There is another station with the name Kiss on air in Melbourne.

Kyle and Jackie are not on it.

Kiss FM (spelt with one I) is a dance music narrowcast station, owned and managed by Timmy Byrne and Kate Wignell. It was on air long before ARN brought the other KIIS brand to Melbourne by renaming the old TTFM/MixFM station in line with the network’s Sydney brand name.

The narrowcaster has run into trouble with the ACMA because some of its transmitters are not working due to technical issues and theft.

A Go Fund Me campaign raising money to restore all the transmitters to working order says, “because we operate on a very limited budget and due to delays beyond our control in getting access to transmitter sites, our efforts to bring the licences affected by those thefts back into compliance with the broadcasting authority’s requirements have been hampered, resulting in the broadcasting authority recently turning up the heat.”

Kiss faces a number of challenges, outlined by Timmy in the campaign:

According to station research, the Kiss audience comprises:

99,000 listeners per week to the FM transmissions,  “however this figure only represents half of Melbourne, so you can safely double that and add other people in the car/room listening,” says the station.

Kiss has 30,000 online streams nationwide and is also heard in 150 countries per day.  Seven percent of the audience is Aboriginal and Torres Strait islander,  11% is LGBTQI and 99% are aged over 18. 42% of the audience earn over $100K, 70% work fulltime.

KISS FM has been operating as a low powered open narrowcast (LPON) FM radio station since 2005, supporting local DJs and Producers with music and DJ mixes. “Our mission is to make underground electronic dance music, including hip-hop, accessible to all without having to answer to commercial overlords,” says the station.

KISS FM is funded by its members and some advertising. All the hosts and presenters are members.

The ACMA has been approached for comment and we will add the ACMA response when it arrives.