What David Koch’s departure means for Australian TV’s breakfast wars

Welcome to the third decade of Australia’s own morning wars.

In one corner: Today’s Karl Stefanovic and Sarah Abo.

And in the other: Sunrise’s Natalie Barr and … who?

What does David Koch’s (centre) departure mean for Australian breakfast news and its stars, including Lisa Millar (left) and Karl Stefanovic (right)?Credit: Artwork by Marija Ercegovac

That is the biggest question in Australian television after Monday’s surprise announcement from Sunrise co-host David Koch that he is hanging up his breakfast boots after 21 years of gangbusters ratings success.

He leaves behind a remarkable television success story. After nearly two decades in the role, he leaves behind a show with a relatively strong set of ratings figures— and a co-host, in Barr, who has been an early morning fixture for 15 years. She was the pre-dawn newsreader, then the Sunrise newsreader, and since 2021 has been Koch’s co-host.

Like Koch, she is a great survivor in a time slot often marked by turbulence.

Koch leaves Barr with Seven settled in a comfortable ratings position — Nine* and Seven spar over the demographic breakdowns and viewer numbers in certain capital cities, but the overall figures are still in Seven’s favour. One morning last week, Sunrise even cracked the overall ratings top 20 — rarefied air for breakfast television, and a sign that while free-to-air viewer numbers have taken a battering in prime time, the morning routine remains a key battleground.

While the ABC’s News Breakfast team of Michael Rowland and Lisa Millar have occasionally crept into second-place in the ratings battle, it’s the battle for the commercial juggernauts that attracts most of the attention.

Which brings us to the succession guessing game. Koch’s are enormous shoes to fill.

You don’t have to like him to acknowledge that, and even Koch knows that many people do not fancy sharing breakfast or any other meal with him. On Twitter, he is often a punchline and one of his comments made after announcing his departure on Monday helps reveal why: “When you are doing three and three-quarter hours a day of live TV, you cannot pretend to be something you’re not. I’m not woke and you can’t pretend to be woke if you’re not. You can’t fake who you are because you’ll get found out.”

Today’s host Karl Stefanovic.Credit: Getty Images

It’s a sign of how long he has been a part of the national furniture that these words would have made zero sense when he started his 21-year Sunrise run in 2003. Back then, breakfast hosts only used the word woke in relation to the time they set their alarm clocks.

But it also highlights a dilemma for Seven as it contemplates the succession plan: how to stay on top while still seeming relevant in 2023?

Across Koch’s career, it was Today’s hosting desk that has become something of a rolling experiment. It was mostly the women who came and went at Nine (seven of them since Sunrise started) while the two Ks — Karl and Kochie — sailed through the ratings wars mostly undisturbed (Today’s Karl-free experiment lasted just a year in 2018).

Koch always had it easier because Sunrise nearly always had the better ratings. If the babble of brekky TV leaves you babbling this might seem a mystery, but Sunrise — under the wizardry of founding producer Adam Boland and his relentless “family” vibe — brought in outsized viewer numbers (and dollars) for Seven.

Koch (alongside Melissa Doyle, then Samantha Armytage, and now Barr) was the relentless face of that success.

A “dad joke” in human form, Kochie made Sunrise feel like being slapped awake with a slice of Vegemite toast every morning, and it worked beyond anyone’s expectations. Just ask Kevin Rudd, who rode his regular Sunrise gig to The Lodge. A 2006 Kokoda trek with Kochie and Joe Hockey was among his warm-up events for winning the 2007 election.

All of which makes the choice of the next Brekky Central incumbent a fascinating guessing game – and a big gamble for Seven. The entrails of this decision – and the ratings that follow it – will be examined in minute detail.

On the one hand, it’s the dream gig — stepping into a ratings powerhouse whose main demand might be to just continue what Sunrise already does so well. But breakfast TV relies like no other time slot on chemistry (and flails when chemistry is absent). That means the next Sunrise host has to do more than meet basic ratings benchmarks – he or she will need to bring the morning magic alongside Barr. And as David Koch himself has proven, that magic comes in unlikely packages.

The other debate will be around diversity.

Both Nine and ABC have taken strides to deliver breakfast TV couches that more resemble the demographic make-up of real-life living rooms. News Breakfast on the ABC has harnessed the serious news chops of its hosts to fashion itself as the Cash Cow-free alternative to the snap, crackle and pop of its commercial rivals and has established itself as a strong competitor.

Could Sunrise — which has regularly found itself accused of being a home for controversial, far-right figures like Pauline Hanson — shake up the show completely with a left-field hosting choice?

Fair shake of the sauce bottle, as Kevin Rudd might say.

The early frontrunner is current Seven presenter Matt Shirvington who has previously filled in for Koch on Sunrise. Another favourite is new Seven recruit and TV vet Chris Brown who was recently poached from Channel 10. Both are white enough to blind you. Genuine diversity seems a bridge too far, but there will certainly be generational change.

*Nine is the publisher of this masthead.

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