Stories of Successful Small Towns
This page describes successful ventures in small towns that may provide ideas for Northcliffe's future.

This contribution is from Ken Moore who visited the small village of Koonwarra in the south Gippsland area of Victoria in July 2002. The tourist name for the district is PROM Country because it's not far from Wilson's Promontory, the most southern point of the Australian mainland.

Koonwarra has developed a reputation for being a go-getter small town and is developing small scale, but high quality food, wine and lifestyle service businesses. I have wanted to go there for some time and was invited to a one-day seminar on developing sustainable businesses in small towns based around the Koonwarra experience.

I think Koonwarra offers ideas for things that we could do in Northcliffe, because in many ways it is very similar - climate and landscapes are similar and the town has a small population of 240 people, although it is only 7 kms from a town the size of Manjimup. The traditional industries have been dairy, beef and timber and in recent years there has been acceptance that the community needed to look for new opportunities in the face of dairy deregulation, a scaling back of the timber industry and the variability of beef prices.

All small towns going through a rebirth, need a strong driver and, in the case of Northcliffe, I hope it will be the NICC Centre when it co-locates the Telecentre, Tourist Centre, Library and provides facilities for the Arts Association.

The driver for Koonwarra's rebirth was the old general store which has been beautifully renovated by a brother and sister without a lot of dollars. It is now the hub of the town and operates as a cafe/restaurant, produce store, post office and newsagent with a garden wine bar and rose gardens for private functions. The garden wine bar is, in fact, a concrete tank that has been converted to a cosy bar which has a happy hour for locals and visitors every Friday (with half price drinks for local wines and beer from a boutique brewery). It was going to cost $2,000 for the tank to be taken away so the owners decided to put a roof and doors on it and build a bar inside for the $2,000 - what an amazing investment that has become a quality watering hole and meeting place for locals and visitors!!

The theme of the store is 'seasonal, regional and sustainable' meaning that it provides quality local or regional produce grown using sustainable (clean and green) production methods and only available fresh.

The owners have now bought a building across the road that they call the Poet's Corner Cafe and it is a cooking school, produce store, bookshop with native gardens and facilities for private functions. They also hold poetry readings and jazz nights in a gazebo built on top of a corrugated iron tank.

A number of other innovative businesses have sprung up around the Poet's Corner:

1.The Artisans Workshop with a gallery and gardens for hand crafted ceramics, hammocks and cushions, fountains and statuary, decorator homewares, giant glazed pots. The workshop offers ceramic classes, art and craft courses, 'paint a plate' courses.

2. The Escential Shop which specialises in beauty, massage, healing, essential oils, pot pourri and also offers workshops.

3. A photographic studio that produces posters, calendars and post cards of local scenery and also shoots scenery to sell for film-making both here and overseas (eg, Babe). The local photographer also provides classes on photography and film making.

Other innovative businesses that have been developed in town are:

A Centre for Sustainable Development which has renovated the old hall for offices, meeting rooms and training rooms. This provides training and workshops for businesses (eg, how to grow your business sustainably), individuals (eg, personal sustainability and living sustainably) and schools in sustainable education. The Centre also offers consultancy services, mentoring and coaching Australia-wide.

The OrganicFix which provides markets and marketing services for local organic produce. This has been an amazing success story with the owners commencing 18 months ago with $500 and 4 local suppliers. They now have a turnover of $250,000 and have 12 local producers supplying product locally and regionally.

A Farmers Market for all local produce.

Heritage furniture which produces fine furniture from local timbers.

A base for the highly successful Victorian Greenfleet initiative which is a non-profit company that invites motorists to subscribe $30 per year (tax deductible) and in return plants 17 trees per car to absorb carbon dioxide emissions from cars. One tree in its lifetime absorbs the CO2 emissions of the average car, storing the carbon in the wood and releasing oxygen back into the atmosphere. Greenfleet now plants trees in most states including WA soon.

The town has developed a forest park like Northcliffe's with a walking trail which begins at the Poet's Corner.

Several years ago, the school closed down, but the locals have leased it from the Government at a nominal rent and turned it into meeting and training rooms, a mountain biking school and an organic growing school.

So what are the ingredients for the growing success of the town as explained by the locals. The first thing was a driver and this was the initiative of the brother and sister who turned the local store into a quality local produce outlet also offering facilities for dining, functions and courses. This initiative led to other businesses developing around the themes promoted by the Koonwarra Store.

Another success factor is that the businesses saw the connections between them and now work together cooperatively and build new opportunities on their strengths and relationships. A third success factor is that all businesses have recognised that almost everything has a training and educational component people are willing to pay for and they have built courses, workshops and consultancy into their businesses.

So there it is - hopefully, a source of successful ideas rather than something that we can replicate in every detail. Here is the Koonwarra website if you want to look at some of the things going on there:

http://www.promcountry.com.au/koonwarravillage

Source: Ken Moore 14/8/02