Indie Ladbroke Productions exits radio

The first radio indie to produce a programme for the BBC is no longer pitching for work as it gears up to leave radio.

Ladbroke Productions has been producing radio programming for the BBC since the early 1990s. In that time they have made around 500+ different productions and many thousands of hours of output for all of the national networks and for BBC World Service.

In a post on its website, the company says: “All good things must come to an end, and in a time of tough budgets, low commissioning results and higher prodction costs, we are sad to announce that Ladbroke Productions is no longer pitching for BBC radio work. As of Feb 2013 we are not open for commissioning ideas, and will not be engaging in any of the forthcoming commissioning rounds.

“We have a year of existing BBC programming contracts to work on, and then, once everything has been delivered the company will join with our audiobook production sister company Ladbroke Audio to form one enterprise, focusing on the audiobook and archive sales & production market.

Over the years a number of radio producers have gone independent creating a thriving ‘indie’ scene. Ashley Byrne, Creative Director of fellow indie Made in Manchester Productions also also makes programmes for the BBC.

He told RadioToday: “I’m sad to see Ladbroke abandon radio production. They’ve a record to be really proud of and have made some of the best radio of the past few decades. In many ways they were pioneers in the sector. It’s a real loss to both indie production and to BBC radio. I wish Neil and his team the best of luck in their new ventures”