Northsound 1 breakfast presenter Lauren Mitchell has said it has been an “absolute honour” to host the show as it aired for the last time.
Last month radio bosses announced the popular show Jeff and Lauren in the Morning, which has been broadcast since 2017, would be axed in favour of Edinburgh-based Boogie in the Morning, which is already on Forth 1.
It means it is the end of an era for the radio station – which started life as Northsound Radio in 1981 – as no specific shows for the north-east will be broadcast on it, with all being networked with its sister Bauer Radio stations.
Lauren and her colleague Jeff Diack have broadcast more than 2,000 Jeff and Lauren in the Morning breakfast shows together.
Speaking to The Press and Journal, Lauren said: “It truly has been a fantastic eight years waking up people in the north-east.
“It’s been an absolute honour to be a part of the local community, meet so many wonderful people and work with so many great charities.
“Thank you from the bottom of my heart if you have joined us over the last eight years. I will miss it but super excited for the next challenge.”
As well as the axing of Northsound’s breakfast show, it was announced at the same time that Inverness-based radio station MFR – also owned by Bauer – would be scrapping Jodie McCluskey’s Jodie at Breakfast show.
It has already ended and is being replaced by Boogie in the Morning, which will air weekdays from 6 to 10am “live across Scotland”, except in Glasgow and the west, from January 6.
MFR now no longer has any programmes broadcast from its studio in the Scorguie Place area of the Highland Capital.
Content director for Hits Radio portfolio in Scotland, Victoria Easton-Riley, said: “We share our huge thanks with Jodie, Jeff and Lauren for all they’ve contributed.”
Original 106’s Breakfast with Claire and Pete, which broadcasts live from Aberdeen every weekday morning between 6am and 10am, will now be the only breakfast show live from the Granite City.
Group head of programmes at DC Thomson – which owns Original 106 – Robin Galloway called the decision to axe Northsound’s breakfast show as a “very sad day for the north-east”.
‘You’ve got to feel for the local presenters’
He said: “Northsound Radio was where many local broadcasters – myself included – cut their teeth on the local airwaves and the chance for budding north-east radio presenters to gain a foothold on the commercial radio ladder has been diminished.
“As all Northsound 1 programming already comes from Glasgow, adding in a new breakfast show from Edinburgh leaves me in no doubt whatsoever that listeners in the north-east just don’t matter anymore.
“Aberdeen listeners have been loyal to the radio station for decades and this is how they are rewarded. Shame on the decision-makers.”
Conversation