About Mareeba Express

Mareeba Express

Overview

The Mareeba Express is the inventory name for The Express, the independent free weekly newspaper published from Mareeba for the Atherton Tablelands and Far North Queensland hinterland. The paper appears under the masthead "The Express" — styled "EXPRESS" on its front page, with the strapline "Delivering news across our region" — and is published every Wednesday, in print and as a free digital flip-book edition through its website, theexpressnewspaper.com.au. It is home delivered and sold and distributed through newsagents and outlets across Mareeba, Atherton and the Tableland towns, and its own published distribution description claims delivery to more than 70 communities, including remote cattle stations in Cape York, with a distribution of 11,000 copies. The paper is published by Carlo Portella — known as Carl Portella — through his Mareeba company Portasea Pty Ltd, making it a stablemate of Cairns Local News, which Portella also owns. It is a member of the Queensland Country Press Association, in whose annual awards it has repeatedly figured, winning Best Free Newspaper in 2022. The Express is currently publishing: replica editions sighted include those of Wednesday 4 February, 25 February, 4 March and 6 May 2026, leading on Mareeba Shire's CBD masterplan, an Atherton Show feature on women farmers and the Mount Garnet races and rodeo.

History

The Express is a modern foundation, not a revival: although a newspaper called the Mareeba Express was published in the town in the 1890s — Queensland Places records it beginning about 1895 — that paper is long defunct and unrelated to the present title. The current Express was in print by 2017. A submission to the federal parliament's regional newspapers inquiry by David Anthony, a former journalist on News Corp's Tablelander, records that the independent Mareeba-based Express was by then undercutting News Corp's advertising rates so effectively that News retired its Tablelands Advertiser masthead in 2017. The Mareeba Chamber of Commerce's Economic Snapshot for 2017–18 was published by The Express newspaper, confirming its established place in the town's business life by that year. News Corp closed the Tablelander itself in its 2020 regional restructure, leaving The Express as the Tablelands' locally produced newspaper. Under Portella the paper has built a strong record in the Queensland Country Press Association's Media Excellence Awards: it won Best Free Newspaper at the 2022 awards, where judges praised its bold headlines, well-written stories and strong sections; in 2023 it won the Journalistic Team Excellence Award for a newspaper, presented to journalist Ellie Fink and publisher Carl Portella, and Fink also took second place in Young Journalist of the Year; in 2024 its special publication for the Tablelands Better Beef Open Days, "Better Bulls, Best Beef", placed second for Best Special Publication; and in 2025 its month-long domestic violence campaign — for which it turned its masthead from red to purple — placed third in its campaign category. No exact founding date for the modern paper is publicly documented, and none is asserted here.

Programming and Content

The Express covers the local issues, events, sport and people of Mareeba Shire and the Atherton Tablelands, and its own description emphasises that "the secret is keeping it local". Its 2026 editions show the range: the 25 February 2026 issue led on Mareeba Shire Council's $2 million CBD masterplan, a stormwater-driven redesign of the town's main street; the 4 March issue carried a major International Women's Day feature on women in Tablelands farming, tied to the Atherton Show and photographed in an avocado packing shed at Rocky Creek Orchards; the 6 May issue led on the Mount Garnet Races and Rodeo, the opening of the regional rodeo season; and the 4 February issue marked the return of some 895,000 Queensland students to school, with a Mareeba classroom photograph. Regular content includes council and community news, agriculture and rural features — the paper's Better Beef Days publications serve the Tableland cattle industry — sport, racing, school news, entertainment and community campaigns such as its domestic violence awareness month. The Queensland Country Press Association's 2022 judges, in naming it the state's best free newspaper, described solid advertising support in different sections including entertainment, property and a rural section, with strong classifieds — a section mix the paper maintains — and its Better Beef Days publication was also highly commended in the association's 2024 special-publication judging, separate from the second place won by its companion event guide. As a Wednesday paper it anchors the Tablelands' weekly news cycle, and its reporting is produced for a readership spread across farm towns, service centres and remote properties rather than a single urban market.

Audience and Reach

The Express is distributed from its Mareeba base across the Atherton Tablelands and the far northern hinterland. In the paper's own published description, it is home delivered and distributed across the region including the major hinterland towns of Mareeba and Atherton, reaching more than 70 communities including remote cattle stations in Cape York, with a distribution of 11,000 copies; those figures are the publisher's own and are presented as such. It is available through newsagents and numerous outlets as well as by home delivery. Mareeba itself is the largest town on the Tablelands, a service and agricultural centre for an irrigation district growing avocados, mangoes, coffee, sugar cane and cattle, and the paper's coverage extends to Atherton, Herberton, Dimbulah, Kuranda, Mount Garnet and the smaller localities between. Since the closure of News Corp's Tablelander in 2020 and the earlier retirement of the Tablelands Advertiser, The Express has been the only locally published newspaper based on the Tablelands; its readers' alternatives are Cairns-based media, principally the Cairns Post.

Digital Presence

Every edition of The Express is published as a free digital flip-book, formerly through the paper's Issuu and Dialog channels — editions there run from at least August 2022 through December 2024, uploaded under Carlo Portella's account — and more recently through Calaméo, where the full editions of February, March and May 2026 can be read. Its website, theexpressnewspaper.com.au, supports the print paper with the digital edition, online stories and a community advertising directory; the Queensland Country Press Association's judges in 2022 praised "an excellent online website with flip book and text to audio on stories and a community advertising directory". The title is tracked as a verified newspaper outlet by Muck Rack, which records its weekly Wednesday frequency.

Ownership and Organisation

The Express is independently owned and published by Portasea Pty Ltd of Mareeba, the company of publisher Carlo (Carl) Portella, who is also the owner of The Express (Mareeba) recorded on the Australian Communications and Media Authority's register and a co-owner of Cairns Local News Pty Ltd, publisher of Cairns Local News. Its editorial team has included journalist Ellie Fink, recognised in the 2023 Queensland Country Press awards. The paper is a member publication of the Queensland Country Press Association, in whose annual Media Excellence Awards it has been a regular winner and placegetter. It has no connection with News Corp Australia, whose Tablelands titles it outlasted, nor with the nineteenth-century Mareeba Express of the same name.

Contact and Availability

The Express is published every Wednesday and is free. Print copies are home delivered and available through newsagents and outlets in Mareeba, Atherton and across its Tablelands and far northern distribution area, and each edition can be read in full, free, as a digital flip-book via theexpressnewspaper.com.au. Readers and advertisers contact the paper through its website and its Mareeba office.