PRECEDE
As Noosa Today begins a new chapter as Noosa’s only community newspaper in print, we kick off our regular history page by reflecting on the spirited group of newspapermen and women who founded the title. PHIL JARRATT reports.
Isobel “Izzy” Coleman remembers it like it was yesterday.
As senior journalist at the successful Noosa Journal (which had grown into a family of Journals covering the length of the Sunshine Coast), she and her staff were summoned to a meeting with the owners, Quest Newspapers, in Maroochydore in March 2012. Completely unexpectedly, they were told that the family of titles was no longer financially viable and they were all redundant.
Izzy, who now lives on Kangaroo Island, South Australia, told Noosa Today: “We were in shock, to say the least. It was terrible in that room, people were angry, some were crying. We’d lost our jobs and we couldn’t understand why, but even more importantly, we felt that it was Noosa’s loss too. I was close to tears myself, but I started to think practically. I could see the redundancy packages in big envelopes in a box by the wall, I knew we’d have a bit of money, so I thought, bugger it! We’ll start our own paper.”
Izzy quickly canvased the idea with Journal general manager Sue Willis, who was in, and by the end of the day they’d been joined by most of the Journal team, including distribution manager Tim Riches, photographer Andrew Seymour, admin’s Jill Drescher, sales rep Brandi Wikaira and journo Emily Black.
Izzy recalls: “As soon as news of the Journal’s closing got out, I was bombarded with calls and messages from locals who felt bad for me and the team, but also had very genuine concerns about only having one local paper. Commercially, business owners were worried the other paper would have a monopoly and, therefore, increase advertising costs. As a community, people were worried that without an independent voice, their stories would not get told.”
The name Noosa Today came out of an early team meeting, around the same time the founders agreed to work without pay until they could generate enough revenue to guarantee survival. Says Izzy: “There was no argument about who did what – we really only had one of everything, editor, photographer and so on. We just got on with it, pooling ideas, listening to each other, respecting each other’s contribution.
“The icing on the cake was the enormous support we received from the community. They embraced the paper, offered help and made us feel it was all worthwhile. Locals stepped up to write for us, promote us and deliver the paper. It was truly a team effort.”
Izzy says that she’s particularly proud of the fact that they took a crazy, spontaneous idea and ran with it, and while the founders made plenty of sacrifices along the way, the formula was successful. “We launched a paper that is still running today, and that is something I will always be proud of,” she says.
Apart from original columnists this writer and Ron Lane, the founding NT team has now moved on, but the ethos of the paper, now proudly back in print and on your lawn every Friday, remains the same – to entertain, educate, and above all, give the community an independent voice.
· Sincere thanks to Isobel Coleman and Andrew Seymour for their assistance with this article.
