VA Radio: LMA Gives Colonial Operation Of N/T WINC-AM

Under new management, the Northern Shenandoah Valley’s oldest radio station has a new name but is keeping its longtime news/talk format.

Colonial Radio Group of Williamsport LLC has began operating Winchester's News/Talk  WINC 1400 AM, said Allen Shaw, president and CEO of outgoing owner Centennial Broadcasting II.

The station now is operating with the call letters WZFC. Within a few days, Colonial and Centennial will submit a license transfer application to the Federal Communications Commission, Shaw said. If the transfer is approved, Colonial will buy the station from Centennial for $25,000, he said.

Centennial, based in North Carolina, previously announced plans to sell its two other area stations, WINC 105.5 FM, licensed to Berryville, and WZFC 104.9 FM (now WKDV-FM), licensed to Strasburg, to Metro Radio of Fairfax. That sale was completed last week, Shaw said. In a previous interview, he said Centennial decided to sell the stations because “we’re a very small company” and “it’s a challenge for us” financially to continue to own and operate them.

AM 1400 wasn’t able to keep the WINC call letters under the LMA terms of the arrangement between Centennial and Colonial.

In a prepared statement, Kelly Koonce, chief operations officer for Metro Radio, said the company plans to retain WINC-FM’s hot adult contemporary format, which emphasizes pop music from the 1990s through today.

The expected $25,000 sale price of the AM station isn’t a lot of money in today’s business world. But it’s hard to operate an AM station nowadays, reports The Winchester Star.

“Many AM radio stations are not able to make enough money” to make buying them worthwhile, Shaw said.

Centennial offered WINC-AM to Metro free of charge, but Metro didn’t want it, he said.

WINC-AM celebrated its 80th anniversary on June 26. Having been founded by the Lewis family, the station was bought by Centennial in 2007.

WINC-AM’s tower on the property will be taken down at some point, Shaw said.  Colonial is in talks with another area radio station about sharing its transmission facilities, Bartley said.