Randburg Sun shines at Excellence Awards
Caxton newspapers dominated the awards for 2021 with the majority of the Newspaper of the Year categories won by Caxton titles.
Randburg Sun once again shone brightly at the annual AVBOB FCJ Excellence Awards walking away with the Best Community Project award for our Hero of the Month campaign, as well as third place in the Best Corporate Owned Free Newspaper (pagination 24 and over) category.
The Hero of the Month campaign was run in partnership with Westpack Lifestyle who sponsored monthly gift vouchers to members of the community who were nominated by their peers for their charitable efforts within the community. Randburg Sun‘s sister publication, the Fourways Review was named Best Newspaper of the Year in the same category, while Northcliff Melville Times took fourth place in the Best Newspaper of the Year, in the category Best Corporate Owned Free Newspaper pagination 24 and less, making it a good night for the Caxton Joburg North team.
Caxton newspapers dominated the awards for 2021 with the majority of the Newspaper of the Year categories won by Caxton titles.
“Our readers are at the core of everything that we do at Caxton Local Media, so to be recognised for giving back to those readers is a tremendous honour for us,” said editor Aimee McGill.
“It takes a dedicated team to make award-winning newspapers happen – from journalists, editors, sub-editors, production staff and the sales team – each and every person is an important role player, and I am so grateful for the effort each and every person has put in to make this possible. A community newspaper is nothing without its readers. Our readers are the reason we do what we do, and the catalysts in our process. Thank you to every community member who sends us a tip-off, invites us to events, and reads our publication. It really is an honour to work with you.”
This year the FCJ (Forum of Community Journalists) gained the support of a new title sponsor AVBOB which, through its investment in the forum and industry, showed its acknowledgement of the role of community journalists in society and its support of excellent journalism.
“We live in an era of fake news and ‘alternative facts’ with a plethora of unregulated platforms and social media channels designed to push unseen agendas to the unsuspecting consumer. And so, in this time, your role and purpose as journalists to be a source of credible and objective news and information cannot be overstated,” said Carl van der Riet, CEO of AVBOB.
Executive director of the FCJ and Caxton editor Marietta Lombard said, “The community journalist has the privilege of telling the reader’s story on the best day of the reader’s life – when the reader wishes to share the news of a son or a daughter who has won a gold medal. We have a huge responsibility of telling the same reader’s story on their worst day – when there is the need to speak out about injustice or the loss of a loved one. As community journalists, we carry that privilege and responsibility in our hearts and execute it in our storytelling.”
For the first time since the Covid-19 pandemic, FCJ again hosted its annual awards in person on October 14 at the Birchwood Hotel and OR Tambo Conference Centre.
The FCJ’s loyal sponsors Media24 and Caxton enabled the forum to host a national seminar with guest speakers Reg Rumney and André Gouws before the gala dinner.
To see photos of the awards evening, and the team celebrating their success, scan this QR code.
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