TGIF AT BBC 1

BBC Radio 1 has shaken up its weekend scheduling to further entice the youth market with a new three-day program that starts a day earlier on Friday. That means the famous Breakfast Show, hosted by Nick Grimshaw, has been cut down to four days, with Dev and Alice Levine to take over morning hosting duties on the fifth day.

Following that, a Radio 1’s Greatest Hits slot will be presented by Maya Jama, and Saturdays singer Mollie King joins Matt Edmondson for a Friday afternoon slot. The usual chart show presented by Scott Mills follows.

Grimshaw took over the Breakfast presenting slot in 2012 to bring a fresh and young voice to the slot. In Q4 2017, the show’s audience was 6.16m listeners a week—down from the 7m previous host Chris Moyles notched up during his eight years in the job. However, station Controller Ben Cooper notes that Radio 1 has more than 10m listeners overall and 10.7m views on its YouTube channel per week, and 10m+ followers on social media.

“Growing new young audiences for the BBC and developing new talent for the industry is what I want Radio 1 to be famous for, alongside its mainstay of breaking new U.K. artists,” Cooper said. “The three ambitions though are symbiotic. Radio 1 can keep attracting new audiences if it keeps making noise and trying new things with presenters that reflect youth culture and that are passionate about the new music they play.

“Radio 1 is a world famous brand and I want it to stay that way — for the BBC, for the U.K. music industry and most of all for young audiences. By never being boring, always innovating and by celebrating the weekend a day early, I strongly believe we can achieve that.”