Counting Down To WRNR’s Relaunch
• Only five more shopping days until Steve Kingston & Kirk Litton‘s mighty WRNR/Annapolis, MD formally makes its triumphant July 4th return to the prestigious platform known as Frequency Modulation… with an assist from 810 WYRE/Annapolis, which Kingston famously programmed in the mid-’70s — and now owns… and translator W228ER at 93.5.
As we recently reported, there has been a major on-air void in the market since Kingston, who bought 103.1 WRNR in 1998, sold the 103.1 frequency to the Baltimore-based Peter & John Radio Fellowship for $1.54 million in early 2023, while retaining the station’s intellectual property. The format has been streaming online since 103.1 signed off terrestrially on Feb. 12, 2023. Kingston and partner Litton’s Cortana Media acquired WYRE in 2024.
As Kingston recently told RAMP, “This is a full-circle moment for me, as WRNR will again provide music, news and local information to Annapolis and the Chesapeake Bay region as we look forward to relaunching the station on our new home and super-serving the community on 93.5 FM, 810 AM and streaming at WRNR.com.”
A recent email from the WRNR sales department contains these three key promises to prospective advertising partners: 1) 93 Second commercial breaks (shorter breaks = more ears still tuned in); 2) Local Partners air first! (before national messages); 3) Category Exclusivity every commercial break (no competitors in same break). Over the weekend, Kingston told us, “We are now a wall of music, but will hold auditions for air talent soon!”
