It’s safe to say that digital maps are popular navigational tools, but rather than logging onto Google Maps, John Glanville opted to pursue an opportunity.
“The quality of the cartographic information, how it’s organized and the geographical look and feel of Benchmark Maps differentiates itself from a Google product,” he said.
Glanville, a Santa Barbara venture capitalist, bought the company about a year ago. Benchmark Maps produces road and recreation atlases that feature roads classed by type and surface, landmarks, topography and public land ownership information.
The atlases display detailed recreation information with phone numbers and Web sites, climate graphs, cities, towns and locales with hunting units, and page-to-page overlap with GPS grids.
“I will put our cartographic content against any competitor,” Glanville said about his Benchmark Maps, which has been making atlases since 1995.
Although there are apps for that, Benchmark Maps can provide more detail than a 4-inch screen, said Glanville, who is targeting outdoor enthusiasts and educators.
“An atlas can give you a larger context,” he said. “Yes, you can get turn-by-turn directions right to a campground, and you probably will anyway, but the reality is an atlas will give you a broader context of what is around you.”
Benchmark Maps is developing mobile apps that will allow users to share their adventures through a social networking platform, according to business development manager Lauren Perez.
“We are trying to make it a personal experience that is customizable through our atlases,” she said. “We want to connect the technology and our end user in a dendritic way so they can utilize the many layers of our map.”
Glanville said he also plans to use public city, county, regional and statewide information so users can access all the specific details unique to those areas.
“We’re on the dawn of a whole new era in cartography,” he said, “and we are taking on how to educate the next generation on what cartography is about.”
— Noozhawk business writer Alex Kacik can be reached at akacik@noozhawk.com. Follow Noozhawk on Twitter: @noozhawk, @NoozhawkNews and @NoozhawkBiz. Connect with Noozhawk on Facebook.