The final edition of Auckland Council’s home-delivered magazine is out, as the publication falls victim to rising costs and budget-cutting since the election of the mayor Wayne Brown.
The Our Auckland magazine has been sent to Auckland homes for almost 12 years, but a $240,000, 50% cost rise has proved the final straw, with the 24-page January-February edition set to be the last.
The council has decided not to renew a three-year contract with Sydney-based Storyation, part of the NewsCorp media empire, for the publication.
The magazine had been part of an $800,000-a-year contract with Storyation, which also included the firm producing digital and video publicity content.
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Around $300,000 will continue to be spent on the video and digital material, but rising paper, printing and distribution costs led to the magazine portion of the deal being canned.
One part of the 2021 deal allowed Storyation to earn additional money from external advertising in the magazine, but the final edition carries nothing from outside the council “family”.
Our Auckland has had a rocky few years, with its production being taken back inside the council in 2020 when the previous contractor, German-owned Bauer, closed its New Zealand operations at short notice.
Todd Niall/Stuff
The January-February 2023 issue of Auckland Council’s Our Auckland magazine will be the last.
A year later, Auckland Council struck a deal with the Australian media company, and said it would have cost $1.2 million a year to continue publishing Our Auckland in-house, and reduced it from 11 to six copies a year.
The decision to scrap the magazine was taken in November, six weeks after the election of the mayor Wayne Brown, and following a forecast $295 million deficit in the council 2023-24 Budget.
The council is urging Aucklanders to keep up with its news via the Our Auckland website, and its other online outlets such as on social media.
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