Breakfast A Cheerful Time For Fox Crew

The Age

Thursday August 7, 2008

Michael Lallo

MORE good news for Fox FM, with The Matt & Jo Show gaining 1.3 points to claim 14.5% of the breakfast audience. The show is now 6.5 points clear of Hughesy & Kate on Nova - a far cry from last year when they were neck and neck. And Hamish & Andy has achieved its best result yet: a massive 21% in drive.

"I don't want to discredit the brekkie team," says Austereo boss Ben Amarfio, "but the fact that Hamish & Andy and the whole station are doing so well is rubbing off on them."

"It's the halo effect," agrees another station chief. "You can bet your bottom dollar that everyone is trying to poach those guys."

Fox's sister station, TripleM, also improved, climbing 0.6 points to snare 6.7% of listeners. After small drops in previous surveys, Pete & Myf increased 0.1 point to 5.9%, making it the most successful of the three new breakfast shows.

Amarfio admits that Triple M had lost its way over the past few years, allowing itself to get spooked by competitors. "We were a bit preoccupied with looking over our shoulder," he says. "So we returned to our rock, sport and comedy heritage - and it's working."

Perhaps a back-to-basics approach is needed at Mix, with the ailing station shedding listeners in every slot and dropping 0.3 points overall. Its Two Women & A Metro breakfast program (George McEncroe, Brigitte Duclos and Tom Gleeson, pictured), after peaking this year at 5.1%, now attracts just 3.2% of listeners after shedding a further 0.5 points. This puts it just 0.1 point ahead of Vega's Dicko, Dave and Chrissie show, which lost 0.1 point. Embarrassingly, Mix has now fallen behind oldies music station Magic, which climbed 1 point to 5%. But Australian Radio Network boss Steve Rowe says he won't abandon Mix's bold push into the "lifestyle" territory occupied by magazines.

"It's too early to change the strategy when you're up against so many competitors," he says. "If you're in Adelaide or Ballarat you could expect to turn it around a lot quicker, but you have to give it time in Melbourne."

Sister station Gold lost 0.2 points but is still the second-highest-rating FM station, on 7.6%. Nova has stabilised after two poor surveys, increasing 0.1 point to 7.3%.

"It would have been nice to have more of an increase but we have to be patient," says DMG Radio general manager Sam Thompson. "Overall it's a pretty flat survey - no one experienced huge increases or decreases."

Indeed, the biggest overall drop was the 1.3 points shed by 774 ABC Melbourne, still the third-strongest station, on 10.2%. It lost points in every shift but achieved exactly the same figure this time last year, suggesting a cyclical listening pattern.

3AW (owned by Fairfax Media, owner of The Age) dropped 0.2 points but maintained its dominance with a 16.6% share. Ross Stevenson and John Burns leapt 1.2 points to 21.3%, making their breakfast program the highest-rating show in Melbourne. Like 774, 3AW lost some football listeners to Triple M and SEN, but it easily remains the top footy station.

© 2008 The Age

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