New sound for Lancaster community radio station

Volunteer-led community radio station 103.5 Beyond Radio is planning an on-air rebrand following feedback and suggestions from local people.
Beyond Radio's mascot with morning volunteer presenter Denise Cooper.Beyond Radio's mascot with morning volunteer presenter Denise Cooper.
Beyond Radio's mascot with morning volunteer presenter Denise Cooper.

The station, which recently celebrated its third year on air and has studios in Bowerham, will slowly start to introduce a new sound and a new voice which may sound familiar to radio lovers.

Nathan Hill, the station’s commercial director, said: “We’ve been listening to public feedback about what local people want to hear on their radios, our new strapline is ‘Real Local Radio’ and to us it’s more than just a throw away strapline.

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“We live in a rapidly changing world and the local media landscape has changed dramatically over the past number of years and our team of staff and 80+ local volunteers are working extremely hard to provide a great local radio service that Lancaster and Morecambe can be proud of.

“Part of our growth of the station is to ensure we have a recognisable brand and give our audience something they can relate to – it’s not only about playing great music, there’s got to be more to it.”

“Whist we believe our brand is very strong, there’s always room for improvement and after hearing feedback we’ve decided to launch a new jingle package which include the words “Real Local Radio” and heavily refers to our wonderful local area in which we are proudly based.

“We’ve also decided to use the voice of Ian Brannan, and whilst the name may not be familiar with many people, his voice probably will be; he was the familiar voice which was used for The Bay Radio for around 15 years just before it changed to Heart Radio.

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“Re-branding a radio station’s sound is quite a large task, there’s a lot of audio to edit, so we’re planning a phased implementation of the new jingles and we’ll slowly start to shift and develop our sound over the next number of weeks.

“Beyond Radio was launched in July 2017 by me and a fellow group of local volunteer radio enthusiasts and has quickly grown in reputation and in size.

“We’re always open to new volunteers too and no experience is necessary – we would encourage anybody who wishes to get involved to head to our website and fill out the volunteer registration form.

“We’ve seen a number of our volunteers move on to paid employment in the media industry and it just a great organisation with a great set of volunteers which I’m immensely proud of.”

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