The Stage

Commercial radio makes further gains on BBC

Published Thursday 26 October 2006 at 12:30 by Liz Thomas

Commercial radio showed some signs of a fightback after narrowing the BBC’s lead for a second successive quarter.

Overall the BBC’s share is 54.3%, a slight drop from the 54.6% year on year. Meanwhile, the advertising-funded sector’s total share now stands at 43.6%, up from 42.9%.

Radio 1 was the only main national station out of the Corporation’s umbrella of networks that added listeners in the past year, jumping up by 2.4% to 10.58 million, while Five Live saw the biggest drop of around 5% of its audience, which now stands at 5.75 million.

According to figures published by audience measurement index Rajar, the performance of commercial stations has been bolstered by the increased interest in digital offerings such as the Emap-owned Smash Hits.

BBC 6Music enjoyed the Corporation’s strongest increase with a jump of more than 40% to 400,000 but 1Xtra and Asian Network were both down.

Jenny Abramsky, the director of BBC radio and music, said: “I’m pleased to see the continued steady growth of Radio 1, and our digital-only networks contributing to the rise in digital listening.”