Radio coup of the year

After twenty years of Swiss private radio history, the signs of fatigue came first and were most pronounced in the most important radio agglomeration, the greater Zurich area, where the number two in the Swiss radio market, Hitradio Z, has seen its audience flee in droves in recent years. However, listeners did not migrate to competitor Radio 24, which also suffered losses, albeit on a much smaller scale. The winner across the board was DRS 3. In the first half of 2003, the Zurich station even suffered a particular setback: The public service station catapulted to the top spot in its market in terms of listenership. The retaliation came immediately after Hitradio Z relaunched itself on August 15, 2003 under the new name Energy Zürich and together with the radio multinational NRJ Groupe, targeting a younger audience. This gave the Zurich radio landscape a much-needed makeover, as shown by the listening figures just three months after the launch of the new station. For intruder DRS 3, the growth abruptly turned into a significant loss. In contrast, all private radio stations in the greater Zurich area, above all Radio 24, were able to make strong gains in terms of listenership. Only Radio 24 can rest easy: The Tamedia station attracted the most listeners this year, taking them away from NRJ and DRS 3.
(dse)