And nonetheless is still consistently rating below the station average.
And a music format that isn’t matched by anything else on the FM band.
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That’s a key point about the music format. In reality there’s very little competition in music formats in places like Adelaide and Brisbane. It’s not like a Triple M listener is likely to switch to SA or Nova easily.
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Correct. The Adelaide Rush Hour consistently rated below the station average. The overall station format is “rock’s greatest hits”, trying to appeal to a broader audience, and then 4pm rolls around when people are jumping back in cars, and a show that’s all of:
- Blokey
- Self-indulgent, and
- Obsessive about the two Adelaide based AFL teams (when not everyone in Adelaide supports Port or the Crows)
Comes on the air. Suddenly a large percentage of females, and decent percentage of males, are reaching for the dial.
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I think that’s part of the problem - expensive, personality driven shows. Do they really rate higher than a single local jock? And what’s the difference in cost?
Yet it’s a successful formula for 5AA whom if the reaction on socials is anything to go by is going to be a big winner from this move…
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It’s clear it’s just a cost cutting exercise.
National drive show here we come.
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yeah investors and shareholders are a shit stain on society if people disagree there part of the problem
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I reckon move Marty Sheargold to drive 4 to 6. Keep stations local until 4.
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National programming is just the reality of where Australian radio is heading. The truth is compared with most other countries, Australia has been lucky to keep as much local content on-air for as long as we have.
It was widely speculated that had the SCA-ARN merger taken place, we would have ended up with Christian O’Connell doing national breakfast on Triple M.
Thats now not going to happen, but other consolidation across all networks definitely will.
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This has largely been missed by the majority of people about K&JO expanding into Melbourne - its the beginning of what could likely be an avalanche of changes across radio as a whole. The focus has been on the content that K&JO broadcast rather than its being the start of something much bigger than either of them.
Regardless of whether the SCA/ARN deal got up or not, this has been coming for a while - it was only waiting for someone to move first.
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Do we assume national drive next year? Maybe Marty?
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It wouldn’t really make sense to only announce the Adelaide and Perth axings today if they could’ve announced other cities like Brisbane being dropped at the same time.
I still wonder if there’s anything to read into the James Brayshaw and Dave Hughes pairing from earlier this year. That might have broader appeal for national drive given Brayshaw is a national face that doesn’t only do AFL (unlike Brownless).
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My guess is there will be one show for AFL states and one show for NRL states, since Triple M is big on sports.
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New AFL rights deal is about to be announced (most likely tomorrow). Its expected to keep things mostly similar to the current deal. However stations like SCA will definitely need to stump up more cash in the new deal. Another reason why cuts need to occur in other areas.
It’s 1988 and Sydney radio stations are owned by:
- Families (2UW owned by the Alberts and 2UE was owned by the Lambs)
- “Not for profit” organisations like 2SM (the Catholic Church) and 2KY (Labor Party)
- An individual - Rod Muir owned 2MMM
- A bunch of celebrities - John Laws and Graham Kennedy and friends owned 2DayFM
The owners enjoyed their profits and most of the profits were never publicly announced.
Today most of our radio stations are publicly listed companies where shareholders (and superannuation funds) expect ever increasing share prices. With a limited pool of advertising dollars, the only other way to increase profits is to cut costs. To cut costs in 2024 to boost profits, to cut again in 2025 and again in 2026. If the market sees costs being cut - up goes the share price. Super funds, financial advisers and shareholders don’t care that the No.1 Drive Show in Adelaide was axed, they just care that the number of employees at SCA has fallen.
SCA shares are worth 50c each today. On January 1 2024 they were valued at over $1.
Good shows that rate No.1 are getting axed. Every salary is being evaluated. Expenses being cut. I thought publicly listed businesses owning radio stations would bring innovation, clever marketing and the best ideas from around the world. Instead they bring networked crap from interstate and a willingness to let stations fail for decades (MMM and 2DayFM in Sydney) as they are part of a national network and not an individual frequency that deserves success.
It’s a business model where profits, employee numbers and share prices are public information and it sucks.
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The fact is simple. SCA as a whole are struggling big time. Having 2-4 top performing metro stations isn’t enough to keep the entire network afloat.
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But when you cut the show from the station that is number one and number one for the last two years in Adelaide, just makes no sense.
They’ll go from 2 - 4 high performing stations to none very quickly.
If you can’t sell advertise and sponsors to the number one drive show, in a very competitive Adelaide Market at Drive, then you shouldn’t be in the radio business.
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This is the argument I keep making, they’re cutting their nose to spite their face, this is the issue with publicly traded companies owning media stocks. They aren’t in the right space for that anymore.
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I tend to agree. We have the wrong companies owning media, particularly radio. I actually blame this partly on the way successive governments have restricted the supply of commercial FM licences in this country, particularly in the capitals. This has inflated the value and profits of these stations (initially) to a point it’s attracted certain types of operators to exist. Now as pressures come on the industry they are left with big debts and high expectations for profits which are no longer achievable. They’ve over capitalised on big shows and are left with a maximum of 2 stations in the major markets so economies of scale are limited. They’ve expanded into regional radio because with no hope of more metro stations this was the only path to expansion. If we had double the commercial FM stations in the major cities and operators were allowed 3 or 4 each the situation would be different. We wouldn’t have licences costing $100M for a start.
Regulatory failure.
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and it drives people to podcasts / spotify / streaming.
the companies are still stuck in the radio first mindset - and I get it, I really do. I was in the room when Paul Thompson bid $80 million for 106.9 in Brisbane. that money not only needs to be recouped but also money needs to be made on top of it (why spend 80 million on a license and get say 4% return in radio when you could invest and get 10%?)
But it’s not 2004 anymore. People have devices in their pockets that can hook into their cars stereo and play virtually any station anywhere in the world. there are hundreds of stations playing the same songs you do available to the consumer now.
your point of difference should be local. otherwise, what’s the difference between me listening to MMM Brisbane or Q104.3 NYC?
Going national will accelerate the death spiral of radio
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