I’ve said for around 5 years now Newcastle is ripe for competition. With a market population of around 850,000 it’s by far the largest market in Australia with just 1 commercial news service.
Of course with Seven owning the station now it makes a lot more sense. The Nine/NBN bulletin is average at best.
Time for a shake up
A new player And some competition is exactly what Newcastle and NBN needs to raise the bar
That would be an absolute steal for Seven
Yea it would. And I’d say Seven and NBN know it.
I’m not sure he would pack up his life in Newcastle and move to Sydney for a gig.
It wouldn’t be produced in Newcastle?
Seems a bit “arrogant”. I wouldn’t say the Seven was the dominant news service in Melbourne or Brisbane or perhaps the Gold Coast.
Looking at the first 6 months of this year Seven is ahead in Melbourne by 3,000 and Brisbane by 2,000. In Brisbane Nine has won more survey weeks including the last.
They should’ve said Queensland.
I would say Seven was dominant in Regional Queensland, Adelaide and Perth but not any of the east coast metro markets.
I’ld be VERY surprised if they didn’t centralise it from their new digs in Refern. Their news department already runs on a shoestring budget, I can’t see them investing big money into another brand new facility just 150km up the road.
That’s fair. True true.
Wouldn’t be that expensive to have a set in Newcastle and do switching in Sydney if they decide to go down that road, unless someone like Paul Lobb was “exclusive” to the Newcastle bulletin if presented from Everleigh.
In that case Daniel Gibson for Canberra and Geoff Phillips for Illawarra/Far South Coast if they’re going for name recognition.
Still very costly and time consuming when they can just present the bulletin using existing infrastructure and resources, 150km down the road.
True but you could use the same argument for Seven Maroochydore.
I’m sure Seven realises a pre-recorded local news produced in Sydney up against NBN News isn’t going to cut through though.
Geoff Phillips would have been a great option for a “Seven News Illawarra” bulletin at one point in time, however he has been retired for a number of years now. Seven would have to offer him a huge sum of money to lure him out of retirement!
If I was the news director at Seven and responsible for hiring a presenter for the Illawarra/South Coast bulletin, Melissa Russel would be my top pick for the role. She’s a great newsreader and arguably even better than Bruce Roberts IMO, but she’s behind him in the pecking order at WIN.
Stephen Murphy presenting the noodle updates
To be honest, I don’t think he’d be a good fit for Seven News. Very well known and a stalwart in the region, but I feel he’s past his prime.
Wouldn’t someone good be a better option?
Absolutely, they’d want someone with energy. I’m sure he’s a nice guy, but there’s a reason he never went further than Win.
Getting Lobb would be great for that region, but I don’t necessarily think he’s a good presenter. Same with Brough, Mitchell, Brunning. I often wonder how they got there and what it is that makes them popular. But the viewers seem to resonate with these presenters. There’s something familiar that they like about them. I think it would work in Seven’s favour rather than recruiting a new face.
Yeah I agree. He wouldn’t be my personal pick for a bulletin of the sort, but if Seven were specifically after someone who’s well-known and has years of experience, he would be one of the few, local media personalities who would have been suited to present an Illawarra-based bulletin.
Maybe 15+ years ago it would have made some sense to offer him a role, but not in 2022 (and especially not in the current media landscape). I doubt he would have ever left WIN anyway, even if he had been offered a presenting role on a competitor’s bulletin.
Certainly people know Daniel Gibson and like him, and he’s a good choice
Many other names have also been well known in Canberra in days gone by for WIN news and Ten Capital News
If we’re talking hypotheticals here I’d love to see Greg Robson presenting a Canberra news bulletin