Don’t judge each day by the harvest you reap but by the seeds that you plant.~ Robert Louis Stevenson
March is the time that we sow the seeds for our garden. And at the chamber, those seeds are meetings — rows and rows of meetings.
We co-hosted the Economic Summit with Reynolds Homestead on the last day of February and have had a wrap up meeting to finalize the report to share with you. While many of the challenges are larger businesses mentioned are not eye opening, such as childcare, employee health and wellness, finding new hires and soft and hard skill training, it is always good to have it in print so we can share with our local, state, and federal representatives. A portion of that summit, we also allowed our businesses to share successes they have had. A strong sense of community and support for each other was a highlight of such successes. We are a county that is lucky to have such long standing businesses, many of which are multi-generational in length. Griffith Lumber is celebrating 90 years in business, Poor Farmers Market celebrated 40 years of continual daily operations, and Howell Grocery is gearing up on May 4 to celebrate 100 years in business. To address the challenges, it will take a concerted effort on behalf of our county, town and regional leaders to work toward solutions.
The chamber is excited to be part of the Patrick County delegates that will participate in the Appalachian Regional Commission Gateway Community Initiative. We have been meeting during March to prepare for our April training.
We met with the head of the Martinsville-Henry County Chamber to address the needs we both face and how we partner together. The chamber also attended the Blue Ridge Parkway Foundation’s reception in Roanoke, alongside Patrick County Tourism. Showing up for these regional get togethers allows us to network with partners and keep Patrick County in the spotlight. We are finalizing our “how to start a business checklist” and will be sharing that with everyone soon. We will also be offering a seminar in April to discuss the resources available. We hosted the Business After Hours at The Historic Star Theatre on March 7th which was well attended and a Ribbon Cutting for CPB Behavioral Therapy and Advocacy LLC for their expanded offices on Main Street in Stuart.
For April, we will be hosting the aforementioned seminar on “starting a business in Patrick County,” The Pick-Up Patrick litter campaign all month and attending the ARC training.
(Adcock is the executive director of the Patrick County Chamber of Commerce.)
