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New digs at Chamber of Commerce office

by jmaloni
Sat, Jul 27th 2019 07:00 am

The Niagara River Region Chamber of Commerce hosted an open house Friday to debut its new look.

“We did receive a grant for some of the renovations,” President Jennifer Pauly said. “The William Mayne grants helped us get the digital screen, which Lewiston Digital installed for us and helped us get a running commercial and promotions on there. That’s something that we can aim to use for promotional aspects for our members and organizations that put on events here in the community.

“We were talking with our executive board about the look of the chamber. We’ve been in a couple offices in the lifespan of the chamber. And we’ve just moved furniture to furniture to furniture, to building to building to building. When we came here, it didn’t quite work, but we made it happen. We’ve been here going on almost five years, and we just needed a change.

“When you came in the front door, it was office space, but it was also a welcome center. So, there wasn’t any clear distinction between the two. Visitors often felt like they were invading our space, and we often felt like visitors were invading our space. … It just wasn’t functional. So, we decided to flip the space. And now we have a clear space for visitors to come in.

“We flipped the entrance to the side, and now Caitlin and Suzanne each have their own functional desk area, their own functional work area, that is secure. We have a lot of our filing cabinets and storage that now hides all of our office things. We are a functioning office, so we have a lot of paperwork and things.

“We have a nice new meeting table to meet with members, to meet with visitors, to maybe have small meetings here. Our staff meetings take place here. When people come in for their health insurance, Suzanne’s able to address them here at the table.

“Our welcome center now has more area for brochures; a clear-cut area to sign-in; we have a little divider desk here to help us service members and visitors; and we have complimentary coffee and water. And right now, there’s soft drinks in the fridge, too. Spicey Pickle donated the fridge to us.

“It’s been a great thing. We now have a cohesive look, a different look, which we didn’t before. It helps us have more of a professional feeling as soon as you walk in the office, both from member aspect and visitor aspect.”

The Chamber of Commerce is located at the corner of Center and South Ninth streets, in the corner of Academy Park across from Tops.

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