2fm - another 5 million bailout in 2016

medium wave

Surprised not to see a thread on this, yesterday's RTE annual report showed that 2fm needed another 5 million bailout in 2016, despite the large paypackets of Tubridy and Hayes no longer being an issue. How is a generic pop music station costing so much money ?

dave4565

Its costing because they can't have one "presenter" on at a time two and three together one trying to out smut the other they are like a bunch of teenagers in the back of a bus trying to impress each other

PAKNET

Yep.

Sure their own website even brags they have 27 presenters!

10 of those presenters across a typical weekday:
- 3 on breakfast + producer
- 2 on mid-morning + producer
- 1 on afternoons + producer
- 1 on drivetime + producer
- 1 on the evening show + producer
- 2 on the night show + producer

Then news, sport, entertainment journalists - there's probably two shifts to cover the broadcast day.

That's ~22 people just for the midweek 0700 to 0000 day.
Before you add a single "behind-the-scenes" person in to the mix.

When you compare that to far more successful (and financially viable) stations like the FM104's, Red FM's, Spin's, iRadio's, etc. I wouldn't be surprised if you'd struggle to find 22 people spanning the entire payroll for the station...

Funny how things differ when you have to cut your cloth and survive in the real world...

foxtrot101

I can't find anything on this. There is recent reports of RTE recording losses of €19.7m in 2016, but nothing about 2fm, The only I could find is article from last year with Dan Healy declaring 2fm will become a net contributor to RTE’s finances in 2016, having reached a break-even position in 2015.

http://www.irishexaminer.com/ireland/rte-records-losses-of-197m-after-busy-2016-455125.html

https://www.irishtimes.com/business/media-and-marketing/radio-station-2fm-to-become-profitable-for-rt%C3%A9-in-2016-1.2540293

Dirty Dingus McGee

Why do pop music stations bother with presenters at all, surely just having non stop music playing on a loop would be far more cost effective and what most people want seeing as I doubt most people want to listen to an idiot DJ talking ****e endlessly.

I listen to midlands radio 3 on the way to work each morning where it's just music with no DJ and it's a real pleasure.

wnolan1992

Why would I listen to the radio for non-stop music? I'd just use Spotify...



Anyway, would 2016 not still include Colm Hayes? Wasn't he on weekends there last year? I'd imagine that the weekend lineup last year of former weekday presenters who seemed to be running down the remainders of their contracts probably contributed to the losses in a not insignificant manner.

It really would be interesting to see where the money is going though. I mean, come on, they CAN'T be spending €5 million plus on payroll alone. I'd be highly surprised if any of their weekday presenters are on much more than €100k (not saying that's insignificant), and you'd imagine the likes of Chris, Ciara and Tracy Clifford would be on a bit less.


Did the soft rebrand they did last year cost that much?

Fuzzy Clam

wnolan1992 wrote: »

Why would I listen to the radio for non-stop music? I'd just use Spotify...



Anyway, would 2016 not still include Colm Hayes? Wasn't he on weekends there last year? I'd imagine that the weekend lineup last year of former weekday presenters who seemed to be running down the remainders of their contracts probably contributed to the losses in a not insignificant manner.

It really would be interesting to see where the money is going though. I mean, come on, they CAN'T be spending €5 million plus on payroll alone. I'd be highly surprised if any of their weekday presenters are on much more than €100k (not saying that's insignificant), and you'd imagine the likes of Chris, Ciara and Tracy Clifford would be on a bit less.


Did the soft rebrand they did last year cost that much?

I would imagine that the charge to 2RN is quite substantial.

Dirty Dingus McGee

wnolan1992 wrote: »

Why would I listen to the radio for non-stop music? I'd just use Spotify...



Anyway, would 2016 not still include Colm Hayes? Wasn't he on weekends there last year? I'd imagine that the weekend lineup last year of former weekday presenters who seemed to be running down the remainders of their contracts probably contributed to the losses in a not insignificant manner.

It really would be interesting to see where the money is going though. I mean, come on, they CAN'T be spending €5 million plus on payroll alone. I'd be highly surprised if any of their weekday presenters are on much more than €100k (not saying that's insignificant), and you'd imagine the likes of Chris, Ciara and Tracy Clifford would be on a bit less.


Did the soft rebrand they did last year cost that much?

Because it's miles better than listening to any sort of talk from DJ's in general.Most people's downloads and cd collections are limited compared to what radio stations can offer.

It's amazing that a lot of stations advertise the fact that they play more music than any other station so surely the natural step up from that would be to just get rid of any sort of talk on music stations altogether.

CeilingFly

The young listeners they target are no longer there.

So many other options vying for their ears that the costs of a national "youth" station is excessive for the potential listenership.

Only real option is to mothball it.

AndyBoBandy

Lottie don't come cheap!!

Former Former

CeilingFly wrote: »

Only real option is to mothball it.

They can't. There would be uproar.

DopeTech

AndyBoBandy wrote: »

Lottie don't come cheap!!

Think the problem is that she comes at all. She's improved a lot since she started and when she was on with Keith doing breakfast last week I thought she was a lot more listenable when she's not reading shi**y showbiz off a page.

wnolan1992

CeilingFly wrote: »

The young listeners they target are no longer there.

So many other options vying for their ears that the costs of a national "youth" station is excessive for the potential listenership.

Only real option is to mothball it.

Funny how Spin and iRadio aren't decrying the loss of the "young listener". Funny how they seem to be doing really well targeting their demographic with the kind of content their demographic wants.

2FM's problem was and remains to be they're still caught between trying to be Today FM and trying to be Spin. It's been a mess for the last 10 years and has only had a semi-stable schedule for just over a year.

Former Former wrote: »

They can't. There would be uproar.

It would also give Denis O'Brien a lovely monopoly over the country's music radio.

Ursus Horribilis

CeilingFly wrote: »

The young listeners they target are no longer there.

So many other options vying for their ears that the costs of a national "youth" station is excessive for the potential listenership.

Only real option is to mothball it.

Or turn it into the equivalent of BBC Radio 2. The youth market's over-saturated, with Today FM, iRadio, Spin et. al catering for them. There is nothing for the people caught in the middle. People who perhaps just want to listen to music shows presented by one DJ, a mixture of show types and not too much talk.

It's hard to justify 2FM in its current form. Unlike Radio 1 which has a public service broadcasting element to it, 2fm is no different to every ten-a-penny yoof music station out there. Just with pricier presenters and money coming from the public purse.

dxhound2005

Any time I read about 2 FM here it is always doom and gloom as if nobody is listening to the station. But there are a lot of people listening. The figures for the second quarter of the year should be out soon, but these are some numbers from the first quarter.

http://www.irishexaminer.com/breakingnews/entertainment/big-hitters-in-rte-enjoy-listenership-increases-as-jnlr-figures-released-787426.html

There was also good news for RTÉ 2FM as their flagship breakfast show remained the number one radio show in Ireland for 15-34s. Breakfast Republic now has a listenership of 167,000 - up 13,000.

The Nicky Byrne Show with Jenny Greene and The Eoghan McDermott Show also saw gains of 8,000 and 3,000 listeners respectively.

Head of station Dan Healy commented: "2FM was re-imagined so that it would appeal to a younger audience and it is very satisfying to see this age group interacting with the station in such large numbers."

"The station now has six of the top ten programmes for 15-34-year-olds, with Breakfast Republic being the number one show for this age group in Ireland.

"Although 2FM does not target All Adults, Breakfast Republic has the same number of All Adults tuning in (167,000) every day as the Ian Dempsey Breakfast Show (on Today FM)."

foxtrot101

I'm not sure about the op, I can't find a source for the claim anywhere. Unless it's from the actual accounts, but no news outlet has picked up on it. So if you're reading, medium wave, can you tell us where this is coming from. Cheers.

Ursus Horribilis

Whoever "medium wave" is, they seem to have done a hit and run. Opened their account, posted this then closed the account.

foxtrot101

Ah, so he has. As I said, I don't think there's anything to this really. 2fm was supposed to be a net contributor again in 2016.

Medium Wave.

what is the matter with you people ? it is written in back and white in the report that 2fm got 4€ from every tv licence last year

Medium Wave.

link here static.rasset.ie/documents/about/rte-annual-report-2016.pdf

PAKNET

Presumably the OP is referring to [this] on page 133.

Summary:
2FM cost just over €12m to run for the year ended 31 Dec 2015.
It made just over €6m in commercial revenue.
Leaving €5.3m of a shortfall which is ultimately met via a subvention from the license fee.

foxtrot101

Medium Wave. wrote: »

what is the matter with you people ? it is written in back and white in the report that 2fm got 4€ from every tv licence last year

What is being reported in the papers is RTE's €19.7 Million overall deficit , this is found in the final row of (e) Analysis of revenues, costs and (deficit)/surplus by channel, service and broadcasting genre and between public-service and non-public-service activities p130

2fm's deficit is €778,000, it seems to get 6 million for the public service element of it's broadcasting, what the actually entails...I haven't a clue.

Still, the deficit from the year before was only €114,000, and Dan Healy was confidently predicting a definite surplus in 2016.

dxhound2005

2 FM continues to gain listeners. How many does it need to cancel out the bailout money?

http://www.independent.ie/entertainment/radio/jnlrs-bad-news-for-rte-radio-1-and-today-fm-as-newstalk-and-2fm-make-gains-35973424.html

2FM, however, continues to grow with Breakfast Republic proving the biggest winner of the year. The show gained 11,000 listeners since the last book in April this year and an impressive 27,000 since this time last year.

wnolan1992

Well, Nicky Byrne is getting €200,000 for his gig anyway....

TallGlass

wnolan1992 wrote: »

Well, Nicky Byrne is getting €200,000 for his gig anyway....

I done some maths, it would take me 5 years saving 1700€ PM to reach even half of his wages and I have a average wage job. Yet I am expected to pay for this madness. Can we not just sell off RTÉ like we sell everything else off and reduce or get rid of the licence fee?

I couldn't care less if someone is on 1m and rubbish once I am not paying for it.

These salaries are seriously out of wack for a public service. 200k, WTF for chatting and playing a bit of music. And Tubbs on nearly 500k, he is alright, not 500k alright.

hairyslug

Jenny Greene must be scratching her head wondering what she's got to do.

Are her dance/orchestra nights part of 2fm or her own production.

AndyBoBandy

hairyslug wrote: »

Are her dance/orchestra nights part of 2fm or her own production.

Given that it's a carbon copy of a BBC format, I'd imagine RTÉ are all over it! And she's just the one that presses play at the start of he set.

TallGlass

hairyslug wrote: »

Jenny Greene must be scratching her head wondering what she's got to do.

She ain't the only one scratching her head wondering what you got to do, I would have to move heaven and earth to even be considered for a 50k role, let alone 200k. I would have more chance of seen a unicorn or winning the lotto then getting paid 200k or 500k.

If these lads are pulling in the numbers and revenue, why are RTE looking for licence fee increases? Something just isn't adding up here for me.

They are getting serious money from the licence fee, revenue from ads and online content, yet are still able to pay staggering amounts to presenters and still put the poor hand out saying they haven't got the money.

colinod0806

wnolan1992 wrote: »

Well, Nicky Byrne is getting €200,000 for his gig anyway....

Is that just for the radio job or including the tv work?

colinod0806

colinod0806 wrote: »

Is that just for the radio job or including the tv work?

It covers all of his work for RTE

Bullocks

A Tyrant Named Miltiades! wrote: »

It covers all of his work for RTE

Wonder how they quantify it for the year ?

colinod0806

Bullocks wrote: »

Wonder how they quantify it for the year ?

Well i would say a very large chunk of it pays for him being the host of the flagship Sunday evening tv show.

goose2005

Ursus Horribilis wrote: »

Or turn it into the equivalent of BBC Radio 2. The youth market's over-saturated, with Today FM, iRadio, Spin et. al catering for them. There is nothing for the people caught in the middle. People who perhaps just want to listen to music shows presented by one DJ, a mixture of show types and not too much talk.

Aren't Nova and 4FM aimed at the
people caught in the middle?

School Socks

Nicky Byrnes Sunday night tv show, dancing with the stars only started in January of this year and that 200k figure was for 2015, so I'd imagine he is on double that salary now.

School Socks

Nova & 4fm aren't available to large parts of the country on the FM band

Ursus Horribilis

goose2005 wrote: »

Aren't Nova and 4FM aimed at the people caught in the middle?

Maybe they are but neither are national radio stations. Far from it.

Radio Nova is a glorified local radio station with a reach into the Dublin commuter belt.

4fm is a multi-city licence and broadcasts to seemingly random parts of the country. Even though Kilkenny and Waterford were cities last time I looked, neither they nor the south east are covered by it. Nor is the north-west or the midlands.

By the looks of things DAB is finished in this country and won't be expanding.

School Socks

Isn't 11 million a ridiculous running cost for 2fm? It could be easily run on 3/4 million.

Whereisgalway

I counted 8 people on breakfast republic this morning, 3 hosts, producer, news & sports reader, traffic announcer & a entertainment coospondant

8 people plus a team of researchers wtf like