James Valentine, who announced his retirement this week from ABC Sydney, is hosting his final afternoon show on Friday.

He will present from 12.30pm for one more time, with highlights from his 25 years in the daypart, working with his longtime producer Jen Flemming.

The afternoon slot is truly the toughest in radio.

Radio industry audiences, revenue and salaries peak in breakfast radio where the foundations of a station are built for both listeners and advertisers.

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But it is the afternoon shows that must do the heavy lifting to keep listeners who have started to drift away in mornings, and who will hopefully return for the other radio primetime, the drive show.

James Valentine’s skill was navigating that time slot for a quarter of a century and keeping an engaged audience. How engaged? Just listen to the avalanche of heartfelt tributes being delivered by phone and text to the ABC this week from his audience.

Changing of the guard

James Valentine behind the mic (Credit: ABC Radio Sydney: Declan Bowring)

Valentine, 65, is leaving ABC Sydney as the station goes through generational change. The shows surrounding Valentine are hosted by younger folk. Craig Reucassel is 49 and Hamish Macdonald is 44 in breakfast and mornings respectively. Following the station’s afternoon shift now is drive host Thomas Oriti, who is 40.

But the biggest talk radio audiences remain 65+. Will these younger presenters be able to generate new listeners who will then age with their new station?

A look at the ratings for the leading Sydney stations (AM and FM), shows ABC Sydney has the same amount of listeners 40-64 (179,000) as it does 65+, indicating there is some growth at the younger end.

It is very different at 2GB, with 108,000 40-54, but 344,000 aged 65+.

Smooth manages a solid crowd 40-64 — 478,000 — with the audience aged 64+ measured at 234,000.

Keeping listeners as the day progresses remains a challenge for any format, AM and FM. The breakfast audience cumes for the leading stations* are as follows:

Smoothfm 648,000*
2GB 453,000
ABC Sydney 296,000

The loss of audience across the day is significant. At 2GB the drop between the size of the breakfast and afternoon audience is 49%.

The falls for those dayparts at Smooth is 12%, while at ABC Sydney the audience dips 25%. (Source: GfK Survey 8, 2025)

Daytime radio: salaries and formats

Radio prices its daypart talent according to ratings and revenue. While the ABC doesn’t have commercial revenue, it does have ratings. The ABC breakfast announcers secure the biggest salaries, but still well below what commercial breakfast pays.

However, the daytime salaries of ABC announcers are ahead of what some in commercial radio are paid.

On commercial FM, the daytime shifts at some stations are merging into one long show – maybe from 10am until 3pm. Some still break it in two from 9am to noon and then noon through until 4pm.

One talent manager told Mumbrella a commercial FM station might pay a daytime announcer close to $100,000. They would be bracketed by announcers that could be on contracts worth from $1m to much more. Think Kiis’s Kyle Sandilands and Jackie Henderson, and now national Gold breakfast announcer Christian O’Connell, for those at the upper end.

Because the ABC seeks parity when it comes to salaries for people doing similar jobs, the gap between breakfast, daytime, drive and evening salaries are less than in the commercial world.

Digital disruption growing for radio

The growth of digital streaming audio options are hurting radio. For a long time the sector resisted digital disruption, but it is now chipping away.

In commercial radio, big names on multi-million dollar contracts are holding onto audiences in breakfast and drive shows, but there is a lot of pressure in between.

One former network executive said the daytime audience is considering: “Do I listen to ad free music on Spotify, or maybe a largely ad-free podcast? If I choose commercial radio do I want to sit through up to 25 ads an hour?” The answer for some is “No”.

Research shared with Mumbrella on listening trends indicates that radio audiences shrink toward midday when workers go to lunch and turn to mobile phones, which offer an array of alternative entertainment options.

Peak times for podcast listening seem to vary in some research studies. Early morning downloads are growing, while lunchtime can be a peak period for listening through to mid afternoon.

*Smooth has the biggest overall station cume, KIIS narrowly has the biggest breakfast cume.