A huge music fan who spent his teens dreaming of stardom, Andrews ended up in his second-choice career, working for British Gas in Solihull. Part of his job was to buy media on local radio stations, and he found that his meetings with the sales people at Birmingham's BRMB station were getting longer and longer.
'I was fascinated. We would have these long chats about radio, then after a while I would remember what I was there for.' When BRMB's management offered him a job as its marketing director he all but bit their hands off.
So it is hard not to believe Andrews when he says he is in his dream job as marketing director of Virgin Radio, combining his love of music and radio.
He has even managed to continue in his role at EMO (Events, Marketing and Other Stuff), the company he set up in his pre-Virgin days that organises tours for bands such as Kasabian and Stereophonics. He spends four days a week at Virgin and crams his EMO work into the rest of his time.
Oliver Lewis-Barclay, strategic partner at Hooper Galton, who previously worked with Andrews on ads for Virgin Radio, describes him as 'Tiggerish', adding: 'He is so full of energy that I imagine his team probably need to sit him down and give him a Valium.'
Virgin announced last week that it had poached multiple Sony Award-winning DJ Christian O'Connell from London station Xfm to host its breakfast show. 'I feel like a Premiership manager,' Andrews says. 'We got O'Connell but have also hung on to Pete and Geoff (the current breakfast DJs). Christian's great - he's going to be the next Chris Tarrant.'
He hopes that O'Connell's entrance is one more part of the jigsaw that will persuade people that Virgin Radio is not just a rock station. Under the slogan 'The music we all love', he is pitching the brand to consumers and advertisers as representing 'the new mainstream'.
'Bands like Coldplay, Keane and Snow Patrol that are central to our playlist used to be regarded as indie music but have now overtaken pop as the music most people want to hear,' he says.
Like all marketers, 40-year-old Andrews has well-rehearsed lines on his brand's positioning. But unlike many, he is happy to point out where he believes his rivals go wrong. 'Most stations do not understand that radio should not be a rational sell. Playing music is all about tapping into people's emotions, reminding them what they were doing when they heard a particular track.'
He points to Capital Radio's dwindling market share as a reflection of the fact that 'its listeners just do not understand its positioning any more'. And Xfm's latest eccentric ads?
'I have no idea what they're on about, so I can't imagine that its listeners do.'
Media is a combative business, however, and Virgin Radio has more reason than most to protect its patch. Although its breakfast show's listener numbers swelled by 17% over the first quarter of this year, the station lost its title as the second-biggest national commercial radio brand to talkSPORT. Profits dipped 40% last year and rumours are rife that its owner, Scottish Media Group, may sell it, despite turning down an offer from Lord Alli in December.
SMG has just appointed a new chief executive of its radio division - former Yahoo! managing director Fru Hazlitt - who will no doubt be casting a keen eye over the strength of the station's appeal when she starts later this year.
Andrews' summer will be dominated by the festival circuit - Virgin Radio has been heavily promoting its sponsorship of the Nokia Isle of Wight and V festivals and association with T in the Park. And then the planning starts for bringing in O'Connell at the end of the year.
'I don't think you will be seeing any Johnny Vaughan-type ads to promote Christian,' Andrews says. 'He has his own style, so I don't think it will involve any dancing in the street.'
CAREER HISTORY
1996-1998: National brand operations manager, British Gas
1998-2000: Marketing director, BRMB
2000-2001: Managing director, Century Radio
2001-2002: Group marketing director, Capital Radio
2002-present: Co-founder, EMO
2003-present: Marketing director, Virgin Radio