I’m lucky enough to live by the coast. From my attic window I can watch ships traveling up the Thames estuary. Along with the huge container shops heading towards the London Gateway super port are the small trawlers from Leigh-on-Sea’s fishing fleet. I love the juxtaposition of these corporate giants alongside these smaller, agile, independents. And that’s what ‘Trawler’ is all about; a 24 page independent-minded, community-generated publication, anchored here in Leigh-on-Sea.

Trawler’s crowdfunding campaign

We launched Trawler in May via a Crowdfunder campaign that reached its target in just five days (we’re currently overfunding – you can buy a copy and support us here). The publication was born last year out of a local meetup group for creatives and freelancers – Made In Leigh – that I’d co-founded. We felt there were so many great stories around the table, so much creative and entrepreneurial talent in our town, wouldn’t it be great to create a publication to share them?

Although much of Leigh-on-Sea’s population commutes to work in London forty miles away, this former fishing village retains a thriving entrepreneurial and creative vibe. There is an annual art trail, a popular folk festival and the town still boasts a shopping street full of independent retailers: coffee shops, record shop, book shop, ice cream parlour, wine shop, food retailers, bars and restaurants. We like our town.

Trawler is not a newspaper – you won’t find any news in it. It’s a blend of community-generated stories – rooted in a hyperlocal area – framed around creativity and entrepreneurship. Although Trawler is anchored around our local town, this is a publication for curious people everyone and anywhere, telling stories of passion, hard work, creativity and entrepreneurial spirit. I read Monocle magazine and enjoy reading about design shops in Buenos Aires for example; so I thought why wouldn’t a reader in Brooklyn want to read about a Leigh-on-Sea wine shop?

In editing Trawler, I wanted to shine the light on untold stories. Who knew the backstories of the wine shop and the record shop, who knew one of our local churches had a cartoonist in residence? The local aspect is important: Trawler waves the flag for Leigh-on-Sea and the people who choose to live here and start businesses here.

We’ve been lucky to have such professional input on a side project where everybody is giving their time and talents – and lots of it – for free. World class photography from Si Brandon and Dan Rubin, creative direction from Rich With and Lisa Lanfranchi, an enthusiastic team of contributors and editors, fuelled by the passion and energy of our co-founder Michael Mentessi who’s driven the crowdfunding. I’m a professional storyteller who helps organisations capture and tell their stories, as well as an author and business journalist. So we have an experienced team. But this is a community project, it was important that whilst I editorialised the content, we agreed that anyone around the table could contribute. They didn’t have to be an experienced writer and this means we have been able to include a plurality of voices.

Why did we choose the crowdfunding route? It was an experiment. We needed to raise enough money to get 3,000 copies printed but we didn’t want it to be advertiser funded. So we decided to ‘take it to the crowd’ to get the support of not just local people but anyone who might be interested in community-generated content. We were also lucky to get the support of local digital radio manufacturer Ruark Audio who share our passion for the town.

It’s always hard finding time for a side project, especially one as demanding as this. But with a team of people who have all rolled up their sleeves, and given their time and expertise for free, this is a project we can all be proud of. We could have left Trawler as just an idea we had in a coffee shop, but thanks to everyone around the table, we sweated to make it happen.

As for the future, we have had great success on Crowdfunder so if people like the first edition, let’s see where the tide takes Trawler next. Keep your eye to the telescope!

Ian Sanders is editor of Trawler, and a business storyteller & creative consultant.