HCGazette909 North Railroad StreetEagle River, WI 54521

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Volume 10 • Issue 2 • Second Quarter 2019

HCGazette

The HeartlandAshland/Ironwood/Wash-burn/Bayfield and Eagle

River/Minocqua/Rhinelander mar-kets combined increased their2019 Advantage Systems revenuesby 50% over 2018. Heartland hasengaged the services of Advantage

Systems since 2010, the year theCoursolle’s bought the company.

The total revenue in that 10 yearperiod is $2,419,245 with the an-nual revenue total increasing eachyear.

See Advantage, Page 5

Heartland closed onthe purchase ofhighly-rated

100,000 watt country “Coy-ote” WCYE and “TheTicket”sports-talk25,000 wattWHOH onFebruary 28,2019.  

About 24hours lateror at 2 pmthe follow-ing day,March 1,2019, Heartland CorporateProgram Director MikeWolf  “threw the switch” onthe Northwood’s “Mix 96”and the halls of Heartlandbegan jumping.  

Mix 96 was the brainchildof Wolf who even renamedand had the new station’sFCC call sign officiallychanged to WNWX, “TheNorthwood’s Mix 96.” 

According to Heartland

CEO Jim Coursolle, the allnew Mix 96 fills a void inlocal radio station program-ming.  “No area station wasserving the market with aTop 40 - Hot Adult Contem-porary format.  Mix 96 istargeting adults 18 to 34 and18 to 49 in age.  These arethe people raising youngfamilies with plenty ofneeds.  These are the listen-ers who buy more babyfood, kids clothing, SUVs

and vans, etc.” Coursollesaid this demographic issought after by our area mer-chants.  

Wolf added, “This formatwill also reach the younghigh school and college agepeople, many who workpart-time and have spend-able income.”  According toWolf, this demographic hasmore spendable income thanthey are given credit for. 

See Mix96, Page 5

Page 2 . . .Pres. Release

Page 3 . . .Ashland News

Page 4 . . .Eagle River News

Jim Coursolle, CRMCPresident and CEO

Wendi Ell, newsletter designer and publisher

In ThisIssue

“One of America’s Finest Small Market Radio Broadcasting Companies”

www.heartlandcomm.com

WhAt A Difference A DAy MAkeS

“Mix 96” coMeS Alive!

Advantage System Program a Major SuccessA 50% Increase 2019 vs. 2018

Mike WolfCorporate Program Director

Two special days that have comeand gone, and one ahead of us inJune cause me to remember.

Mother’s Day and Memorial Day 2019are past.  Each Mother’s Day always putsa smile on my faceand a little sadness inmy heart.  You mayfeel the same way.  Ismile now at a coupleof memories with myMom as the star.  I ama little sad I can’t livethese memories allover again.

One memory is ahuge wide-open yawnby my Mom capturedon an eight millimeterhome movie (remember those films) on aearly Christmas morning just after poorMom had been abruptly awoken by four orfive kids (can’t remember if my youngestsister had been born yet) to quickly cometo the living room to see Santa’s treasuretrove.   I am sure I took that film because Ithink I was the only Coursolle kid with aKodak Brownie 8 millimeter. I may have

gotten that movie camera for Christmasthat year and was excited and quick to tryit out?  

The other was my mother shouting atme in our garage to “put those hubcapsback on my car  before the tires fall off!”  Ihad just popped the hubcaps off of her carshortly after getting my driver’s license;and I also poked a few holes in her car’smuffler to make her ‘50 Buick sound likea hot rod. Anyone who knows anythingabout ‘50 Buicks knows they were notvery “cool” cars - quite to the contrary -definitely not hot rods!

We celebrate Father’s Day in June.From an early age, my father, a formerFBI agent and Navy Lt. Commander,taught all five Coursolle kids to respectour country and the military.  I rememberhow very handsome my Dad looked inpictures dressed in his Navy officer’s uni-form.  I also remember seeing pictures ofmy wife Diane’s Dad in his Army uniformand how proud I was to watch my father-in-law give the main speech at his townMemorial Day celebration for manyyears.  Neither my Dad or Diane’s Dadwere injured during WWII - thank God -but I am sure my Mom and mother-in-lawmade great sacrifices while their husbandswere away at war.  

There are so many lessons (memories) Ilearned from my Dad.  Some of the times Iremember most were meeting him down-town Minneapolis after work...having din-ner and then walking a few blocks to theMinneapolis Armory to see George Mikan,Whitey Scoog and the Minneapolis Lakers(later to move to Los Angeles) play BobCousy and the Boston Celtics. 

See Memories, Page 5

May

18th – Trevor (Ray) Semann – Ashland

24th – Bruce Marcus – Eagle River

26th – Deb Hunt – Eagle River

June

12th – Richard Feld – Ashland

July

22nd – Scott Larson – Eagle River

31st — Tammy Hollister – Ashland

HCGazette

Jim CoursollePresident, CEO

Management

John Warren ......................$40,021

Jeff Wagner ........................$13,542

Sales Reps

Trish Keeley ......................$25,299

Diane Byington ..................$23,379

Tammy Hollister..................$20,573

Scott Larson ......................$18,460

April Top Sellers

Pres. ReleasePage 2 Volume 10 • Issue 2 • Second Quarter 2019

Pres. ReleaseHCGazette

Birthday “Broadcasts”

2320 Ellis Avenue. P.O. Box 613, Ashland, Wisconsin 54806

By John Warren, General ManagerWBSZ/WNXR/WJJH/WATW

Our marketing work-shop was held theweek of March 11th

at the great Lakes Visitor Cen-ter just west of Ashland thisyear. Congratulation to TammyHolister, Shannon Andersonand Tyler Ostman on a success-ful event. Our attendance re-mained strong and our salesnumbers were up in 2019!Again, congratulations to theentire sales staff.

The Plans for Man CaveVI are underway. Thepromotion is starting on

June 14th with the drawing to beheld on Friday, August 9th.There’ll be over $20,000 inprizes given away this summerplus the Man Cave prize packagevalued at approximately $5,000.

Man Cave V prizes included65-inch 4 K Ultra HD TV fromNorthstar Electronics Ironwood,one year supply of pizza fromLittle Caesars Ashland, FlexSteel Herculies Big Mans re-cliner. round end table, framed

Green Bay Packers memorabiliamatted wood with glass framefrom Hitts Fine Furniture, oneyear supply of Trinko’s products,NFL score board, a full size out-door Badger and Green BayPackers flags along with someother goodies from Home Ex-pressions, a Ricarr Vacuum fromNorthwoods Vac & CleaningSupplies, a DeWalt 20-voltbrushless hammer drill and im-pact driver combo kit fromMcRae’s True Value Hardwareand its topped off with a yearsupply of Coors Light.

John WarrenAshland General Manager

www.wbszfm.com

www.wnxrfm.com

www.wjjhfm.com

Volume 10 • Issue 2 • Second Quarter 2019 Page 3

AshlandAshlandA very busy 1st and 2nd Quarter of 2019

On August 21st the 55 PlusHealth Expo will be held atthe Bay Area Civic Center

and the Bretting’s Center in Ashland.If you’re 55 years young or more,there’ll be a free lunch, free healthcare screenings, free bingo, freeseminars and music along with ap-proximately 60 booths with a varietyof vendors.

Man Cave V winner, with all the winnings, pictured L to R Dave Olson,Gina Sejbl, the winner, and Trevor Ray.

From the WNXRstudio, Q-ball

Alot ofthingsgoing on

just in the last threemonths or so onWNXR. The board has been ad-justed and working great. ThanksBonno. The Brewers started theirseason, and it would appear weare getting a new network. Thecomputers will arrive soon, thenwe have to do some learning. TheLRN system I think will be aneasier program to navigate. Wewould then be able to do our jobsmore efficiently. Thanks to MikeWolf, he has helped me out enor-mously in every aspect of pro-gramming.

From the J96 studio, Trevor Ray

It has been awild year! Finallycrossed the oneyear mark on theair on J96. Re-cently, I started theChequamegonBay Fishing Re-port which airsevery Tuesday morning. Localbait shop owner Scott Brettingcomes into the studio and we talkfishing for the whole hour. Withthe season finally starting to moveinto spring fishing, we have localguides lining up to be on air. Thegreat part of the program is weare able to record it and podcastit. The Chequamegon Bay Fish-ing Report is available to bedownloaded from wjjhfm.com,Apple iTunes, or from the GooglePlay Store.

See Studio, Page 5

Mike WolfCorporate Program Director

Jim CoursolleEagle River General Manager

www.wrjo.com

909 N. Railroad Street, P.O. Box 309, Eagle River, Wisconsin 54521

Page 4 Volume 10 • Issue 2 • Second Quarter 2019

PD Notes...By Mike Wolf, Corparate Program Director

So the work has begun and the wel-come wagon is about to roll on in.

The WRJO and WERL studios aregetting set to welcome in WCYE (Coy-ote 93-7) and WNWX (Mix 96) into theEagle River Broadcast Complex. It isquite an undertaking but the staff is upto the challenge.

Two new studios were constructedand added on, while the newsroom wasmoved to its new location.

Bruce Marcus is at home in his brandnew Heartland news studio. He’s alreadyconducting an in-dept interview, or talk-ing to his mother, either way his use ofadverbs and adjectives is definitelyaward-winning.

The Mix 96 studios counters, micsand board have been installed but thereis plenty more work to do. Wendy Fisheris just buttoning up the board installationand getting ready for a test. For somereason she keeps yelling, “Captain, weneed more power!”

Jeff Bonno, Heartland engineer, al-though buried in wiring, circuit boards,and electrical components, is definitelyup to the challenge and making shortwork of the tasks at hand.

See Construction, Page 5

Eagle RiverEagle River

Volume 10 • Issue 2 • Second Quarter 2019 Page 5

Mix96, from Page 1

Besides many of these people havingpart-time and summer jobs, anyone whohas a teenager or young adult in theirhousehold knows that parents also helpteens with their needs and wants. 

Jeff Wagner, who oversees Heartland ad-vertising sales for the Northwood’s Vaca-tion Triangle market (Minocqua - EagleRiver - Rhinelander) said, “We are de-lighted to be able to reach this vibrantyoung market with WNWX ‘Mix 96,’ a lo-cally-owned radio station.  It will be awhole new market for merchants to culti-vate.” 

Mix 96 offers 24 hours of Top 40 Hot ACmusic.  Beginning May 20, Brewer baseballbroadcasts will be switched from Mix 96 to94.5 WRJO, the iconic heritage full-serviceHeartland station. This will allow Mix 96to program music 24/7.

Advantage, from Page 1

According to Heartland CEO JimCoursolle, “The ASI programs havebeen terrific!” Coursolle said that notonly are revenues increased by the ASIprogram itself, but that there was aresidual benefit from the merchant sem-inar programs. The professionalism ofASI seminars given by ASI’s KeithFader has had lasting benefits through-out each year. Merchants have told us

how much they appreciate the informa-tion conveyed during the presentations.”

At the end of the final 2019 EagleRiver Advantage Systems’ merchantseminar, an Eagle River Heartland salesteam group picture was taken withEagle River sales leader Trish Keeleyholding a sign with the Eagle River goalof $200,000. Eagle River Sales Man-ager Jeff Wagner noted how importantgoal-setting is; the Eagle River team ac-complished $205,585 for 2019.

Memories, from Page 2

I remember the times Dad and Mom gotdressed up to go dancing with their Winter-set Dance Club or the times he came homein his Minneapolis Aquatennial (big TwinCities summer celebration) uniform.  

I am sure everyone reading this has simi-lar memories of growing up in their familyhome.  It’s really fun to look back on thepictures of the days living under my parent’sroof and also the later memories of Dianeand our little girls at home.  

All of us are making memories that willlast a lifetime right now.  We are doing it forour spouses, kids, grandkids and for our-selves.  The good news is that for the mostpart, we humans mostly remember the goodtimes.  The picincs, Christmases, trips to theDells, camping trips with campfire songsand S’Mores, Brewer games, whatever theyare. 

As we move into summer...make somememories that last a lifetime.  Burgers andfries and cherry pies...  as Charlie Pride usedto sing.  Take some pictures, but the indeliblepictures in your mind are the most vivid.   

We live in the amazing Wisconsin North-woods...200 to 300 foot pines, thousands oflakes, the sound of loons calling, boating,fishing, golf, hiking, camping; these —  withyou and your family on the set — are someof the ways we will all make lots of memo-ries this summer.  

Get ready... 2019 is going to be a terrificsummer filled with so many of your family’smost exciting memories!

Construction, from Page 4

Although if you listen carefully youcan hear a voice coming from thebasement that keeps asking, “where isthat dam beeping coming from?”

To get that signal beamed acrossthe Northwoods, it takes the steadyhand and nerves of steel of a towerclimber. Jason is ascending into thesky to start the process of aiming oneof our many STL dishes. I wonderhow far he will get up the tower be-fore he realizes his tools are still onthe ground?

So there is still quite a bit of workto do, but a great staff is on hand toget it all done. We will not be in-stalling any in-studio cameras to trackthe progress of the Heartland build,but building tours are given on a bi-daily, by appointment only basis from3:17am – 3:53am. There is a snackserved with the tour but you mustprovide your own beverage. Also, alltour takers will receive a commemo-rative piece of drywall from the con-struction to take home.

Check back in the next HCGazettefor updates.

Eagle River Sales Team (L to R) Scott Larson, Diane Byington, Jeff Wagner, Trish Keeley,Keith Fader, Jessica Svoke, Jim Coursolle.

Studio, from Page 3

The show has seen steady down-loads/listens since it debuted the weekof fishing opener and hopefully agood summer of fishing will increaseweekly downloads.

From the Z93 studio, Rick St. Nick

New kid here on the block at Heart-land’s Ashland cluster.

Moving here by way of Michigan’s

U.P., I didn’t thinkwinter could be anymore brutal. Boy, wasI ever wrong. Thegood news though, isthat I can build a de-cent snowman.

Still get a few but-terflies when I first crack the mic at6:01 in the morning. Could be nerv-ousness, or the fact that I take a laxa-tive, 30 minutes prior to show time.

Gotta run now, but thanks for invit-ing me into the Heartland family.