Simmons Media Group of Salt Lake City is finalizing agreements to purchase two more radio stations in St. George for $1.25 million and seven more in Blackfoot, Idaho, for another $13 million.
In addition, Simmons had signed an agreement for a local marketing deal to sell advertising for a third St. George radio station. These two deals will increase the radio ownership of Simmons to about two dozen stations in Utah, New Mexico, Idaho and Texas.
"Southern Utah is growing," G. Craig Hanson, president of Simmons Radio, gave as the main reason for purchase of KREC (FM-98.1, soft hits format) and also KUNF (AM-1210, nostalgic music) from Marathon Media of Chicago.
Simmons will also handle all advertising for KONY (FM-101.1, county music format).
The company already owns KDXU (AM-890, all news) and KSNN (FM-93.5), "Sunny" hits format) in St. George. Simmons has also been leasing, with a future option to buy, KEOT (FM-99.7, country) and KTSP (AM-1450, talk format) from Western Communications.
Hanson admits this St. George deal, both purchases and leasing, is part of a movement in radio to have clusters of stations in the same area. This cuts staff, advertising and office costs. The company will look at eventually putting all its St. George Stations in one facility.
Regarding the purchase of the seven Idaho stations, four FM and three AM, Hanson said the economics of the sale and market opportunities make it ideal. He said Simmons owned stations in southern Idaho from 1986 to 1993. The Idaho purchases are also being made from Marathon Media.
KLCE (FM-97.3, classy hits); KFTZ (FM-103.3, hit music); KCVI (FM-101.5, rock music) and KOSZ (FM-105.5, '80s music) are the four stations licensed in Idaho Falls that Simmons is buying.
KICN (AM-1260, Spanish), KECN (AM-690, news/talk); and KBLI (AM-1620, ESPN sports) are the three stations licensed in Blackfoot.
Despite the licensing differences, all these Idaho stations are already housed in the same facility, in Blackfoot.
The Idaho Falls-Blackfoot-Pocatello market has some 120,000 people and could be the newest Arbitron rating area to be measured soon.
Hanson expects all the deals to close in the next few months. They also still require Federal Communications approval.
In Salt Lake, Simmons is based at Trolley Corners and operates KSFI (FM-100); KRSP (Arrow 103.5); KQMB (Star 102.7); KDYL (AM-1280); and KXRK (X-96). All those stations are housed in the "Airwave" facility.
It also owns six stations in Albuquerque and one in Austin, Texas.
Hanson said Simmons could still, according to FCC rules, own one more FM station in the Salt Lake market and two more AM stations.
"We haven't found an opportunity for those yet," he said.
In addition, Simmons also has plans to obtain an FCC license to construct two brand-new radio stations in northern Utah. A new Brigham City station at FM-100.7 on the dial and Oakley's first-ever station at FM-101.5 (Summit County) could all be on the air within the next year. Formats and call letters for those new stations are pending.
E-MAIL: lynn@desnews.com