Business Retention and Development Committee Agenda and Packet 2011 04 04

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BRaD Meeting Summary March 7, 2011 Page 2 of 4 PRESENTATION BY ENRIQUE GUTIERREZ, QWEST COMMUNITY REPRESENTATIVE - Mr. Gutierrez, a former small business owner, is the Qwest Community Representative for the Denver metro area and mentors small businesses on behalf of Qwest in areas of technology and social media. He arranges forums for small businesses and covers topics focusing on specific needs of these small businesses. Many times a successful small business owner will be the featured speaker. Forums are free or at a small fee to cover the cost of the speaker. Enrique supports the Denver metro area small business community, but he can be available by invitation to areas outside of Denver, such as City of Louisville. He would be interested in providing his services to small businesses in Louisville if at least 15 small businesses were able to come together for a forum. At least 2 hours are needed for the forum and he would need the specifics of what the businesses want help with and he can then structure an agenda to fit their needs. To access the website for the Qwest Small Business Resource Center, go to http://connectthedots.qwest.com/denver Contact information for Mr. Gutierrez is on the home page of this website. CHAMBER’S AMBASSADORS PROGRAM – John Benedetti, President of the Louisville Chamber, updated the group. This year the Chamber has formalized the Ambassador Program and brought in volunteers to be paired up with Chamber Board members to provide contact with businesses in Louisville. The Chamber has made a list of businesses to call on, segregated the calling districts and assigned an Ambassador and volunteer to each sector. Each quarter, 5-7 businesses will be designated to be called on and through the meetings non-Chamber members will be encouraged to join. Follow-ups with these businesses will be made in 4-6 months following the initial meeting. The Ambassador Program will be working in conjunction with the Chamber Marketing Committee, reaching out to market Louisville events and promote Louisville. BRaD member, Menaker, suggested forming a committee of City staff, DBA, Chamber, LRC representative and a representative from the Centennial Valley Merchant Group, to further market Louisville. Shelley Angell, Chamber, is trying to ensure there is no overlap among the different committees as the group is concerned that businesses are not overly contacted and then become irritated when they are contacted too many times. RETENTION VISITS OVERVIEW: Wheels Manufacturing – Shelley Angell and Michael Menaker Business located at CTC; has a sophisticated machine shop and makes metal machine parts for bicycles; sells to distributors; difficult time finding qualified machinists; company is busy and growing quickly. One complaint they have is the snow removal on streets at CTC. The company also said there was some difficulty in the past 6 months working with the City Building Department where they felt there was a lack of coordination within City staff.