Category Archive

Author of three editions of the Offbeat Bride book and From Shitshow To Afterglow, Ariel Meadow Stallings acts as the publisher of all the Offbeat Empire websites.

The imaginary titles of really terrible Offbeat Empire posts

What if I just let the editors go crazy with their pitches? What if we specialized in shitstorm posts? This was the question I posited to the staff in an email recently, asking them to share the imaginary titles of the most terrible Offbeat Empire posts we would never, ever publish. Then I laughed and laughed and laughed at their responses.

And so, just for funsies, here’s a short list of the horrific imaginary posts we’d never run…

Inclusive advertising that doesn’t pander

I work in Iowa, where same-sex marriage is legal (whoot for equality), and I was recently asked by my workplace to put together a brochure about the wedding rental facilities we have available — pavilions, parks, that sort of thing.

I am already planning on including a “We rent to everyone, regardless of who you’re in love with ” in the FAQs, but I want to make a bigger statement with the actual design.

On the flip side, I don’t want to seem like I’m blatantly pandering for the sake of it — I guess in my mind, I just feel like it’s somewhat exploitative to include a picture of two brides or two grooms just because “See how different they are? AND WE DON’T EVEN CARE!!”

What do you think? What’s the best way to advertise in a non-gender specific way? How would you do it?

If I submit my wedding to you, do I risk getting mocked online?

“I can see myself submitting content to Offbeat Home and Life… However, with the recent hateful post on another site regarding a lovely wedding featured on Offbeat Bride, I’m a little afraid to submit ANYTHING…”

Submissions we don’t ever accept

It’s unofficial “let’s talk about submissions!” week here on the Offbeat Empire! While I generally prefer to focus on the positive (e.g. here the kind of submissions we love!), I thought it might be useful to share a few kinds of submissions that we never ever accept… and a few of the reasons why. This is becoming extra pertinent because it’s wedding season and we’re getting a LOT of inquiries from business websites about commercial guestposts.

So while we LOVE getting guestpost submissions, here are a few of the guestposts that always get declined…