Cochran’s Collector’s Guide celebrates 20 years with a new blog.

Co-publisher Bliss Cochran has launched a blog on their website, at http://www.cochrans.com where she explores antique topics.

Formerly editor/publisher of her own Cochran’s antique magazine for 11 years, she’s happy to be back to doing the projects she enjoys most: researching, interviewing, photographing and writing about the myriad aspects of antiques, their history and values, antique-related events such as shows, auctions and more.

The website is also the free-access online location of Cochrans’ 200-page annual travel-size map guide to antique stores and shows in the western US from Washington to Arizona. The 2009 hardcopy version will be available free in advertisers’ stores and shows in October, and its online version will be available in January, 2009.

Cochran’s Collector’s Guide was launched in 1989 as a three-county California publication, 40 pages in length. Now at 200 pages, it is regarded as essential for traveling antique shoppers, who keep a copy handy in their glove compartments. One copy of Cochran’s will lead a traveler from Washington State to Arizona, locating antique stores all along the way.

Stores appearing in the Guide can also get free individual web pages, so they can display color photos of their merchandise. Visitors outside the five-state distribution area can print out web pages of the areas where they plan to travel, enlarging the maps if they wish.

“People tell us: ‘Now this is just what we were looking for.’”
Doris Cearly, Main Antique Mall, Medford, OR