The Farmers Club

The “Club Notes” for Monday, the 15th of July, 2024.

By Dwain Duxson

Support local if it's local

We called into my wife Paula's mother's place over the weekend in Stawell (Vic), and I picked up the local paper for a read. There was a full-page story on the back page talking about a crisis meeting for the local and one thriving cricket association that is looking like it might be no longer. Another story for another day. There were a few other local stories, but apart from 2 pages of AFL footy tipping and a page or 2 of classifieds, most of the other stuff was syndicated content. By that, I mean it wasn't produced locally; it was produced from the head office and used as filler for the Stawell Times News and most of the other publications in Australian Country Media's (ACM) stable. See a link here. A full-page ad for the Stock and Land triggered that it was an ACM publication. My thoughts were that this thing would take about 10 minutes to read and offer very little value to the locals. I can see why readership is struggling for something like this, and it's more out of habit that people like my mother-in-law buy it. The best publications are done independently, usually by a local or group of locals that only focus on local issues and advertising. This is the way to go, and there are more and more of these popping up. However, don't for one minute dismiss the effort that goes into these publications, and don't expect them to be free, you will likely have to pay a subscription, or the advertiser will fund it. Whatever way, make sure you support these independent publications. Good content, written by people and not machines, is not free these days. What do you get locally? Reply to [email protected]

The Farmers Club - Non-Commodity Thinking 

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