It was an Awesome Newcastle like never before last night at Young Street Hotel. An important sports game started at 7:30, and also one of our finalists cancelled last minute. It was destined to be a night of high energy, spontaneity and uniqueness!

As per usual we welcomed heaps of fabulous board members including returning guest board members Tiana Jarvis of Maitland City Council and Kara Sullivan of Guts Creative. We welcomed first time guest board members Jackson Bauer of Moneyme and Tim Cox of Sage Marketing. We are also excited to welcome two new permanent board members, Adrienne Donnelly and Sharife Rahmani.

This month our finalists were Mardi Lee from Renewy Living Podcast, Shonavee Simpson from The Edge of Search SEO Conference, Jaeden the bartender from Young Street Hotel, and Nick a fan of crypto money who decided to jump in and shoot his shot.

Mardi went first. She explained that ReNewy Living is an eco-living social enterprise that believes in the power of local action to create a lasting environmental and social legacy. Each episode features conversations with community minded locals who share their strengths for living sustainably, including previous Awesome Newcastle winners like The Share Shop and Upcycle Newcastle! She would use the $1000 will be used as a contribution towards the first podcast series.

Next up was Shonavee. She works at a local ad agency called Firewall Digital, and her SEO conference, The Edge of Search ’24 will bring the digital and tech community of Newcastle together, demonstrating why collaboration is future of digital campaigns, and showcase the incredible city that is Newcastle.  She would use the money to sponsor a speaker from the Newcastle/Hunter Region area.

Next up went Jaeden. It was only his third or fourth shift at Young Street, but his boss kindly let him take ten minutes off  to pitch his idea about shipping containers as affordable, environmentally friendly houses in the Newcastle Region. Jaeden is a student interested in sustainability and architecture, and he would use the money to create a 3D model to show the city of Newcastle to take his idea further.

Then, a patron at the bar named Nick jumped up and talked to the board about how he wants to get cryptocurrency going in Newcastle through vending machines. As our host Alex had been asking around all over the bar if anyone had any Awesome ideas that could use funding, you can’t really blame him for having a a go!

It was truly a unique night of Awesome Newcastle pitches. The board asked lots of questions and then got down to the business of deliberating as the sports would soon be starting.

Then we invited Jackson to the stage to announce the winner, and he passed the money to Mardi. Congratulations, Mardi! We’re so excited for you, and we can’t wait to listen to all your fabulous podcast guests on ReNewy Living.

Thanks for joining us for this original episode of Awesome Newcastle, and we’ll see you next time!