GWR FM (Bristol & Bath)
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Overview
GWR FM is the name of three pop Independent Local Radio stations based in Bristol, Bath and Wiltshire in the United Kingdom. See also GWR FM (Swindon).
The radio stations serve the former county of Avon and Bath. It broadcasts on 96.3 and 103FM. The station plays top 40 and Hot Adult contemporary music targeting 15-35 year old adults. It is currently the highest-rated local radio station in the area, (Source RAJAR) beating local competition from
Many Bristolians consider the radio station to be synonymous with Bristol.
History
GWR FM launched on 27th October 1981 under its original name, Radio West, 11 years after BBC Radio Bristol. The station began a full service commercial radio station on 96.3 MHz FM and 1260 kHz AM (238 metres medium wave) and it was the culmination of a merger between two companies bidding for the Bristol and Bath radio licence (Radio Avonside and Bristol Channel) awarded by the then Independent Broadcasting Authority. The choice of on-air name proved to be a simple affair as the BBC aired a series called Shoestring complete with the fictitious Radio West.
Radio West's cost base was large due to the extravagant studio premises that had been purchased, and the lack of audience made for disastrous advertising revenue and losses of £300,000 by 1983. John Bradford, who had helped found the extremely successful Mercia Sound in Coventry, joined the station in 1983. Alongside Dave Cash (ex Capital Radio), big guns Johnnie Walker (ex Caroline, BBC) and Roger Day (ex Caroline, Piccadilly, and latterly BRMB) were wheeled in, but to no avail. The station still slipped and programmes had to be curtailed in October 1983 and the station closed down each day at 7:30 pm, while the remaining resources were concentrated on daytime output. After more fine tuning of the station's output Radio West became more mainstream and by late 1984 things were looking more promising and programmes were extended to a 1am closedown.
Although the station was broadcasting programmes of a high quality (including award-nominated computer show Datarama), listeners remained loyal to BBC Radio Bristol, already established as the first radio station for the locality.
Financially commercial radio struggled to make any money as the 1980s economy in Britain was hampered by vast union stikes. Radio West never made a penny since it started and looked set to close when the neighbouring local station Wiltshire Radio, based in Swindon made an official approach to merge the two stations, creating a station covering from Weston-super-Mare in the west to Swindon and Hungerford in the east. This merger was approved by the British Government and was completed in 1985.
Closure of Radio West
Radio West formally closed in September 1985 with a preview of the new radio station to come during test transmissions which followed immediately. In October 1985 GWR Radio was launched as a 24-hour radio station (previously Radio West closed in overnight to re-open in the morning). New disc jockeys were brought in, however the station still sounded like competitor Radio Bristol with its mix of music, news and talk (as per the trend in British commercial radio at the time) and radio listening figures still didn't see an improvement.
Split services
GWR Radio began splitting frequencies as required by the British Government - which declared its desire to end simulcasting on both FM and AM. In November 1988 GWR Radio launched Brunel Classic Gold, a golden oldies service (now part of the Classic Gold Network) whilst GWR FM launched an opt-out service for Bath alongside GWR Bristol.
After the lifting on sanctions restricting the time spent playing music (so-called 'needle time') in 1988, GWR FM became more and more music-led, playing Top 40 chart music during the daytime, and specialist music (Big Band music, rock, rap etc) was over time elimnated. The local element of the station especially its news coverage had progressively become briefer and reduced in length, then moved onto Brunel Classic Gold, before being dropped altogether. Despite this GWR FM had at last become popular with the rise in listenership figures confirming this.
The Mix Network
In 1992 a re-launch of the station saw The New GWR-FM become the hub of what was The Mix Network, a network of radio stations owned by the GWR Group (now GCap Media ) covering southern England and Wales. The radio station's (and the group's) long held philosophy of heavily researching the average person's listening habits and tastes led by Group chairman Ralph Bernard has created a tightly formatted sound where popular Top 40 chart hits ex-Top 40 songs are blended in with older hits. This has led to its "Better Music Mix" format which has since spread to other radio stations within the GWR Group, including Essex FM, Trent FM and Beacon Radio creating a mini national network.
The practice for the Mix Network stations were each station played a centrally produced playlist (from GWR FM itself), songs were broadcast on or almost at the same time as neighbouring group stations and each station adpoted the "Better Music Mix" tagline, to be said by local disc jockeys in between each song. Fans of the previous guises of some stations bought by the GWR Group, notably Essex FM and Beacon Radio were shocked and disgusted at the sudden re-branding of the station's taglines and playlists, accusing the new management of reducing local content such as news reports and cancelling local shows in place of programming from the Mix Network, such as Late Night Love and The Request Fest, which originate from the Bristol studios.
Despite protests from outside Bristol, GWR FM continues to be very popular with current RAJAR listening figures showing an average 18% listening share of all radio broadcast in the area.
Current programmes broadcast on GWR FM
- The Morning Crew with Bush and Troy
- Late Night Love with Graham Torrington
- Music Control with Kevin Hughes and Sally Bailey
- Sunday Revival with James Bassam
- Ministry of Sound dance show
- Hit 40 UK
Slogans
- 1982 Radio West- "We got a good thing going"
- 1985 GWR- "Listen, we're talking about you!"
- 1989 GWR Radio "The West number one", "Good Music, Great Talk"
- 1992 The New GWR FM- "No rap, less chat"
- 1995 GWR FM - "Now playing a better music mix"
- 2000 Bristol's GWR FM, Bath's GWR FM "Today's best mix"
- 2004 "Today's best mix, today's best variety" "More music, less talk" "From the world's best city"
- 2005/6 "Good Music is Back"
What GWR stands for
It is well known that the initials GWR has had a long association with the Great Western Railway especially in the South West of England, and there is a popular misconception with listeners that the station stands for Great Western Radio. Indeed neighbouring GWR Wiltshire was called Wiltshire Radio (WR) before its merger with Radio West. However according to Group management, the letters GWR officially do not stand for anything.
It should also be noted that GWR's oldies service was originally called Brunel Classic Gold, after the GWR's founding father Isambard Kingdom Brunel.
The GWR Group
The company which formerly owned GWR, the GWR Group, expanded from the late 1980s / early 1990s onwards to purchase other stations throughout the country. Many UK stations now follow the GWR format. It became the largest radio company in the UK, before merging with its competitor Capital Radio to become GCap Media on May 9, 2005.
References
- The Radio Companion by Paul Donovan, ISBN number 9-780586-090121
- Commercial Radio Pocket Book by Commercial Radio Companies Association
- Radio Authority Pocket Book 1992-2003 by the Radio Authority
- Transdiffusion http://www.transdiffusion.org