La
Grillade, as well as Peacock Gardens, are two of the long established eating scenes
in Sydney’s
Crows Nest, especially for the Nine Network.

And no-one
has liked La Grillade as a wining and dining venue more than Vance Lothringer, the legendary Nine Network
sales boss who up to a month or so ago, was the driving force behind the number
one TV Network in the country. He was replaced a month ago by Paul Waldren from GTV 9 in Melbourne.

So I
hope he enjoyed the really long lunch at La Grillade
on Friday with Anthony Fitzgerald, an old adversary in the Free Top Air ad sales
world when he was head sales honcho at Seven (replaced by James Warburton).
These
days Fitzgerald, who has spent 20 years at Seven, runs
MCN, or Multi Channel network, which looks after around 85% of the ad sales on
Foxtel’s channels.

It’s a
growing gig and with his old FTA background and knowledge of Vance, Fitzgerald
might be angling to see if the former Nine boss (now
the executive in charge of giving good golf, as one Nine person jokes) wants to
change hats.

After his changed role at Nine, “Vance lunches” is no longer the story, but rather: “who is
Vance lunching with?” The fact that La Grillade was
chosen for the occasion was a sign that Vance and Anthony Fitzgerald don’t care
who saw them, especially as it’s about a kilometre from the Nine bunker at
Willoughby.