Newest tech not always popular choice with consumers

Got in the car the other day and flipped on the radio. Basic, over the airwaves radio — not satellite or streaming. Didn’t Bluetooth my iPhone to play Apple Music.

I did the same thing a few weeks ago with a friend in the car. He said, “Wow, I didn’t know anyone still listened to regular radio.” I didn’t know everyone stopped.

I’m usually being behind the times

— a late adopter. No waiting in line for iPhone15 for me. I let Sirius radio expire after my three-month trial when I bought my car in 2016.

But even I was surprised the other morning when I heard the announcer tell us to get ready for the all-request lunch break coming up at noon. Wait. What? They still do this? People call the radio station and ask for a song to be played, then wait for hours hoping to hear it. Sure enough, it’s true.

“This one is going out to Lou in Slatington. Here’s Def Leppard’s Pour Some Sugar on Me.”

Now that’s commitment. No instant gratification. No CDs, downloads, YouTubes, Spotify or iTunes. Just a strong desire at 9 a.m. to hear some quality ‘80s hair metal and to hope it happens sometime between noon and 1 p.m.

I found myself wondering about Lou. Did he get to hear his request? I hoped so. I was rooting for him. What if he went to the bathroom when they played it? Terribly unjust. Why is this Lou’s means of hearing a song in 2024? Lots of free time. No internet, or smart phone.

Why that song? Not a bad song but an unlikely I-finally-got-through-to-the all-request lunch break hotline choice.

“Take a bottle, shake it up. Break the bubble, break it up. Pour some sugar on me, in the name of love. Pour some sugar on me.”

My conclusion is that Lou from Slatington is a proud Old School guy, committed to hearing the music of his era in the means of his era. He’s anchored in a past that brings him comfort and understanding.

Every era has these guys. Today’s explosion of technological advancement just makes them stand out more.

When I was a kid in the ‘60s and ‘70s I remember the guys with the greaser hairstyles combed into a ducktail in the back. To me, it looked both odd and a little scary. It was clear, however, that they still felt cool, unlike the dads in Bermudas wearing white socks and black loafers. They just seemed unaware, much like the guys of today in roomy dad jeans or ‘80s style denim shorts, now just called “jorts” in the pejorative.

I prefer to see Lou and his buddies — and the dad jeans, the jorts, and the radio-listening and song-requesting as their rage against the machine. It’s their wrench in the power loom, their Luddite rebellion.

In a world of constant change, and upgrades and deep fakes and artificial intelligence, flipping on the same radio station you listened to in high school — hearing your name mentioned as the song plays that you blasted in your GTO after graduation — is like an anchor in a storm.

Change is both fun and unsettling. Business celebrates disrupters while most us of just long for less disruption. We search for calmer waters in the familiar. That’s why people still shop at stores.

Yes, e-commerce has grown and those packages on the doorstep are exciting and convenient, but the reality is that only 16% of all retail sales in the U.S. happen online. That means 84% of retail purchases still occur in bricks and mortar stores.

It would be understandable if someone thought the opposite. The most recent industry outlook for online sales has been adjusted downward from earlier projections. Not until 2027 are online sales expected to reach 20% of total U.S. retail.

In the Lehigh Valley, while employment has exploded in e-commerce fulfillment centers and at third-party logistics firms of national retailers, job totals in traditional retail have held steady the last five years. The region has benefited on both sides of the retail employment equation.

Traditional retail employs about 34,000 people in the Lehigh Valley. That is more jobs than in e-commerce, where a specific job count is hard to extract from the overall distribution and industrial job numbers that exceed 40,000 in the Lehigh Valley.

Unexpectedly, perhaps, jobs in the bricks and mortar retail sector are growing. Retail sales positions were the most advertised jobs in the region last quarter, according to Workforce Board Lehigh Valley, outpacing openings for

nurses and health care workers.

It turns out that people still like going to stores — and still listen to the radio. There’s something about holding on to the experiences of the past in a world of change. It slows things down just a little.

While I’ve never called the radio station to request a favorite song, I did spend hours as a kid sitting next to my parents’ big wooden piece of furniture that contained a radio and record player.

Against the speaker, I’d press a cheap cassette tape recorder — waiting to hit the play and record buttons at just the right time — to capture a low audio version of the AM radio hits of the ’70s. It was a thrill when you got it right.

Maybe that’s how it feels when you hear your name and song on the all-request lunch hour. I think I’ll join Lou this week.

“Here’s one going out to Don from Bethlehem.”

“Pour some sugar on me, come on fire me up …”