Radio Stations
"Rock & Roll" burst onto American radio stations about the same time that portable radios took off and they fed each others growth. As more and more people heard rock and roll music, they wanted the convenience of a portable radio so they could listen to their favorite radio stations any time. And more portable radios meant more ears to hear the rock & roll played by radio stations. Parents to whom the first transistor radios had been marketed realized that the transistor radios they had purchased had another use. Instead of their children listening to their favorite rock & roll radio stations on the family radio, they could let the kids take the transistor radios into their rooms or outside to listen the their favorite radio stations elsewhere and get some peace and quite in their homes.
But American manufacturers were slow to notice this and that opened the door the Japanese manufacturers like Sony. Sony had a difficult time entering the American market and sent engineers to America to study transistor production. In a few years, the Japanese were making better transistors than Americans by taking what they learned and adding their own knowledge of electronics to produce better transistors that could be used to manufacture AM/FM portable radios which enabled listeners to hear their favorite radio stations. In 1954, the Japanese had produced their first transistor and by the end of the 1950s the Japanese were dominating the American market for transistor radios. Japanese manufacturers sold more than six million radios raking in over $60 million in profits by giving people what they wanted: the ability to listen to their favorite radio stations on the go. As demand soared, the Japanese continuously improved their technology making smaller transistors which in turn allowed them to manufacture and sell more and smaller transistor radios. Americans were gobbling up Japanese transistor radios as fast as they could be produced and using the listen to radio stations. The golden age or radio stations had arrived now that the majority of the country not only had a radio in the living room but also a portable radio which allowed them to listen to their favorite radio stations almost anywhere. American manufacturers continued to misjudge not only America's taste in music but also the direction of portable radios. They insisted that rock & roll would soon see its demise and that the demand for smaller transistor radios would soon run its course too. They continued to produce larger more cumbersome portable radios and they were dead wrong on all accounts. As the progression of portable radios and radio stations continued manufacturers began offering more styles and colors than the standard square black portable radios that had been offered previously and by the mid 1960s the price of portable transistor radios had dropped to $10. Portable radios and the radio stations the broadcast were here to stay. |