It’s been done before but always a hit. With schools heading back in the next few weeks everywhere, partner with your local police department to set up a clandestine radar trap at an elementary school in a hot zip code. Have the officer (or someone from the show who’s there), share speeds of cars passing through. All in an effort to remind people to go the speed limit around schools when they’re in session.
A challenge for almost everyone is remembering the names of people you just met. So, how about doing The Name Game with each cast member? Take three calls from listeners who’ll give a cast member their name and an interesting fact about themselves. The cast member must remember the names for 24 hours. The next day at the same time, have back on all three listeners who offered up the interesting fact to see if the cast member remembers their name. You can do this multiple times with everyone on the show to see who remembers names best. Hear audio of this idea here.
With summer vacation travel about to kick into high gear, airports will be quite busy. Let’s lean into a group of people who have stories. Tales from the TSA is where you get great travel stories from current and former TSA workers in your market. Solicit for them offline then record a bunch you can air through the month as everyone will be at the airport, looking to head out of town for some time off.
Who’s the most American of the people you work with? Test them all with questions immigrants are asked to become citizens. You can crown Most Patriotic of all you work with.
With the FIFA World Cup the biggest story in America for the next few weeks, choose a premiere match up every few days and learn how to say simple things in those languages on the show by inviting in someone fluent who can teach them to you.
Father’s Day is June 21. Gather dad jokes from listeners this week – set up a phone line where they can leave their name, city, and dad joke. Then, on your show this Friday, feature a listener with a dad joke every ten minutes. If you wanna cover 6:00-9:00am, you’ll need eighteen (with no recycling). Make it a theme this week to get them for a relevant Friday show.
With ten weeks to go before Labor Day (the traditional end of the summer), how about re-kindling romance with Ten Dates in Ten Weeks. Profile a different cool date locals could enjoy in your market. This one is sponsorable so, share the idea with the sales folks so they can win, too.
America’s 250th birthday will be a big topic in one month. To tap in, can you get 250 kids to read the Pledge of Allegiance or get 250 people to meet you at a public location to sing the National Anthem?
Many kids of your listeners will be graduating from high school over the next few weeks. And some of those kids will go on to higher education. Which costs a lot! Time for Scratch It for the Graduate. Talk with listeners whose kids are headed to college. Find out where and how much that costs. Then grab a $1 scratch off lottery card and give them all the winnings to defray the cost!
College and high school graduation season is upon us. Once you gather the dates for local graduations, do a recurring feature in those weeks called Gush on Your Grad where moms and dads come on to tell you about their kid who’s graduating! You’ll feel their pride (or relief!) and it’ll be very local, as the school will be named.