Web Highlights: The Maine Thing Quarterly
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Web Highlights is an ongoing series showcasing some of the brightest and most useful destinations online, celebrating the imaginative minds that come together in web development to make the internet a more interesting place.
This week’s highlight comes to you direct from the state of Maine, where The Maine Thing Quarterly draws its inspiration. Advertised as ‘Quintessentially Maine’, The Maine Thing Quarterly is a tourism magnet, travel guide, and online magazine all wrapped into one decidedly attractive website. It’s the perfect balance of visual stimulus and quality content that makes brand advertising successful, and it’s only in its infancy! At least two additional issues are due to land on the site in the future to compliment the two currently housed there, which focus on local commodities, Lobster and Beer, respectively.
Beneath the guise of a media rich webzine lies a cache of well written editorial content. Interactive articles with chapter titling and navigation are the the tip of the iceberg, as The Maine Thing Quarterly dives into the quintessential facets of the state that make it unique and interesting. Eloquent editorial is accompanied by historic retellings, family profiles, recipes, and a native awareness to all things Maine - all without ever forfeiting that rich underlying visual experience. This is truly an online publication that excels in hybrid offerings.
Where the topics lure you in, the chronology will certainly secure and maintain your interest. The Maine Thing Quarterly’s Lobster columns (for example) share an inside look at what makes the lobster a staple of Maine, who catches them, how to cook them (complete with recipes!), a ‘let’s go lobstering’ call to action, and a wonderful gallery - all complete with enough sources to keep you researching for as long as your heart desires. It truly is an intimate sharing experience, and at the end of it all, you can subscribe to quarterly newsletters or link to the column on your social media platform of choice. Readers beware: the Beer column will surely leave you thirsty.
What’s incredible is not that Maine has disguised the mundane call for tourism as a visually engaging experience built on rich content - it’s that they’ve transformed that interaction entirely. By foregoing the vast, photoshopped scenery and cliché commercialization of a place, Maine has genuinely shared a part of its heritage and its culture, and the effect is an authentic, alluring proposal that any traveller should be willing to consider.
In the end, this is a website that far surpasses its own value proposal. Beyond the media and the articles is an experience that will truly shape your opinion of the state and your interest in visiting. It’s a strategic digital play that offers you one product - an online magazine - and inevitably delivers a great deal more.
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