Publisher: Qnotes Gay Charlotte and LGBT Carolina News, Arts & Entertainment

qnotes is the LGBT arts, entertainment and news publication based in Charlotte, N.C. With a strong and robust presence online at goqnotes.com, and a free print circulation distributed every other week, we are the largest and most trusted source of news, politics, opinion, entertainment, art, lifestyle, community events and more for LGBT North Carolinians and South Carolinians. Our print edition is distributed in major cities and small-to-medium sized cities and towns in North Carolina including the greater Charlotte metro area, and in Raleigh, Greensboro, Winston-Salem, Durham, Chapel Hill and Carrboro. Our online edition serves all readers across the Carolinas and receives tens of thousands of hits each month. It offers daily news, arts and entertainment updates and upcoming events, along with news and other features from each of our print editions. Mission Statement The focus of qnotes is to serve the LGBT and straight ally communities of the Charlotte region, North Carolina and beyond, by featuring arts, entertainment, news and views content in print and online that directly enlightens, informs and engages the readers about LGBT life and social justice issues. Origins In 1983, the now defunct Queen City Quordinators started publishing a small, monthly newsletter named “Q-Notes.” The newsletter ended its run in 1984, with the close of the non-profit. In 1986, the newsletter was revived, and the publication was reborn as a monthly, print newspaper. The first issue of the revived community news source was published in June 1986, to coincide with National LGBT Pride Month. In 1989, Jim Yarbrough, the owner of Pride Publishing and Typesetting, Inc., bought the publication and in 1996, qnotes began distributing every other week. Merger with The Front Page On May 12, 2006, qnotes merged with the Raleigh, N.C.-based The Front Page, another North Carolina LGBT newspaper. The Front Page began publishing in 1979 in Raleigh, N.C., under longtime publisher and editor Jim Baxter. Continued Growth In April 2008, qnotes revamped its online presence and debuted a new website and content management system at www.q-notes.com. Changes to the website continued gradually until our January 2010 redesign, rebranding and editorial re-direction, in which “Q-Notes” became qnotes. The publication’s new direction calls for more in-depth, future-focused features in its bi-weekly print edition and a far more robust, daily updated website at the new goqnotes.com.