Market Overview

On the following pages you will find a description of the radio landscape in some 15 European countries offering a brief look into how different markets are developing and what opportunities radio offers across Europe.

In addition to these general market profiles, a restricted access area for egta members offers a more detailed overview of national advertising markets, major market players, legislative background, pricing policies etc. Though not exhaustive the extensive overview of figures is unique in Europe and represents the data used by radio professionals in the respective country.


Switzerland

Prior to 1983, there were no private radio stations on the Swiss airwaves. Radio 24, a commercial radio, however, aired illegally from Northern Italy and quickly found success. The station’s popularity with audiences and advertisers ultimately broke down the state monopoly and private radio stations were free to air on the liberalised airwaves.

To date radio has not failed to maintain its popularity in Switzerland with about 90% reach and average listening time at around 118 minutes per day.

Dominating the Swiss media landscape are printed media with 51 percent of media adspend. In relation to the population and size of Switzerland the number of printed media is quite above average. TV in turn takes a 31 percent share of the advertising market and radio accounts for 3,7 percent.

There are 56 private radios and 6.3 million listeners in Switzerland – 1.488.500 listeners in French-speaking Switzerland, 4.504.500 in German-speaking Switzerland and 281.000 in Italian-speaking Switzerland. In addition a number of public and private stations from neighbouring Italy, Germany, Austria and France spill over into Switzerland.

Ownership of Swiss radio stations is strongly defined by cross-media links between print and radio. The largest private radio stations Radio 24, Radio Zürisee, Radio Argovia and Radio Energy Zurich are owned by the publishing houses Tamedia, NZZ-Group , AZ Medien and Ringier respectively.

Strong public broadcaster

The public broadcaster SRG SSR maintains a strong position in the market. Swiss public broadcasting is financed through advertising and license fees which are defined by the Federal Council. Public broadcaster SSR-SRG is allowed advertising on television but not radio. SRG SSR has six radio studios in Zurich, Berne, Basle, Geneva, Lausanne and Lugano that ultimately mirror the multilingual and multicultural structure of Switzerland.

Given the politival and geographic conditions in Switzerland radio is sold in “pools” with the aim of facilitating national and/or language specific bookings of local radios for advertisers who wish to aggregate their reach. There are currently moe than 30 radio pools in Switzerland which are defined according to linguistic areas, regions or towns and cities.

Innovative passive audience measurement

When it comes to audience measurement the Swiss have proven to be quite innovative, being one of the first European markets to establish a passive measurement system as the country’s radio currency - the so-called Media Watch. Since January 2009, radio audiences in Switzerland are being measured solely using the Mediawatch. The newly adapted Mediawatch is able to measure more frequently and the panels have been adapted so as to be more representative with regards to geography and socio-demographic factors. The results for the first quarter of 2009 revealed positive results.

Restriced accessMembers Only Section (Restricted Access)
This section contains more specific information on the market; including overviews of the market players, adspend, media mix, household equipment, pricing policies, seasonality indexes, legislation concerning advertising placement, as well as audience measurement technical factors.