Paper Giants The Birth of Cleo Part1

In early 1972, 30-year-old journalist and editor, Ita Buttrose and 35-year old Kerry Packer, heir to what was then Australia’s most ruthlessly powerful and influential publishing family, got together to create a magazine that became one of the most dramatic sensations in Australian publishing history. CLEO went on to help define women, Australia and the relationship between the two. Research and marketing analysis showed the project would be a failure and the magazine was vehemently opposed by the powerful head of the Packer clan, the domineering Sir Frank Packer (known to his employees as “God”), yet Ita and Kerry, knowing the consequences of failure would be dire, decided to back their gut instincts anyway.