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BBC’s radio brands start to crackle

Posted in Media, Oliver Milman, Latest reporters' blogs October 26th, 2007 by Oliver Milman

With morale sunk by an impending job cull, BBC radio staff would’ve been hoping for yesterday’s listener figures to provide some cheer. However, the now-routine spanking of the commercial sector didn’t materialise.

All of the major BBC radio stations suffered audience dips in the third quarter, with Five Live crumpling to a seven-year low. Yes, British sport was pretty patchy during the summer, but was it that grim?

Even the seemingly unstoppable Chris Moyles (pictured) appears to have stalled, losing nearly 300,000 listeners from his Radio 1 breakfast show.

How is this possible? Moyles’ stubble-strewn face seems to greet me wherever I look these days. The other night, I had to sit through a premature Christmas TV ad for Woolworths with Moyles providing the voiceover.

His gurning mug then appeared, splashed across a DVD of his witticisms. He was effectively using a high street retailer to promote himself on national TV. And yet he’s lost listeners. Maybe listeners are falling out of love with Moyles’ unique brand of hilarity?

Even Terry Wogan saw people desert his breakfast show. The BBC blathered that these losses were seasonal. Another explanation is that Radio 1 and Radio 2, which command 25 per cent of all wireless listening between them, have hit something of a glass ceiling.

There are only so many people out there who want to listen to Moyles, Wogan et al on a regular basis. Once you’ve captured them all, there’s only one way your audience is going to go, and that’s southwards.

No amount of guitar noodling by Russell Brand on BBC ‘ads’ appears to help. The corporation has become a victim of its own success, and will have to try and prop up its audience with a slashed budget and a smaller news team, which drives the content of key stations such as Five Live and Radio 4.

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