Kaye Adams told viewers the team were “a little bit sad” because one of the team was quitting for a new life in Australia.
The presenter – herself a long-running Loose Women star having first appeared in 1999 – big goodbye to Tom Sage.
Kaye, 60, said: “I hope you’ve had fun with us today, but it’s a little bit sad for us.
“Our dear friend and deputy editor of the show Tom is going off to a wonderful new life Down Under.
“We’re hoping he’s going to be a boomerang and come back to us, we will miss him so so much. He is a wonderful colleague and an even more wonderful friend.”
Nadia Sawalha, 58, added: “We will really miss him.”
Jane Moore, 60, said: “He’s been in this building for 15 years and it’s going to be weird without him, but Tom we love you.”
Kaye signed off Friday’s show, saying: “We did try and get him to sit in the audience, but he wasn’t going to do it.
“Don’t worry Tom, we’re going to be with you in a few moments. Pop the champagne!”
Loose Women started life in 1999 and – bar a brief period where bosses changed the name to Live Talk – has been on air ever since.
It has broadcast from Norwich, Manchester and now London, where it comes live at lunchtimes from the Television Centre studios where ITV daytime is based.