The optimism that the radio industry bestowed on Capital three months ago has been shattered by a shocking fall in the latest Rajars, posing questions about the new strategy for the station implemented last year.
In the second quarter 2007, there was a humbling fall to fourth place in London, behind the niche dance station Kiss. This followed months of appeals that people should wait before judging until the new programmer arrived, the new marketing campaign had bedded in or until the new London managing director Fru Hazlitt had made her mark. Now there are few excuses left to give.
Last week, Hazlitt said the station's poor result - the 4.1% market share was the lowest ever for Capital - was simply part of the process of "transformation" and though she was confident of a turnaround this would "not happen overnight".
She took comfort from the fact that Capital's audience profile was getting younger. Taking a station younger is more difficult than adding older listeners, according to GMG Radio chief executive John Myers. "It will be competing for the 25-year-old listener's time against a whole range of different media, as well as going up against all the London stations that are after the same demographic," he says.
Stick to plan
Myers believes it would be "unwise" to bet against Hazlitt and Co not being able to turn the station around. "Who knows how long it will take (to improve), but I assume it has researched its creative campaign and is getting the thumbs up from the audience it's going to, so my advice is always stick to the plan," he adds.
Meanwhile, as Capital fights for listeners, advertisers are not yet deserting the ship. One former senior executive at the station believes advertisers would still rather head to Capital, where the station is not as popular but is foreground music, than to Magic, which is the number one commercial station in London, but is traditionally a background sound. But he also believes it is imperative to Capital's progress that it accepts "the new reality" - the success of Radio 1.
"Everyone talks about Magic, Heart and Kiss, but they're missing the point," he says. "Where Capital used to own the mainstream London sound, Radio 1 is now in charge."
He believes commercial radio is guilty of not holding on to talented presenters.
"Chris Moyles used to be at Capital," he points out. "He is a phenomenom only matched by Chris Tarrant's success. It needs to find another demographic-busting personality for the breakfast show."
Celebrity DJs at Radios 1 and 2 are the collective excuse for why commercial radio cannot beat the BBC in share, but Victoria Sangster, head of radio at Mediaedge:cia, disagrees that celebrity is crucial.
"Magic is not DJ-led, but is number one in London," she says. "Kiss has done really well and everyone is singing the praises of these two unknown DJs at breakfast."
The well-known volatility of Rajar statistics might be a factor in Capital's result, according to some. In Q1 this year, Virgin Radio was told it had lost 30% of its young male listeners.
"You can have a rogue book," says its chief executive Paul Jackson. "Our hours had gone down massively, but this quarter we were back up again.
"When you spend a large amount in the marketplace, you expect to get a trickle of people trying it out, so to lose audience is unheard of," he says. "If the format and positioning is not working, you have to write it off and start again."
Drastic step
This may be a drastic solution, but one thing is certain among industry commentators - it is time for Capital to concede partial defeat and accept its position.
While Kiss owns the 15 to 24 age group, Heart the 25 to 34s and Magic the 35 to 44s, Capital is floundering without a demographic to pursue. "It can't be all things to all people," says one rival. "Capital still has the best seat on the beach, but it's about working out who it wants to appeal to and then doing that in large doses."
As has been said by many commentators before, Capital needs to find an identity, an audience, and stick to it.