tourist brochure/map insert

Posted on by

Greetings Guild Members!

Last month I took on communications with a graphic designer to create an insert for the existing Maine Cheese Guild brochure, that would include a map and list of licensed creameries/dairies that would welcome visitors (not just for open Creamery Day).  Also with interest in rewriting some of  the existing brochure.

Regarding this, I have questions for you all…

I had been under the understanding that we wanted to revamp the existing brochure, print more copies and then to also have created and printed the map insert to go along with the brochures.  And then to be able to access printable copies of each here on the guild website.

I had [mis]understood that the graphic design company I was put in contact with for creating the insert were the original printers of the brochure.  What I have learned is that it was a different company who created the brochure.

So my questions for you all are: Should we in fact be revamping the brochure and having more printed?  By the same people who designed it?  Should we be hiring a different design company to create the insert or asking the original brochure folks?  Lastly, I would need to be put in contact with the original brochure folks if our decision is that we be working with them for any of this.

Please post or send me replies and any feedback you are inspired to express.

Thank you!

~ Robin (of 3 Level Farm in South China)

3levelfarm at gmail.com  (207) 445-3276

Blunt Talk on Jobs

Posted on by

I was invited to Governor LePage’s “Workshop on Job Creation” on July 10th in Springvale where he asked members of the Maine business community for “blunt and honest” suggestions on how to improve the relationship between the public and private sector to foster job growth. I took him up on his request and as the Biddeford Journal Tribute accurately reported the next day:

Without a boost in the number of dairy inspectors – there’s just one for the whole state at present, Rector said – new cheesemakers can’t get into the industry and existing manufacturers can’t expand their operations.

The Birth of Blue

Posted on by

The village of Roquefort, France is located on the southern tip of the high Massif Central plateau about 100 miles from the Mediterranean Sea, and it is built into the cliffs containing the caves that “invented” blue cheese. Natural air currents vent these caves (called “fleurines“) and carry the naturally occurring Penicillium roqueforti spores through them, as well as keep the caves at a constant temperature and humidity. As part of the AOC definition of “Roquefort” cheese, all cheeses with that name must spend at least two weeks in these caves. This means that 24 hours a day trailer trucks full of young cheese are brought to the caves while each cheese that has already been two weeks in the caves are loaded back onto the same trailers and taken away to cold storage for final aging. Below are some pictures of the village, as well as of an antique cheese piercing machine that looks more like a medieval torture device (which is apt because long ago the Catholic Church purged non-believers from this region through a reign of torture and terror).
Continue reading→