"Mannequins Killed the Radio Star"

Radio in Britain has never before changed so swiftly as it has in the last 2 weeks. Between them Global Radio and the BBC are either turning what was once a great entertainment industry into an 'advert machine' without professional dj's, or making changes to 'balance gender' and be politically correct. 


All this goes on with very few comments from radio 'professionals', but in the case of Global's stations there is a torrent of listener voices... At Smooth and Gold out go iconic radio dj's Simon Bates, Kid Jensen, Pat Sharp, Lynn Parsons, Carlos and others, and at 'Gold' all but one of the dj's are 'let go' as it is to run continuous music (and ads) twenty hours a day! 

At Smooth, in come 3 women who have basically worked in television but who are now being marketed as 'dj's. Foolishly BBC Radio 2 started this 'fashion'/ personality led trend, and others follow, even though they don't have the BBC-sized budget to get real personalities. 

The image used for the first 'cat walk' of the new 'Smooth ladies' resembles shop window mannequins, with no allusion whatsoever to the fact they play music! With just a little cartoonizing the image suggests 'Barbie broadcasters' ... 

BBC Radio 1 also had an 'all mannequin' weekend.. err sorry 'all female' weekend. There was a succession of rather vacuous Barbie broadcasters most of whom the listeners are unfamiliar with as they are usually confined to times of day (or night) more suiting their skills. There is more about this below.

This mis-balance towards women on radio did not cause a 'butterfly effect' in another part of the (radio) universe with a Somerset levels size inundation of male dj's. Indeed the opposite is happening. 

'Globally', the industry lost a pile of experienced males dj's when the station called 'Gold' announced that weekdays it would soon only have only ONE dj (on its breakfast show) and all the other (male) presenters were leaving! Within minutes listeners were very vocal in an almost universal (Global?) negative response to the changes. 

Hundreds of negative comments were posted on the Facebook page of first Smooth, and then 'Gold'; internet petitions started, and comments raged in many Facebook pages. What was surprising about this was that the listeners clearly felt it was THEIR station being ruined, the type of allegiance to a station we thought had died years ago.....

....clearly it lives on in the over-45s!

As well as short sharp comments there was clear focus in many, such as these about 'Gold'.

Sue Potter

We your listeners don't seem to have any say in what we want regardless to the amount of emails sent.The DJs that have become our friends over the years have done us proud,but more they have done Gold proud and you have treated them disgustingly.Shame on you.

Peter Whittaker

Like many other listeners to this great station,we cant believe that you are getting rid of 4 presenters...Disgusted isn't the word...non-stop music may work after midnight...But during the day.Well sorry to tell you.Many of your listeners will jump ship,go back to hearing mundane rubbish that's classed as music these days...Well,sorry to tell you,I`m one of them.RIP GOLD as we know it was...

John Donaldson

Our German friends have always said there are two problems in England,class distinction and bad management.Here we have,from Global,a typical case of BAD management.They have a highly successful and very popular radio station,so decide to put it beyond the reach of most of it's loyal listeners,to encourage us to listen to Smooth.That's not encouragement,that's denying us choice.Shame on you Global for all this crap

And typical of the comments posted on the Smooth Facebook page:

Lynn Travis

Why are we suddenly being inundated with BBC rejects ??? Where are all my favourite presenters gone to - Dave Lincoln, Andy Peebles, Dave Brown ????? Also when Smooth began you would very rarely hear songs repeated but now you can hear the same song in every show  The original pleasure is going going gone

Eventually such was the venomosity towards tv presenter Kate Garraway (who replaced dj Lynn Parsons) that after Monday they stopped posting a daily 'topic' for Garraway to prevent more comments. 

Even 'soap' actress Tina Hobley who had arrived in a swathe of "from Coronation Street" publicity, received such negativity they do not post a Facebook plug for her Sunday show now. This is perhaps because anyone asking for a request during it is informed by other Facebook users that it is all 'recorded'. 

Radio listeners are now 'savvy' to ALL this...

Such is the strength of feeling that actual listeners (as opposed to radio anoraks or blog authors) have even found the obscure 'business' Facebook page for Global and it has had an endless stream of comments and petitions about taking off the dj's from Gold, such as:

Donna Milton

Disgusted with you Global  well and truly, How can you treat your loyal staff this way?? All they have ever done is keep your Gold radio going and making it better as the years have past!!! How can you sleep at night, knowing you are disrupting families live's ??? You should hang your heads in shame!!! Oh and while i'm at it, you will slowly lose your Gold radio station because you need listeners don't you?? to keep a station going...................Well bye bye Gold because these changes you have taken upon yourselves is putting Gold into it grave!!!! It's gonna go down

With the hundreds of comments posted on Facebook they can afford to cancel their next few 'focus groups' !?

Of course what is ironic is that both Smooth and 'Gold' are managed by 'suits' some of whom have decades of radio experience and are members of the 'Radio Academy'. Yet members of the (so-called) academy, and nearly everyone else, turn a 'blind ear' to the ELEPHANT in the room. 

The fact is that 70% of national British commercial radio is now controlled by the programming theories and whims of very few people whose primary criteria is profit and loss, NOT what their listeners want. It's a similar scenario to the 'London v. Britain' banking situation.

Will we ever see the 'Academy' doing what any open organisation would and have a meeting with a debate between 3 of the 'Barbie broadcasters' and 3 of the redundant dj's? 

I doubt it... So those in the industry (and the many now out of work) have to just keep quiet..... and hope it might change.

It won't ~ dissent by silence has never worked. 

Sadly things are just as bad within the BBC.

Under ever-increasing pressure from groups such as 'Sound Women' their 'all female' weekend on Radio One ran for over 2 days.  Few had much to say.  

Sarah-Jane Crawford 'bellowed': "No sausage fest out here tonight... it's all about the xx chromosome. Hehehe" * 

Jameela Jamil : "I want to eat bacon off Jason Derulo's stomach"

Hardly liberating? And I do hope 'Lord' Tony Hall (who has pushed for 50% females on BBC Local Radio breakfast shows by this Autumn) loves this. And of course the male dj's were still being paid to take the weekend off.

But looking at the graphic below suggests that despite its attempt to be politically correct and 'gender balance' its radio stations, all the BBC has done is divide women into 2 types. Even though it IS radio, not tv, it's clear what a key criteria is for being on Radio 1 (I say 'being' it's hardly work) ....

Worryingly, the invasion of newly-trained women (or those already there being pushed up the ladder) on BBC Local radio is costing the licence payer even more as they cannot sack the male presenters (some are moved to sport or news). And the almost inevitable 'maternity leave' means the BBC will also have to financially cover more of this - and presumably pay some of the cast-aside male presenters to do the shows? 

The BBC seems to ignore the fact that radio is inevitably a 'career' and building a following is an on-going job. If the broadcaster has  2 or 3 'maternity leaves' in just a few years the listener soon forgets about them.

In 2014 the new 'broadcast barbies' and 'BBC Local Radio women' will increase in number, and Radio 1 will start planning their next 'all women' day. And sadly, in an industry that has lost all its imagination, by 2015 a crop of 'women's days' will doubtless appear all over British radio?  The 'baby elephant' in the room, will growandgrow, whilst the 'suits' will let perfectly good professional dj's and presenters 'wither on the vine'.

Of course, unlike the BBC, Global can perhaps be partly forgiven for this cavalcade of changes as their radio output is partly linked to their financial income.  Lord Allen, the Global Radio 'chairman' (as the Independent's journalist Chris Blackhurst calls him) wisely points out** that:

"BBC Radio 1, 2 and 3 have a combined content budget of £123.6m

 ...and Capital, which is up against Radio 1

...Heart, which is against Radio 2,

...and Classic, which takes on Radio 3....

... have a combined content budget of £19m"

With £104.6 million MORE... the BBC has no such excuse......

The British Radio Industry is losing many of the very talented people who have been the fabric of radio for the last 10, 20 even 30 years, and no one seems to be defending them!  This is why I was surprised by a recent blog*** by 'guru' David Lloyd. 

To sum it up he argued at length that radio is 'better' now. I find it surprising that the man who created the popular 'radio moments' truly believes this. He concluded:

"I have a feeling that the restructuring of radio is now approaching completion; and the medium is finding its place in a different world.  Different sorts of people will be involved.  Radio can be a curated background blend of your favourite songs, or it can create a ripple of dialogue which can continue in many places, not just on the air.  Another golden age of radio is beginning."


If by "different sorts of people will be involved" ....he meant more women, he's right


If  "radio can be a curated background blend of your favourite songs" meant no dj's for 20 hours a day, he's right


If  "a ripple of dialogue which can continue in many places" referred to London's LBC dressing itself up (mannequin style) as a national talk station, he's right


But as regards "Another golden age of radio is beginning", sorry David,  tv presenters, and women with just a few months hurried training (be it by the BBC or a commercial group) will NOT make another 'golden age of radio'. 

THE 'golden age' of radio in the UK was created by people who had natural talent, who loved music, loved radio, and had the voice and personality to share their 'radio selves' with the audience. Because of that the audience loved them, and 'stuck' with them. 

I firmly believe that the gift of being a great broadcaster is a natural one. You cannot teach more women to paint pictures just because you want more female artists ~ you'll end up with some very average paintings ~ and I'm sure we ALL know good radio is about 'pictures in the mind'.

With its huge budget the BBC can afford to do exactly what pressure groups dictate, and it seems the currently prevalent forces in commercial radio will blatantly copy it, though on (relatively) tiny budgets...  

"Mannequins HAVE Killed the Radio Star"

* http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/tv/features/the-week-in-radio-women-rule-the-airwaves-for-international-womens-day--but-men-still-call-the-tune-9188232.html

** http://www.independent.co.uk/news/people/profiles/lord-allen-putting-an-obsessive-attitude-to-work--and-making-it-pay-9195868.html

*** http://davidlloyd-radio.blogspot.co.uk/2014/02/were-old-days-better.html

Dear BBC - I'm typing as fast as I can....

I was going to call this blog "DouBBCle Standards" when I started it yesterday, but the BBC faux pas are coming at us so fast I've had to re-name it and ..... type as fast as I can to get it on today! 

Firstly, I ask "How MANY  acts of (alleged) bullying does it take for the BBC to act on them?"

‘Thirty’ ... or ‘Several’ ??

“THIRTY”

(The Independent 24 January 2014)

Rod McKenzie: “complaints by more than THIRTY current and former members of staff. A dossier of statements from 17 serving and former members of the BBC’s Newsbeat, describes a “climate of paranoia and fear” in which they worked under an editor who has been moved following a year-long inquiry into bullying and harassment across the BBC.Rod McKenzie has been given a final written warning and moved to another role outside of the BBC network news following complaints by more than THIRTY current and former members of staff. 

Throughout the disciplinary process Mr McKenzie has disputed the claims against him, and has since pointed out that some of the claims were not upheld. Statements seen by this newspaper detail alarming levels of distress experienced by young BBC journalists who are required to produce news for Radio 1 and 1Xtra’s audience of 16-29 year old listeners.”

“SEVERAL”

BBC News website 5 March 2014

Mark Lawson:  BBC arts presenter “is to leave Radio 4's ‘Front Row’ after 16 years, it has been announced. ‘For personal reasons I shall be taking a break from live daily radio journalism’ he said in a statement.  The broadcaster's departure follows allegations of bullying among SEVERAL staff in the BBC Radio Arts Unit.” 

I know nothing more than is stated/alleged, but I do wonder how many MORE than THIRTY it might take for the BBC to actually SACK someone? I also wonder if Mark Lawson is maybe 'ticked-off' that he only had 'several' but is treated this way?

But all of this pales into insignificance compared to that heard on BBC Coventry & Warwickshire, as aptly recorded and visualised on YouTube:

http://youtu.be/vMWDyF4V4YE

Anyone who has actually worked in radio might find the official BBC statement rather too 'fantastic' to believe.

"There was a technical mistake where sound effects being prepared in another studio for an unrelated item were accidentally broadcast over the news bulletin"

Given that sound fx have not been broadcast over their news in living memory, do they truly think anyone believes this given that the fx matched perfectly the dialogue of the Pistorius story? Of course I'm sure no one thinks it was rowdy young journalists larking around in the next studio as the bulletin went out, not realising it had an 'open mic'?

If the sound fx were being made for an 'unrelated item' the BBC would have said what it WAS for? Unless they work a VERY long way ahead for making sound fx for Halloween.... I have no idea what 'unrelated item' they would fit...

So, BBC Coventry /Warwickshire, is it for Halloween?

Of course there is the fact that now rather than being one of the worst-performing BBC Local stations, at least people know it exists.  Now where was it as regards 'average hours per listener' in the official Rajar audience figures in September 2013? 

You find it!

Sorry, that was naughty; BBC Coventry /Warwickshire had just 8.6 hours so did not even get into the 'top 20', and an equally poor 15% weekly reach. 

This leads me to ask WHY the BBC continue with very brittle, speech-led local breakfast programming when it clearly does not work in many areas? 

There is also the factor that 'Lord' Tony, the BBC DG wants '50% female co-presenters on BBC local radio breakfast shows by this autumn', as widely reported last year. At a time the BBC needs severe financial stringency they are responding to feminist pressure groups and promoting inexperienced  or newly trained (in a hurry) staff onto what should be their main show of the day. 

(In MY 40 years radio experience

 good broadcasters are never 'trained' they are born...)

All the above is purely to be SEEN to be politically correct to the feminists!

The only glimmer of hope in this awful management/ politically correct mess is that the BBC Local stations are showing some signs of change by employing REAL broadcasters such as James Whale on BBC Essex. With 40 years experience, he cut his 'radio teeth' in the north-east for decades and was also very successful on London's LBC. Similarly, ex-commercial radio dj's are used on weekends or late nights on some stations. But they would be far better (mature) candidates for the breakfast shows, or the afternoon show on BBC Coventry /Warwickshire!

Instead, BBC Local radio blunders on blindly with 'university type' staff, several decades younger and out of touch with their ageing audience, playing music often issued before they went to school.

SOLUTION: just close down the FIVE least successful BBC Local radio stations, and put the next lowest 5 'on notice'. It will save building rental, reduce pension and wage costs.

And of course, get some MATURE presenters and journalists.

If I can't convince the BBC, just dig out the report John Myers did on BBC Local radio. You paid for it, so READ it !
__________________

Postscript: I was delighted when 2 hours after I posted this it was 'favourited' on Twitter by BBC Radio 2's Jeremy Vine, and I had a supportive email from a BBC Local Radio editor - thank you.

Radio Pancake

I just had memories come flooding back of Pancake Day 33 years ago at Radio Trent in Nottingham. 

Our librarian Jane Morrell and the engineer's secretary Alyson Brown would go into the 'Trent kitchen' about 10.30am, and start to prepare real pancakes for everyone! 

At that time Radio Trent had about 55 staff so this was a big job, and they'd serve from mid-day. 

It became a tradition that first pancakes went to our MD Ron Coles, and then I'd dash up after my 9-12 show to get mine! In would pile the 10 sales staff, 2 or 3 engineers, receptionists, maybe an off-duty security man, our delightful secretaries (including mine the much-loved Jean Hook and Ron's 'rock' Shelley), that day's news staff, say five, a sport's reporter, 3 or 4 from the accounts department, and the team from 'traffic' (who produced the advertising logs completely manually). 

And of course, most of the dj's - Tony Lyman, John Peters, Dale Winton, Viv Evans, Steve Merike, Peter Tait, Graham Knight, Guy Morris, Pete Wagstaff, and a still young David Lloyd who had joined us in 1980. And Programme Controller Chris Hughes would dash-in for a pancake between cigarettes in the car park!

Local commercial radio was somewhat more relaxed then; no 'brands', just a great team.

I cannot recall when the Pancake tradition died-out. As dj's 'moved on' to our stations in Leicester or Derby, or joined other stations things did start to change. In came computers, so less staff were needed - people left, but I think the Pancake tradition made it into the 1990s? 

Jane & I were still in the library doing the playlist each week, but I think were too busy by then for such frivolity, as we were doing the music for the Midland's Radio eastern stations in Leicester and Derby as well as Nottingham, plus of course GEM-AM had been born in 1988. By 1994 Jane and I had been 'together' 16 years doing the playlists (a GREAT job) and joked we saw more of each other than our partners...  

I wonder how many people work on the regional service that replaced Radio Trent, and if they have their own "Jane & Alyson"? Somehow, I doubt if they need to make many pancakes...

Some 'sisters' are NOT doing it for themselves + radio wages!!

For 2 years the BBC has pandered to feminist pressure-groups (in fact holds events for them) has been overly politically correct, and recently 'Lord Tony' decreed he wanted 50% Women presenters on BBC Local Radio breakfast shows by 'Autumn 2014'. 

Now, Gillian Reynolds, the most revered and honoured woman in UK radio, 'tells it like it is'!  It seems some 'sisters' are not 'doing it for themselves' or for Ms Reynolds, or indeed the listeners.

"Radio 2’s Sunday nights changed, Shennan says from necessity, I think for the worse. Clare Teal is a good singer. As host of a new two-hour show she’s embarrassing."*

"Shennan made a star signing this year in Clare Balding,... Good Morning Sunday, once a religious programme, was recalibrated for her, becoming “spiritually inclined”. Balding’s undoubted gifts are not shown to advantage here."*

* http://fw.to/mfiGyqF

It's time to FORGET quotas, and political correctness, and let there be a more natural balance in male/female radio presenters based on native ability!

More seriously in unnaturally, speedily, elevating women into radio, presumably the BBC will be paying them equal wages to their male counterparts, even though they are much newer to the role and got it by 'feminist default'?! 

Lord Tony?

I ask as I've recently become familiar with what seems to me to be a huge disparity with what BBC Local Radio pays for shows, and the equivalent in commercial (branded) radio. As far back as 1997 some BBC local stations were paying freelance presenters more than £20,000 a year just to present weekend shows! This was at the time some young, spotty hopefuls in (what was) ILR were being given £10 or £20 a shift on long overnights, before voice-tracking took over of course.... :-(

Goodness knows what some of the BBC Local staff must be getting 17 years later? 

Can anyone no longer enamoured with the secretive BBC system enlighten me further on BBC Local wages, past and present? 

Given the rapidly shrinking (in Rajar) and dying audience for many BBC Locals (some get less than 1 hour and 20 mins a day per listener) these shows are very expensive per head of audience!

And of course, I'd also love to find out which ILR over-nighters were paid the lowest wage between 1997 and now!

Young listeners ARE deserting music radio!

Yet another round of Rajar audience figures are manipulated and hyped, and the stations and media agencies are proclaiming how well syndicated commercial radio is doing, to tie-in of course with '40 years of commercial radio'.

But, take a look at the whole long-term picture. 

Graphs from MediaUK* basically show that by aiming only at under 30s stations such as (for example) Capital's flagship one in London, have lost 50-60% of their 'listening hours' in less than 10 years.

No amount of massaging the figures can hide what the second graph 'hours per listener' shows. It's how long people tune-in and stay listening. This is

"useful to know if the audience likes what they hear, or the consistency of the station sound"*. 

It shows the average Capital London listener 'hears' only 4.5 hours of the station in SEVEN days - it used to be 10 ! I'm amazed that any advertising agency would recommend using any station with such figures - what chance do you have of them actually hearing your ad!?

Of course no amount of poor figures, or the fact BBC Radio 2 is light years ahead in audience size, will change the 'system'. But the most important fact it shows is that stations such as Capital are of little use to the young audience seeking new music or a varied musical diet. 

Ofcom and the government should ask if it's really healthy for the UK music industry to be 'led by the nose' by syndicated stations that narrow-cast tiny playlists indistinguishable from those in radio around the world? In a country that is fast losing any local identity, there is nowhere left in commercial radio for the next generation of musicians and song-writers to go....... and it's their music that British radio needs to survive.

Beautiful yes, but not a VOICE for radio...

On Thursday the BBC’s Tony Hall decreed that, 'by the end of 2014, the corporation is aiming for 50 per cent of local stations to have a woman presenting the high-profile Breakfast shows – either in a solo capacity or as part of a team.'

Just before that (Free) radio ‘guru’ David Lloyd asked in a well thought-out blog “Is there anyone out there?” Crucially, this usually chirpy, informed blogger asked, “am I alone in despairing, largely, of a generation?”

My answer to David is ‘No’ !

And to Tony Hall, I say ‘Please NO!”

Tony, I am not against women on the radio. Over my 20 ‘ILR years’ I personally took-on quality female presenters.++  But I have to state there are some hours of the day where a female voice works.... and others where it does NOT. It’s been a ‘law of radio’ for decades, and to unnaturally adjust the ‘gender misbalance' (as Sound Women* call it) this way, would be politically correct, but a grave mistake.

As David Lloyd discussed in his blog, ‘there are some great radio courses’, but I doubt greatly if there are 20 or 30 female presenters on them this year who would be of sufficient quality to hold down presenting breakfast shows in 12 months time!!

Let me explain. This (hastily written) blog actually developed from a half-written one that I was cogitating over before I saw David Lloyd’s question.

'Am I alone in despairing, largely, of a generation?'

My answer: “No David definitely not alone, because radio had indeed ‘lost’ a whole generation!”

HOW and WHY?

I am talking about the ‘dj’ (sorry BBC folk, presenters).

Let’s look at WHO the dj’s were that we enjoyed on radio in the ‘golden years’ of the 60s to 80s, where, when there were NO 'Media Studies' courses, many of today’s dj’s learned their craft... just by being inspired.

The earlier ones learned their craft from (for example): Tony Blackburn, Johnny Walker, Keith Skues, Roger Day, Simon Dee, Kenny Everitt, John Peel, Dave Cash, Tony Windsor, Dave Dennis.....

The slightly younger ones from : Noel Edmonds, Alan Freeman, David Hamilton, Terry Wogan, Emperor Rosko, Simon Bates, Steve Wright (or locally) Les Ross, Dale Winton, Roger Scott, Gavin McCoy etc,.

So the ‘passing’ of radio techniques, ‘wisdom’, was not done on a ‘Media Studies’ course, but by the individual being inspired by what they HEARD coming out of the radio, and copying facets of several presenters to create ‘their’ own, personal ‘dj persona’.

Now let’s look at WHO the dj’s of today (or potential dj’s) have had to lisen to and learn THEIR craft from, in the 90s and 'noughties':

Zoe Ball, Sara Cox, Chris Moyles, Chris Evans, Jo Whiley, Scott Mills, Ken Bruce, Sarah Kennedy, Simon Mayo, Jonathan Ross, James Whale, Chris Tarrant (I really cannot name many truly influential ILR dj’s from this period as it was the era of ‘liner cards’, and endless segues) More recently we have, Scott Mills, Vanessa Feltz, Elaine Page, Richard Madely, Claudia Winkelman and Christian O’Connell

I think it’s quite clear what the KEY differencea are

• the influx of female on-air staff

• or (male or female) staff who are NOT actually dj’s, but ‘personalities’

Many have no native presentation skills; the true art of the (music loving) dj has been lost.  Only this week we had Alex Jones a 'tv personality' on BBC Radio 2; beautiful yes, a face for television, but not a voice for radio...

So to get on BBC Radio 2, an aspiring radio presenter would be best advised get work on television?! 

To get a job in ‘local’ commercial radio’... well... there are not really many, as you are competing with a large number of trained, talented but recently redundant people looking for work.

So, the point of my original Blog was:

“Is it any wonder young people are no longer inspired to want to work in radio?"

But now, knowing that Tony Hall and the BBC are pushing for 50% female staff on breakfast, I have to say it is political correctness gone mad. I am sure some pressure groups will take great offence at my stance, but as John Ryan, director of 2ZY points out** in his Blog: 

'Where are all the new women presenters going to come from? It’s not since Viva! 963 that twenty great female presenters were needed in one fell swoop. But the radio road in 2013 is littered with older, ex-commercial, or former BBC Local/network women who left the business for whatever reason in the last 20 years. It will take time for the new generation of female talent to percolate into the territory of BBC LR from universities.'

My conclusion?

I think Tony Hall has (surprisingly) already stumbled (in the name of political correctness) in his new role....

Tony, I'd love to charge a large consultancy fee, but here is some free advice: the PROBLEM with BBC Local Radio breakfast shows is that :

• They are run by NEWS side of the BBC

• The presenters are often ex-University students

• The presenters are too young to relate to the audience

• The shows sound like a radio version of Blue Peter

Your solution is to employ former ILR presenters from each area, have a 80/20% mix of music/news, and pay for them by getting rid of a whole tier of Local Radio management, as 'guru' John Myers suggested in a report the BBC seem to have lost.

Look in your filing cabinets Tony!

Len Groat

ps: You might also want to check the old ratings of Zoe Ball and Sara Cox on Radio 1 Breakfast!
____________

pps: Numero Uno 'radio guru' John Myers has now Tweeted:

"Ahh Tony. You were doing so well and then this tosh. You hire the best for the job not the best woman or men."

ppps: Young radio guru David Lloyd, has now blogged (calmly) on this:

http://davidlloyd-radio.blogspot.co.uk/2013/08/muttering-darkly-over-muffins.html
______________________


++  Krissi Carpenter, Erica Hughes, Jenni Costello. I also worked with Anne-Marie Minhall as a young presenter for our ‘Careline’, and then dj on GEM-AM, a team of 'mums' for the (then innovative) ‘Toddler & Playgroup spot’, and even Chris Burns. Before that at Metro I worked with Maggie Mash and Ann Dover.

+ http://davidlloyd-radio.blogspot.co.uk/2012/12/is-there-anyone-any-good-out-there.html?m=1

*Sound Women produced this very questionable piece of 'research':  http://www.soundwomen.co.uk/research/ and seem to 'have the ear' of the BBC

** http://blog.2zy.co.uk/4-questions-about-women-at-breakfast-on-bbc-local-radio

"Radio Wages ~ Like They Used To Be..."

I was interested to read in Media Guardian* on 16 July:

"GMG Radio's sale triggered a £1.33m payout for Stuart Taylor, the former managing director of the radio division. Taylor received £710,000 as a "transaction bonus" on achieving the unexpectedly high sale price, another £509,000 for loss of office when he left GMG on 30 June following the sale"

I've put part of it in bold as it made me think about 'transaction bonuses'. I wonder who invented these in radio, and when?

Just for fun I added-up all my annual wages in the 17 years I was at Trent/GEM-AM from '77 to '94. It started at £4,250 in 1977, and gradually went past the (then) stunningly high £10,000, later over £20,000, and in my last few years almost reached the 'Himalyan-high' of £30,000. 

So, give or take a few thousand, my total basic wage over 17 years was £260,000.....

Now what did I get for 'transaction bonuses'?

Nothing.

And what did I get for (as Head of Programmes and Music) achieving 23% reach on GEM-AM, and 34% reach on Trent-FM, Nottingham ?

Nothing.

Of course the currently 'politically correct (radio) attitude' to these 'old days' is that groups such as Midlands Radio (which owned Trent/ GEM-AM for the later years) were not financially viable as stand-alone groups - it's been argued that the Saga group was making a loss and inevitably had to be 'swallowed' by a bigger fish.

Presumably, all the radio 'gurus' (and young would-be radio 'gurus') make such judgements based on the HUGE profits the large groups make?

No.

Because GMG group had to 'write-off 54.2 MILLION from the value of GMG Radio'* which ran the Smooth and Real station brands before the sale.

Of course Radio Trent, GEM-AM and Saga never such HUGE losses, something the 'radio gurus' might be well-advised to remember..... as well as radio investors, the government and Ofcom.

I'm sure I'm noted as being a sceptical as regards the way UK commercial radio is run nowadays, but surely someone sensible in government can do something to allow some LOCAL stations to be started up again!? 

With cautious management, local ownership, and the marvels of today's technology, it would be easily feasible to have a station with 18 hours live, that makes at least a small profit. And it could target more than just the under 30 year olds, and have local features rather then the mind-less 'show biz gossip' that has made the vast majority of listeners turn way from it to BBC Radio 2 (not as good as it thinks it is but hey it has no real competition...)

A new local station (in an area such as Nottingham) certainly would never lose MILLIONS or give disgustingly large pay-offs to people who over-saw stations that clearly failed because of their centrally controlled, non-local programming policies.

When the history of the first FIFTY years of commercial radio is written in 10 years time, I'm happy to be judged on the stations I ran for love rather than money, which had large audiences; the time is right for reviving 'Radio Like It Used To Be'...