Dublin listenership has slipped yet again and is now at a reach of 79% or 803,000 listeners. Actually the listenership in the capital has either been briefly static or in decline since the survey of 2011 Q1 which is eleven surveys back at this point. There’s very little to indicate the reason for the decline in Radio listenership in the capital and one can only speculate that other activities have taken the place of what was once solely “radio time”.
Inside that overall figure of 803,000 is the battle between thirteen stations all competing for ears on a daily basis. As with every survey there are winners and losers. Going on a year on year comparison this year is no different. There were falls for 104FM and 98FM dropping 26,000 and 24,000 respectively, Spin and Q102 also loosing 19,000 each as well (98FM is up on the previous survey unlike the other fallers just mentioned).
Newstalk managed a respectable increase of 8,000 and coupled with a drop in the fortunes of Spin FM this survey (146,000 to 127,000) it propels Newstalk into the third most listened to station in the capital. It may not seem much, but if you were selling, I’d rather be saying the fact thai I’m the third biggest as opposed to the forth biggest! (George Burns was being interviewed once and the host said to him ‘you’ll be 100 next year, who’d want to be 100?’. Burns turned to him and said ‘anyone who’s 99’)
The RTE stable did well in the capital this survey with 2FM gaining listeners for the fourth successive survey along with gains for RTE1 and Lyric.
| Station | 13 Q4 | 13 Q4 | 12 Q | 12 Q4 | +/- | +/- |
| ‘000 | % | ‘000 | % | ‘000 | % | |
| RTE Radio 1 | 286 | 28% | 274 | 27% | 12 | 1% |
| FM 104 | 196 | 19% | 222 | 22% | -26 | -3% |
| Newstalk | 128 | 13% | 120 | 12% | 8 | 1% |
| Spin 1038 | 127 | 13% | 146 | 14% | -19 | -1% |
| Q102 | 87 | 9% | 106 | 10% | -19 | -1% |
| 98FM | 85 | 8% | 109 | 11% | -24 | -3% |
| Today FM | 81 | 8% | 77 | 8% | 4 | 0% |
| RTE 2FM | 72 | 7% | 62 | 6% | 10 | 1% |
| RTE Lyric FM | 55 | 5% | 45 | 4% | 10 | 1% |
| Radio Nova 100FM | 50 | 5% | 44 | 4% | 6 | 1% |
| Sunshine 106.8 | 33 | 3% | 30 | 3% | 3 | 0% |
| Classic Hits 4FM | 31 | 3% | 24 | 2% | 7 | 1% |
| Phantom 105.2FM | 15 | 1% | 16 | 2% | -1 | -1% |
These figures can sometimes be nearly misleading unless you see a station’s performance over time. In the tables below are the reach statistics for Dublin which show you each survey since 2009Q1. It’s here you get a better picture of a station’s progress.
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Market Shares
| Station | 13_4 | 12_4 | +/- |
| RTE Radio 1 | 34.80% | 32.50% | 2.30% |
| FM104 | 12.10% | 14.20% | -2.10% |
| Newstalk | 9.00% | 7.40% | 1.60% |
| Spin 1038 | 6.90% | 8.00% | -1.10% |
| Q102 | 6.70% | 9.30% | -2.60% |
| Today FM | 6.20% | 6.10% | 0.10% |
| RTE 2FM | 5.40% | 4.80% | 0.60% |
| 98FM | 5.30% | 7.30% | -2.00% |
| Radio Nova 100FM | 4.20% | 2.70% | 1.50% |
| RTE Lyric FM | 2.80% | 2.40% | 0.40% |
| Classic Hits 4FM | 2.60% | 1.30% | 1.30% |
| Sunshine 106.8 | 2.50% | 2.40% | 0.10% |
| Phantom 105.2FM | 0.80% | 0.90% | -0.10% |
| Other Region/ | 0.40% | 0.40% | 0.00% |
If you look at the national picture, shares are all but static, not just in this survey by in most of them. There’s never really any major deviation in the National Shares. But with Dublin listenership the shares do swing over surveys.
Eight stations gained share at the expense of the six stations loosing share. RTE1 and Newstalk were the biggest winners gaining 2.3% and 1.6% respectively. At the other end of the scale Q102, FM104 and 98FM all lost more than two percentage points each. It’s apparent from this survey, and previous ones, that the stations trying to attract the youth audience are struggling in their endeavours.
I try to avoid the demographics in these surveys as they can be massively time consuming. But it’s worth looking at the age profile of a typical radio listener in the capital, now compared to 2010. It becomes patently obvious that the earlier age groups are tuning in less and less with each survey. I saw a fully branded Luas over the festivities – the sponsor was Spotify. Table below shows the ‘listened yesterday’ figures broken down by age from 2013 compared to 2010.
| Age | 000 | % | 000 | % | +/- | +/- | |
| 2013 | 2013 | 2010 | 2010 | ||||
| 15-19 | 49 | 72% | 61 | 90% | -12 | -20% | |
| 20-24 | 58 | 75% | 71 | 88% | -13 | -18% | |
| 25-34 | 186 | 76% | 216 | 87% | -30 | -14% | |
| 35-44 | 158 | 78% | 145 | 82% | 13 | 9% | |
| 45-54 | 131 | 84% | 128 | 88% | 3 | 2% | |
| 55-64 | 99 | 82% | 94 | 83% | 5 | 5% | |
| 65+ | 124 | 84% | 111 | 85% | 13 | 12% | |
| 18+ | 772 | 80% | 788 | 85% | -16 | -2% | |
| 15-24 | 106 | 74% | 132 | 89% | -26 | -20% | |
| 15-34 | 292 | 75% | 348 | 87% | -56 | -16% | |
| 35+ | 511 | 82% | 478 | 84% | 33 | 7% | |
| 20-44 | 401 | 77% | 432 | 85% | -31 | -7% | |
| 45+ | 354 | 83% | 333 | 85% | 21 | 6% |
Quarter Hours
A very quick look at the listening landscape in Dublin across the day. The graphs are too busy for one pass so the stations are divided into three graphs, overall, first six, next five (in the final two RTE1 is removed so as not to dominate the graph – my excuse and hat-tip at the same time!).
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Just to overload the senses! It’s the Dublin stations, quarter hours, year on year. When you’re cycling through the tabs just remember that the red line is the current survey and the blue last years.
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