While the Bendigo Advertiser, as its name suggests, is centred on the thriving central Victorian City of Bendigo, it also covers a vast area of north and central Victoria. This ranges from Kerang and Echuca in the north, to Kyneton and Woodend in the south and from Heathcote in the east to St. Arnaud in the west.

The region includes a wide diversity of people, industries and pursuits. The prime industries are agriculture, ranging from wheat and sheep to the west and dairy farming in the north, intensive orchards and vineyards in the south. North and central Victorian agriculture is considered among the most efficient in the world.

The Bendigo Advertiser was founded in 1853, during the time Bendigo was becoming one of the world's most outstanding gold fields. Without gold there would not be a Bendigo. The vast golden rivers flowing from Bendigo to Melbourne financed vast empires, and fueled sparkling success. For example it was gold and the prospect of selling necessary items to miners and their families which encouraged a Russian immigrant named Simcha Baevski to come to Bendigo. Never heard of him? He changed his name to Sidney Myer. That's an often overlooked fact of Bendigo.As is the fact that the Chiko Roll was invented in Bendigo and that one of the founders of the Australian Federation, Sir John Quick was a Bendigo lawyer and journalist, for the Bendigo Advertiser.

Whilst gold is no longer a huge part of our future, Bendigo Mining recently began gold production beneath the city and employs many hundreds of people. Perseverance Mining, located just 30 miles to the south is also well on it's way to gold production. The health industry supports more than 4,000 employees across the region. Rivaled perhaps only by the education industry which includes a university campus, one of the biggest TAFE colleges in the nation, an enormous and innovative secondary college, two major private secondary colleges and a large range of private primary schools.

Industrially, the city is also well placed. It is home to one of the biggest sites of the ADI, the defences conglomerate and from Bendigo heavy engineering items are shipped to defence forces around the world. Technology has freed Bendigo from the tyranny of distances and the new city's cosmopolitan lifestyle, great weather, fantastic heritage architecture and easier pace are helping to develop more and more service industries. At the forefront is the Bendigo Bank and their new headquarters have now opened. This wonderful new headquarters has instilled confidence in the city and the staff of the Bendigo Bank.

The Bendigo Advertiser has been an active part of much of the restoration of the city and region itself undergoing an all embracing make over in 1998. The newspaper became a tabloid and won the pacific region most sought after award for tabloid newspaper design with its second edition. It remains the authoritative voice of the region, adopting the twin roles of informing and reforming.