Radio: Who Listens?

For a sponsor, Ethyl Gasoline, CBS statisticians last week prepared an analysis of U. S. radio listening, coast to coast:

> Of the 33,000,000 U. S. homes, 28,000,000 families own radios. Also in use are 6,500,000 auto radios, 10,500,000 extra sets. Total: 45,000,000.

> Eighty-three and one-half per cent of radio homes tune in daily, for an average 5.1 hours. Reckoned “family hours of listening” daily: 119,238,000.

> In each daily tuning home, an average of three members of the family hear the radio every day. Estimated total U. S. audience: 70,140,000.

>In 1939, some 750 U. S. radio stations broadcast an average of 16 hours daily. Tuning families paid a total daily electric bill of $290,000.

Last month the BBC Handbook for 1940 reached the U. S. Some statistics on British listening:

> Of the 9,000,000 licensed radio sets in Britain (license fee: 10 shillings), about 600,000 are in “A” homes (£10 a week income or more); 2,250,000 in “B”‘ homes (£4 to £10 weekly); 4,200,000 in “C” homes (£2 10s; to £4 weekly); some 2,000,000 in “D” homes (below £2 10s; a week). Average listeners per home: 3.67.

> In Britain, as in the U. S., the audience peak is at 8 p.m., with some 85% of listeners listening. In Britain, cradle of woman suffrage, father picks the programs most of the time.