Presentation highlights the growth, change in Pickaway Co.
Here are the remarks from the annual Pickaway Chamber of Commerce leaders from the annual dinner — lots of good things happening so support the chamber. For more information, see pickawaychamber.com/
From Chamber Chair Jessica Calder:
In the spring of 2023, the Chamber embarked on a three-year Strategic Plan. This Strategic Plan has set the groundwork for what we are currently doing and what we plan on doing for you, our members.
During the planning process, we visited our mission, vision, and defined our core values.
After much discussion, we determined the mission of the Pickaway County Chamber of Commerce is to provide strategic growth and success through support and resources for businesses in Pickaway County. During this presentation of the strategic plan, we will review with you the current programs and what we plan to do to assist you, our businesses.
Part of the strategic process was also to define our vision. The vision of the Pickaway County Chamber of Commerce is to support the development of businesses in Pickaway County. We want to see continued growth of local business to enhance the well-being of our county.
The mission and vision cannot be achieved without the assessment of the core values that we operate by. I would like to take a moment to share with you our Core Values and ask you, as a business member to reflect on these values.
At the Chamber, we are PASSIONATE. We have passion for the businesses and community of Pickaway County. We demonstrate this passion by investing tirelessly to support, promote, advocate, and provide leadership to assist our businesses in striving for success.
Providing programs such as Safety Council, Leadership Pickaway, company communications through eblast messages to the membership, significant reduction of your worker’s Compensation Premium, and providing health care options to our members are a few of the ways in which we show our passion.
The Chamber is empathetic, caring, compassionate: We value each business for its uniqueness and contribution to our community. We treat everyone with equity, dignity, and professionalism and strive to serve the varying needs of the businesses.
We recognize that the needs of each business are different. The benefits of corporate membership are much different than that of the smaller businesses; however, we strive to add value to all businesses. One of the illustrations of this is through joint partnership with the OhioMeansJobs in holding local job fairs.
The Chamber believes in Community. We believe that investing our time and resources into the businesses of Pickaway County will build a stronger community. A community that will be rich in history, have strong families, safe homes and neighborhoods, successful businesses, and where, through cooperation and collaboration, people will have a sense of belonging.
The Chamber works with a number of nonprofits and organizations to promote our community. The Chamber has an advisory position on the Uptown Circleville nonprofit, serves on the Pickaway Progress Partnership (P3) Board, Pickaway WORKS Board, Pickaway County Commission on Aging Board and serves as a business representative to the Pickaway Addition Action Coalition, and the Pickaway Ross Career Technology Center Adult Education Advisory Board. You will find Chamber staff and board members serving our community in many capacities throughout Pickaway County.
We have four priorities within our Strategic Plan and we would like to share some information about each of those areas. Some of our Board members will now share our priorities with you.
From Chamber Secretary April Metzger:
Our first priority is to provide continuous value through education, resources, and opportunities. This is the most visual goal that the Chamber has. Let me explain how we have begun addressing this initiative.
Board members and staff have been doing a review of all points of contact in our database to make sure we have the most up to date information. If you are not getting the informational emails from the Chamber you are missing out, please let Krista know.
A review and assessment of all past and current chamber programs has been completed. Additional training and program opportunities are being assessed. We are continuing with Safety Council, bringing back Leadership Pickaway, holding quarterly new member orientations and have scheduled an update for all members to attend and become “refreshed” about all of the benefits of Chamber membership. We have continued our business after hours events and these have been well attended. For those of you who have not attended, a business after hours is an opportunity to network with other Chamber members. It is held in different locations each month and is great way to promote your business. We currently have Business After Hours sponsored through this fall. If your business would like to host an after hours, please reach out to Chamber Director Krista Bower soon as we will begin scheduling into 2025.
Krista and board members have been going out to meet with businesses. Krista met with a group of business leaders in Commercial Point regarding services they need for their businesses. A similar meeting was held with the Ashville Business Alliance. The Chamber will continue to encourage conversations with Krista and our Board to make sure we are providing what you need.
We are looking at our marketing. We want to make sure we promote businesses and programs on different forms of media. The first week of April you should have received the new monthly Chamber newsletter that is being sent out to our membership. This is a great way to stay informed about what has happened as well as learn about the events that are coming up.
Finally, our goal at the end of this year is to do a survey of Chamber members. We want to assess what we have done and hear what you would like as far as future services. Please make sure that you have the Pickawaychamber.com email set as a trusted source so that you will be able to provide us with that feedback.
I’d like to introduce you to Allen Roberts who is going to share our second priority with you.
From Chamber Board member Allen Roberts:
Our second priority is to increase and diversify revenue streams that will assist to financially sustain the Pickaway County Chamber of Commerce.
The Chamber’s primary source of funding is through business membership. We thank each of you for being members of our Chamber. Our Chamber dues are substantially lower than other larger Chambers in our area and competitive with others our size. Therefore, we are continuing to look at revenue streams other than from dues.
One way we are doing that, which is a benefit to YOU, our businesses, is through our sponsorship programs. We have several sponsors who receive special benefits such as primary seating at the Annual Dinner, automatic registration for the golf outing, a listing on our website and special recognition at all Chamber events by their name or logo being listed on the banner that we proudly display at the events. This year’s Platinum sponsors include: The Savings Bank, Atomic Credit Union, Pickaway Ross Career Technology Center Adult Education and Pickaway County Banking Center. Also, Gold sponsors include: Adena, BHM CPA’s, Kingston National Bank, and Ohio Health. There are different levels of sponsorship, please reach out to Krista to take care of this marketing opportunity and arrange to become a sponsor.
To increase outreach, the Chamber has embarked on a new Ambassador program. Tonight I would like to introduce to you the inaugural ambassadors. Would the following people please stand:
Andrea GreenBrittany GrateBrianna HoodHannah ParkerBrenda ShortMcKenzie Wadlington
Thank you for agreeing to serve as the inaugural ambassadors for the 2024 year.
The role of these ambassadors will be to serve as an additional point of contact for new members and visiting with returning members. We ask them to attend as many events as possible and do outreach to encourage other members as well as nonmembers to come to our events. We want them to be part of the official welcoming committee of the Chamber. We are seeking additional ambassadors. The commitment is minimal but the impact you can make is extremely valuable to you, your business and the Chamber. If you are interested in becoming an Ambassador, you can find a link on the Pickaway County Chamber of Commerce webpage. Please complete that and one of our committee members will be in touch with you.
By having additional outreach with our Board and Ambassadors, we hope to generate more memberships. Through membership growth, we can deliver more services for our businesses. As we grow and can potentially hire staff, it allows the Chamber to begin looking at opportunities for grants and funding sources that will enhance our membership benefits.
The Pickaway County Chamber of Commerce has complete financial transparency. As Krista shared earlier in the meeting, we are growing. Memberships will fluctuate as businesses leave for any number of reasons; however, maintaining growth of our membership is a commitment we want to make to you, our members.
From Chamber Board member Christy Stewart:
As Board and staff, it is a priority for us to operate efficiently to ensure growth, internal alignment and organizational health.
The first step in this process was to review and update policies and procedures to make sure they are consistent with the size and capacity of our Chamber. Having continuity in the way that we work, is important to the Chamber. As Krista is nearing her second year, the board wanted to commit to her that as our sole employee, she had written policies that she could refer to for guidance in processes to make sure that we were providing our Chamber members with the best possible service we can. Being a one employee organization is not easy. However, until we grow our organizational capacity, as Allen described through financial stewardship, this Board will commit to step up and assist Krista with valuable working committees.
In addition to the Annual Dinner and Golf Committees, we also have committees focusing on Membership, Ambassadors, and Marketing.
In addition to our internal operations, we want to make sure we are collaborating with others in the community. In the past year we have worked with Uptown Circleville, the Pickaway County Visitors Bureau, and P3 to make sure that the nonprofits are all working together. It is our goal to continue to work and grow these relationships to make Pickaway County a better place for our businesses.
From Chamber Board member Sarah Mercer:
The final strategic initiative is to strengthen our organization by building capacity. We have taken the first steps by filling our board with an array of diverse members that represent different sizes and types of businesses from our county. We also have nonprofit representation on the board. In the future, as openings occur and new Board members are brought on they will be vetted to make sure that we are representing the types of the businesses that are Chamber members.
This past year, the Pickaway County Chamber has changed the platform which we use to track members to Growthzone. This software has a number of features that we will be offering to our members in the future. This is another opportunity to strengthen our organization while providing additional service to our members.
As mentioned earlier the Board has made a more focused effort in working in a committee structure which allows further outreach and support for the Chamber members. Focusing on supporting our programs, marketing and other initiatives through these committees will allow the Chamber more outreach and marketing.
During the past 4 years the Pickaway County Chamber recognizes that there has been change. Change in leadership at the Chamber, change in the businesses that we serve and change in the way that businesses are doing business since the pandemic. By recognizing this and talking to our members, we will build the capacity to serve you better.
This Chamber Board is dedicated to providing support to Krista, our Executive Director to help grow our Chamber. It is our hope that through additional growth we can hire additional staff to provide even more services to our members.
Chamber President Calder gets the last word:
We hope through this review of our Strategic Plan that you can see that our Pickaway Chamber of Commerce has been, and continues to work hard for you, our members. I hope that you will consider becoming more active in the programs and opportunities that we are providing. We also appreciate your feedback on ways that you feel that we can enhance our services. Please reach out to a board member or Krista to discuss.
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