By Catherine Komp, Engagement Director
Last summer, Corinne Saunders was feeling good. The Outer Banks native and longtime reporter had just gotten word that she was a finalist for two North Carolina Press Association awards, including for a story she affectionately refers to as the “poop pond.” As the Outer Banks reporter for The Virginian-Pilot, Saunders was digging into all kinds of accountability stories. This one helped shine a light on years of negligence at a private wastewater treatment plant.
“This was about a literal pond of poop in Southern Shores here, and people didn’t know about it,” said Saunders. “It’s supposed to be a wastewater management facility, but it’s broken. It hadn’t been functioning. The company keeps getting fined by the state, but [they didn’t fix it] and they wanted to build more development on the lot right next door.”
But just days after hearing about the recognition of her reporting, Saunders got some news that’s all too familiar these days: the hedge fund-owned Virginian Pilot was eliminating her position.
Full-time journalism jobs in the Outer Banks are extremely rare. Before the Pilot, Saunders moved around, going back to High Country Press in Boone and then to The Daily Advance in Elizabeth City. She returned to the Outer Banks to freelance, but often found it hard to sell her investigative and accountability pitches.
“It could be advertiser conflict, it could be personal conflict,” Saunders said. “The Outer Banks is small, everybody knows everybody. There were a lot of brick walls and I was seeing how that lack of coverage really affected people.”
So, she decided to fill that gap with something new, something she could build herself from the ground-up: Outer Banks Insider.
“I really launched fast. I knew that if I sat back and did all the research that I wanted to, it might be years before I even started. Fortunately, my husband was like ‘You just need to go for it… and understand that in the beginning of anything, not everything’s going to work, not everything’s going to be perfect, but getting going is the most important step.’”
Saunders’s husband Anthony helps out with some of the tech, but she’s doing the rest. Since launching last September, she’s published 80+ articles including examining the foster care crisis in the Outer Banks, breaking news about the reinstatement of a dredging permit, digging into federal grand jury subpoenas issued to local government and finding out which local voters were swept up in Jefferson Griffin’s attempted ballot purge.
“I talked to so many people on the list, many who didn’t want to be interviewed, and that’s fine, but so many of them had no idea that they were on it,” said Saunders.She also covers community, education and culture, like the Outer Banks chorus “singing its way across the Atlantic” and the first ever “miniboat” project at a local school. Saunders was even on hand for the Avalon Pier crab pot drop on New Year’s eve.
Saunders also has an MA in Teaching with a specialization in ESL. She’s subsidized her passion for local news by also working as a teacher in Dare County and by waiting tables. Saunders is also a mom.
“I have immense gratitude toward my amazing kiddo, who has ridden the ups and downs of a good part of my journalistic journey with me,” said Saunders.
Saunders also credits early mentors, including a career counselor at App State who encouraged the English major to apply for an internship at High Country Press. She says the paper’s then-publisher Ken Ketchie took a chance on her and editor Kathleen McFadden provided her with “a strong woman role model in the newspaper business and taught me to pursue excellence.”
Now she’s on her own, taking all that she’s learned from coaches and supporters throughout her career with her as she juggles the many demands of being a soloprenuer. Saunders launched Outer Banks Insider as an LLC, with a subscription-based revenue model: $5 per month or $50 per year.
“My goal is to not rely on advertising, so I don’t have the kinds of conflicts of interest that could hold me back editorially, or even the optics of that,” said Saunders.
Saunders does offer one open access story per week. So far, she says subscriptions are a bit lower than her goals, but she knows it will take a while to grow her audience. For 2025, she wants to focus on a more sustainable workflow and building up the business side of the operation.
“I’ve been doing journalism for 18 years and the bulk of it has been in northeast North Carolina. A lot of people were at least kind of familiar with my byline. So, I’m still working on organizing more advertising. So far, it’s just been word-of-mouth, social media, and talking to people in person,” said Saunders.
Saunders says some have questioned why she doesn’t just move to a bigger city to pursue better opportunities. She says she wants to carve her own path, doing what she’s good at in the place she calls home.
“I’m an island girl, this is my community,” Saunders wrote after accepting her 2024 NCPA awards. “I care about our future, and I’m giving it all I’ve got.”
