Invicta FM

Radio station


name=Invicta FM
airdate=October 1, 1984
frequency=95.9 MHz, 102.8 MHz, 96.1 MHz,
97.0 MHz and 103.1 MHz
share = 12.1%
share as of = September 2007
share source = [http://www.rajar.co.uk/listening/quarterly_listening.php]
area=Maidstone, Medway,
East & West Kent
format=Contemporary
owner=Global Radio
website= [http://www.invictafm.com/ www.invictafm.com]

Invicta FM is a local commercial station which broadcasts to the county of Kent in South East England. It until recently was owned by GCap Media and is now owned by Global it plays commercial, chart-oriented popular music.

Broadcast from studios on an industrial estate just outside Whitstable, the station plays a mix of pop, rock, RnB and old school with the Tag Line being "More Music Variety".

History

Early history

In the early eighties, two different companies won the right to run radio stations in Kent. East Kent was going to be served by Network East Kent while West Kent was to get Northdown Radio. Following problems before launch possibly brought on by the 1984 recession, The Independent Broadcasting Authority agreed to the two companies merging. The new company acquired an unsuccessful applicant for the East Kent licence, Radio Invicta Ltd, which owned the lease on a building in Canterbury which was to become the company's headquarters. The newly created company was known as Invicta Sound plc and was independently owned by a number of private shareholders. The station went to air as Invicta Sound on 1 October 1984. The station output was said to have featured a mix of middle-of-the-road music couple with a prominent news schedule where a news bulletin would last at least 9 minutes [http://www.ssaunders.plus.com/thisisilr/is/isinfo.html] .

The station's heavy news output - possibly as a way of stealing listeners from rival BBC Radio Kent was recognised by station staff as unsuccessful, losing a lot of listeners. After this disappointing start after the first few months, the station was relaunched as Invicta Radio in October 1985.

The company's studios were based in an old warehouse at 15 Station Road East in Canterbury, with a second, smaller base at 37 Earl Street in Maidstone. Originally, presenters generally had the option of choosing where to present their show from, depending on where they lived. Plus in the very early days, there was some separate programming for East and West Kent.

In 1985, a general reorganisation of radio frequencies in Britain forced Invicta into changing a number of its broadcast numbers:

*103.8 MHz (West Kent) became 103.1 MHz
*95.1 MHz (East Kent) became 102.8 MHz
*96.3 MHz (Ashford) became 96.1 MHz
*95.9 MHz (Thanet) and 97.0 MHz (Folkestone and Dover) remained unchanged.

The lack of a single high-powered frequency for the east of the county was because of international frequency clearance problems due to the proximity to France across the English Channel. Instead three low-powered transmitters were installed in Ashford, Folkestone/Dover and Thanet. This problem did not affect BBC national and local radio, which use a single high-powered site at Swingate, near Dover [http://tx.mb21.co.uk/gallery/swingate.asp]

A few years after the rebranding of the station to Invicta Radio, the station became known as Invicta FM. Soon after, separate breakfast shows started to be broadcast to the following areas:

*East Kent / West Kent (from 15 Station Road East, Canterbury, and later from Whitstable)
*Ashford (initially from the Ashford International Hotel, Ashford, then from Canterbury, and later from Whitstable)
*Thanet (from 15 Station Road East, Canterbury, and later from Whitstable)

tation split

As required by the Home Office to end simulcasting on FM and AM, in March 1989, Invicta Radio became Invicta FM and a sister station, Coast AM began broadcasting on Invicta's AM frequencies.

Coast AM was an AOR/soft rock station under the leadership of ex-Capital Producer/DJ Kerry Juby with music programmed by Paul Stafford (Head of Music /Living on Rock 7-11pm mon-fri), who left the station abruptly in early 1990. Eammon Kelly was the station's first breakfast host. A few months after the launch, Coast AM was renamed "Coast Classics". The service began playing more 'oldies' and by 1990 it became a fully fledged 'Golden Oldies' station. Throughout this period, Coast was a 24-hour live local station, but in 1991 it started taking a "sustaining service" from Chiltern Radio's expanding AM 'Gold' service, SuperGold. As a result of this change, the station was renamed Invicta Supergold. This helped as research had shown that listeners never fully got used to the station's name, many still calling it Invicta! A near-identical set of jingles from JAM were re-sung with the station's new name, and there were no major schedule changes. However, just before this change took place, and for most of Summer 1991, presenters at the station were instructed to call the station "Coast Classics Invicta Supergold" on air, to enable listeners to get used to the change. It became a highly popular station and once achieved a 17% reach in a JICRAR survey, much to the disgust of its Southern Radio bosses who preferred their AM stations to hover around the 9% mark.

Group expansion

In 1991, controversy was sparked as one of the famous DJs, Chris Ryder (aka Caesar the Geezer), was terminated from his job over criminal charges related to theft from charity. He was ultimately found not guilty on these charges, but was convicted of intent to defraud Fact|date=February 2008.

Also in 1991, the Maidstone studios and offices closed and a few months later, the entire company moved to a brand new, larger, building just outside Whitstable. This was due to the company getting too big for its Canterbury home having started to expand its radio operations beyond Kent. By now it had acquired a radio station in Frinton, Essex called Mellow 1557, as well as a stake in a radio station in Boulogne-sur-Mer, France, which it had relaunched as Continental Invicta FM.Fact|date=February 2008

Acquisition by Capital Radio

Shortly after moving to its current base, the station was acquired by Southern Radio plc which, in turn, was acquired by Capital Radio plc in May 1994. (Mellow 1557, now known as Dream 100 FM, was sold by Southern Radio plc a few months after it took control of the Invicta Radio Group.)

New commercial micro stations in the late nineties were awarded licences in Kent by the Radio Authority like TLR which covered Thanet, Medway FM (Medway towns), Neptune Radio(Shepway and Dover), CTFM (Canterbury and district) and KFM (Tonbridge). These put extra pressure on advertising revenue and mainly adopted a much larger play list of songs as well as employing ex familiar Invicta presenters. All these stations have now been acquired by Kmfm.

Breakfast shows

For some time the station ran four breakfast shows from Whitstable - Invicta Supergold, Invicta FM (102.8 and 103.1 and in Dover on 97.0) Invicta FM Ashford (96.1) and Invicta FM Thanet (95.9). The different programmes all took the same news and sports bulletins but had different presenters. This made it difficult for Invicta FM to promote its breakfast programme, as there were three different presenters broadcasting to different parts of Kent.

The split FM breakfast was discontinued with the launch of The Invicta FM Morning Zoo in 1995 - with Neil Francis, Simon Beale, Kirsty Long on travel and Stuart Thomas newsreading. The Morning Zoo was the brainchild of then Programme Controller Sandy Beech.

Commercials continued to be split four ways on Invicta FM, with East, West, Thanet and Ashford as the different broadcast regions.

The Morning Zoo was a fixture of the Invicta FM schedule for many years. Neil Francis was the initial lead presenter of the show until 2000 - he was later partnered with Sam Hughes. From 2000, James Heming was the lead presenter of the Morning Zoo following the departure of Neil Francis. The last Morning Zoo was broadcast on Friday 22 December 2006. The breakfast show was rebranded "James and Ali in the morning" at the beginning of 2007, to reflect the move away from the 'zoo' style of a handful of people interacting with each other at once. Since May 2008, it has been known as "James Heming in the morning". James now presents the show solo with occasional interactions from producer Dobbo, news and showbiz girl Nicola and travel boy Ben. This was after Ali Wheeler left the station on Friday 2 May 2008 to have her first child.

upergold becomes Capital Gold

"See also Capital Gold" When Chiltern closed its SuperGold sustaining service, Invicta FM and Invicta Supergold began sharing a single programme overnight (the presenter simply called it "Invicta" and used split jingles on FM and AM). This usually ran from midnight or 1am till 6am, although the later launch of an "early breakfast" programme on Invicta FM meant the overnight presenter would do the last hour on Supergold only.

Invicta Supergold closed down March 1998, to be replaced by the mainly networked Capital Gold. A local breakfast show, however, was retained. This was ahead of the rolling out of the station across other AM stations owned by the company and the Kent site acted as a test station (due to its close proximity to Capital Gold in London), to ensure syndication worked, and to iron out any problems. By September, Capital Gold could also be heard in Birmingham, Sussex, Hampshire and, not long after, South Wales. A local breakfast show survived until August 2007, when Capital Gold owners GCap purchased the Classic Gold stations back from UBC. Ofcom agreed a proposal to move the four hour local opt-out from breakfast to afternoons. Ross Lowe presents this voicetracked slot on the now renamed "Gold" station from 12 to 4 weekdays. Local news, travel and commercials remain however. All other output in now produced at the Gold studios at Leicester Square in London.

Invicta FM post Capital/GWR Merger

Capital Radio plc acquired GWR Group plc in 2005 and on May 1 of that year, the newly enlarged group was renamed GCap Media plc. The first effects of the GCap merger were felt by Invicta FM soon afterwards. New boss Craig Boddy, assisted by GCap management (Hugh Murray and Regional Programme boss Peter Sinclair), undertook a radical restructure of the station in September 2005, in response to falling listening figures and mounting overheads. Boddy changed Invicta from the style influenced by nearby Capital FM, to one which roughly resembled the old Mix Network.

The new relaunched Invicta carried the first of the GWR straplines 'The best mix of the 80s, 90s and today' from Monday September 19, 2005. The second strapline 'Today's Best Mix', was introduced on Bank Holiday Monday, 28 August 2006.

In May 2008, Craig Boddy left and some of the characteristics of the time when Capital ran the station prior to GCap Media, were returning in part, including a hotter music mix and more presenter interaction.

June 30th 2008 , radical changes again for One Network stations including Invicta. New owners of GCap, Global (most noted for owning the Heart stations), took advantage of recently relaxed OfCom regulations on networking to reduce local minimum requirements down to ten hours weekdays and four for Saturdays and Sundays. That means only 6am to 7pm is local (excluding the new Philippa Collins networked mid morning show from 10-1) weekdays, and just 8am-noon at weekends. The changes meant long running shows like Party Invicta were given the chop.

A lot of modern music and rocky/edgey music has been dropped by Global in favour of a slightly and bigger concentration of older music back to the 70s in a few cases and up to 3 80's songs an hour, sounding like a younger version of Heart. All stations affected share the same playlist (e.g. Invicta FM plays the same songs in the same order now as sister station Essex FM). The strapline also mirrors Heart's - More Music Variety, as does the name of the now renamed guess the year feature - The Time Tunnel.

In July 2008 former Invicta FM and KMFM Programme Controller Mike Osborne was appointed to the newly created role of Programme Director.

Renaming

In September 2008 it was reported that Invicta, along with 28 other local radio stations, would be renamed as Heart FM [http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/7619368.stm] and remove most of the local shows. This will leave just two weekday shows (Breakfast and Drivetime) that are produced in the county, the rest will be produced in London. [http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2008/sep/16/globalradio.commercialradio] .This will be the second major rebranding of radio stations in kent recently after all the small stations owned by Kent Messenger were rebranded KMFM losing there local identity.

hared Programming

The station broadcasts locally produced shows during the day and a number of syndicated or "networked" shows, which do not originate from Kent.

* "Kevin Hughes in the Evening" (formerly "Music Control") and "Nightshift" (formerly "Music On Demand") both come from GWR Bristol.
*"Wind Down" originates from BRMB in Birmingham.
* "Gaz Wezley"Party Anthems", the Jason Donavan, Pat Sharp and Philippa Collins Shows and hit40uk all come from Capital 95.8 in Leicester Square, London.

tation Straplines

*1984 - "The Sound of Kent"

*1985 - "You've Got It Right" and "Right Across The County"

*1988 - "Tune In And Rip The Knob Off!"

*1989 - "60s, 70s & 80s"

*1990 - "The Best Music"

*1994 - "Betta... Brighta... Hotta... Stronga"

*1995 - "Kent's Best Music"

*1996 - "Kent's Best Music and More of It"

*1996 - "Kent's Number One Hit Music Station"

*1998 - "Today's Music For Kent"

*2000 - "Today's Best Music For Kent"

*2003 - "Kent's Radio Station"

*2005 - "The Best Mix of the 80s, 90s and Today"

*2006 - "Today's Best Mix"

*2008 - "Haven't You Heard"

*2008 (2) - More Music Variety

Trivia

*The word "Invicta" is the county of Kent's Latin motto and means "unconquered".
*Ex-presenter and now quite famous Daryl Denham once fell asleep during a show.
*Geoff Allan in the middle of his mid-morning show left to go home and get a pigeon out of his loft
*Neil Francis overslept and missed the start of the first ever "Morning Zoo" programme, presenting part of it by mobile phone from his car. The story made the front page of "Kent Today".
*Invicta Supergold breakfast presenters Dasher and Dawn (ex husband and wife Dave Asher and Caroline Martin) once went on "strike" because programme controller Sandy Beech removed their chairs. Story made front page of the Times
* Bob Mower and Tim Stewart both broadcast their shows live from Q101 in Chicago, and were joined by Q101's Murph in The Morning
*Invicta Supergold Presenter Johhny Lewis presented a live show from a hot air baloon over Kent.

tation staff

Current presenters

Since July 2008, only five shows (three daily, one each on Saturday and Sunday) on Invicta are based locally, the rest are all networked, as detailed below:

Local Presenters:

*James Heming (Chief breakfast presenter since 2000 and the longest serving presenter, since 1997)
*Ben Mundy (Hosted 'The Score' on Saturday afternoons. Now reads travel at breakfast and Drive during the week)
*Andy Walker (Weekday afternoon presenter, until recently fronted Party Invicta on Saturday nights)
*Neil Kefford (Weekday drivetime and Saturday breakfast presenter)
*Korenne Lofts (Saturday breakfast co-presenter)
*Louis Hurst (Sunday breakfast)

Networked Presenters:

*Philippa Collins (Weekday mornings)
*Kevin Hughes (Music Control - weekday evenings)
*Cat James (The Wind Down - weeknights)
*Dan Wood (Music On Demand (weeknights). Andy Henly on Friday nights
*Pat Sharp (Saturday lunchtime)
*Mark Dennison (Saturday afternoons)
*Gaz Wesley (Friday and Saturday night Party Anthems)
*Jo Russell (Sunday afternoons)
*Lucio (hit40uk - Sunday afternoon)
*Jason Donovan (Sunday Night With Jason Donovan - Sundays)

Past presenters

*Geoff Allen (now at BBC Solent)
*Mark Anthony Aka Mark Fox, (Later at Virgin Radio)
*Andy Archer (now at BBC Norfolk)
*Doc Atherton (Freelances at KMFM but now mainly runs a Pharmacy in Broadstairs)
*Bam Bam (later at Galaxy 105, then Kiss 100 and Capital 95.8)
*Adam Bridge (now at GCap Media Programming Dept)
*Caesar the Boogieman (aka Chris Ryder)
*Dave Cash (now at BBC Radio Kent)
*Ray Clark (formerly Breeze AM, now BBC Essex)
*Ian Collins (now at talkSPORT)
*Roger Day (now at BBC Radio Kent)
*Paul Deacon
*Geoff Fitch (later Neptune), (now qualified Paramedic NHS)
*Daryl Denham (later 100.7 Heart FM, Virgin Radio at Century FM (North-East), Hallam FM now at Real Radio Yorkshire)
*Paul Ellen AKA Pies In The Skies (now at Time 106.8, South London radio and KMFM)
*Neil Faraday (now at KMFM)
*Caroline Feraday (later LBC 97.3, now at BBC South-East Today)
*Chris Finn (now at KMFM)
*Nino Firetto later Super Channel
*Neil Francis (now at Virgin Radio)
*Nigel Harris (now KMFM)
*Tim Stewart (Now working in film)
*Steve Harris (now at Xfm London)
*Sam Hughes (now at Gold)
*Jerry James (now at BBC Leeds)
*Adrian John
*Duncan Johnson
*Kerry Juby (Deceased)
*Eamonn Kelly
*Myleene Klass (Formerly hosted Networked Sunday evening show) with Matt Brown
*Rob Knight
*Claire Lawson (Ex-Drivetime and morning presenter)
*Simon Lee
*Bob LeRoi (ex Invicta Supergold)
*Johnny Lewis (now at KMFM)
*Wendy Lloyd (later LBC 97.3)
*Rod Lucas (now at BBC Radio Five Live)
*Justin Mannington (occasional DJ and full-time Record Librarian, Coast AM)
*Dan Marsh (now at {Dubai 92)
*Jonathan Miles (now at {BBC Radio Newcastle)
*Bob Mower (Coast AM/Invicta Supergold, now breakfast KMFM Canterbury)
*Tim Murphy (still at Essex FM)
*Sarah Ollett
*John Osborne (now at Virgin Radio)
*Simon Parkin (later Real Radio, now at BBC Somerset Sound)
*Chris Pearson (now at BFBS)
*Carl Partridge (Carter) (former Breakfast Producer - now a writer)
*Richard Porter (later Virgin Radio and Magic 105.4, now a Producer at thejazz)
*Lee Price (now at Virgin Radio)
*Terry Purvis
*Rik "The Lovesponge" Scott (now at KMFM)
*Benedict Smith (KMFM and freelances at other GCap sites in the South East)
*Dobbo (now producing the Invicta FM Breakfast Show)
*Paul Stafford (Living on Rock) - Now in Western Australia on Radio Fremantle (The World Football Programme)
*Neil Taylor (now at KMFM)
*Pete Tong (now at BBC Radio 1)
*Glen Thompsett (now at Meridian TV etc)
*Tim Votier (now at BSkyB and 107.8 Radio Jackie)
*Ali Wheeler (left to become a full-time mother)
*Simon West
*Rick Edwards (now at Gemini FM) NOT the Channel 4 presenter.
*Jerry Wright (now at 107.8 Radio Jackie SW London & North Surrey)
*Stephen Sullivan (Now at Capital 95.8)
*Ryan Seacrest
*Allan Lake
* [Tony Peters] (Now at [http://www.valleysradio.co.uk/presenter.php?presenter=79] Valleys Radio)
*Jeremy Kyle (aka 'Jezza', later at BRMB/Century/Virgin, was at Capital 95.8 (and other GCap stations) and on The Jeremy Kyle Show on ITV. Presented The Jeremy Kyle Show, Saturday afternoons. Jeremy and James Heming first started on Invicta at the end of 1996 with a double act evening show, before Jeremy moved to host the Confessions show on BRMB and James to a short stint at XFM London breakfast.

Past newsreaders

*John Brunning (now Classic FM, a GCap sister station)
*Paul Chantler
*Leon Robins
*Sue Flipping
*Stuart Thomas
*Jane Hill (now Lincs FM)
*Jo Blake
*Richard Forest
*Tony Shepherd
*Alan Granville
*Jenny Barsby
*Paul King
*The Mousse
*Dan Marsh
*Tony Doe
*Tim Jones
*Stuart Green
*Will Barkway
*Claire Martin
*Tony Fisher
*Jo Sykes

Programme Controllers

*1984 - Roger Day
*1989 - Kerry Juby
*1990 - Roger Day
*1991 - Neil Taylor
*1992 - Johnny Lewis
*1993 - Francis Currie
*1995 - Sandy Beech
*1996 - Paul Jackson
*1997 - Clive Dickens (caretaker, assisted by Tim Stewart and Lee Price)
*1997 - Andrew Phillips
*1999 - Jeff O'Brien (caretaker, assisted by Tim Stewart and Lee Price)
*1999 - Luis Clark
*2000 - Mark Sadler (caretaker, assisted by Tony Fisher and Lee Price)
*2000 - Mike Osborne
*2002 - Rebecca Trbojevich
*2004 - Max Hailey
*2005 - Craig Boddy
*2008 - Craig Boddy/Mike Osborne

Past producers

*Rik Scott
*Dominic Hill
*Adam Bridge
*Karl Pilkington
*Bruce Nevard
*Lee Price
*David Francis

External links

* [http://www.invictafm.com/ Invicta FM Website]
* [http://www.gcapmedia.com/ GCap Media plc Corporate Website]