This week, our editor and overseer of this staff and community highlight, Marketing & Events Manager Richelle Boyd, shares her origin story.
I started out my journey at the Independent as an intern working in the newsroom under our superb Jean Yamamura. On my very first day — when I was on my way to get my first assignment — our Senior Editor Nick Welsh stopped me and strongarmed me into a meeting with the school district’s superintendent at the time.
From that moment on, I was in love with the environment of the Indy, and I liked the kooky, determined staffers even better. So, when I found out that my new job — working on all the marketing for the Independent, coordinating food weeks, and managing event logistics among many other things — was also going to include picking someone on staff or in our community to highlight each week, I was excited. It’s a slightly daunting task, trying to find something fresh each and every week, but I’ve always enjoyed getting to know my co-workers, and it was a great chance for me, a Santa Barbara transplant, to get to know all the people and happenings in our community.
One of my first ever highlights for the paper was our CNPA Journalism awards, which have steadily become a highlight of my work over the past three years. Though I’m not submitting stories that I’ve written (sadly, my weekly highlight is not award-winning), getting to reexamine the work from the previous years from our stellar cast is always amazing. I also love that I get to work closely with our Editor in Chief Marianne Partridge on these awards. I also get to work closely with her on our local heroes list and the selection process — another daunting task with the number of submissions that we get, but working with Marianne is always wonderful and keeps me on my toes.
Even with all this great editorial influence over my work, I still enjoy managing and planning events and tabling out in our community the most. Getting to plan events such as the INDY40 Fest happening this weekend are my biggest highlights — working with businesses and organizations in town to create fun spaces that people want to be in. It’s such a pleasure to be at an event and watch everyone in attendance enjoying it too — to see the impact all of my months of planning have made.
And getting into those little details is the most important part of my job. From closely managing our Best of Santa Barbara® Readers’ Poll, to reaching out to winners of our “Snap. Share. Win!” Instagram contests, and making sure all of the ads in the paper and social media for these promotions are correct. It’s even ordering all of the giveaways we have at our tables when you see at other community events that aren’t our own.
It’s no thankless job, but it’s way more work than people assume. I’ve been able to evolve my role and slowly start to add to the Independent’s portfolio of specialty weeks and events throughout the year. I hope to continue to expand on them, even if it just means diving deeper into the details or adding new elements to our classic projects. I can’t wait to do even more, and I look forward to all the community stories and great people I’ll get to meet and write about in the years to come.
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