I’m told he does the show from home in his jim-jams. Whatever he’s doing, “Barbecue” Bob Gallagher is doing it very well indeed.
His Breakfast show on 4BH, which is owned by Nine Radio but managed by Victoria-based ACE Radio, is one of the success stories of Brisbane radio in recent years.
A combination of his familiarity to the audience, the great old songs he plays, and the peculiarities of the Brisbane radio market have seen him quietly work his way up the radio charts while other, more expensive shows and talent, have fallen by the wayside.
It would be easy to say that Gallagher has “done a Bradbury”, by skating towards the front of the pack after some of his competitors fell over. But that would be to unfairly dismiss the hard work he has put in over decades, notably with 97.3 and 4KQ.
Bob has certainly been quietly getting on with the job, delivering great bang for 4BH’s buck. More power to him.
A few more observations about Thursday’s radio ratings results:
They could give credence to a rumour doing the rounds that the sacking and rehiring of Robin Bailey, Kip Wightman and Corey Oates was a stunt by KIIS owners ARN to push Nova 1069 into “refreshing” its line-up, which led to the sacking of Ash Bradnam. That move, of course, seems to have backfired on Nova, which was a big loser in the survey. It all seems too clever by half, but anything is possible.
Once again, the results for 4BC prove just how bad the Nine Radio decision-makers in Sydney are when it comes to programming for Brisbane. The station’s abysmal results are a direct result of them not understanding the market here and not wanting to understand the market here. Of course, the talent will face the consequences, but the people who call the shots are ultimately to blame. I hope the new owners, the Laundy family, realise what’s going on and not only stick with live and local content in Brisbane, but arrange for it to be driven by people who truly understand this city. One important point: Brisbane is not regional Queensland or western Sydney. The politics in the River City are more nuanced than some want to believe.
Those who like hypotheticals might be wondering if the Brisbane radio landscape would be different with GOLD and Smooth on the FM dial, as they are in Sydney and Melbourne. My spies tell me that Nova Entertainment is keen to get Smooth on air in Brisbane and is eyeing up the 97.3 frequency, which it half owns with ARN. KIIS currently occupies that spot, and its strength (and the nature of the agreement between ARN and Nova) means it will probably stay there.
The success of Triple M in Brisbane should come as no surprise. Even the now-embattled ARN knew it was a prize back in the day. Its grand plan a few years ago was to take over Southern Cross Austereo, and grab the Triple M brand, then offload its own GOLD network and SCA’s Hit stations into a new entity. The partners in that venture got cold feet. SCA eventually merged with the Seven network and there are undoubtedly people out there right now wondering whether and when it might be a good idea to swoop on ARN, which is likely to take a large financial hit whichever way its legal battle with former employees Kyle Sandilands and Jackie Henderson pans out.
6.35am Friday update
It must be difficult for radio people to carry on being bright and chipper in the morning when they’ve just had a bad ratings result. So far today (Friday). 4BC’s Sofie Formica and Dean Miller seem to be coping well in an outside broadcast from Redcliffe. Such a shame, then, that somebody at 4BC can’t even spell Formica’s first name correctly in the link to the live stream.
Spencer’s say
Spencer Howson, the onetime King of Brisbane radio, was a guest on Seven’s afternoon news on Thursday talking about the ratings. He was quite kind to some of the players who didn’t do so well and pointed out, rightly, that one bad survey shouldn’t be a reason to make wholesale changes.
He mentioned how volatile the ratings had been lately, saying it had been a long time since a Breakfast show had gone eight surveys in a row at No.1. Listen to him here:
What Howson didn’t mention was that the last time that happened, it was his show on 612 ABC that had the long winning streak!
And that’s a good enough reason for a trip down memory lane to revisit the numbers from survey 1 in 2016 — exactly 10 years ago.
Back then, Howson was no.1 in Breakfast with a 14.1 share — a rating that would have made him no.1 again this time around. Nova and 97.3 (not yet KIIS) were equal second place in Breakfast back in 2016, followed by Triple M and B105 (then branded hit105).
Overall, 97.3 was no.1 on 12.1pc, followed by Nova (11), Triple M (10.8), hit105 (10.3), 612 ABC (9.6), 4KQ (8.2), 4BC (5.0) and 4BH (then branded Magic) on 2.8. Magic scored just a 2.4 share in Breakfast. How times change.
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P.S.
Oh, in 2016, the Breakfast show on 97.3 was presented by Robin Bailey, Terry Hansen— and Bob Gallagher!
Disclaimer: Brett Debritz has written about radio since he was 20. He produced Spencer Howson and Bill McDonald at 4BC back when they rated higher than the current shows in the same time slots.