About Noosa Today

Noosa Today

Overview

Noosa Today is a free weekly newspaper serving Noosa and its surrounding communities on Queensland's Sunshine Coast, publishing in print each Friday and continuously online at noosatoday.com.au. It is owned by Star News Group, the Thomas family's Victorian-based independent publishing group, and it is the local masthead for the Noosa Shire, covering council affairs, community news, sport, lifestyle and property in one of Australia's best-known coastal holiday regions.

The paper describes itself, in its current sponsorship and advertising material, as "the region's leading free newspaper", a trusted source of news, features and community information delivered through "our well-established print, online, and social platforms", with a dedicated full-gloss real estate magazine insert keeping residents informed of property news. A print edition dated Friday 27 June 2025 has been sighted in the course of research for this profile, with Noosa Council's Your Noosa magazine carried in the paper's pages that week — direct evidence of the weekly Friday print cycle operating in 2025.

History

Noosa Today began as a local independent startup. According to GXpress, the trade journal of the Australasian newsmedia industry, the paper was cofounded by Isobel Coleman and launched after News Corp Australia's Quest newspaper division closed the Noosa Journal, together with its glossy Weekender companion. In its first, independent period the masthead carried the straps "Your town, your paper" and "Independently family owned", and the paper was printed by APN at Yandina, south of Noosa.

Star News Group bought the Noosa masthead from its founders in 2014, as GXpress recorded in a later profile of the group. Under Star, the paper's print edition was withdrawn in 2019 — a year before the COVID-19 pandemic — and Noosa Today continued as a digital-only publication.

That changed abruptly in June 2020. When News Corp Australia announced the closure of more than one hundred regional print editions, including the print edition of its own Noosa News, Star moved within days. As GXpress reported at the time, a week after News Corp "sounded the death knell" for the Noosa News print edition, Noosa Today was back in print: a 28-page tabloid accompanied by a 24-page glossy property section, produced after three working days of round-the-clock effort, printed at Australian Community Media's North Richmond plant in New South Wales and trucked north to Noosa at a cost of $2,200. The paper's sales manager, Phil Le Pettit, had just been elected president of the Queensland Country Press Association, and his message to readers was blunt: "Print is not dead."

The free print edition has continued since that 2020 relaunch, and the paper remains on Star News Group's current roster of Queensland titles.

The 2020 relaunch was also a statement about the group's model. Speaking to GXpress in June 2020, Paul Thomas said News Corp's announcement had prompted approaches "all the way along the coast" from politicians, businesspeople and communities wanting local print titles restored, and he pointed to interest in local ownership as part of a potential model for regional publishing. "Out of this sad mess, the good thing to come has been the positiveness of everyone," Thomas said. Noosa Today, back in print within a week of its News Corp rival's print closure, was the first worked example of that argument, and GXpress's later profile of the group recorded the mechanics of it: bought from its founders in 2014, turned digital-only a year before the pandemic, then relaunched as a free print tabloid in June 2020 as soon as the market opened.

Programming and Content

Noosa Today's content is the standard mix of an Australian coastal weekly, weighted toward the issues of a high-amenity shire where planning, environment and tourism dominate public debate: Noosa Council decisions and local politics, community and school news, sport, entertainment and lifestyle coverage, and a substantial property component published as a full-gloss real estate magazine insert within the paper. The state member for Noosa, Sandy Bolton, has published a monthly column in the paper, with her office's newsletters directing constituents to her columns in Noosa Today and her website republishing columns from August and September 2023 and April 2024. Local political coverage has at times drawn outside comment: in January 2024 the paper's journalist Phil Jarratt — a veteran surf writer who had earlier written a column for the relaunched print edition — was reporting on a contested occupation of the former Tewantin TAFE site, coverage later discussed in local media commentary, which credited Jarratt with giving readers the context behind the protest groups involved; the same commentary subsequently noted that the paper had parted company with him, the one experienced journalist it said had been covering local politics with nuance. At the 2020 print relaunch, the paper's 24-page glossy property section was aligned to the realestateview.com.au portal, a tie-in reflecting how central the Noosa property market is to the paper's commercial base; the gloss real estate magazine insert remains part of the paper's current format. Council material also reaches residents through the paper: Noosa Council's own Your Noosa magazine was distributed within Noosa Today's pages in June 2025.

Audience and Reach

The paper's audience is the Noosa Shire community — a resident population spread across Noosa Heads, Noosaville, Tewantin, Cooroy, Pomona and the coastal and hinterland villages — together with the large visitor and second-home market that reads local property and lifestyle coverage. As a free, letterbox- and pickup-distributed weekly with an accompanying website and social channels, its reach rests on household penetration of the shire rather than paid circulation, and no independently audited circulation figure for the title is published in the sources consulted. Its own description of itself as "the region's leading free newspaper" is the publisher's characterisation and is recorded here as such.

Digital Presence

Noosa Today's website is noosatoday.com.au, carrying the paper's news online alongside its print edition; the paper also maintains social media channels, which its own material groups with print and online as its three established platforms. The digital operation has an unusual history within the one masthead: between 2019 and June 2020 the website was the paper's only home, after Star withdrew the print edition, before the free print weekly was relaunched in response to News Corp's regional print closures. Star News Group's corporate listings and Wikipedia's current account of the group both continue to list Noosa Today among its Queensland titles.

Ownership and Organisation

Noosa Today is owned by Star News Group, a family-owned Australian publishing company founded in 1909 by Albert Edward Thomas with the Berwick Shire News and Pakenham and Cranbourne Gazette, still owned by the Thomas family and based at Pakenham, Victoria. The group took its present name in August 2005, and its managing director, Paul Thomas, is the fourth generation of the family to run it. GXpress identified Thomas in June 2020 as the owner of Noosa Today and of Warwick's Southern Free Times in Queensland; Wikipedia's listing of the group counts Noosa Today among its twenty Queensland titles, and the group also operates the Today News Group stable of Queensland mastheads. Star acquired Noosa Today from its founders in 2014. At the 2020 print relaunch the paper's sales manager was Phil Le Pettit, then newly elected president of the Queensland Country Press Association.

Contact and Availability

Noosa Today is a free newspaper: the print edition is distributed across the Noosa Shire each Friday and can also be read online at noosatoday.com.au, where the paper publishes between print editions. Readers and advertisers deal with the paper through its website and its Sunshine Coast business listings; the title is a sponsor-listed participant in the Sunshine Coast Business Awards, whose current material describes the paper's print, online and social operation in the terms quoted in the overview of this profile.