Radio Research

• Who was first ever breakfast show presenter on Radio 1?

The first ever presenter was Tony Blackburn who held the position for nearly 6 years. 

• Other DJ's who presented the show?

Zoe Ball 1998

Sara Cox 2000

Chris Moyles 2004

Nick Grimshaw 2012

• Biographical info on Nick Grimshaw?

Nick got his first job in Radio 1 in 2007 September presenting BBC's youth stand 'switch' with friend and fellow DJ Annie Mac. Before Nick did the breakfast show for radio 1 full time he did do the weekend breakfast show from Oct 2008 to May 2009 and from 2010 to 2012 was the main stand in presenter for Scott Mills on the show and on the 11th of July 2012 it was announced that he would then be the presenter for the breakfast show. 

• Current listening figures for the breakfast show?

4.93 million listeners a week between July and September 2017.

• Who is the controller of BBC radio 1?

Ben Cooper

• How is radio 1 funded?

Its funded through the TV license which is charged to all households and companies. 

• How does radio 1 try and be distinctive?

Its remit aims to entertain and engage a broad range of young listeners through contemporary music and speech, and achieves this through playing current chart music talking about current celebs and media scandals as well as interviewing celebs. Radio 1 also has a you tube channel where they show their performances and interviews of guests on the show. 

• What is the difference between BBC radio stations and commercial stations?

Large commercial stations typically reach the largest audience, normally the interviews and shows are pore recorded and can be cut down into sound bites, these larger stations jump on stories involving celebrities and scandals.

Smaller commercial stations tend to do longer interviews which are more in depth as bits are not cut out which means that the guest can promote their brand and tell the audience where to find more information e.g. at their website which drives the traffic to the right place unlike larger commercial stations which may cut this bit out. Smaller stations are also more friendly and up for a chat compared to larger stations however its often harder for a smaller station to sell their big stories.

The BBC radio stations are very different to commercial stations as they are strict on brand mentions, they are only allowed one brand mention in each interview and its likely the guest will be cut off if they mention it more than once and therefore the guests are strategic.  BBC mid mornings often do live chats with more brand opportunity and the interviews often a better than their pre recorded clips and are therefore popular among listeners due to the high quality chat and experienced broadcasters. BBC breakfast stories and interviews have different tones during different times of the day e.g. in the mornings there's more serious news stories and mid mornings more casual chat and other stories have specific themes to their stories.