RTE big names attract new listeners

The big names at RTÉ radio had cause for celebration after the JNLR figures showed they continued to gain listeners.
With Radio 1 holding on to the top spot as the most listened to station in the country, Morning Ireland ’s Aine Lawlor and Cathal MacCoille, Joe Duffy, Marian Finucane, Ronan Collins, Ryan Tubridy and Pat Kenny all saw their listenership figures increase on a weekly basis between July 2008 and June 2009. There were significant gains for RTÉ Radio 1's Mooney , which won over an extra 17,000 listeners to bring it to 222,000, with Saturday view gaining 24,000 listeners and the News at One getting an extra 18,000 people tuning in. Despite Gerry Ryan's loss of 4,000 listeners, figures were still over the 300,000 mark. In May, it was announced that the show had lost 11,000 listeners. The falling figures are indicative of 2FM's woes, with RTÉ recently announcing it would reposition the station to appeal to an older audience. However, overall, 2FM is still in the second most listened to radio station in the country. Today FM remains in third place at 15 per cent, Newstalk at in fourth at 7 per cent and RTÉ Lyric FM in fifth at 4 per cent.
Newstalk has increased its daily listenership by 16 per cent, with 257,000 listeners tuning in and an increase of 10 per cent on listeners every week at 542,000. Tom Dunne's morning show has added 26,000 to its audience, a 53 per cent rise, while The Right Hook has gained 15,000 listeners - a rise of 16 per cent. The Breakfast Show , which recently brought in Ivan Yates as a presenter, has risen 12 per cent, adding 8,000 listeners.
In Dublin, FM104 came out on top with a market share of 11.5 per cent. However, this is a slight fall of 1 per cent on previous figures.
In local radio, the most listened-to station remains Highland Radio in Co Donegal, which grew its market share by 1.8 per cent to 64.2 per cent.
New station 4FM is has 95,000 listeners each week, 16 weeks after it launched. The station, which is available in Dublin, Cork Galway, Clare and Limerick, has set a target of 150,000 weekly listeners by the end of its first year.

Irish Times 18/08