The Howler Magazine has been in existence in Costa Rica as both a print and electronic version since 1996. They highlight the beauty of Costa Rica, its adventures, culture arts. While also discussing business and wellness.
John B. Quam, Editor in chief, publisher and visionary of Howler, moved to Costa Rica in 2014 retired and found that he could not just sit on a beach. David Mill who started the Howler originally was going to let it go away. So John purchased it in 2016.
“The Howler Monkey is the loudest voice in the forest. We are the loudest media here”.
John has been in Matapalo a small town outside the Surfing city of Tamarindo for the COVID pandemic. “I have spent my time reformulating the online magazine as well as our website”.
It has been a struggle for The Howler as they have few paying advertisers but as an icon brand in Costa Rica, they cannot shut down.
“We have kept going and reinventing ourselves”.
John believes that the world is hungry to travel again and he has seen big spikes of people reading about Costa Rica. “Being locked down they are itching to get out once again”.
When it comes to the digital nomad industry John thinks that some will go away as they have not been creative enough to stay with it. Also, the travel writers have been locked down also which he sees causes less content or bad content.
“I find many blogs to be poorly written and not informative on a deep level. They just touch the surface. People are looking for more than that.
Keep in mind that people that travel are more intellectual and read more. Having great content keeps them coming back”
Ecotourism in Costa Rica is not a thought it is an action. “I see that eco-tourism will be even more important”. Howler of course practice what they preach. “We have one world to keep clean and beautiful”.
John often hires website workers from the Philippines and also India. “Sometimes I take writers that have been to Costa Rica with good content”. When hiring in a foreign country he has found this very affordable and good clean work.
His advice to others in the industry is to have good quality writing and be informative.
“Photos are also super important”.
Lastly, his top recommendations for when we can travel freely again would be Vietnam and Japan, Panama and Columbia.
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