About Us
Created and developed by current publishers Robert Pawlowski and Steve Walsh, Distinctive Directories debuted with The Valley Book (Farmington Valley, CT) in 2000.
The company now consists of four annual publications that cover the desirable Central Connecticut market, The Valley Book, The West Hartford Book, The Glastonbury Book and The Shoreline Book. Total circulation is more than 105,000 with Web sites that attract more than 800,000 visitors.
We sum up our approach at the beginning of every book: While globalization, regionalization, mergers and chain ownership are the undeniable national trends, we remain just the opposite. We’re a homegrown resource for strictly local information produced entirely by local people. We appreciate the big picture, but we embrace the small one… the one with the special things that make us proud this part of the world is home.
“We recognized some important trends when we started,” says, Steve Walsh. “First, everybody’s busier than ever before. Second, they read less, and have less interest in local newspapers and lifestyle magazines. Third, for most of them all the yellow books have become confusing and clumsy. And there’s so many direct-mail pieces, people are just tossing them out. Advertisers have known the Internet was becoming a big factor, but they’re still hesitant about whether they should go 100% in that direction.”
Pawlowski adds, “We’ve created a combination of a local business directory and community guide in print AND online that’s easy to use, where people can find the everyday local things they need quickly. We’re finding a lot of the younger families use the Web more at home and put the book in the car. Others keep the book on the kitchen counter for reference and like the online version for contests, showtimes and restaurant menus. We’ve known since we began, the book was a big hit but over the past few years our web site traffic has emerged as equally important.”
But what we believe defines us best is what people say about us. Take a look.
Distinctive Directories today is a group of about 20 local marketing and publishing pros, artists, writers and neighbors who love what we do and do their best work for us.
We’re located in Simsbury Center in the historic Thomas Bickford home, which we share with Webster Bank and Arts Exclusive Gallery.
