The stations caters to a mainly young provincial audience with a potential listenership of 150,000. It is aimed at 15- to 34-year-olds and plays mainly popular music. The first song was played by Seamus Barry, and it was Timbaland's "The Way I Are". The station broadcasts to the Munster region on 102-103 and 94.7 MHz FM. It is on air 24/7 playing popular music during most of the day and dance or techno music during the night. Specialist weekend shows hosted by Paul Webb, Peter Curtin and Code cover house, techno, hip-hop and drum'n'bass respectively. SPIN South West's format is taken from Dublin's SPIN 1038, the original SPIN station started in 2002, also owned by Denis O'Brien's Communicorp Group Limited. The SouthWest station also simulcasts programmes from its Dublin sister station. The primary example of this is SPIN Hits with Nikki Hayes, which is broadcast from 9:45 to 12:45 am daily. However, this is no longer broadcast since SPIN Now began. The stations make use of split links to regionalise the show, however generic jingles referring to the station as SPIN are used. Other programmes such as Club Educate and Hit 30 na hÉireann are also syndicated. In mid-2012, SPIN South West began using the same imaging as SPIN 1038, and also stopped its own news in favour of syndicated news from its Dublin counterpart.
History
Its original management team included Aevann Upton, Nessa McGann, and Julie White. The station started with a total of 47 staff, including an on-air line-up of Seamus Barry, Dan Mooney, Jacqui Leahy, Muireann O'Connell, Ed Roche, Ciara Revins, Chloe Liddy Judge, Michelle Mc Mahon, Conor Quaid, John Hayes, Aiden McAuliffe, Caroline Smith. Many of the presenters came from student radio stations in the region, with 3 coming from local station Live 95FM, Seamus Barry joined SPIN from Cork's 96FM. The Programme Director, Nessa McGann joined SPIN from a similar role in Wired FM, a student station in Limerick. Joint National Listenership Research listener figures as of 17/02/2011 showed SPIN South West had a weekly audience of 143,000, an increase of 4000 since the last figures. In 2016, The Radio Station opened a second studio in Tralee, County Kerry and broadcast shows weekly. This also is an office for Sales and Marketing.
Awards and recognition
The station was nominated for three PPI radio Awards in 2009, for chat show SPIN Talk, Station Imaging, and breakfast show Breakfast Xpresso, as well as one for an insert for The Lisbon Treaty which featured Peter Curtin, Jacqui Leahy, John Hayes & Ciara Revins. In 2009 The Zoo Crew, then presented by Michelle McMahon & Conor Quaid was nominated for a Meteor Ireland Music Award for best Regional DJ. In 2010 Michelle McMahon was nominated for her new time-slot on SPIN @ Work. In 2013 Eoghain Fitz won Gold for Best Radio Dj, Ed Roche, Sheena Faughnan, Ray Wingnut, Bridget Nicholas, and Jason Murphy were nominated for various awards at the 2013 PPI Radio Awards. In 2014 Ray Wingnut won a Gold PPI Award for Specialist Music Programme, and also a Bronze Award in the New Irish Music/Musical Talent category. Ed Roche & Sheena Faughnan won The Silver Award for Best Music Programme with The Zoo Crew Hot 30. The station also won an award for its Station Imaging.
