Radio and Advertising

I was driving to Milwaukee last Thursday when I got caught in traffic. The drive that usually takes me an hour and a half took over four hours! I only had one single CD in my car, and after listening to it on repeat for two hours, I decided to turn on the radio. That was a mistake. It was around five o'clock and every station I went to was playing commercials. So now I'm at a standstill on I-94 with nothing to listen to except commercials. I was not a happy camper, at all. My windows were all rolled down and the people stuck next to me were laughing as I called my sister to yell about my current situation. I definitely provided some entertainment for those around me. Anyway, back to the radio part. I turned it on and found commercial after commercial. It didn't matter what station I was on, there were commercials. Occasionally, as I flipped between stations, I would catch the last 20 seconds or so of a song and then it would be back to commercials. This got me thinking. Clearly, five o'clock is the prime time for commercials to air because many people are driving home, and are possibly stuck in traffic. However, are advertisers really reaching their audience? If the majority of drivers are like me, when they hear a commercial they'll flip stations. Others either have CDs playing or their iPods hooked up. When you're stuck in traffic, the last thing you want to hear are commercials. So while it might seem like five is a good time to reach mass amounts of people, I feel like advertising at this time doesn't really help at all. I was so mad that I kept hearing commercials that I began to hate the products being advertised. I love roller coasters, but after hearing the Six Flags commercial over and over, I never want to visit there ever again. I guess it goes both ways. Advertisers are able to spread the word about different products and such, but people will start to resent that product after they hear the same commercial five times within the hour. I can't be the only person that feels this way. Maybe if there were less annoying commercials at peak hours for radio listening, radio would still be as popular as it used to be. Although they need the advertisements to make money. It's kind of like a Catch-22. I think I'll just stick to CDs and my iPod because radio just isn't worth the frustration it causes me.