KiwiFM canned, govt gets back frequencies

NZ Musician reports that KiwiFM is shutting down.

"Mediaworks have now confirmed that Kiwi FM will close down after 9 years on air as of March 31.

Kiwi FM has been broadcasting on reserved crown frequencies in Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch, which will be returned to the crown."

 

The station received almost no support from Mediaworks during it's lifetime, hardly surprising given they had got the frequencies for free, so had nothing at stake. 

 

Originally launched as a 100% Kiwi music station, they tweaked that to 70% Kiwi a few years back, in an attempt to grow their audience beyond consistently miniscule ratings, despite city-wide frequencies in Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch..

 

They developed some great talent there, such as Wammo, Fleur Jack, Wallace Chapman and others. I enjoyed DJing on the station from 2008 for 3 years, before a restructure. But a station that treated Kiwi Music as a genre was never gonna work, long term. That's not how people listen to music.