What is now WSNX began life as Beautiful Music station WQWQ in 1971. Goodrich Radio Marketing purchased the frequency in 1984 and quickly changed the Beautiful Music format to Top 40 and used the moniker "Sunny-FM" on-air. Goodrich Radio located the studios at 875 E. Summit in Norton Shores, just outside Muskegon. The antenna was upgraded to get a city-grade signal into Grand Rapids. Sunny FM on-air personalities in the 1980s included Jim Biggins, J.J. Duling, Diamond Dave, Jo Jo Gerard, Mark Frost, Ranger Bob and T.R. McCoy. WSNX moved to Grand Rapids in 1996, where it was occupying the same offices of sister stationWODJOldies format and WKWMUrban AC. It would also drop the "Sunny FM" moniker and simply go by "104.5 WSNX". It was around this time that the CHR-formatted station added an apparent hip-hop or urban feel musically, as well as adding local music. During the late 1980s, WSNX was one of several competing CHR stations in the area, with the dominant WGRD and WKLQ. By the mid-1990s, WGRD had switched to alternative rock and WKLQ had long since switched to album-oriented rock, and the CHR battle was between WSNX and Federated Media's adult-leaning "Mix 96". In early 1997, Clear Channel purchased 96.1 from Federated Media and flipped it to "Continuous Hit Music I-96" as WVTI. Goodrich aimed WSNX directly at I-96, competing with them on the air and through promotions. The station identified itself as "Grand Rapids' Hottest Music, 104.5 WSNX" or just SNX in jingle form. WSNX moved again to downtown Grand Rapids after it was purchased by Clear Channel Radio in September 1999, and took the "Continuous Hit Music" moniker and a slightly more mainstream, though still rhythmic-leaning, CHR format, as I-96 was retooled as a Hot AC to compete with 95.7 W-Lite. In 2006, the station dropped the "Continuous Hit Music" slogan, and the point from "104.5" and the station simply branded itself as "104-5 WSNX", virtually the same time when contemporary hit radio rival WHTS was launched. In 2011, the station has started using the "West Michigan's Party Station" slogan, but this is not used on-air and only used on the station's website. WSNX was the first radio station in both the Grand Rapids and Muskegon markets to broadcast in HD Radio, as it does today. Its HD2 subchannel originally carried the Dance Top 40 "Club Phusion" format, but switched to urban in late 2009. The HD2 is a rebroadcast of Clear Channel's iHeartRadiomainstream urban format known as "The Beat."
Jingles and imaging
The late '90s saw WSNX use 3 jingle packages from Reelworld. KDWB 1996, KDWB 1997, and WZPL. In 2001, The station used N2 Kiss, Dallas. This started a long 10-year jingle deal that would see WSNX use every KDWB jingle package N2 Effect released. The deal ended in 2010, and WSNX has not used any jingles since. The station's imaging voices was Brian James until 1999, then Saint John until 2007, and now most recently Doctor Dave from 2007–present.
