What happens when a TV reporter walks away from the camera and ends up inside one of the world’s largest pharmaceutical companies?

Stacy Beard thought she’d be covering wars. Instead, her journalism career led her from the anchor desk to Town Hall—and eventually to Novo Nordisk, right here in Johnston County. In this conversation, we unpack the real reason she left WRAL, the burnout no one talks about, and what she’s learned about storytelling, leadership, and local impact along the way.

This isn’t just a career pivot—it’s a masterclass in reinvention.

I think, if you will find it interesting and fascinating. Her story is a great one about somebody who just fell in love with journalism and turned that into a career of journalism. And then providing information where you're just telling the town story, just like you would tell a news story and now telling Novo Nordisk's story to the public and all the things that, the good things that Novo's doing in Johnston County.

So listen in.

Jonathan Breeden: Hello and welcome to another edition of The Best of Johnston County Podcast. I'm your host, Jonathan Breeden. And on the today's episode we have Stacy Beard with communications with Novo Nordisk Plant in Clayton, North Carolina. We're gonna do two episodes of her.

We're gonna talk almost all about Novo Nordisk, about the what it does, the first expansion, the new expansion, and the miracle drugs that it puts out. And many of you don't know that depending on which day of the year it is. Novo Nordisk is one of the largest companies in Europe. It was the largest, depending on which day, depending on stock price.

But many people don't realize that one of the largest companies in the world really and definitely in Europe is has one of their main hubs right here in Johnston County. We're gonna talk a little bit about that. So anyway, before we do that, we'd like you to like, follow and subscribe to this podcast wherever you see it, whether we on Apple, Spotify, YouTube, LinkedIn, TikTok, or any of the other social media channels of The Best of Johnston County Podcast.

We've had small business owners like Dentist Tim Sims Woody Bailey of Woody's Computing Donald O’Meara, a realtor just about any type of profession. We've had somebody on talking about their profession and how their profession can help you and how they provide services right here in Johnston County, so you don't have to go to Raleigh to shop.

Welcome, Stacy.

Stacy Beard: Thank you.

Jonathan Breeden: It's always promoting the county, so anyway.

Stacy Beard: And you do a great job. Can I just say, I know you said like your family watches and they might be the only ones I'm watching. I'm one of those watchers. You do a great job and I think you fill a big void

Jonathan Breeden: Well, thank you.

Stacy Beard: in the county, so thank you.

Jonathan Breeden: Thank you. Thank you for saying that.

Stacy Beard: Thanks for having me on.

Jonathan Breeden: I've tried, I've tried, I just tried to, I started this to put positivity about Johnston County in the community. To educate the neighbors about the businesses and the services.

Stacy Beard: Yes.

Jonathan Breeden: And the county they live in, because so many people, there was an article just a couple weeks ago, 77,000 people or 77%

Stacy Beard: Oh in that way,

Stacy Beard: That's right.

Jonathan Breeden: We're even getting a target in Johnston County, at Selma, at North State Food Hall. So people say, we need a target. We're  getting a target.

Stacy Beard: we're getting it

Jonathan Breeden: So tell us a little bit about you and how I guess your career, where you grew up. I don't really know those answers.

Stacy Beard: Well, it was my career that brought me here. If you go way back, way, way back, born in Philadelphia.

Jonathan Breeden: Okay.

Stacy Beard: But in school loved sciences. Thought I was gonna get into the sciences, but also in high school, got involved with the newspaper, the school newspaper, and I said, man, I like writing.

I really like writing. And so looking for schools to go to wanted to go to a cool city. Did not wanna stay East Coast, wanted to see the rest of the country. And Northwestern had a really good journalism program.

Jonathan Breeden: They do.

Stacy Beard: And I said, let me see if I can get in. And I got in, I thought by accident. I said, I better go that somebody messed up.

Jonathan Breeden: Okay

Stacy Beard: and be a war correspondent. But in junior year of college, then Medill School of Journalism made you choose a track, either tv, print, or magazine.

And I said, well, let me give this TV thing a try and they sent me to Topeka, Kansas. So I was like, oh my gosh.

Jonathan Breeden: Oh my goodness.

Stacy Beard: Where, wherever am I?

Jonathan Breeden: Yeah. Especially from Philadelphia.

Stacy Beard: Yeah. And yeah, and I lived,

Jonathan Breeden: they didn't work in Chicago.

Stacy Beard: I lived in the basement of a Jewish family who was hosting students and I, they had two Siamese cats who stayed in the basement.

So I said, I gotta do this. So graduated from Northwestern, stayed in the summer to teach high school journalists in the summer program they had there called the Cherubs. And meanwhile was sending out, I don't know, you remember them? VHS tapes?

Jonathan Breeden: Yeah. VHS tapes.

Right. That was your resume in broadcast journalism, right? Absolutely.

Stacy Beard: So send out resume tapes on a VHS all over the country to tiny, tiny stations. 'cause at the time. You had to start small and then, you know, a broadcast reporter would make their way up eventually. You're hoping to get into the top 15 markets, you know, the Philadelphias, the New Yorks, you know, those kinds of things.

Jonathan Breeden: Was this still in Chicago?

Stacy Beard: No, this was my family. My parents had moved into Jersey after that.

Jonathan Breeden: Okay. Alright.

Stacy Beard: So in Jersey riding the UPS truck and I get a call from Carlsbad, New Mexico and he says, you'll have to drive your own car.

And I'm thinking, where is Carlsbad? There's like caverns there. And he goes, well do you know area 51? And I'm like, yeah. And he is like, well, we're not far from that. And I'm like, well that's kind of cool. But he also said something that got me upset, which was, I love your reporting, but your hair, do you still have that hair?

And I'm like, what? What? So of course, being this, you know, journalist who cannot be talked to about my look I'm reporting and it's my words and my report, I said, forget it. Then I didn't hear again for another month or so until Kalispell, Montana called, and I said, well, that, that's even further. But I said, I gotta do it.

So one woman banding but ate it up, loved it. Made $14,000 a year, which, which like was the most money I could ever dream of. I was like, I am, wow. I've landed. This is incredible. Right. But loved every minute and just, you know, couldn't get enough of it ate, slept, you know.

Jonathan Breeden: Well, it's not work if you love it. Right.

Stacy Beard: No, just,

Jonathan Breeden: I mean, that's the way I am with this law office, right. Like, I, I just love it.

Stacy Beard: Yes.

Stacy Beard: Yeah.

Jonathan Breeden: And I would, I would mimic trying to be Tom Suiter, and I did some, I did some high school radio, high school football and radio and was the stats guy.

Stacy Beard: Yeah.

Jonathan Breeden: And, and you know, when I get to, I get there and I got to know Bob Holly to come to the games. I got there and I called the station and I'm like. Like, I really wanna come help. Like is there something I can do? Because I wanna be Tom Suiter. Tom Suiter spoke at my middle school one time. You know, it was like,

Stacy Beard: He's so cool.

Jonathan Breeden: but I wanna be Tom Suiter.

Yeah. And they said, yeah, sure. We, and so I went in and you know, and for 10 years I worked on football Friday, and, but it didn't take any long to figure out. That I was probably not gonna make it in tv. And it was not as glamorous as I thought it was.

Stacy Beard: Yes.

Stacy Beard: Yeah. Agree.

Jonathan Breeden: So that was, it was a ton of fun. So I got to live out my dream by being around my childhood heroes.

Stacy Beard: Yes.

Jonathan Breeden: Volunteering, you know, whatever, few times a week, whatever. But not actually having to do it. So I got to see both of both words and realize that it wasn't for me 'cause I thought about going to Syracuse actually applied to go to Syracuse, go their broadcast journalism program. You know, didn't go with NC State instead. But, but yeah, so I get it

Stacy Beard: I really advise

Jonathan Breeden: and you did get to live the dream.

You, you'll love it, and it won't seem like work.

Jonathan Breeden: No. And, and, you know and volunteering there all those years it never seemed like work. I didn't even after became a lawyer, I would leave court, go home, change clothes, drive to the station, get in a car with Brad Simmons, and we would go to Roanoke Rapids to cover high school football.

I just loved it. I loved high school football. I loved Ariel, I loved the people there. Even though I was already a lawyer, already had this business practicing law, I would literally leave court

Stacy Beard: that's crazy

Jonathan Breeden: and drive to the station so I could go cover high school football games. I did that for years. I just absolutely loved it.

And I got there and I met the people that were the real deal, right? They weren't about makeup and show ratings. It was about telling the story, digging for the truth. Tons of veteran folks there that I still admire today. And I just, I loved it. I was just excited to be lucky enough to get hired at this station at the time, number one in the market, but had been the leader forever.

Jonathan Breeden: Forever.

Stacy Beard: For that reason. Right?

Jonathan Breeden: Yeah.

Stacy Beard: But authentic people who were the same person. They were all in air as they were off air. You meet a lot of people on TV that look super sweet and nice, and they get off, you know, they're not the same person. But these people were the same,

Jonathan Breeden: right

Stacy Beard: whether the the camera lights were on or not, they were the same person and that.

Jonathan Breeden: Well, and you did a lot of, you covered a lot of cool stories over the years.

Stacy Beard: I did.

Jonathan Breeden: You did your share of hurricanes.

Stacy Beard: Oh, yes.

Jonathan Breeden: You know,

Stacy Beard: tornadoes,

Jonathan Breeden: tornadoes uh,

Stacy Beard: all kinds of, yeah. And it was, it was really.

It was John Edwards who did me in.

Jonathan Breeden: John Edwards.

Stacy Beard: The John Edwards trial

Jonathan Breeden: Okay

Stacy Beard: was in Greensboro and I was covering it and it, it was a fascinating trial, you know, lots of crazy ups and downs, but I would wake up at six in the morning and I had just had a child, right?

Jonathan Breeden: Oh, okay.

Stacy Beard: I just had my first baby, so I'm like trying to get used to this, you know, being a mom and being in this crazy TV world.

Jonathan Breeden: Right.

Stacy Beard: So that's when I started looking around and that's when the Clayton new star landed on my driveway. 'cause I lived in Johnston County and it said Town of Clayton hiring for first ever communications person because they knew they needed to tell their story. Right?

Jonathan Breeden: Right.

Stacy Beard: They needed a website and they needed social media and they needed, and they actually had a public access channel. Which was like 24 hours of government programming, right?

Jonathan Breeden: Yep. They did

Stacy Beard: Waynes World, right? And, and I said, I could do that. I could do that, right? And you know, it was crazy 'cause 15 years plus in TV news, I was like, geez, am I gonna get out?

Jonathan Breeden: Well, and, and well, and the other good thing for the town was. All of us that were fi we all had a relationship with you. Right. Whether you knew us, we know you, even though

Stacy Beard: Yes.

Jonathan Breeden: we didn't know you.

Stacy Beard: Right.

Jonathan Breeden: But we feel like we know you.

Stacy Beard: Yeah.

Jonathan Breeden: And so when you came to the town, most of us

Stacy Beard: Yes

Jonathan Breeden: already had a relationship

Stacy Beard: Yeah

Jonathan Breeden: with you.

Stacy Beard: That's true. Yeah. I think about that the,

Jonathan Breeden: through the television.

Stacy Beard: Yeah.

Jonathan Breeden: You know, I mean, I've met you a few times Elle, but like, you know what I mean? Like

Stacy Beard: Right, right.

Jonathan Breeden: That kind of stuff.

Stacy Beard: Yeah.

Jonathan Breeden: And I think that was a good move for the town because they didn't know. What they needed, but you could do it. And I thought she did a great job for the town and it was something the town desperately needed. I gotta give Jody McLeod the mayor credit for, you know, coming up with the idea and the town manager at the time and say, okay, that we're gonna do this.

What are they doing? They're doing nothing.

Jonathan Breeden: Right?

Stacy Beard: But it was daily. I mean, it was whether they was somebody complaining about garbage collection or a decision the council had made or the parks needing more parks or whatever it was, or things that weren't really, people don't understand the government, they would complain about, you know, I-40, well that's not the town of Clayton, that's not Johnston.

I was posting as the town of Clayton. I took it very personally, very personally which wasn't good. You know, my husband would hear about it and I'd probably talk to my son an infant about it, like, oh my gosh. But. It means a lot for me to make sure people understand what their government is doing for them and what they can and what they can't do, but to, to appreciate the complexity and the difficulty of that.

Jonathan Breeden: Yeah. And so you did that for seven or eight years?

Stacy Beard: Eight years.

Jonathan Breeden: Eight. Eight years. Like 20, 21,

Stacy Beard: 8 years. Yeah.

Jonathan Breeden: It seems like a long time.

Stacy Beard: Yeah.

Jonathan Breeden: Like how, like it seems like you were just there.

Stacy Beard: I know, right?

Jonathan Breeden: I mean, it's been four years. But like, like I just remember and maybe it's 'cause I knew you, like I would always pay more attention to what you're doing than what the current person is doing.

Stacy Beard: Yeah,

Jonathan Breeden: You know. But anyway.

Jonathan Breeden: So you left there and you went to work for Wake County. Did you do the same thing for them?

Stacy Beard: Doing the same thing for them, I was excited for the opportunity to work with a larger team because we were a small team. It was myself and Nader Abba Hassan. He was our video guy. So he was making the videos, making Clayton look amazing. And I said, geez, I really. It was COVID. It was such a crazy time. But I did make a decision to go there. Worked with a great team. It was what I was doing in Clayton on a grander scale, you know, million plus residents in Wake County.

We need somebody to speak externally to the community and to the world about us and what we do here and that we're hiring and what do you think? And I said, well, geez, I wasn't looking for a job, but gosh, I live like four minutes, four, four minutes from the plant, so, you know. Yeah. And I was new to corporate, new to foreign owned, new to pharmaceuticals.

It's been a learning curve, but fascinating. I had driven past it and people drive past it every day.

Jonathan Breeden: Yep.

Stacy Beard: Had no idea, you know, really what was going on inside, what they made there, how it was made, how many people, you know, work there. So it's really been a fascinating experience.

Stacy Beard: Yes.

Jonathan Breeden: Now there have been some other bigger ones, including I. The, the second expansion, we'll call it.

Stacy Beard: Yep.

Jonathan Breeden: And then of course, we just got the Amazon announcement for Richmond County last week when we're recording this at the beginning of June

Stacy Beard: Yep

Every Walmart. Every McDonald's, every house. Everything didn't add to the expansion that they were doing there on Powhatan Road for Novo. Now, Novo is not in the town of Clayton. It will never be in the town of Clayton. That's a podcast for another day. It's in an economic empowerment zone and stuff like that.

Stacy Beard: Yeah.

Jonathan Breeden: Before you get to the jobs of just tax value to the county.

Stacy Beard: Right, yeah. And we, you know, I say we have three sites in Clayton now, so we have the original site that was there, 93 I actually interviewed the woman who was the eighth employee of Novo Nordisk.

Jonathan Breeden: Oh my goodness.

Stacy Beard: And she retired just recently, after 30 years. So we've been in, a lot of people don't realize that Novo Nordisk has been in Johnston County for 30 years. The second facility, the $2 billion facilities right across the street, and now just down the railroad tracks, down Powhatan is the second I call it the second expansion, right. I'll call it second expansion too. What. But that is a facility that will be almost four times the size of the original site that we built. And doing just the same thing, the fill, finish, the packaging of the medicines to help fight obesity and diabetes and other chronic diseases that are sent all over the world.

And then it is the largest fill Finnish packaging expansion facility in all of Novo Nordisk of, of, you know, they have sites all over the world in like 80 countries. But it'll, it's the largest expansion they've got going right now.

Jonathan Breeden: Yeah.

Stacy Beard: And it's incredible.

Jonathan Breeden: And yeah, I mean, the first expansion. Was 97 acres under roof.

Stacy Beard: Yes.

Jonathan Breeden: Think about that. I don't know how big the second one is, but I remember the first one, the first time I drove by, they were like, it's 97 acres on the roof. That is huge. And then I've gotten to take a tour. You gave me a tour.

Stacy Beard: Yeah.

Jonathan Breeden: Last year when I went with the chamber. Fascinating place. I couldn't believe it. I You would not have thought you were in Johnston County.

Stacy Beard: I know.

Stacy Beard: Well, people have, yeah, people have, well, it's very Danish.

They love the windows, they love the open air that like it has that, you know, 'cause our company's based in Denmark. But I also think. People need to see the inside because I, in North Carolina, maybe, especially when I thought of manufacturing, I thought of very dirty, you know, dark, scary, dangerous kind of, and it's, it's not, it's so clean and, and, and safe and open and, you know, it's, I mean, it's.

It's really beautiful, which is is crazy thing to say. It's, they're like, Hey, where should we shoot videos? Well, where would you like, there's so many choices of where to shoot video. It's gorgeous in here, right?

Jonathan Breeden: It really is.

Stacy Beard: Yeah.

Jonathan Breeden: It was unbelievable. I was, I really enjoyed that. I learned so much and it was a little bit of.

High school chemistry, which I'd forgotten in biology.

Stacy Beard: Yes.

Stacy Beard: Yeah.

Jonathan Breeden: So I'll, I'll stick to law after that. But but I was taking the tour on my tour that day was Paul Auclair Deep River Brewing, which is the same thing.

So he was, he was

Stacy Beard: just like making beer.

Jonathan Breeden: Right. He was extremely fascinating. Right. Computer. Same thing as making beer and

Stacy Beard: start with a yeast sound. That's it. That's like making computer.

Jonathan Breeden: That's right. I, he was, he really understood it because it's the same thing

Stacy Beard: He did. He did

Jonathan Breeden: just a different thing. So, anyway, so I guess what, we'll, starting to wrap up this this episode, how many people work for Novo in Johnston County right now?

Stacy Beard: So we also have a facility in Durham, and between the three Clayton sites and the Durham site, we have 2,800 people in the triangle that work for us.

Jonathan Breeden: Oh, that's awesome.

Stacy Beard: And you don't have to be a chemist or you know, we're hiring kids outta Johnston County High School with this bio work certificate through Johnston Community College.

Jonathan Breeden: Well, and, and, and what I tell people is and we had Joy Callahan on a few weeks ago on this podcast talking about the Bioworks program.

And I've said that it's a lot like high school chemistry. It's a little more advanced than that, but it's not college like really, really hard. Like you can learn this,

Stacy Beard: you can

Jonathan Breeden: and they pay people like 25, 26 thousand an hour to do anything there.

Stacy Beard: Yes.

Jonathan Breeden: Like even if you're like just working there as a janitor, you make good money with full benefits. Like it is a really good job and a really good career.

And I can't tell you how many people that I've represented over the years who have four year degrees, they went back and got the Bioworks certificate and are making more money at Novo than they ever made with their four year degree.

Stacy Beard: Wow. Yeah.

Stacy Beard: Yes, it is.

Jonathan Breeden: Exactly.

Stacy Beard: And my job is to tell more people that story and about that. So that's why I thank you for having me on. So that gets out there because I think people don't realize the opportunities there and the work-life balance and all the benefits.

You know, it really is. It's an amazing place that takes care of its employees, yeah.

Jonathan Breeden: Well there's no doubt, no doubt. Well, the last question we ask everybody is, what do you love most about Johnston County?

Stacy Beard: I love all the people. There's so many different people and they're just welcoming and, and just super friendly.

I felt embraced as soon as we moved here and, and, you know, I try to, to brag on us as much as I can in that way.

Jonathan Breeden: Well, so if people wanna know more about Novo and working at Novo and, and reach out to you, how can they reach out to you? Or your team?

Jonathan Breeden: Right.

Stacy Beard: Um, But there's a button there to click and link and, and I'm on social media, so please reach out to me to LinkedIn.

LinkedIn. I'm on there Stacy Beard. You know, it's, it's. I would love to hear from anybody here in Johnston County if they wanna learn more about Novo.

Jonathan Breeden: Well, cool. Cool. Well, anyway, we'd like to thank Stacy for being our guest on this episode of The Best of Johnston County Podcast. Listen back in a couple weeks, and in the next couple weeks we're gonna do a second podcast with her, where we're gonna dig deeper into what Novo is, what it does, and where it is going. As we ask you earlier, please like, follow, subscribe to this podcast wherever you see it, whether it be on Apple, YouTube, Spotify, LinkedIn, TikTok, or any of the other social media channels so that you'll be made aware of future episodes of The Best of Johnston County Podcast. The Best of Johnston County Podcast comes out every single Monday and has now for well over 18 months.

We'll make sure we share those with her. Until next time, I'm your host, Jonathan Breeden.

That's the end of today's episode of Best of Johnston County, a show brought to you by the trusted team at Breeden Law Office. We thank you for joining us today and we look forward to sharing more interesting facets of this community next week. Every story, every viewpoint adds another thread to the rich tapestry of Johnston County.

If the legal aspects highlighted raised some questions, help is just around the corner at www. breedenfirm. com.