Sydney mogul gives own son a $300k salary at her own media company

Staff at one of Sydney’s top media companies are a bit unsettled after the rapid promotion of one employee.

Staff at Mia Freedman’s online media company Mamamia were never going to be surprised when a member of Freedman’s family walks into the office and claims a desk.

It is, after all, managed and run by Freedman and her husband Jason Lavigne, the business’s CEO and joint founder.

However the online publishing supremo, we hear, is captaining an unsettled ship at the moment thanks in part, say insiders, to the rapid escalation through the ranks of the couple’s eldest son, Luca.

After eight years at Mamamia, Lavigne, who we take to be about 27, was last year appointed Mamamia’s chief operating officer (COO).

He holds the title in conjunction with a second role as chief product officer. Lucky boy.

Mia’s boy is said to be collecting a handsome $300k salary.

Mamamia founder Mia Freedman and son Luca Lavigne. Picture: Instagram

The Mamamia office has become a family affair, with Luca’s wife Jessie Stephens also on the books. Picture: Instagram

In a workplace that has drawn considerable fire through the years for paying its staff low salaries, it’s Lavigne’s bulky pay payment that is frustrating some staff at the outfit currently.

Lavigne’s appointment came as no surprise to Mamamia staff who note his star has been meteorically on the rise since joining the family business in 2016 as a content producer.

Prior to that, his LinkedIn resume records his only other work experience was as a Merivale bartender for four-month period in 2016 and a kitchen assistant at Vic’s Meats Woollahra for six months that same year. Those brief stints followed his graduation from Sydney Grammar School in 2015. By 2017 Lavigne was producing podcasts.

Then, with two years in media under his belt, he was appointed business development manager in 2018, a role he held for two years until 2021 when he was promoted to head of product before, last year, taking on the COO role.

At this rate he should make CEO by 30.

Of course in small operations, career advancement can happen quickly.

Along the way, after penning an online article for the website in which he said he couldn’t wait to be a father – he was then 19 – Lavigne found a wife in the Mamamia newsroom and became a dad.

Both of these achievements he clocked up in 2023.

His wife is Jessie Stephens, a celebrated member of the Mamamia team who joined the operation as an editorial assistant in 2015 and is older than Lavigne.

The couple welcomed a daughter, Luna, in 2023.

In January, the departure of Jessie’s twin sister Clare from the company raised eyebrows.

She has struck out on her own and is not alone, we understand.

It must feel nice to have a break from Freedman’s orbit, which some have likened to a cult, after a decade.

BATTLE SCARS

The breakdown of Guy Sebastian’s latest artist-agent relationship is not as harmonious as claimed, sources have told this column.

His split with Jennifer Fontaine of Private Idaho management agency comes just weeks before the singer is expected take the stand as a witness in the embezzlement trial of his former agent and close friend Titus Day of 6 Degrees.

That matter is headed for retrial in a Sydney court on May 26 after Day successfully appealed the initial verdict and was released from jail after serving seven months of a 2 ½-year sentence. Day denies the allegations and is defending the matter.

It also follows the Department of Public Prosecutions compensating Day to the tune of $960,000 for legal costs in January.

Guy Sebastian with Jennifer Fontaine and Lauren Stamper. Picture: Instagram

Sebastian – whose hits include Battle Scars and Choir – retained Fontaine as his agent after his relationship with Day, his agent and friend of 12 years, broke down in 2017.

The singer’s business and that of Jules Sebastian, his wife, and their charitable foundation represents a third of Fontaine’s business.

Her website lists five other clients; Human Nature, former Human Nature member Phil Burton, former Human Nature brothers Andrew and Mike Tierney, 2023 Australian Idol winner Royston Noell and Gary Pinto.

“The loss of Guy’s business, which he is taking in-house to self-manage, is going to be felt at Private Idaho,” said an insider who claimed Fontaine was “bruised” by the dumping.

“He and Jules have long been part of her extended family. This will hurt.”

The source claimed there had been a “blow up” between the two parties in recent weeks before they acknowledged the split to news.com.au in separate respectful statements on Tuesday that claimed Sebastian and Fontaine remained “arm in arm”.

Going forward, the singer will keep the commissions previously paid to his agent, that sum conservatively put at 25 per cent of bookings.

Guy Sebastian’s former manager Titus Day. Picture: NewsWire / Nikki Short

On his The Voice contract alone, the commission would have stretched to a six-figure sum before Sebastian and Channel 7 parted ways at the end of last year.

The singer has claimed he quit the show to work on a new album and tour. He has a new single due out this month.

TV insiders claim 7 benched Sebastian, along with LeAnn Rimes and Adam Lambert, to refresh the program’s judging panel.

Kate Miller-Heidke, Melanie C, Ronan Keating and Richard Marx will feature in the 2025 season which airs later this year.

Having gotten her start in the music industry working in the executive office of Sony Music boss Denis Handlin, a longtime supporter, Fontaine was at Sebastian’s side offering support when the singer – and his wife Jules – were called to appear at Day’s 2022 trial.

Sebastian was a coach on The Voice 2024 before parting ways with Channel 7 last year.

Guy Sebastian with Jules Sebastian. Picture: Don Arnold/Getty Images

The couple are expected to be called to the stand again next month along with a host of witnesses who previously testified. Sebastian may have to cancel the one commitment posted on his official website calendar during the week, an appearance at the UK’s The Come Together Festival on June 4.

Among witnesses expected to be recalled is detective senior constable David Murphy, the policeman (and cricket teammate of Sebastian’s best friend Tim Freeburn) and key witness Damien Luscombe, the White Sky Music accountant now serving a three-year and nine-month jail sentence for defrauding musical talent clients such as Gotye, Angus and Julia Stone and Peking Duk to the tune of $2.1 million.

Luscombe had testified at Day’s 2022 trial that he had been retained by Sebastian in 2015 to manage his books.

In 2022, a jury found that Day had misappropriated $620,000 from Sebastian. The verdict was overturned on appeal.

Day has long maintained his innocence and alleges it is Sebastian who owes him money.

NAUGHTY CORNER

Parents at soon-to-be co-ed school Cranbrook in Sydney are outraged after learning about an “astonishing and shocking little incident” that took place at a recent school camp involving a couple of loved up students.

The school is no stranger to controversy.

In recent years it has known more than its share after having failed to manage a series of internal crises effectively and well, prompting frustrated factions to leak to outside media.

Yet despite this, parents are up in arms once again, claiming the school failed to effectively communicate details of the incident – witnessed by students and regarding which police were called – and reassure incensed parents and students that the school has a strategy for dealing with such important matters.

The soon-to-be co-ed Cranbrook School is no stranger to controversy.

We have been provided with graphic details which, if true, are alarming, hence the decision not to publish them here.

Fair to say, we can well understand why furious parents have leapt onto WhatsApp chats to vent about the drama.

Little boys will be little boys as parents know better than most, but the issue is bound to create serious problems for the school going forward with future school camps (no pun intended) and would deter and possibly terrify parents planning to pull daughters out of prestigious local schools to send them to Cranbrook.

Given the school has employed a stellar array of expensive PR groups to manage less visceral matters in the past, one might think they’d have a communications strategy in place that would offer parents a modicum of reassurance that they know how to handle a crisis.

PREGNANCY NEWS

Tennis champion Sam Stosur has confirmed she is pregnant.

The retired tennis ace and her partner Liz Astling will welcome their second child later this year, in the Australian spring.

The Australian grand slam winner is believed to be in the second trimester of her pregnancy.

It is believed to be a first-time pregnancy for Stosur, 41, who welcomed daughter Genevieve with her partner, a former physical therapist with the Fed Cup (now the Billie Jean King Cup in honour of the equality pioneer), in 2020.

Former professional tennis player Sam Stosur announcing her pregnancy. Picture: Instagram

Liz Astling and Sam Stosur are pictured at the Newcombe medal. Picture: Tony Gough

Astling carried the couple’s first child who will be five in June.

The tennis great confirmed the pregnancy on social media overnight, days after News.com.au put the question to tennis insiders.

“We’re so excited for the new addition to our family. It’s my turn this time,” Stosur posted to Instagram along with a short clip showing her dusting off a baby capsule and pram.

The couple’s eldest daughter was born during the pandemic so the couple are said to be relishing being out and about during Stosur’s pregnancy.

The tennis star is sporting a small bump, which in recent weeks has prompted speculation.

Stosur, who retired from tennis in 2023, won the US Open in 2011 and has six grand slam titles to her name, three mixed doubles titles and three women’s doubles titles.

She spent 16 years ranked in the world’s top 100.

Stosur came out on social media in December 2019 following the Newcombe Medal.

The tennis pro would later say that while she had long been open about her sexuality with friends and family, it wasn’t until she found herself standing on the podium at the event thanking a large supporters’ contingent – and not her partner Astling – that she realised something wasn’t right.

Sam Stosur with partner Liz Astling and their daughter Genevieve. Picture: Instagram

“There’s certainly been moments throughout my life and my career where I’ve thought about putting it out there to the world, being a bit more open with my private life, but on the whole I’m not really like that anyway … for whatever reason I was never ready to do that,” she said.

“I think I got to the point … where I was standing on the stage and talking and talking and thanking all these people and I remember walking to the carpark on the night and something just didn’t feel right ‘cos I’d thanked all these people who were obviously very very important to me – but not my partner and she is a huge part of what I’ve tried to be and what I am now and that just didn’t sit right with me.

“I thought ‘bugger this. I want to thank her and I want to do this and that’s why I put it on Instagram.”

In her Instagram post Stosur, then 35, wrote: “To my mum, dad, Daniel and Dom and my partner Liz, you have given me the love, support and every opportunity to pursue my dream and I’ll be forever grateful.”

“This is who I am,” she later said in a TV interview.

“Everyone who knows me knows who I am and be proud of that. There’s nothing to worry about and now I’ve got a daughter and I want to share that experience.”

Originally published as Sydney mogul gives own son a $300k salary at her own media company