Message from our Managing Editor and Founder

It has been a while since we have reached out to our broader audience, newsletter readers and members to give you an update on what is happening at The Straight.  

Firstly, thank you for the support, readership and patronage of The Straight since we launched two and a half years ago.

We have had a remarkable 1.5 million unique users on our platform over that time, with total time spent on The Straight an incredible 58,200 hours, 2425 days, or 6.6 years! What is better is our audience continues to not only grow but engage with us at record levels.

You will recall we introduced our paid membership platform in October 2025 as part of our strategy to continue to deliver on our promise to provide the best news, analysis and features for the racing, wagering and breeding industries as well as expand our offering.

This membership strategy was something we outlined from our launch in 2023 as crucial to our commercial model and ongoing independence.

Around 50 per cent of our exclusive feature and analysis content is currently behind a member wall. However, since we launched membership, we have allowed non-members to access one article per month.

From this week, that exclusive content will only be available to those with a paid membership. We will clearly denote our member-only content, but in order to access everything you will need a membership.

To clarify, paid membership is separate from those who are signed up to our newsletters, which will continue to be available free to our newsletter readers.    

The value The Straight provides will differ for each person, but for those who value what we do and the service we offer, the membership fee, which is $19 per month or $199 per year, will be worth paying.

The Straight will always have some content made freely available, including, as mentioned, our daily and feature newsletters and our general news content. We value our broad readership enormously and will continue to provide a destination for you to remain updated with the most important industry information.

For our members, current and future, we will be expanding our offering, including exclusive access to reporting, analysis, social media/WhatsApp groups, events and other initiatives. Stay tuned for more updates.

We have also rolled out a major update of The Straight Jobs, our employment portal, with a greater focus on careers and pathways across the racing, breeding, bloodstock and wagering industries.

You will also notice a refreshed approach to our newsletters and social media presence over the coming month.

We are committed to providing our readers and members with not only the best content, but the best possible experience.

If we should fall short of that promise, please send me an email on editor@thestraight.com.au and let me know how we can do better.

Regards

Bren O’Brien

Managing Editor and Founder

The Straight