Hilarious to me that no one is talking about this aspect. It is going to be one hell of a costly endeavour for ARN, who is already having to cut costs off the back of Kyle and Jack’s new contracts
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I kinda think that’s a possibility.
I know others think they want Triple M for the sport, which could be true. But I wouldn’t be at all surprised if their version of a national Triple M network ends up being much more like the current Pure Gold network under the Triple M name. Maybe still with some sport but not as much, and maybe with a slightly younger and rock leaning music format, but not hugely different to what’s on Gold/WS now. It would certainly work in Brisbane, Adelaide and Perth (on 96 Triple M, with KIIS 94.5 and Hit 92.9 perhaps).
I just can’t see them sticking with the current form of 2MMM and 3MMM
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Whatever ARN end up with will always be some sort of a compromise with ACP, because i don’t they’ll just accept whatever ARN don’t want. And will depend on what sort of model ACP want given they are not a media company.
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I do wonder what sort of involvement ACP will actually have in the running of their stations in reality. Will they actually just be run by ARN in reality with ACP more a silent partner to satisfy ownership rules. If ARN are really pulling the strings behind the scenes then the Hit network for example might deliberately move away from CHR to “make way” for KIIS and boost their success.
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If ARN are having any operational influence on the ACP stations, isn’t that a breach of the 2 station rule?
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The Regionals changed to a Rock’s Greatest Hits format in 2020 which i liked a lot only for the ratings to tank, I antkind of sick of hearing most of the songs that Triple M Newcastle and the Regional versions sound like a WSFM clone and play the songs you would most likely hear on the HIT Metro stations such as Ed Sheeran, Robbie Williams, Michael Jackson (an ideal song that the metros would play is “Beat It” which features a guitar solo from Eddie Van Halen) and to a lesser extent Whitney Houston and Madonna. It would be good for ARN To make the Regionals live up to the Triple M name or at least convert them to a Jack FM format.
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Only if anyone finds out. I’m sure there will be a lot of operational “efficiencies” between the two groups. I don’t think there’s anything to stop shared facilities for example.
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96FM will never go back to Triple M and 92.9 will never flip back to Hit. Despite almost 25 years since 96.1 Triple M changed back to 96FM and Hit 92.9 becoming Triple M, it still confused some people.
I expect anything they do will be backed by a massive marketing campaign to re-educate listeners.
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I would never say never with something like that. I bet a lot of Perth people would have said Triple M would never return to Perth in the early 90s after it left 96.1.
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i don’t want to imagine the uproar here in perth if the 96FM and Mix94.5 brand names were killed off lol - networked drive had a lot of uproar here as it is
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I expect them to spend as little as possible to re-educate listeners, especially in Perth. And if people are already confused…
Not sure massive marketing campaigns are in the budget nowadays.
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Wow! Rude much!? There’s only about 400K fewer people than Brisbane.
If talent are moving from one station to another, there will most definitely be marketing campaigns (aka buses adorned with the breakfast team, TV commercials, news coverage). It certainly happened when Austereo completed their purchase of PMFM and 94.5 and Southern Cross purchased 96FM. There was talent moving between 92.9 and 96FM and I remember the news stories and marketing campaigns.
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I think this is it.
ARN won’t want to get rid of Christian O’Connell, why would they when he’s consistently #1 in Melbourne. He’s also based out of the same Melbourne studio as Kiss (albeit with K&J broadcasting from Sydney), so it just doesn’t make sense to separate them.
I imagine they keep K&J, move it to a nationally syndicated network which will include Mix 102.3 Adelaide and it’s equivalent in Brisbane, not sure about Perth given the time zone difference. Christian will keep his show, but the station will be re-labelled as MMM, everything else about it will remain pretty much the same as it is today on Gold. We’ve seen in Adelaide the MMM playing a “rock’s greatest hits format” works well (admittedly we don’t have an FM Gold equivalent they compete with).
Existing MMM space at SCA will likely be re-branded, and focus on male-oriented rock, with a heavy sport focus, and retaining localised shows and content.
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Plus the football.
The other way of looking at it is Triple M as it is with OC and the ARN Classic Hits music log?
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Exactly - Christian keeps his show, his team, and the Gold music log remains the same. Really only the station name changes.
Meanwhile what’s currently MMM Melbourne also remains largely as-is, they keep Marty and a male-oriented playlist, and footy on weekends. I’ve read the brand MMM have built up among cashed-up males is very lucrative to advertisers.
The long term game is for ARN to run two national shows. MMM retain more local content. Do they even need a merge with MMM to achieve that?
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You answered your own question. This is what ARN want.
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The nail has been hit smack on the head here.
ARN already have KIIS dominating the women, however, lately (since moving aware from Good Times & Great Classic Hits), the Pure Gold network is sounding a little too ‘pop’ for their liking. At least by having Triple M, ARN could really dominate all-round.
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I think it’s going to take more than adding O’Connell in for Breakfast to make Triple M dominate in the ratings, particularly in Sydney.
I think they will need to tinker with the music, go a bit less rock and more greatest hits, and spend up BIG on promoting it, something SCA never did much with Triple M.
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I’m pretty sure ACMA will be watching this one very closely, probably other networks/station owners too, though that’s few these days.
As for anything stopping shared facilities, not sure about now, but I don’t remember hearing anything change, & when 2CH Sydney was sold & 2UE moved in with them & 2GB, both MRN as it was at the time & the new 2CH owners had to give ACMA an assurance that there was no operational influence on 2CH by MRN & that 2CH would move studio locations within 12months so they aren’t co-located with the other two & there was no way an operational influence could happen.
It’ll remain to be seen how ARN/ACP achieve this to suit ACMA?
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Isn’t the plan for ARN to take over the whole Triple M network and for ACP to take over the Hit network? This would include the DAB extensions. LiSTNR will be co-owned by both ARN and ACP.