NorthPine: Upper Midwest Broadcasting

Data Dump: Top Nebraska Radio Station Owners

After earlier listings of top radio group owners in Minnesota and Wisconsin, there’s a notable difference in Nebraska: only one of the top four group owners in the state is a commercial, for-profit company.

It seemed appropriate to tally the numbers after two of the state’s largest broadcasters, the Nebraska Rural Radio Association and Flood Communications, recently added stations.

The NRRA is the largest owner of commercial radio signals in the state when translators are included (Flood is larger if only full-power signals are counted). As a cooperative owned by Nebraska farmers and ranchers, the NRRA the only one of its kind in the nation.

But both NRRA and Flood are surpassed by non-commercial broadcaster My Bridge Radio when construction permits for new stations are included. (This list has been updated to reflect seven CP’s that were inadvertently excluded from the initial count.)

There are only eleven entities which own ten or more radio signals in the state (including translators). Of those eleven, six are for-profit companies.

FM full-powerFM translatorFM totalAMTotal
My Bridge Radio15*11*26*2*28
NRRA81220727
Flood**11*718725
State of Nebraska***17*522022
NRG Media10414620
Alpha Media729413
Armada Media639211
Eagle Radio729211
VSS (Spirit)9*211011
iHeartMedia628210
EMF6410010

*Includes construction permits for stations not yet on air and/or station purchases that have not yet been finalized
**Stations owned by Flood Communications LLC, Flood Communications West LLC, Flood Communications of Beatrice LLC, Flood Communications of Omaha LLC, Flood Communications Tri Cities LLC, Flood Broadcasting, and Red Beacon Communications LLC, collectively doing business as News Channel Nebraska. Includes the pending purchase of two full-power FM stations.
***18 stations or construction permits owned by the Nebraska Educational Telecommunications Commission and four stations owned by state universities/colleges

This listing has been updated to increase the number of full-power stations attributable to My Bridge Radio, when construction permits for new stations are included.

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