Briefly the locals. Highland is still the highest listened to local station reaching 65% of its franchise area, but still dropped 4% points year on year. Bolting into second this year, from forth, is Mid-West with an impressive 8% points increase. Equally impressive is the rise of Ocean FM who gained 9%. Galway bay and LM FM see the biggest declines Local  2011 2010 2009 11/10  11/09   Highland Radio  65 69 67 -4 -2 Mid West Radio  58 50 48 8 10 Radio Kerry  50 51 45 -1 5 Ocean FM  50 41 46 9 4 Limerick’s Live 95FM 

The local stations have varying penetration ranging from Highlands 67% to East Coasts 23%. But still in top spot is Highland with a fairly commanding lead.  The only real movements were KCLR up 7 points and ocean up 6. On the other side of that coin TippFM was down 6 points and LMFM down 5.    Station 2011 2010 +/- Highland Radio 67 69 -2 MWR 55 52 3 Shannonside 54 Radio Kerry 51 50 1 WLR FM 49 47 2 Ocean FM 49 43 6 Limericks Live 95 48 51 -3 Shannonside/Northern Sound 47 47 0 Clare FM 46

Dublin market whilst very crowded, it’s actually fairly static. In the list below there has only been two one changes in the order: 2FM down and Newstalk up.   2FM lost about a quarter of its listeners in the capital and is now firmly rooted, like Wolves last year,  to the bottom of the table. Actually, things are so bad at the station (and no offence is intended here) that they are only 37,000 listeners away from Lyric FM. The original populist station is fast approached by the specialist Lyric. Big gains for both Newstalk and FM104. Q102 will have

The latest JNLR figures hold no real surprise in some quarters. Radio listenership, whilst still particularly healthy with a 85% penetration, has dropped back a little on last year’s comparable figures. Radio 2011 2011 2010 2010 000 +/- Any Radio 2979 85% 3024 86% -45 Any National 1610 46% 1678 48% -68 Any RTE Radio 1228 35% 1299 37% -71 RTE1/2FM/Lyric 1208 34% 1290 37% -82 RTE Radio 1 873 25% 858 24% 15 RTE 2FM 404 11% 506 14% -102 RTE Lyric FM 107 3% 112 3% -5 Today FM 444 13% 477 14% -33 Newstalk 281 8% 260

In order to digest this you’d have to take this in two chunks. The first part we will deal with the ‘national stations’ and later we will deal with the ‘local stations’. As with most research/analysis – the numbers normally speak for themselves, as they do in this case. The comparison in this case is with the previous year – the exact twelve months – July to June in each year. I struggle to understand why the likes of the BCI and BAI, when issuing these results, will draw their comparisons to  a different survey period – but anyway, these

Looking at the local stations and the king pin is still Highland Radio, but it has fallen back year on year. Some of the station had a free run for years competing only against the National broadcaster. However most of the multi city stations have built up a significant listenership over the past few years. In the main most, of the local stations have fallen on the back of strengthening figures from the multi city franchises and you can see below. The biggest single fallers were Tipp FM, Midlands 103FM, Limerick Live and LM FM. The only stations to put

In the Capital, the radio waves are pretty crowded with twelve stations, not including any spill-over or community based stations. Radio reaches 85% of the capitals citizens or 837,000 people every day (average listened yesterday). The National Broadcaster dominates, reaching 38% of the population in some form or another. RTE1 reaches 30% (292,000) of the market, up 1% on the previous twelve months. Like its showing in the national market, 2FM struggled in the City as well, dropping to a 10% reach and, in comparison to previous books a paltry 92,000 listeners every day. Two years ago, in the 2009

Radio seems in a healthy state. It manages to captivate 85% of the population on an average weekday. That’s just over the 3m mark and only loosing 40,000 pairs of ears over the twelve month period to April 2010 to March 2011. But the results from the JNLR show that, for yet another quarter, 2FM have lost listeners in their droves. Over the year they have managed to rid themselves of nearly 100,000 listeners dropping from 521,000 to 428,000 and falling from a reach of 15% to 12%.   2011 2010 +/- +/-  Any Radio 3003 85% 3043 86% -40

The JNLR figures thump in the desks today and, on the surface it would seem that there is a small shift away from radio. National – Yesterday 2010 2010 2009 2009 2008 2008 2007 2007 2006 2006 % R % S % R % S % R % S % R % S % R % S Any Regional/Local 57 54 58 51 55 50 52 48 56 51 RTÉ Radio 1 25 23 26 23 24 22 23 22 24 21 RTÉ 2FM 13 8 15 10 16 12 17 13 18 13 RTÉ Lyric FM 3 2 3

In terms of the overall health of the listening market within the local franchises, that figure varies considerably across the counties. In the OceanFM franchise – Donegal South/Sligo/Nth Leit – the listened to any radio yesterday figure is 95% whereas in the East Coast FM area, Wicklow, that figure plummets to 79%. Many a thesis could be forwarded as to the difference in the listening base – but none to be found here. Of the 16 local stations, eleven saw a fall in their numbers. Tipp FM, Ocean FM, Midlands 103 all saw a 5% decline in numbers. Radio Kerry

Cork’s story is that it saw some of the biggest swings in the major franchises. The listened to yesterday for Cork was 81% down from 85% the previous 12 months (21,000 listeners). 2Fm, again, lost out as did 96FM which dropped a fairly substantial 4% points. The C103  gain in share helped the combined figure not look as stark a drop as it could have been. Having said that it’s still the station in Cork reaching 35% of the franchise on a daily basis followed by Radio 1 at 26%,  9% points ahead. Cork – Yesterday 2010 2009 +/- +/-

Turning the attentions to the Dublin area, the runners and riders are listed below, as is there form to date. Dublin – Yesterday 2010 2010 2009 2009 +/- +/- R% S% R% S% R% S% RTÉ Radio 1 29 30.5 30 32.8 -1.0 -2.3 RTÉ 2FM 10 7.0 12 8.3 -2.0 -1.3 RTÉ Lyric FM 5 3.2 5 2.9 0.0 0.3 Today FM 9 5.8 10 7.0 -1.0 -1.2 Newstalk 10 5.9 11 7.0 -1.0 -1.1 98FM 14 11.6 15 10.4 -1.0 1.2 FM104 20 11.2 20 10.7 0.0 0.5 Q102 13 11.1 13 8.6 0.0 2.5 Country 106.8/Sunshine 3

Looking at the National Listenership figures, one would think that RTE, as a whole, was having a torrid time dropping 39,000 in their combined listenership. But its only one station in the stable that’s making it look so bad – 2FM. Last quarter in 2011 it lost 60,000 listeners compared to the same quarter in 2010. Given that, in general, radio listenership has stayed the same year on year, it’s nothing to do with the market. At the bottom of this article are the listenership figures going back five years – all for the last quarter of each year.. Back

This is the place we can dole out a few Radio Oscars! The regional listenership is normally a fairly static affair, but this year it’s thrown up a few surprises – good ones as well. For this analysis, we decided to look both at their local reach in percentage terms and also in actual numbers. At a first look at numbers, they seem deceptive, just note that we are looking at different size populations in each franchise area. For example, the estimated universe for the Donegal North franchise is 98,000 of which Highland have a 67% reach or 65,000 sets

The last quarter of 2010 shows, like the first quarter, very little has changed to the capitals radio listening habits. They still, en masse, like Radio 1, they are still jettisoning 2FM in their droves and, if you’re not tuned into Radio 1, you have to be too young and are instead listening to FM104 [55% of FM104 listeners are aged between 15-24 compared to 13% in the case of Radio One]. FM104 is now firmly rooted into second place and is listened to by 21% (201,000) of the capital population but Radio 1 still manages a hefty 31% (298,000).

The JNLR for the period October 2009 to September 2010 has been released. Before we delve into the figures, these two facts should be considered. In many cases (even the official B.A.I. press release) comparisons are generally made between figures 12 months to the third quarter 2010 and the 12 months to the second quarter 2009. However, we advocate the much vaunted theory of “apples and oranges” and the fact that then cont be counted together. Therefore we analyse the figures 12 months to September 2010, strangely, to the comparable 12 month figures to September 2009, but that’s probably just

Evening loosing 2% points in Dublin, RTE 1 is still the dominant player in the market and by nearly 100,000 pairs of ears. FM104 is its nearest rival in the capital at a reach of 189,000 people followed by Spin at 140,000 how have vaulted a place to second over the past 12 months. But lurking in the background and doing very steady work is Q102. Currently in 5th position they have been grabbing listeners survey after survey. In the survey in 2007 the same station had a mere 96,000 listeners ‘yesterday’ – it’s not too shabby.          2FM and Newstalk

Turning our attention to the regional stations, some have had a better 12 months than others. Still the outright leader in this league table is Highland with a fairly formidable 69% reach. The three stations bordering capital are at the bottom of the table and it would be simply down to competition in the Greater Dublin area. Not only have the surrounding counties franchises have to contend with the competition from the nationals – but also from the six Dublin Franchises overspill. Tipp FM, Shannonside and LM FM all took a bit of a dip over the 12 months. Tipp

Local radio  is alive and well some better than others, but that’s down to a variety of factors. Still dominant (relative to it’s peers) is Highland Radio with a reach of 69% of its franchise area. On the other hand is Kfm who only 24% its franchise area. To be frank, it’s easy to see how that would happen in their situation with such a variety of radio sources available in Kildare – including ‘spill over from some of the Dublin Stations franchises. Over the three years the biggest fallers are Limerick’s live and KCLR. In the intervening period there

As we await the JNLR tomorrow, I heard an interesting conversation on the said medium. I was listening to the fact that Mr Yates is (allegedly) none to keen on the 3:30am awakenings so that he can present the morning show on Newstalk so is looking for a new slot (allegedly). The mantra in the radio business is: Win the morning – win the day. So I was curious as to how the morning pans out for the rest of the day for the national stations. I left it at the nationals, as the charts below looks complex enough without