The Breeze (formerly ''Andover Sound'') was an

independent local radio Independent Local Radio is the collective name given to commercial radio stations in the United Kingdom. As a result of the buyouts and mergers permitted by the Broadcasting Act 1990, and deregulation resulting from the Communications Act 2003, ...

station in England, serving

Andover Andover may refer to: Places Australia * Andover, Tasmania Canada * Andover Parish, New Brunswick * Perth-Andover, New Brunswick United Kingdom * Andover, Hampshire, England ** RAF Andover, a former Royal Air Force station United States * Ando ...

and northwest Hampshire, and parts of east Wiltshire from studios at Eastgate House in Andover. Beginning as Andover Sound in 2008, from 2011 the station was owned and operated by

Bauer Radio Bauer Media Audio UK is a UK-based radio division of the Bauer Media Group. History In early 2008, German magazine publisher Bauer bought the radio division of British company Emap, which had been established as East Midland Allied Press in ...

as part of The Breeze network. From September 2020 the station was replaced by

Greatest Hits Radio Greatest Hits Radio is a classic hits radio network in the United Kingdom, owned and operated by Bauer. Overview The network launched on 5 January 2015 as the "Bauer City 2 Network", and rebranded on 7 January 2019 due to the success of Ra ...

History

Originally launched in May 2008 as Andover Sound by ITV regional news presenter Ian Axton (now of

ITV West Country ITV West Country is the British television service provided by ITV Broadcasting Limited for the South West England franchise area on the ITV network. Previously, between 2009 and 2013, the area was a non-franchise region, branded with the sa ...

), who owned a majority 80% stake in the station with the remaining 20% owned by

Tindle Radio Tindle Radio is a media company which owns commercial stations in the Channel Islands and the Republic of Ireland. It has its head office in Farnham, Surrey, shared with Tindle Newspapers. History Sir Ray Tindle acquired Island FM in G ...

. Andover Sound bought out Kick FM, a station serving Newbury and West Berkshire, in June 2009; it was rebranded as Newbury Sound a month later. Both Andover and Newbury stations were sold to

Celador CPL Productions (formerly Celador) is a British entertainment company originally formed in the United Kingdom in 1981 as an independent television production company. It created and produced a number of popular light entertainment shows and is ...

in August 2011. On 12 March 2012, Celador announced Newbury Sound and Andover Sound would be rebranded as The Breeze, falling in line with an existing network of stations serving

South Hampshire South Hampshire is a term used mainly to refer to the conurbation formed by the city of Portsmouth, city of Southampton and the non-metropolitan boroughs of Gosport, Fareham, Havant and Eastleigh in southern Hampshire, South East England. The ...

and the West of England (Bristol, Somerset and West Wiltshire). The rebrand took place on 2 April 2012. In January 2012, the Newbury station was co-located to Andover Sound's studios. However, breakfast and weekday drive-time programming was presented from Basingstoke, with networked output from Southampton during off-peak hours. In September 2020, The Breeze in Andover and Newbury, along with other stations in the network, were rebranded to become part of the

network as Greatest Hits Radio Berkshire and East Hampshire.

Awards

As Andover Sound, the station won various radio industry awards, including a New York Festivals ''News/Documentary Special'' accolade in July 2009 for ''Remembering Jamie'', a half-hour programme on the sudden death of a local teenager. Andover Sound was also named as the Radio Academy South Station of the Year in December 2009. At the 2010

Sony Radio Academy Awards The Radio Academy Awards, started in 1983, were the most prestigious awards in the British radio industry. For most of their existence, they were run by ZAFER Associates, but in latter years were brought under the control of The Radio Academy ...

, Andover Sound won silver in the News Journalist of the Year category (for editor

Ben McGrail Ben McGrail (born 4 November) is a British broadcast journalist, best known for his work at ITV News West Country as their Somerset Correspondent. Career McGrail studied broadcast journalism at the University of Leeds from 2004 to 2007 where ...

& journalist Faye Marsh) and was nominated in the Station of the Year (300,000 or fewer listeners) category. In June 2010, the station was named as the Arqiva Commercial Radio Station of the Year (300,000 or fewer listeners).

References

External links

Official website
– archived 18 August 2020 {{DEFAULTSORT:Breeze (Andover) Radio stations in Hampshire Radio stations established in 2008 Test Valley Andover, Hampshire