Displaying items by tag: Chamber of Commerce

What should we do with an extra day? That’s a question that first entered my brain in 2000.

I was with the North Central Massachusetts Chamber of Commerce at that time. I had been there for five years. I had seen how much good a strong vibrant well led chamber of commerce could do for its community, its members and the local economy.

But on February 29, 2000, I sat there and wondered how the Chamber might mobilize the community to use this extra day to do something….but what?

Fast forward to 2015, I’m at the Saratoga County Chamber of Commerce, and I saw an opportunity to discuss this idea. 

That fall, we convened a meeting with a bunch of local leaders. People from the nonprofit sector, the for-profit sector and some local philanthropists.

We reminded them that 2016 was a Leap Year. We suggested we find a way to use this extra day for something good. I kept calling it the “extra day initiative.” 

There was interest. People liked the concept. That’s why they showed up. But what should we do or what could we ask our members and people in the community to do with their extra day. 

Bo Goliber, from Fingerpaint, at some point in the discussion, shouted out “Leap of Kindness Day.” 

Everyone said brilliant.

As the representative from GLOBALFOUNDRIES suggested, we then had to figure out how an individual by themselves or a company with 3,000 employees could both participate. 

How might we scale this idea of a Leap of Kindness Day? 

That led us to contact larger local nonprofits to see what we could do to help them. They told us. We need food, clothing, personal care items, money, etc. Setting up a collection drive was reasonably simple for our larger members and they organized drives to meet these local needs. 

Others came to us with their own ideas. Espey Manufacturing wanted to thank our US Navy Sailors with Stewart’s gift cards. The Hampton Inn and Suites, in Saratoga Springs, made breakfast for the Lake Avenue Fire Station. Polyset brought breakfast and lunch to first responders in Clifton Park. The Ballston Spa BPA collected non-skid socks for a local nursing home. 

As we started sharing #leapofkindnessday with our members and our community, other chambers of commerce took notice.

In 2016, we had 52 chambers of commerce in 30 states that asked us if they could share our Leap of Kindness Day idea with their members and communities. We said yes.

Its 2020 now. Four years later. This is another Leap Year. And so we’re again leading the effort to promote Leap of Kindness Day in Saratoga County and beyond. 

New acts of kindness have been announced. 

Customers at Curtis Lumber, for instance, have already bought more than 500 2x4s that Curtis Lumber will be donating to Habitat for Humanity on February 29. 

The Clifton Park Halfmoon Library is collecting funds from patrons for CAPTAIN Community Health Services. T-Shirt Graphics is selling hoodies for just $8 online. All purchases will be donated to the Racetrack Chaplaincy who will give these to backstretch workers.Two website development firms offered to help Kelly’s Angels with a special request. There are collection drives for food, clothes and personal care items already underway. 

This year, we already have more than 160 chambers of commerce in 41 states, Canada and Ireland joining us in celebrating Leap of Kindness Day.

Now, you don’t have to organize a collection drive to participate. Every individual can do something kind for someone else. Make a donation on February 29 to your favorite local charity. Send a thank you note to someone that changed your life. 

February 29 this year is a Saturday. Take your family or friends out for breakfast, lunch, or dinner and TIP big. 

Here in Saratoga, we had the chance to invent Leap of Kindness Day. And the impact is humbling to say the least as more people every day share what they plan to do not just in Saratoga County but across the world. So we ask, what will YOU do with your extra day on February 29, 2020? 

For more information on how you can get involved and make a difference, visit: www.saratoga.org/foundation/leap-of-kindness-day-2020.

SARATOGA SPRINGS — In an effort to sustain both the First Night and July 4th fireworks displays in downtown Saratoga Springs this year and into the future, the Saratoga County Chamber of Commerce has created a Saratoga Springs Fireworks Fund. The Chamber is now seeking local businesses that want to see First Night and July 4th fireworks displays continue to become a sponsor or to make an online donation. All sponsorship funds and donations to the Saratoga Springs Fireworks Fund are tax-deductible as charitable donations. This is your chance to make a difference! The funds donated will be used solely to put on the fireworks this year on First Night and July 4th and hopefully for years to come. To donate, please visit secure.givelively.org/donate/ saratoga-county-foundation-inc/ saratoga-springs-fireworks-fund.

When Theresa Agresta, the owner of Allegory Studios and CultureTalk, became the Chair of the Saratoga County Chamber’s Board of Directors earlier this year, she wanted our Chamber to do more than ever before for small business owners.

As a small business owner herself, she had a sense that business owners would value an opportunity to meet up to share their concerns, ideas and challenges privately with one another. 

So we established a new Business Owners Council and invited owners to meet up with one another once a month, at the Chamber.

We then invited local experts to these meetings to talk about employee benefits, cash flow projections, how to manage charitable giving, new sexual harassment training laws, developing sales goals, etc.

The creation of this new member benefit is a big accomplishment for the Chamber in 2019. 

This Council now meets on the first Tuesday, of every month, from 4 to 5 p.m. at the Chamber. 

Our goal will be to increase participation and to continue to bring in speakers on issues of relevance to local small business owners.

This accomplishment is a direct result of the leadership being provided by volunteers with the Chamber, like Theresa Agresta. 

On January 23, 2020, our Chamber will host our 102nd Annual Dinner. We will honor Theresa Agresta and other volunteer leaders for their service to the chamber and this community. 

Our Annual Dinner is also a time for our members and the community to celebrate all of the Chamber’s accomplishments from 2019 and to look ahead to 2020.

Now there is no way we can celebrate every accomplishment.

But there are three that demonstrate how our Chamber changes things for the benefit of our members and all of the communities we serve across Saratoga County.

For starters, we built a Field House for the benefit of US Navy Sailors and their families stationed in Saratoga County, on the US Navy’s Naval Support Activity Center base, in Saratoga Springs. 

The funding came via a grant secured by former State Senator Kathy Marchione. After working with local Navy leaders to determine what to build with these funds, the Chamber hired Munter Enterprises to build this 7,700 square foot facility. 

Now US Navy Sailors stationed in Saratoga County have a first-ever safe, secure, on-base, indoor location to play volleyball or basketball; to host graduations, movie nights, and educational workshops; to drill and to prepare so that they can succeed in all of their missions.

In 2019, we created the Saratoga County Institute for Management in collaboration with SUNY Empire State College. 

With the support of the Saratoga County Capital Resources Corporation, we were able to offer scholarships to small businesses and nonprofits so they could participate in the Institute’s classes. 

From scratch really, we had to create new curriculum, secure expert presenters, oversee the 21 classes, and support the participants and their employers who sponsored them. 

Graduates of the Institute will be better leaders within their organizations thereby helping these companies and nonprofits to succeed, grow and thrive.

In 2019, our community came together like never before to create ONE online community calendar. To get this done, we had to collaborate with Mannix Marketing, Discover Saratoga, the Saratoga Springs DBA, Skidmore College and the Saratoga Springs City Center. 

Now with one online events calendar in place, event organizers can enter information on any one of our seven top performing local websites and that information feeds to all of them. 

The goal is to make it easier for event organizers to promote their events and for people to find them.

And if you’d like to learn more about the many other accomplishments we had in 2019, we invite you to visit www.saratoga.org or to attend our Annual Dinner. 

I don’t know who the 2,000 people were that took part in this survey. But let’s assume that it was a valid poll and the results are accurate.

The poll determined that the top three New Year’s Resolutions for 2019 are: 
1. Diet or eat healthier
2. Exercise more
3. Lose weight

So if these results are accurate, there are lots of people out there with resolutions or personal goals related to health and wellness.

The trouble with resolutions, however, is not making them. It is keeping them.

Sure everyone wants to eat healthier. Who doesn’t want to exercise more or lose weight. 

Once again, we’re told perhaps 60 percent of people make a resolution but just 8 percent keep them.

So what can we do to make this the year that our own health and wellness matters.

I’m told that writing down a goal with a way it can be measured and a time by when it will be accomplished helps. You can post this goal somewhere so that you see it every day or every week. This might help make sure you are scheduling time to get it done.

Sharing such a goal or resolution with others also improves the likelihood you’ll succeed. 

Maybe the people you tell your goal or resolution to will give you advice or feedback that helps you. They might even decide to do it with you. And if they do join you, then you’ll have someone to share your success with when you do get it done.

So now if you made a resolution or wrote down a goal that involved diet or eating healthier; exercising more; or losing weight. We can help too!

No, the Chamber does not have a miracle diet or weight loss program. Sorry.

But we do have our fifth Annual Health and Wellness Week coming up February 3 through February 9.

Sponsored by The Adirondack Trust Company and MVP Healthcare, our Health and Wellness Week involves a range of local health and wellness organizations hosting FREE classes, workshops, and workouts for anyone that wants to try something new to achieve their health goals.

Want more details? Please take a look at the list of free activities on our Chamber events page at www.saratoga.org or give us a call at 518-584-3255. You can also follow us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram as we’ll be promoting every one of these free events and more as we get closer to that week.

Here’s a sample: Our Health and Wellness Week already has opportunity for you (and that friend or family members who has that same goal) to try the Pure Barre; Metabolic Meltdown; Vent Fitness Studio; Purebred Athletics; Custom Fitness; or a session on Mindfulness at One Roof; or you can get ready to save someone’s life by taking a CPR training course at the Clifton Park – Halfmoon EMS. 

We’ll be adding additional events and opportunities to eat healthier, exercise more and to lose weight in the next couple of weeks. 

We purposely set up our Health and Wellness Week five years ago to help people achieve their health and wellness resolutions.

Our hope then and now is that people will look at this list of FREE activities and pick at least one to try. 

And if you like what you try, perhaps you’ll become part of the 8 percent who keeps your resolution in 2019!