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LIKE MANY MARKETS ACROSS THE COUNTRY, GRAND RAPIDS-KALAMAZOO-BATTLE Creek, Mich., the U.S.' 38th-largest with 713,800 television households, is witnessing a boom in its Hispanic population, whose growing numbers are starting to have a direct impact on local media. In this market, the growth of the Hispanic population has been fueled by the region's strong agricultural roots. The local farming industry has attracted large numbers of migrant workers, mostly from Mexico, many of whom have taken up permanent residence. Of the approximately 300,000 Hispanics in Michigan, roughly 100,000 live in the Grand Rapids area in the southwestern part of the state.
"In 10 years, that number is going to grow by a large margin, " says Diane Kniowski, president and general manager of three LIN Broadcasting-owned stations in the market: NBC affiliate WOOD, ABC affiliate WOTV and UPN affiliate WXSP. Lin also oversees ad sales for Paxson's WZPX.
According to Scarborough Research, 4 percent of the market's population is Hispanic (another 6 percent is African American). In the core counties of Kent and fastgrowing Ottawa, Hispanics account for as much as 11 percent of the population. Ottawa County is in an affluent area along the shores of Lake Michigan. As a way of trying to reach this growing segment, WOOD last February started offering live Spanish translations of its 6 p.m. news, including sports and weather, on a separate audio program channel.
And in a market already overcrowded with Talk radio outlets, Covington, Ky.-based Regent Communications recently flipped WNWZ-AM, its News/Talk outlet in Grand Rapids, to Spanish. The Spanish-speaking population "is a significant listening base that had not really been targeted by the major broadcasters," says Phil Catlett, Regent market vp/gm. WNWZ had been broadcasting all in Spanish on the weekends for the past two years. "It was successful enough that we decided to spread it through the whole week," Catlett adds.
Privately owned WYGR-AM had been the market's only Spanish-language station. WYGR does some block programming on which it plays music targeting other ethnic groups.
Grand Rapids remains one of only two top-50 markets that Nielsen Media Research still has not converted to meters, leaving TV stations to rely on diary measurement.
Ed Fernandez, vp/gm of Tribune Co.'s Fox affiliate WXMI, says his station thus...