We sat down for a chinwag with a founding member of G:Zines Collective, Amanda Firenze, to chat all things zines, vending machines and Geelong/Djilang’s thriving zine community.

Tell me a little bit about yourself and the ways you are involved in G:Zines vending machine. Myself and two others (Glen Smith and Nick Lawson) form the G:Zines Collective, which runs our G:Zines monthly swap/sells, workshops and – of course – our fabulous vending machine. We obtained the vending machine through a community art grant from the City of Greater Geelong and with the support of Geelong Regional Libraries (GRL). The vending machine sits in the Dome (Geelong Library and Heritage Centre) and gets rotated every three months.

The G:Zines vending machine has just celebrated its first birthday – how have you found the last 12 months? Our first year was full on! When we started G:Zines, we thought it might take a little bit of time to get local zinesters on board but from our very first event onwards, we have had a steady crew of people who come to our events and want to stock their zines in the vending machine. The vending machine is awesome in that it acts like a permanent advertisement for our events and gets all sorts of people interested in zines. We have stocked it with plenty of zines from Geelong-based zinesters, as well as just as many from further afield – even some international zines have been stocked.

Where did the idea for the vending machine come from? Glen and I have been artist friends for several years now and one day we were talking about the need for more community art spaces in Geelong. He mentioned that some of our local libraries had spaces that used to be customer service centres for local government, but they were no longer being used following COVID closures. We were thinking about gallery spaces, but when I went home that day and was boxing up some zines to send to Sticky Institute in Melbourne/Naarm, it suddenly struck me that a zine space would be a perfect fit for a library. As part of my research into how zine spaces worked for others, I found various retro vending machines in Australia and overseas which got me thinking about whether we could do something similar. 

GRL loved the whole zine space concept, so the call went out to the local arts community to set up the G:Zines collective. Glen and Nick came on board and from there we applied for a grant with the city for the vending machine and some other zine making essentials (guillotine, long-armed stapler, etc.). We had already started our swap/sells and workshops, but the vending machine was the key to having an ongoing presence in the library between our events. We were thrilled when we got notified that our grant application had been successful!Snap by Tobias Titz.

How would you describe Geelong’s zine culture? Geelong’s zine culture is thriving!  There were always zinesters based in Geelong and the surrounding areas, and many were connecting occasionally through events like Festival of the Photocopier and Hallozeen that Sticky Institute run. But there was nowhere local for regular catchups and selling opportunities, and if you weren’t keen on big crowds or able to easily travel, that meant many zinesters ended up working in isolation. Now the social side of our swap/sells is just as important (if not more so) than sales made. We are also seeing other fabulous local zine opportunities. ZINEverleigh just held its third annual zine fair at Inverleigh (about 20 minutes west of Geelong) and it was an absolute pleasure to see zinesters from all over the state coming together for such a wonderful event.

Is there any particular approach or ethos that you keep in mind when choosing which zines to stock? Come one, come all! Honestly – if it is A5 or smaller in size and can physically fit, we will put it in the vending machine. If content is not kid-friendly, we add a warning to the front cover to make that clear. Apart from that, we pop the zines in a polybag for their protection and off we go. I should note that we would never stock anything that is racist, homophobic, etc. That has never come up for us though – zinesters tend to be progressive sorts!

We rotate the vending machine every three months. Our preference will always be to feature local zinesters, but even if we need to wait until the next rotation, we make sure all zines get a go. We put a call out on the socials when it is coming up to a rotation, but zinesters also regularly reach out to us as well – there is nothing more joyous than getting an unexpected zine delivery in our PO Box. One of the best things about zinesters is they are usually more excited by the concept of stocking their stuff in the vending machine – any sales made tend to be a bonus.

What are some of the weirdest zines that you’ve stocked so far in the vending machine? It is always interesting to see what sells – it is never what you might expect. A personal favourite was a zine about vending machines – the zinester was absolutely thrilled that her zine about vending machines was being sold in a vending machine! Another is a do-it-yourself poetry zine in which the zinester hand-cut out all the words for people to arrange. 

What are your hopes for the vending machine’s future? My greatest hope is that it keeps ticking along for a very, very long time. We ended up going for a new, practical, cashless machine so that the library staff wouldn’t have to field questions about change and what not. Initially, I was worried that it would just look like a coke vending machine (which is exactly what it was!) but Glen worked his design magic and the wrap on the vending machine makes it stand out and say something about zines, Geelong and us. The library staff are always letting us know that people phone the library or come into the library just to find the vending machine. Zinesters reach out to us, almost giddy with the idea of getting their zines in there. It is fun and whacky and brings happiness to people – a bit like zines and the people that make them! Long may we all continue.