#MediaMonday – Sandee and Genna Caviness
Today’s #MediaMonday comes to us from the cool pines of Munds Park, 20 miles south of Flagstaff, where Sandee and Genna Caviness are publishers and editors of the Pinewood News, a free monthly newspaper focusing on the bustling Munds Park community.
I stopped into the welcoming Pinewood News offices a couple weeks ago and had a nice chat with Sandee. Her publication is a true community newspaper with a tremendously loyal following.
Sandee, time to share:
A Little About Us and the Pinewood News: Genna, my wife, and I moved to Munds Park in 2019 from Phoenix. I am a native of Arizona, and Genna is a transplant from San Diego but has lived most of her life in Arizona—a state we both love.
Our roots are in the non-profit world, where we spent most of our work life at Hospice of the Valley. At the end of our careers at HOV, Genna was the general manager of the White Dove Thrift Shoppe in Mesa, and I was the creative director for the agency, managing the HOV brand.
When we uprooted ourselves from Phoenix and headed North, we had no career plans other than dreams of simplicity, downsizing, and living large on the most precious commodity—time, a valuable lesson learned in the halls of Hospice of the Valley.
Becoming publishers of the Pinewood News or any newspaper was nowhere on our bucket list or even a fleeting thought for either one of us. It was a door that opened, and it sounded fun, so we took the opportunity to try something new.
Sharon and Jim Emery, the previous owners of the Pinewood News, noticed a website I built for Munds Park called Munds Park Today. I created it because Google’s location services doesn’t work well in our area and often buries businesses supporting Munds Park several pages deep, making it challenging to find local service providers. I’m uncertain if it’s due to our streets being renamed or because Munds Park is an unincorporated area, but residents face difficulty in locating businesses that cater to their needs. While residents heavily rely on Facebook, I found it frustrating to sift through numerous posts and advertisements to find relevant businesses. Therefore, maintaining an up-to-date website seemed like a valuable tool for our community, and we integrated it into the Pinewood News website.
So, it was the development of Munds Park Today that, when Sharon was ready to retire, led her to ask us if we wanted to purchase the paper—and our answer was a fast yes.
We thought, how fun! We love this community, I love to design, and there were seasoned writers who dedicated their time and energy to the paper, all of whom are wonderful to work with. We couldn’t pass it up.
Top three Northern Arizona places to visit? One thing I learned from Munds Park locals is that when you find a lovely location, you keep its secret. Because if you don’t, visitors will overrun the spot and take away all its serenity and beauty. So, shhhhh.
Favorite restaurants? We love all the restaurants in Munds Park for different reasons, but the main reason is that we know the owners and many of their patrons, which makes visiting their establishments feel like going home for dinner.
What do you like to do when you’re not working? We play with our friends, roam the forest, and garden.
What would readers be surprised to know about you? Probably that Genna and I are married. We have been together for 28 years and have two daughters. One of them lives in Phoenix with our grandson and our youngest works here in Munds Park at Kota’s Coffee House.
What are your deadlines? During the spring and summer, we publish two issues per month, and from October to March, we publish only one issue per month, so the deadlines fluctuate. We’re happy to send a Marketing Kit to anyone interested.
What’s the best way to reach you? You can reach us at 928-286-9827 or Hello@ThePinewoodNews.com.
