Greetings on day 283 of January 2025. Well, at least that is what it feels like. January felt like it was never ending with snow and cold temperatures, school delays and world events. We have decided that February will be the beginning of the new year, and it will be a good one!
The chamber kicked off its annual Membership drive and Spring Magazine advertisement sales in January. If you have been a member in the past, “thank you” and if you have not joined, we encourage you to talk with us about the benefits of joining. We are working every day to support and grow our business community. We are excited to start working on the Spring 2025 Patrick County magazine. It is always fun to sit with our team at Patrick County Tourism and SilverLining Design to discuss the articles and pictures.
We are also busy planning lunch and learn seminars. Our first one will be on April 2nd. The topic will be Succession Planning. With so many small, family-owned and operated businesses in Patrick County, we know this will be a great presentation to help ensure the continuation of those businesses with the next generation. We do have a survey out for more input from you, our local businesses, on what topics you would be interested in learning. Please take a moment and fill out that survey so we can work to plan the rest of the year.
Other events we are working on for the first half of the year are a round table discussion with our “cottage” industry businesses in the county. These businesses are home-based or use local outlets and/or the internet to sell their products. We will be partnering with the Reynolds Homestead to bring them together and work on supporting their needs. And, in March, we will be doing a Leprechaun decorating contest, similar to our annual Scarecrow contest.
With the cold temperatures, recovering from the holidays, and the snow, many of our local businesses have seen a decline in visits. We encourage everyone to come out and support our local community.
We hosted a ribbon cutting for KAM’s Corner, LLC on January 22nd. This business is located at 797 Woodland Drive in Stuart. It offers substance abuse case management and mental health skills building programs. We are thankful that they are here helping our community.
Stay up to date with all the events the chamber and our local businesses are doing by following us on Facebook, sign up for our email newsletter or check out our website at www.patrickchamber.com.
Welcome to new businesses joining the chamber in January: Harvest House Emporium, LLC, Terre a’ Terre, and Snow’s Land Maintenance.
(Adcock is the executive director of the Patrick County Chamber of Commerce)
