Impact Radio Group has flipped Regional Mexican “100.7 La Poderosa” KPDA-FM Mountain Home/Boise to Country “100.7 The Bull” KQBL.
The move comes following Impact’s divestiture of 99.1 KINF Gooding to Lee Family Broadcasting, who flipped that station to Regional Mexican last month and closed today allowing Impact to begin operating its recently acquired “My 102.7” KPLD.
KQBL becomes the fourth Country outlet in the Boise market joining Cumulus’ “Kissin 92.3” KIZN and “Nash-FM 97.9” KQFC and Townquare Media’s “Wow Country 104.3” KAWO.
The Bull will be a little broader than its competitors featuring Country artists from the 80s through now including Tim McGraw, Garth Brooks, Kenny Chesney, George Strait, Alabama, Brad Paisley, Faith Hill, Alan Jackson, and Toby Keith. Impact previously ran a Country format branded “The Bull” on 96.1 KSRV-FM until 2007.
Listen to the launch of 100.7 The Bull on FormatChange.com.
Impact Radio Group – the only locally owned and operated cluster in the Boise market enhanced its cluster today with two significant and separate moves.
Regional Mexican “La Poderosa” has been retired in favor of “100.7 The Bull – Boise’s Best Country” – with the new call letters KQBL.
Impact CEO and Boise Market Manager Darrell Calton commented, “With the other operators in Boise running Country music programming from outside the market like Nashville and Cincinnati, Ohio, we felt the opportunity was ripe to launch ‘The Bull’ as a locally programmed Country station.”
“We’ve talked to listeners and advertisers inside the Boise market and they resoundingly said they wanted more than the same songs being played over and over by the corporately owned stations. They wanted a station they could support that is part of their community, and not being fed from an outside market. As a local company focused on local listeners, they’ve told us they want a variety of Country hits from the 80’s, 90’s, and 2000’s,” added Calton. “The research says they want Country to be Country”.
KQBL will focus on over 30 years of great Country music. Core artists include Tim McGraw, Garth Brooks, Kenny Chesney, George Strait, Alabama, Brad Paisley, Faith Hill, Alan Jackson, and Toby Keith just to name a few.
Calton concluded, “Country is a huge part of the music fabric here in Boise. Our advertisers were clear they were seeking a local company who actually supports the local economy that they could advertise with that played great Country music.”
In addition, Impact completed the sale of former News/Talk outlet KINF-FM (99.1) to Lee Family Broadcasting. KINF will move out of the Boise metro into Twin Falls.
Concurrently, Impact began an LMA of KZMG-FM (102.7) from JLD Broadcasting. The sale of KZMG-FM to Impact is expected to close within the next week. Impact is planning on retaining the Hot AC format of KZMG-FM.