Sixty Years of Business

The people behind the stories.

Sixty years of New Zealand business, told by the reporters who broke the stories.

Since 1970, NBR's journalists have been in the room when New Zealand business history was made, and sometimes in the corridor outside, refusing to leave.

Now, for our 60th anniversary, we're opening up the newsroom. How the big stories were found. Why they mattered. What never made the page.

Only 1500 numbered copies will ever be printed. When they're reserved, that's it.

Reserve your number

The record

Six decades of NBR reporting, edited into one volume by Poppie Johnson.

Made properly

Designed as a permanent record, not a paperback. Final specification confirmed before print.

Your number

1500 copies, each numbered in the order reserved. Reserve early for a low number.

Anyone could write a history of NBR.

Only NBR can take you inside the newsroom.

1970
Started by a group one founder calls 'wrong-side-of-the-tracks young troublemakers'. Henry Newrick was 23. He refused the advertorial model of the day and posted advertisers' puff pieces back to them.
The first issue
The lead story asked which companies were manoeuvring to run a second television channel. The centre spread was a long interview with Robert Muldoon, then leader of the opposition.

It is impossible to exaggerate the extent to which there wasn't any real business journalism at the time.
Hugh Rennie QC, a founder

From the archive

The paper, the photographs, the proof.

You are not just waiting

The book is years in the making. Reserve a copy and you see it being made.

Dispatches from the research

As the research turns things up, copy-holders see it first. A document from the archive. A photograph nobody has published. An interview nobody has read.

Reserve early, lower number

Copies are numbered in the order reserved, so the earlier you reserve the lower your number. We confirm your number when the book ships.

The launch, 26 August 2030

The book is released on NBR's 60th anniversary, with the journalists who made it in the room. Copy-holders hear the plans first.

Before you reserve

When will I get the book?

Sixty Years of Business publishes on 26 August 2030, NBR's sixtieth anniversary. Copies are dispatched after publication.

That is a long way off, and it is deliberate. The book marks the anniversary, so it arrives with it.

So I'm paying now for a book I get in 2030?

Yes. You are reserving one of 1500 numbered copies and paying at the time of reservation.

You can cancel at any point before dispatch, for any reason, and get every cent back including shipping. That right stands for the whole period.

Has the book been written yet?

No. Poppie Johnson is writing it, and it will be published to mark the anniversary in 2030.

That is why we describe this as a reservation rather than a purchase. You are securing a numbered copy of the print run, not buying stock we are holding in a warehouse.

What happens if it doesn't go ahead?

The book proceeds only if enough copies are reserved by 1 February 2027.

If we do not reach that point, the project does not go ahead and every reservation is refunded in full, automatically. You will not need to ask.