Radio 106 Radio 106 launched at 6am on Tuesday 23 September 1997 as the East Midlands’ Independent Regional Radio station. Billed as
Radio for Grown Ups, with an advertising campaign on
Central TV for the launch, and an episode of Central TV's '24 hours' in 1998 documented the launch and the relaunch of the station, the station was launched by ex-Radio Trent managing director Ron Coles with former
Centre Radio MD Ken Warburton as programming controller. The first presenter on air was Dickie Dodd. Radio 106's launch schedule included a heavy emphasis on speech content, including daily guests on mid-morning shows and a nightly 3-hour phone-in. Specialist music output featured country, soul and Motown at weekends. The station's launch team included Kevin Fernihough, Mark Keen, Willie Morgan, Kenny Hague, Jake Yapp, Peter King and Sarah Graham. Against competition from established
BBC Local Radio and
GWR-owned commercial stations, Radio 106 recorded poor listening figures, so within seven months of launch, the station's owners
Border Radio Holdings opted for a complete relaunch.
Century 106 In April 1998,
John Myers took control of the station, which was rebranded as "Century 106" and relaunched with a new team of presenters, including Adrian Allen and Chris Ashley. Former
Radio Trent presenter David Lloyd became the station's Managing Director and Programme Controller with ex-Trent colleagues including Tony Lyman, Craig Strong, Gary Burton and Andy Marriott joining the presenting line-up. Other additions to the team included Steve Jordan (breakfast) and Bernie Keith (afternoons). In May 2000, Century 106, along with the other Century stations in the North East and North West, were sold to
Capital Radio. David Lloyd left the station to join
Galaxy 105 in Leeds while presenter Adrian Allen walked out mid-show in protest. The sale to Capital brought an increase in the station's sports coverage - as emphasised in the slogan
music, fun and football. More new presenters joined Century, including Ian Skye, Jason King, Stuart Ellis,
Sam Pinkham and Paula White.
Heart 106 When Capital later merged with GWR, the
Office of Fair Trading ordered Century to be sold off.
Chrysalis bought Century 106 for £29.5m and planned to rebrand the station as
Heart 106, to go with
100.7 Heart FM in the West Midlands as the area matched that of the
ITV Central region and would make it more attractive to advertisers. Heart 106 was launched on 29 August 2005. A further, more subtle rebrand was applied in September 2006 which saw the dropping of the frequencies from station names across the
Heart Network. On 25 June 2007, Chrysalis announced the sale of Heart, along with its sister stations
The Arrow,
LBC and
Galaxy, for £170 million to
Global Radio. Following Global's takeover of
GCap Media, the Office of Fair Trading again ordered Global to sell off Heart and four other Midlands stations -
BRMB,
Mercia FM,
Wyvern FM and
Beacon Radio. In May 2009, the stations were sold to
Orion Media, a company backed by
Lloyds Development Capital and
Phil Riley.
Gem 106 On 9 November 2010, Orion Media announced that Heart 106 would be relaunched and renamed as 'Gem 106' on 1 January 2011. Under the rebrand, the station ended its franchise agreement with Global Radio which allowed it to use the Heart identity and carry networked programming from London. Gem 106 was launched at midnight on Saturday 1 January 2011 with a special programme presented by Orion's director of programming and marketing
David Lloyd. The GEM name stands for 'Great East Midlands', the name created and used from 1988 onwards for
GEM-AM (later Classic Gold GEM) an AM (medium wave), 'solid gold' secondary service of Radio Trent. The majority of the station's programming is locally produced and broadcast from Nottingham. As of March 2016, Gem refreshed their imaging and jingle package using a custom package from Wisebuddah, at which point the '106' was dropped from the name. On 6 May 2016, the station's owners, Orion, announced they had been bought by
Bauer for an undisclosed fee, reportedly between £40 and £50 million. As of August 2016, Gem is aligned with the
Hits Radio network, using its generic on-air imaging package. The station retained its own regional programming throughout the day. In July 2019, Gem began taking overnight programming from the
Hits Radio Network in Manchester on Sunday - Thursday nights before gradually expanding to evening and off-peak output. As of May 2022, Gem broadcasts a regional breakfast show on weekdays from the Nottingham studios, alongside hourly news bulletins seven days a week and traffic updates at peak times. All other programming output comes from the Hits Radio Network.
End of analogue broadcasting - 106 MHz FM On 29 August 2023, Bauer announced that from 2 October 2023, Gem will be available only on DAB and online, while its FM frequency, 106 MHz will be switched to Greatest Hits Radio, stating that 'there are so many FM frequencies in the area it was not possible for both stations to be on FM at once'. At 10:00pm on 1 October 2023, Gem ceased FM transmissions. The station's FM frequency, 106 MHz FM, was switched to
Greatest Hits Radio East Midlands.
Hits Radio rebrand On 10 January 2024, station owners Bauer announced Gem would be rebranded as
Hits Radio East Midlands from 17 April 2024, as part of a network-wide relaunch involving 17 local radio stations in England and Wales. On 20 March 2025, Bauer announced it would end its regional Hits Radio breakfast show for the East Midlands to be replaced by a new national breakfast show for England and Wales on 9 June 2025. Local news and traffic bulletins were retained but the station's Nottingham studios were closed. The station's final regional programme aired on 6 June 2025. ==Audience==