Republican Journal 10/21/09

BELFAST (Oct 21): Prior to this summer, there was no dedicated visitor center around Belfast; no place to pick up a map or ask for a recommendation to a local restaurant; none of those welcoming racks of pamphlets, no ATM. For Jim and Patti LeClair, it was a void that begged to be filled....

...visitors to the Maine Coast Welcome Center can concentrate on the real reasons they came to Maine — sightseeing, shopping eating and generally having a good time. It was with these things in mind that the LeClairs opened the Welcome Center on Memorial Day in the Wentworth Event Center on Searsport Avenue.

Business boomed this summer, and the business quickly outgrew its original location, relocating a half-mile to the east, in the Searsport Avenue building previously occupied by Yankee Trader Gifts...

...In the entrance to the Welcome Center is a map with pins indicating the home towns of visitors who have passed through. After one season, the United States and most of Europe had been nearly obliterated — LeClair said he has yet to see anyone from South Dakota, but the other 49 states are represented — and other pins indicate visitors from, among other far-flung places, Australia, Peru, Iran and Ghana.

FMI

Jim's comment: We do enjoy local press noticing us out there. It's been a fun summer and we've met lot's of other business owners. We're all working together to promote Maine.