From the About page: “Welcome! We are tickled pink that you’ve stumbled across our little blog. We are the Glacier County Honey Company, Greg and Courtney Fullerton, a pair of commercial beekeepers who live on the Blackfeet Indian Reservation, just south of Canada, and just east of Glacier National Park.”

Go say hi to this neat couple/business!

Today we move on to the second installment in The LG Report’s 50-State Interview Series (collect ‘em all!) After starting with Dannie in New York, we’re packing up the wagon train and heading out West to meet Patty from Gardiner, Montana. Giddyap little doggie!

The stereotypes and jokes are rampant in the interview, but I think it’s relatively harmless, good for a few chuckles. Go say hi.

Congratulations to David & Regina Letterman! ALSO: check out this nifty look at Choteau!

Previous Letterman/Montana tidbits: Cold Hard Cash on Letterman show; Tim Montana on Letterman show; and other Letterman news.

My mother-in-law is teaching at a reservation school in Montana. They need their playing fields refurbished- and Kellogg Foods is ready to help.

Vote here for this school:

N.C.T.S. Eagles Field
Busby MT 59016

It would make a huge difference to a very at-risk group of kids.

Use the Search box, narrow it to Montana, and then choose the Busby field; once you “support” it by passing a captcha test, you get a coupon for Kellogg’s cereal! Go vote and make a difference!

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Part of the charm of the Highwood Bar was, of course, the piano-playing of Jack – hunched over the keyboard, wearing his hat, and pounding out all sorts of tunes. And I do mean pounding – he was so enthusiastic in his playing that sometimes you had to nearly yell to talk with someone sitting right next to you. And I mean that in a good way. Here’s Piano Jack, doing what he did so well:

Jack, thanks for being part of a unique experience. You will be missed. My condolences to the family, friends, co-workers, and admirers of Jack’s music.

…The crew at local CBS affiliate KRTV noticed my blog entry and figured it would be a neat story – local man with an unusual business. They did a brief feature on Brent and his biz. It was scheduled to air on Wednesday, but got bumped to Thursday.
Friday morning, the folks at CNN Headlines News picked up on the story. Then it spread to CNN and onto Fox Business News.
The result, as reported by Brent on his Manly Man blog:

I can’t even begin to tell you what the past 24 hours have been like. It’s been amazing. Last night I went to bed smiling, having just watched a two minute segment on my little candle company. I woke up to nine emails and a few orders, and I was quite pleased. My wife and I went off to work thrilled.
The news kept coming in as the day went on. Emails started pouring in. I learned that the segment aired on Headline News. Then went to CNN. Then went to Fox Business News. People from all over the country started emailing saying that they had seen us on their local news programs. People from other countries started emailing, saying they had seen it and wanted to sell them.

Excellent — couldn’t happen to a nicer guy!

And continuing with the blog angle to this lightning strike: earlier today, I noticed that my site visits were pretty high; I checked the referrals, and a large number of them were results of Google searches for “manly man candles,” presumably from people who had just seen the news clip on TV. Here’s a screen shot of what Google looked like around noon today:

Notice that my blog entry actually ranked higher (#3) than the actual Manly Man Candles site.

The other part of this is that I signed up to be an affiliate of Brent’s company, and look at the last 24 hours:

More than 360 people have clicked through to Manly Man Candles from GreaterFalls.com. Some of those clicks (double-digits) resulted in immediate sales; others may have bookmarked the site for later purchases.

So, what’s the lesson here? A few come to mind: first, free publicity is awesome – Brent didn’t have to spend a dime on this week’s free advertising. Second, you never know when lightning will strike; in this case, a chain of events cascaded into a modest avalanche. Third, every business needs a web presence. Brent is smart – he’s covered all his bases, with a business site, a blog, and profiles on social media sites.

The bottom line: everyone wins! I got some awesome candles and great traffic to my site, the KRTV team got a great story that was picked up by the networks, the Manly Man folks got worldwide publicity, and folks who buy Manly Man Candles for the first time are in for a treat!

(this entry was originally posted at GreaterFalls.com)

Next stop: Augusta, near the Rocky Mountain Front! Tiny community – population about 300 or so, I think – with one main street that takes you back in time. One general store, one “bunk house” hotel, a unique gift & art store, a Western clothing store, a diner, a library, and a couple of bars that double as restaurants. Friendly people (duh). On the side streets we found another hotel with a cool retro sign, the public school, and a few parks, houses, and old buildings.

(click to see full-size pix)

And let’s finish up with a drive up to Chester on the Montana Hi-Line. Small community; about 1,000 people, and the seat of Liberty County. It’s amazing how different the scenery is when you drive north versus south (or southwest). Both are beautiful drives, in their own way; I know that some people don’t consider the flatter, more barren region north of Great Falls to be “beautiful,” but it really is awesome. The highlight of the trip was the Sugar Shack – a way-cool retro diner. Unfortunately, it wasn’t open; some of the locals told us that it closed a couple of summers ago, and they’re not sure if it will re-open. Here’s some pix of the trip; click to see ‘em all and in full-size:

There you go: three amazing day-trips in Central Montana. Do you have any favorite day-trips or small communities that you like to visit?

UPDATE: The second button is from Jen – beautiful! The third one is from Sharon – perfect!

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