MINNETRISTA
A happy little (big) website
Bob Ross inspired millions of viewers on his PBS show “The Joy of Painting”—and he did it from a home right here in Muncie, Indiana. The home—originally built for Lucius Ball, one of five brothers behind the glass mason jar conglomerate now known as Ball Corporation—was the site of local PBS station WIPB and served as the set for “The Joy of Painting” for over 10 years.
The house is part of the Minnetrista campus, which comprises several historic Ball family homes, a museum, nature trails, and more. In 2020, Minnetrista launched the Bob Ross Experience as a way to honor and preserve the Bob Ross legacy.
With Bob Ross growing in popularity since “The Joy of Painting” joined the catalog of Netflix, Minnetrista knew the Bob Ross Experience would generate widespread attention on a global scale. The only problem? Minnetrista’s website wasn’t exactly camera-ready, and the exhibit’s launch date was fast-approaching.
Minnetrista turned to Intersection to design a website that would match the fortitude of the organization’s new international presence. We rose to the challenge and delivered a robust new site in just four months.
BEFORE
AFTER
A custom mega menu allowed us highlight key programs and events with imagery built into the main navigation, and we carefully curated discovery tiles throughout to guide users deeper into the site. After a thorough audit of their content, we helped Minnetrista visually and verbally tell their story to the world.
Within the first six months of its launch, the new Minnetrista website welcomed nearly 100,000 unique visitors, with the Bob Ross Experience page garnering just under 60,000 pageviews. With traffic sources including The New York Times, CNN, USA Today, Smithsonian, and more, the website played host to a global audience, with more than 10% of visitors based outside of the United States.
“Because we do so many great things at Minnetrista, our last website was honestly a beast. We were struggling with the functionality and accessibility of our previous website. There was too much information in some places and not enough in others. Our hope was to have a website that was sleek, easy to use, and informational. We wanted users to be able to come to our website and find what they were looking for quickly and easily. We also hoped that they would discover something new while on the website.
We received the website that we set out to have, which has made the lives of our staff and, hopefully, our visitors easier. Our website works in a way that allows us to be successful.”