Sailing into 2026
From the editor Dan Hutchinson: ‘Survive ‘till ‘25’ was the call this time last year and that was always going to be too many punctuation marks.
In the same way that couples adopting a pet is a precursor to actual babies, complicated punctuation is also a sure sign of things to come.
Rather than bounding into 2025, it has been a time of consolidation, tightening the belt and thinking outside the square.
Those that have mastered this concept or who have traded through countless economic cycles are cautiously optimistic of a steady improvement through 2026.
Sadly, nothing rhymes with 2026, so there’s no catchy slogan heading into next year.
Here at Taupō & Tūrangi News, we don’t dwell much on the past, or the future for that matter, it is simply a case of what’s happening now.
There is no space to breath between each weekly issue, as we conjure up the most relevant content for readers, but next year we have more people joining us and bigger plans for news.
Because we are taking a break for three weeks – returning January 15 – we have put together our largest edition of the year, jam-packed full of stuff you might find interesting – both from a news perspective and from our many loyal advertisers.
We caught up with members of the Taupō Community Patrol who have been left holding a bright and twinkly problem, after the town fireworks display was cancelled in November. Using glow sticks as your main annual fundraiser is a solid business plan, but there is only a couple of opportunities each year to sell them on a large scale. The community patrol is now going to sell them off in the days leading up to the Taupō District Council’s New Year Fireworks on the lakefront, so make sure you grab a ‘Thunderstick’ and set yourself up for a bright 2026.
This week’s edition includes a couple of pages of puzzles, a page of colouring-in, a three-page guide to eating out, two pages of What’s On, Christmas Greetings and even a funky advert that encourages readers to ‘interact’ - so make sure you pick up a copy at your favourite local business.
We could have filled another newspaper with content that we didn’t have the time or space for this week, so the first edition back in the New Year is going to be a great one too.
In the meantime, make sure you check out the new foiling, electric catamaran, Air New Zealand’s new electric plane, plans for the Great Lake Centre and loads more stories throughout.
For the team here at Taupō News, it has been a real adventure this year, picking up the local newspaper from NZME and turning it into a thriving local business.
Community newspaper have always held a special place in districts like ours and the basic principals haven’t changed much over the years.
While daily, subscribed newspapers have felt the bite from online advertising, the concept of a freely-available printed community newspaper has never been stronger. As long as there is something for everyone in every edition, and it’s readily available, then everyone is happy.
We print and distribute more newspapers each week than there are letterboxes in the district, and we try to make sure every one of those gets into good hands.
As we head into next year we will be looking to get more people invovled and cover more news around the district, both in print and online.
Enjoy everything that Taupō has to offer and we will be back in letterboxes, inboxes and shops on January 15.
- Dan