A city rebuilt by locals. Posted by locals.
The postcards stop at the Avon and the old cathedral square. The Christchurch people actually live in is Riverside Market at lunch, coffee on New Regent Street, Merivale dinners and Sumner on a sunny afternoon. SIGNL is forming its Christchurch founding roster now: local creators who post that city, and local businesses ready to comp them.
The post is the job.
SIGNL is free for creators. Always. Businesses pay the platform. You never pay to join, to list, or to get booked.
Comp visits are the core. Paid bookings sit on top: set your own rate from a NZ$90 floor, the business pays it, and the platform fee is 6 percent total, split evenly, so you keep 97 percent of your rate. Paid bookings are held by SIGNL until your post is live. Headliners (15,000+ followers) are also first in line for featured paid campaigns when businesses run them.
Christchurch eats by neighbourhood
The rebuild is the story
Christchurch has spent a decade opening new rooms: markets, laneways and restaurants where empty lots used to be. New openings are this city's favourite news, and founding creators get first pick of every one.
Market town at heart
Riverside Market feeds the central city daily, and weekend farmers markets run from Riccarton to Lyttelton. Cantabrians buy local on principle, and they follow the people who post where local is best.
Neighbourhoods over the centre
Visitors do the tram loop. Locals eat in Merivale, drink in Addington, get their hair cut in Riccarton and drive to Sumner when the sun is out. SIGNL creators post that second city, the one residents trust for where to go.
City, port and plains
From Lyttelton over the Port Hills to Akaroa at the end of the peninsula, and out to Rangiora, Rolleston and Lincoln on the plains, small rooms keep opening, and each one survives on local word of mouth.
How it works for Christchurch creators
Claim your founding spot
Sign up free with Christchurch as your market and finish your profile: your handles, your suburbs, what you post about. Founding creators are reviewed in sign-up order, and your tier is set automatically by your total audience.
Go be a customer
Show up, redeem the comp in the app, and experience the business for real. Bring a guest when the offer covers two.
Post within 48 hours
The Standard Visit: 1 post or reel plus 1 story that shares the post, with the goal of posting within 48 hours of the visit, and a week as the outside limit, honest and clearly disclosed as comped. The platform tracks the post, so the business gets proof and you get credit for the visit.
Markets, cafés and new openings
Restaurant meals are the start: stalls at Riverside Market, cafés on New Regent Street and in the central city laneways, dinners in Merivale and Fendalton, fish and chips in New Brighton and Sumner. Salons, barbershops, fitness studios, galleries and event spaces run comp offers too.
Students count here. If you are at the University of Canterbury or Lincoln University, name your school when you sign up or finish your profile: your profile carries your campus, so businesses near your school can find you first. A Standard Visit fits between classes, and alcohol offers are 18+ only.
Where do you land?
Tiers are set automatically by your total audience across platforms, and they rise as you grow. A small, genuinely local audience beats a big, scattered one.
- Everyday people with a local following
- Comp visits, and paid bookings at your own rate
- Perfect first step into local posting
- Regular local posters, the roster's sweet spot
- Comp visits, and paid bookings at your own rate
- Priority access to new businesses
- Established local creators
- Comp visits, and paid bookings at your own rate
- First pick of grand openings and launches
SIGNL starts at 500 total followers across your platforms. Your tier is set by your follower count, and it moves up as you grow. What matters most is not the number, it's that your audience is actually local and actually engages. Nobody picks their own band.
Christchurch businesses: be the room locals post about
Cantabrians choose the neighbourhood café over the famous name, and they choose it because someone they follow ate there. Founding businesses get that someone: real local creators, comped at your cost, posting honestly to the followers who fill your tables.
Ads reach everyone except the people who live nearby. SIGNL puts Christchurch creators who live here inside your business, posting to neighbors who can walk in this week.
Join the founding business list
Apply in a few minutes. Your category spot in your trade area is held in application order, and nothing is charged today.
Founding pricing, held for you
NZ$349 a month for Self-Service (up to 5 creator visits a month, about NZ$70 per creator visit), NZ$619 a month for Growth (up to 10 creator visits a month, about NZ$62 per creator visit) or NZ$1,239 a month for Managed (up to 20 creator visits a month), with a 3-month minimum and then month to month. Founding businesses get NZ$175 off the first month, and all prices are plus GST. Visits you don't use roll into the next month, then expire. The only other cost is the comp the business chooses to offer, provided at its cost, not retail. Founding businesses keep founding pricing while they remain subscribed, and the plan begins when the Christchurch market opens.
Activate when Christchurch opens
Pick creators from the founding roster, offer a comp at your cost, and get honest, tracked posts delivered in 48 hours* of each visit.
*Creators have up to one week to post. The goal is to post within 48 hours of the visit, and hitting it earns their Momentum. If a week passes with no post, the visit is replaced and does not count against your plan.
If a booked creator does not show up or does not post, that visit does not count against your monthly visits. It is replaced.
How content rights work: on a comp visit, you can share the creator's post natively with the creator credited, and nothing more: no downloads, no reposting the file, no ads. On a paid visit, you can also repost the content on your own channels and run it as an ad for 90 days under the standard license included in the booking. The creator always owns the content. Rights follow the visit, never the plan.
Suburb by suburb
The founding roster lives where Cantabrians actually eat, drink, gather and get their hair cut.
- Riccarton
- Merivale
- Fendalton
- Papanui
- Addington
- New Brighton
- Sumner
- Lyttelton
- Halswell
- Hornby
- Bishopdale
Questions, answered straight
Is SIGNL live in Christchurch yet?
Not yet. Founding sign-ups are open now, the founding roster is forming, and founding businesses are joining the founding list. Offers begin when the Christchurch market opens, and founding creators see every offer first.
Does it cost anything to join SIGNL as a creator?
No. SIGNL is free for creators. Always. Businesses pay the platform. You never pay to join, to list, or to get booked. Your compensation on standard visits is the comp itself: the meal, service or experience the business provides.
What would I actually post about in Christchurch?
Real Christchurch days: a lunch verdict from Riverside Market, coffee on New Regent Street, dinner in Merivale, fish and chips on the Sumner esplanade. The Standard Visit is 1 post or reel plus 1 story that shares the post, with the goal of posting within 48 hours of the visit, and a week as the outside limit, honest and clearly disclosed as comped.
I am a student at the University of Canterbury or Lincoln University. Can I join?
Yes. Name your school when you sign up or finish your profile and your profile carries your campus, so businesses near your school can find you first. The Standard Visit fits between classes, and alcohol offers are 18+ only.
How does a Christchurch business join, and when is it charged?
Apply for the founding business list and your category spot is held in application order. Nothing is charged today. Your plan begins when the Christchurch market opens, at founding pricing: NZ$349 a month for Self-Service (up to 5 creator visits a month), NZ$619 a month for Growth (up to 10 creator visits a month) or NZ$1,239 a month for Managed (up to 20 creator visits a month), with a 3-month minimum and then month to month. Founding businesses get NZ$175 off the first month, and all prices are plus GST. Visits you don't use roll into the next month, then expire.
Which parts of Christchurch does the roster cover?
The whole market, suburb by suburb: Riccarton, Merivale, Fendalton, Papanui, Addington, New Brighton, Sumner and Lyttelton, plus the commuter towns of Rangiora, Rolleston and Lincoln. If your followers live here, your audience counts as local here.
This page is the Christchurch founding story: why this city, and what founding means here. The Christchurch market page carries the directory view: founding terms and roster details for this market.
Christchurch's founding roster is forming now
Creators join free and are reviewed in sign-up order. Businesses join the founding list at founding pricing, charged nothing until the market opens.