Hello,
I wanted to provide an update on information that we found out late last week.
On Monday, many of you would have noticed new "Greatest Hits Radio Network" branding on the news junctions and quite a dramatic change in music, which prompted many complaints.
Bauer have responded by changing the music back to carry songs from the last 20 years again and with a much better mix of the rest. This appears to be down to the number of complaint and the number of people in their target demographic abandoning Spirit and it's other siblings. Could this be the first sign from Bauer that they might be questioning their strategy? (let's hope so!).
We also found out that 43 year-old German billion-heiress Yvonne Bauer herself is not happy at all with how these changes have been handled by the UK executives, so is also likely applying pressure to them to do a better job - which frankly is deserved because it has been handled in a shockingly poor way for a media company.
We've also found out more information than they are revealing in the press about what Spirit FM will sound like after September if we don't stop them:
- There will be 21 hours of standard programs from London, Manchester, Liverpool.
- There will be a single 3 hour regional drivetime show on weekdays that will come from Fareham but will cover the entire ITV Meridian region. There will be no local or regional programming at all at the weekends.
This means no McGinley in the Morning and none of the other presenters that we love on Spirit FM. Just a completely generic service that probably won't even be live for a lot of the time.
- Local news and Travel *WILL* be retained using the existing transmission areas, which means we will get hourly bulletins for West Sussex from the existing transmitters. Whether this will last long-term or not if the new network struggles is the unanswered question.
- The new core audience target audience will be 44-64 year olds and will only play songs from 70s, 80s and 90s. To contrast this, Spirit FM aims at 25-55 year olds and plays 70s, 80s, 90s, 00s, 10s and the best current songs - so you don't feel left behind and not hearing great current music.
With the further news that both Global (Heart, Smooth, Gold etc.) making reductions and job losses and the BBC Local/Regional services being cut, this is further terrible news for anyone that listens to radio.
I'm entirely convinced that what Bauer are planning with the new Hits Radio/Greatest Hits Radio Networks will ultimately fail as they bring absolutely nothing new, it's just another tired format with the same old songs and the competition produces way better output, so I fully expect it to fail within the next 2 years - however we'll *NEVER* get our local radio stations like Spirit FM back, once they're gone, they'll be gone forever.
Bauer has a prime opportunity to be the saviours of local radio by changing their plans before it is too late.
Let's send them a message by doing a final push to get us over the 10,000 signature mark as we're planning to close this petition next week and deliver it, along with all your comments to their executives and to Yvonne Bauer herself.
So please share the petition with your friends, neighbours and colleagues again and let's make this happen!
Thank you all for your support - I can't put into words just how much I appreciate every single one of you.
Kind regards,
Steve.