations	Premiere Networks; Westwood One
Ownership
Owner	Townsquare Media; (Townsquare Media Licensee of Utica/Rome, Inc.);
Sister stations	WFRG-FM, WIBX, WODZ-FM, WOUR
History
First air date	January 1, 1974 (as WIBQ)
Former call signs	WIBQ (1974–1985); WNYZ (1985–1989)
Call sign meaning	"Lite and Easy Favorites"
Technical information
Facility ID	169
Class	B
ERP	25,000 watts
HAAT	201 meters (659 ft)
Links
Webcast	Listen Live
Website	lite987.com

WLZW (98.7

radio station in Utica, New York, serving the Utica-Rome radio market. The station is owned by Townsquare Media and calls itself Lite 98.7. It is part of a cluster with news-talk station WIBX, country-formatted WFRG-FM, classic hits station WODZ-FM, and classic rock-formatted WOUR

.

WLZW broadcasts an

Delilah

call-in and request show in the evening.

History

Beautiful Music, Oldies and Rock

The station

signed on the air on January 1, 1974; 50 years ago. It was a sister station to WIBX 950 AM and ran a beautiful music format using the call sign

WIBQ. But in the 1980s, the beautiful music format was starting to attracting only older listeners, while most advertisers seek young to middle aged clients.

Without warning, WIBQ changed its format in 1985 to

Z-Rock satellite delivered Heavy Metal

format available at the time, but instead flipped to the current Adult Contemporary sound and current call sign WLZW, identifying as "Lite 98.7".

Lite 98.7

Lite 98.7's call letters WLZW and format are reflected in its first slogan "Lite and Easy Favorites". In its early years, Lite 98.7 competed with rival AC station and market leader KG 104 WKGW (now sister station

WFRG). WLZW quickly toppled WKGW from its position, and by 1993 WKGW had flipped to classic rock

as WKFM, formerly in Syracuse, taking over the 104.3 frequency.

WLZW was then the only AC station in the Utica-Rome market until the spring of 1994 when WUUU (later WRNY & WUCL, now

WSKS & WRBY, now WUMX

) the previous year, flipped format from oldies to adult contemporary to become "Warm 93.5". While WUUU/WRFM was a softer AC station, WLZW was a bit more upbeat. After over 8 years of competition between the two stations, WRFM flipped format and call sign on December 26, 2002, becoming oldies station WUCL (identified as Kool 93.5) again leaving Lite 98.7 as the only AC station in the market.

This lasted over a year until WRBY flipped to hot AC and call sign to WUMX, identifying as Mix 102.5. In order to compete with WUMX's popular "Christmix 102.5" holiday programming, WLZW began switching to a Christmas Music format in 2009. Traditionally, WLZW switches on or around Thanksgiving Day and continues with holiday music until Christmas Day. In 2015, WUMX tweaked its format to Hot AC and dropped holiday music programming. That left WLZW as the only station in Utica-Rome to broadcast only Christmas music through much of November and December.

Alumni

J.P. Hastings
I.V. Hamilton
Randy Jay
Morgan Daniels
Jeanne Ashley
Greg McShea
Linda Rae
Rich Lawrence
Trudy
Peter Naughton
Mark Richards
Geoff Storm
Rick Andrews
Chuck Knight
Tom Ryan
Lee Michaels (Mike Hotaling)

External links

WLZW in the FCC FM station database
WLZW in Nielsen Audio's FM station database

43°08′38″N 75°10′44″W / 43.144°N 75.179°W / 43.144; -75.179