In his last weeks on 3AW’s overnight shift, Andrew McLaren has been facing a barrage of calls from listeners, outraged that the Melbourne-based overnight show will be replaced with a national program, fronted by Luke Bona, from Sydney.
When it was announced on air this week, caller after caller complained about the decision, as one sequence of programming from the 3am hour earlier this week shows (listen below).
Caller Mary told McLaren: “I’ll get a good nights sleep now because you are the only reason I stay up overnight… I’ll be listening to the ABC now.”
McLaren defended Luke Bona asking listeners to give him a chance, but it was not enough for some listeners. “We don’t care about him, we’re switched on to you here in Melbourne,” said caller John, a garbage collector who listens to the overnight shift while working.
“I’m sad angry and frustrated… [management] will rue that decision, it will come back to bite them,” said Margaret, echoing the sentiments of many other callers.
“That’s the way things go in the corporate world, money has to be saved,” said McLaren, explaining the decision to the listeners.
The new overnight program begins on February 2nd.
Before McLaren took over the shift, 3AW veteran Keith McGowan hosted the Melbourne mid-dawn show for 25 years, retiring three and a half years ago. McGowan has now passed away.
McLaren, and producer Mark Petkovic are not sure what awaits them. McLaren told listeners “I may do some other fill in things on the station, I haven’t talked to management yet.” It is not known what will happen to his producer Mark, who is regularly heard on air with McLaren, as well as his production duties.
Melbourne listeners are notoriously parochial about thier media and fiercely resist any networked program thought to be imposed on them from Sydney.
After listening to details about the program’s replacement, and callers’ responses, one 3AW listener wrote to radioinfo about the change, commenting:
“The passion and loyalty of the audience and the much higher quality of McLaren, [who is] professional… witty and whimsical. He certainly developed a nice riff with his producer Mark, which is so essential when even mid dawn announcers struggle to keep up the energy.
“I think the worst aspect is the obsessive need to wipe a couple of salaries from the costs line, whilst ignoring the impact it has on listeners and station loyalty.
“I don’t know the figures but I understand that 3AW dominated mid dawn numbers which must have value in helping their guys stay on top in breakfast.”