“American Idol” voters have often shown a preference for finalists from the south and midwest, and a detailed ratings breakdown from Tuesday’s season nine premiere reveals that markets from those regions remain quite dialed into the show.
According to a Media Week breakdown, “American Idol”‘s strongest performance Tuesday came from the St. Louis, Missouri market. Within that area, the show drew an estimated 25.9/36 household rating with a whopping 20.0/45 among adults 18-49. As was the case in many key markets, those numbers were up over last year’s premiere.
The next biggest interest level was in the Atlanta, Georgia market. There, the show posted a strong 25.1/35 household rating with an 18.2 in the coveted adults 18-49 demographic.
Other strong performances came from Columbus, Ohio, Kansas City, Missouri, the Raleigh-Durham region of North Carolina, Birmingham, Alabama and the Cleveland-Akron, Ohio area. Most fit the aforementioned regional trend.
Of course, it is not like the northeast opts not to watch the show. “Idol” posted a 20.2/29 household rating in New York City with a 12.3/28 in adults 18-49. Though the NY rating does not compare to that for some of the southern markets, the gross amount of viewers in that area greatly exceeds what the southern and heartland cities bring to the table.
Weaker markets for the show included Albuquerque-Santa Fe, New Mexico (9.1 HH), San Antonio, Texas (11.6), Houston, Texas (13.3 HH), Fort Myers-Naples, Florida (14.0 HH) and Las Vegas, Nevada (15 HH); this indicates that in addition to housing some of the best “Idol” markets, the south also contains some of the worst performers.
The show also did relatively soft numbers in most California markets.
Fox 2 News In The Morning in St. Louis pumps up this show like there’s no tomorrow!