I’m on the early shift today and I managed to get a listen to Triple M Wagga Wagga. I think Triple M have forgotten that they have a few AM stations on the network. One of their footy promos that went on air on 1152AM said “Forget the footy on AM radio” or something to that effect. Oh, the irony! A bit like the time I heard FM by Steely Dan on an AM station.
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The regional breakfast shows are now all using the 13 10 60 phone number. Probably largely to make routing of the 13 12 16 number for the local shifts easier, but also helps with the network branding.
It also appears that the breakfast shows have been given a producer. Carly in Townsville and Riley-Rose in Albury - both previously on various shifts in those respective markets, most recently workdays. Central Coast already had a producer - Matt Lucas.
Possibly the best team to get the axe. Given the competition on the Central Coast it might have been better to keep Ash & Gawdy local and make Bodge & Kristi the NSW network team.
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Sounds like a press release.
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Haha “Fiercely local SCA strategy”
Oh, the irony.
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I agree. Of the four “final brekky shows” from NSW I heard last week, Bodge & Kristi seemed like the one with the potential to work best as a networked regional brekky show.
Central Coast would’ve benefited from staying local, wouldn’t be overly surprised if Star 104.5 dominate the ratings next time there’s a survey (whenever in the future that may be) due to the decision to network Hit breakfast and the absolute mess that has been 2GO/Triple M in recent years!
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I know right. So ‘fiercely’ local they got rid of the 80 year old local station names.
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The flip side of that is that when they changed names, they had to prove that they were still local so in most markets (maybe all) that actually ended up being more local with increased community interaction, street activations, obs and sponsoring local events. I’m sure the same will happen this time although COVID may prevent it from being as significant. The real test is how long that newfound localism sticks around for, but it did highlight that quite often heritage names and local shows can give a greater impression of local involvement than is reality.
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I’m curious as to how many staff at SCA are on JobKeeper, including at the regional stations. The idea of JobKeeper is to keep staff employed rather than getting rid of them, so I’d like to know what has happened here.
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That’s true, but I would argue it didn’t work out in the long run. That only lasted so long before it was back to how it was (in some cases even worse), and the networking has only increased since then.
I haven’t seen any evidence to suggest this yet, and with a decrease in staff rather than just a name change, I don’t see it happening - covid or not.
I agree with this, take for example a BOG AM station. Let’s say 2HC in Coffs, for example. They might still have their name, but everything except afternoons come straight from Sydney, and I should image a large portion of the local audience don’t even know it’s still on air. If they were to change name and bring in a new format, more localism etc. I think that would work out just fine. The difference is the SCA rebrands didn’t change format, or programming, or really anything except replace their local name they had for decades with a city name.
Yet another reason why this network breakfast decision is a bad one.
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where was Bodge and Christy, from people i have spoken to the Orange Breaky was best then the Wagga show, but i dont know who did what…
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Up on the Mid North Coast.
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I saw the comments, a number of people switching to Spotify.
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Well you won’t be getting them back now. Even if you rehired everyone back.
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I think some will be back, once everything settles down.
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Spotify already has a daily drive feature (I think) that combined news podcasts and a selection of tracks you might listen to.
If Spotify were to get the ABC or, preferably, an independent company, to do live updates at given times, plus up to date weather and traffic, SCA are rightfully fucked and deserve every bit they get.
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That would definitely be a game changer!
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Bodge and Christy were at HIT Port Macquarie 102.3 & 105.1
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for me thats just odd. most people on here are complaining about how SCA dont care for the local people, then other people say yeh stuff them… ill do spotify, and if they get news and weather then we will switch to that. Problem is, thats what SCA are giving you now, non local radio FREE on the radio (you pay for spotify). but its the adds between the songs that pay for your right to listen for free. i just think its ironic of some people whinging they arent local, so stuff them ill listen to a web based platform thats based somewhere else in the world…
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I think you’ve hit upon the reason though inadvertently. People are possibly prepared to put up with the huge amount of ads on FM, only when local content is also provided (eg local shows). If the local connection disappears they might as well go to streaming or Spotify to get music with far fewer ads. People don’t want to listen to wall to wall ads just to get music with no local connection.
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