3XY Easy Rock failed because there were already similar formatted stations in Melbourne at that time: 3MP whom were at or near the top of the ratings with its Easy Listening format, 3AK which was “Light and Lively” and to a lesser extent 3TT Classic Hits and Fox FM which had an adult contemporary format. As soon as the Easy Rock format was launched listeners deserted 3XY in their droves, people associated 3XY with rock and pop music and this was a radical move. The reason why 3DB changed call to 3TT in the first place was that people associated 3DB with horse racing (and on Sundays “Golden Memories”) and 3TT was a completely different format, it would be ratings suicide had they stayed with 3DB Classic Hits! Which was what happened at 3XY…
That was MIX’s problem. From its very first day, when people were getting to know it, all those station IDs on constant rotation (saying “ALL NEW” for several years, which was also annoying) boasting that they were the home of Billy Joel, Jon Farnham, Tina Arena, Bette Midler…and so on.
Problem was that XY had to do something… anything. It was losing favour with the kids who were going to FM and it was never going to get them back. They had to aim at the baby boomers which at the time was lucrative and was not so fussed about AM versus FM.
They couldn’t just keep going with the Hot Hits format. Maybe they could have targeted even older and gone after the MP audience… essentially what happened when it came back as Magic a few years later anyway.
Or as was proposed at one point, have XY go to a full on 60s/70s format… which was all set to happen at one point but fell through at literally the last moment i think when a takeover bid for the licence in 1991 fell through. And then KZFM picked up that format and went on to be very successful with it.
IIRC, the other challenge for 3XY was promotion, especially when the XYZoo (Richard Stubbs etc) started - there was bugger all promotion at the time, which made it easier for EON and FOX, even though it was a superior offering (in my humble opinion) to John Peters on EON and Kevin Hillier on FOX (who I think were running with Great Classic Rock - somewhat ironic given all the comments in other threads about the need for Classic Rock!) .
This was about the time the Liberal Party sold XY to Paul Dainty Corporation who bought the station to promote his concerts and as I understand for the property value of 411 King Street. He didn’t promote the station and after selling the property, he passed off XY to 2SM (1989?) who then with no cash to promote and declining ratings (you need to spend money to make money) they went down the XY Easy Rock path. They then sold to GLFM (Bay FM) - another company with limited cash.
I am not saying that promotion would have stopped the success of EON and FOX, rather that success would have been more gradual and provided more time for 3XY to convert to a “better” longer-lasting format. I think the proposed 60s/70s format would have been far more successful - at least a name of Classic Rock would not potentially have had the tautological switch off of Easy Rock (which one were they!) and would be consistent with stations heritage (and probably blocked 3TT). For supposed radio station experts at 2SM (compared to Paul Dainty), they seemed to know a truckload less - XY Easy Rock '89 had a 2% market share compared to 3XY Hot Hits 9% ratings share in '86.
There was also the Breeze 3EE 693 which commenced transmission by XY’s new owners AWA nine months after XY closed, it wasn’t a success because its Easy Listening format was very close to 3MP’s. They also carried football (with Eddie McGuire as chief caller) and “The Good Life” with Ross Campbell which used to be on 3AW.
And AWA sold 3EE to 3MP which used it to relay the 3MP signal on 693, the then ABA wasn’t impressed so they had to run a different format on it, hence Magic was born.
Was there a time in the late 1980s and early 1990s when KIX106FM in Canberra was arguably the only CHR/Top 40 station in Australia?
Tune into 106.3 on the FM band!!! Haha… I’m surprised they didn’t throw the word ‘wireless’ in there as well 
The Breeze was a weird hybrid of 3AW and 3MP and as a result suited nobody.
Was it like an older version of Vega?
Well, it’s not exactly what you’re after, but the logo style is still the same:
This was taken from a Coffs Harbour visitors guide from 2002, which quite strangely advertised the Mid North Coast version instead of the local Coffs Harbour version.
Thanks!
Different colour scheme to the ones I remember seeing, but that’s close enough!
You got one of my favourite ones too, I was always fond of 102.3 / 105.1 due its ROX FM heritage.
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And I think the Mid North Coast station may have been more popular for a little while around Coffs since 105.1 (launched 31 Dec 1993) got a 3.5 year start on 105.5 (launched Aug 1997 I think).
Speaking of which, an article from an older Coffs Harbour visitors guide from the mid-late 90s about the station (along with 2MC):
And an ad from a Port Macquarie tourist map circa 1998, advertising its 102.3 service:
And I found another logo for Star FM, taken from another Port Macquarie tourist map circa 1999:
That is true. In fact, 2CS wasn’t launched until late 1985, which meant 2MC was the only local commercial station for Coffs.
thank you, thank you, thank you!
I would “like” that post 10 times if I could.
I think I remember reading that article too in a Coffs magazine.
Now downloaded for prosperity 
Something that was missed last month, 45 years of 2GO:
During the 80s weekend last weekend, 2GO were making a few references to their AM 1323 and 801 days.
I still find it a bit odd that 2GO only spent just over 5 years on 801, given it involved a transmitter site relocation, which wouldn’t have been cheap.
I guess the lure of FM was too much to ignore
Yeah, it probably wasn’t a known factor at the time, that FM would come up so soon afterwards.
Here’s a quick snapshot of what was making radio news in Melbourne this week in 1986, from the pages of TV Scene:
Margaret Peacock, then the wife of Andrew Peacock, was staying put at 3MP despite rumours of her moving over to 3AW.
Bert Newton was scaling back some of his on-air commitments at 3DB while concentrating on being the station’s general manager.
Derryn Hinch announces he’s hired a new producer for 1987 but says he himself won’t be on 3AW for the whole of the year. As it turns out he was announced late in 1987 to be moving to a TV hosting role at Channel 7.
If the government hadn’t offered FM conversions, what might have happened to 3TT and 3KZ?
Interesting question, assuming FOX and EON/Triple M were still the only commercial FM stations - so that for instance Smooth 91.5 couldn’t have gone Classic Hits on FM and taken 3KZ’s audience.
I think in that case 3KZ may have sounded a bit more like 4KQ in Brisbane, with more 70s music, and still done okay, just not as good as what Gold104.3 is doing now though.
And I think 3TT may have been lite music with a bit of pop, different enough from FOX to not be competing with them (or 3MP or Magic 1278).