2013 Annual Report

2012-2013

ANNUAL REPORTGREEN BAY AREA CHAMBER OF COMMERCE

To strengthen member businesses through enhancing economic and workforce development, resulting in improved quality of life in our community and region.

mission.

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inside.FROM THE CHAIR

ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT

WORKFORCE DEVELOPMENT

LEADERSHIP

CURRENT YOUNG PROFESSIONALS

LIVE54218

GOVERNMENT AFFAIRS

MEMBER SERVICES

FROM THE PRESIDENT

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The test for any successful organization is that it must be relevant and provide value to the customers it serves. For the Green Bay Area Chamber of Commerce, our mission is to strengthen member businesses through economic and workforce development. This not only helps our member businesses to become stronger, but also leads to enhanced regional prosperity and a better quality of life.

As a member-based organization, we seek to understand the needs of our member businesses (our customers) so we can develop programming and support advocacy that help our member businesses grow and be successful.

L E T T E R F R O M T H E C H A I R

Helping member businesses become

stronger.

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One way the Chamber supports member business is through advocacy around issues supporting economic and workforce development. This past fiscal year was an active legislative period with consideration of the State bi-annual budget. The Chamber consciously expanded its public policy positions (through its Public Policy and Good Government Councils) to address all aspects of its mission in areas supporting business, economic and workforce development. In its role as a convener, the Chamber helped to organize multiple events with State legislators through which the Chamber board, member companies and local government officials could engage legislators on policy proposals being considered at the State Capitol.

Another important role for the Chamber is to serve as a catalyst to pull together organizations and individuals to tackle key community-wide issues that are in keeping with its mission. An example of this is the new “Cradle to Career” civic infrastructure that is being brought forward through the joint effort of the Chamber, Greater Green Bay Community Foundation and the Brown County United Way. This effort is intended to create an infrastructure that unites stakeholders around shared goals, measures and results in education, supporting the success of every individual – cradle to career. Partners in Education, the Chamber’s workforce development programming, is one of the key drivers of this. We as a community may be program-rich, but are often system-poor. Working collaboratively with this kind of infrastructure and measurements will lead to a better educated and more talented workforce, providing the human capital necessary to ultimately help member businesses grow.

Many of the Chamber’s economic development activities are organized under Advance, its economic development division. During this past year, Advance expanded its small business leading activities by becoming certified as a Small Business Administration (SBA) intermediary microloan lender, providing $250,000 in direct loans to small businesses under this program. In addition, the contractual framework for the Advance Microloan program was updated to provide for a uniform syndication agreement for all participating financial institutions and to provide for continuation of the program through 2024. We at the Chamber are proud of the impact Advance has in furthering economic development, with an estimated annual impact from Advance programs and services exceeding $64 million this calendar year.

Together with the staff and volunteers who support the Chamber, I am confident our collective efforts are making a difference in helping to strengthen member businesses and promote programs aimed at strengthening our local and regional economy.

stronger.

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Tod Zacharias board chair 2012-2013

ADVANCE is the economic focal point and resource center for Brown County municipalities, helping to create a strong economic environment striving to ensure a diversified economic base and strong workforce through: Business incubation, business development, business attraction and business retention.

E C O N O M I C D E V E L O P M E N T

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Significant achievements this past fiscal year

The Advance Business and Manufacturing Center incubator graduated five companies, welcomed seven new clients and currently leases space to 35 companies with 95 employees and annual payrolls of $3.7 million.

The Advance Microloan program assisted 22 businesses, approved loans totaling $967,000 with three businesses repaying their loans in full. Our certification as a Small Business Administration (SBA) intermediary microloan lender has allowed the program to expand to 11 surrounding counties.

Retention volunteers visited 120 Brown County businesses representing 37,520 employees. From those visits, 38 follow-up action items were completed covering financing,

workforce training, location assistance and referrals to local government.

Our attraction committee’s analysis of economic sectors in Brown County identified four significant gaps in our supply chain of primary industries: plastics, synthetic dyes, aluminum and printed circuits categories.

The Green Bay Area Fact Book expanded its readership to 11,000 recipients as a supplement in The Business News.

The Brown County Culinary Kitchen celebrated two years of helping food-based businesses, offering access to a commercially licensed, shared-use kitchen.

Advance has more than 113 investors including 97 private sector companies and 15 communities plus Brown County.

Our NationJob website received more than 30,000 clicks to apply for positions and had 1.3 million job views.

Advance offers a diversity component in its business development, connecting with minorities in the community.

Advance programming has made a total economic impact in the community of $64,604,781.

Retention visit questionnaires reveal 93 percent of businesses visited anticipate increasing or maintaining their employee levels, 82 percent expect sales growth n the next year, 74 percent rate the local business climate as good or excellent and 60 percent believe the business climate will improve five years from today.

Approximately 70 percent of the incubator’s alumni are still in business or sold their businesses.

The Advance Microloan program has helped with the start-up of eight new businesses, purchase of three existing businesses by new owners and growth of 11 existing businesses.

AdvanceGreenBay.orgAdvanceIncubator.orgTitletown.org/microloanAdvanceEconomicDevelopment.org 5

DID YOU KNOW?


W O R K F O R C E D E V E L O P M E N T

PARTNERS IN EDUCATION (PIE) leads the way in identifying, developing and supporting education and partnerships in area schools to help learners prepare for productive community life and to strengthen the economic vitality of the region.

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The 20th annual Golden Apple Awards recognized six individuals and two teams of exemplary educators.

PIE awarded more than $33,700 in scholarships for post-secondary education.

More than 78 juniors and seniors participated in the Youth Apprenticeship program.

Career Conversations served more than 100 educators and 500 attendees. The program is designed for educators to learn first-hand about employer workforce needs.

Our career education area also worked with the Green Bay Area Public School District to coordinate a Career & Technical Education Summit, bringing business, education

and community leaders together to better understand and support school-to-work transition.

We coordinated the Mr. Titletown Competition Formalwear Fashion Show, which was attended by 650 people and raised more than $5,000 for area schools’ post-prom activities. The event included the awarding of $4,500 in scholarships to four students courtesy of Scholarships Inc. and Green Bay Packaging. Proceeds also benefit the Partners in Education Post-Prom/Post-Grad campaign, which encourages young people to celebrate prom alcohol and drug free. The event provides funding for schools in the form of mini grants, which assist in the development of chemical free post-prom parties sponsored by school parent networks.

DID YOU KNOW?

Since the program’s inception five years ago, the Mr. Titletown Formal Wear Fashion Show’s “Mr. Man” Competition has raised $25,000 to be given to schools in the form of mini-grants and post-secondary scholarships for students.

Seventy-eight students participated in the 2012 Youth Apprenticeship program, took 169 classes at Northeast Wisconsin Technical College, and accumulated more than 17,000 training hours, and more than 60 percent plan continued working for their Youth Apprenticeship training site after graduation.

Our Youth Apprenticeship students participate in a training model based on statewide youth apprenticeship curriculum guidelines endorsed by business and industry. Students continue core classes at their high school (4-5 hours per day), attend industry-related courses at NWTC (typically 1 – 2 nights per week), obtain paid worksite training at an area business learning valuable employability skills, and are trained by a skilled worksite mentor (working 10 – 15 hours per week for a total accumulation of 450 hours each program year). Students graduate with their high school diploma, college-level credits, extremely valuable worksite experience and a jumpstart on their future career.

Titletown.org/PartnersinEducationTitletown.org/YATitletown.org/GoldenApples 7

Youth Apprenticeship formed a partnership with NEW Water and the Green Bay Area Public School District to develop a Water and Wastewater Technology program. The program was approved as a pilot program in Green Bay and one year later was added as a statewide Youth Apprenticeship program for fall 2013.

Partnerships were created/rejuvenated with organizations/coalitions such as Community Action for Healthy Living, Bellin Health Alcohol and Drug Task Force and Green Bay Area Drug Alliance.

PIE provided project management programs to three area high schools, impacting 100 students who now understand how to define, plan, implement and finalize a project.

L E A D E R S H I P

LEADERSHIP GREEN BAY is a professional enrichment program that has been inspiring future leaders since 1985. Each year, it welcomes 45 committed candidates to the program. Future leaders gather once a month to learn about social issues and challenges facing the Green Bay area. The program culminates by participants organizing into teams and identifying social or public issues that need attention. These teams work on community projects designed to raise awareness of an issue, improve team skills and effect change.


Leadership Green Bay successfully completed five large group projects that enhanced our community: The Pals Parent Program created this program to work with parents of families who need guidance to enhance their parenting skills, The Garden of Hope Community Garden built seven raised gardens in collaboration with the New Community Shelter, Together with the clients they planted fruits and vegetables for the coming season, Beautify the Fox River provided more than 150 volunteers

to clean a 10-mile stretch of the Fox River that enhances our community, Walk a Mile In Her Shoes, a collaboration of Leadership Green Bay, the Golden House and the Sexual Assault Center, raised more than $20,000 to help stop the violence among women and children in our community. Project “Hand-Up” partnered with Freedom House, the only homeless shelter in Green Bay for families, to update their technology room with laptop computers and to renovate the space with new furniture and paint.

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DID YOU KNOW?

Since Leadership Green Bay’s inception, more than 1,000 leaders have completed the program and tackled 128 small group projects throughout the community.

It took 164 speakers, facilitators and planners to create and host the sessions for the Leadership Green Bay Class of 2013.

10 schools hosted Leadership Green Bay class site visits this year.

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succeed by example

A PROGRAM OF THE GREEN BAY AREA CHAMBER OF COMMERCE

L E A D E R S H I P

BROWN COUNTY TEEN LEADERSHIP (BCTL) is offered to high school sophomores during the academic year. Modeled after the adult Leadership Green Bay program, each session focuses on developing specific leadership skills and incorporates that instruction into a civic information theme. Participants also complete a community-based group project as part of the program.


BCTL successfully expanded the program from five sessions to eight sessions with the addition of a workforce development day and a health and wellness day.

This year’s BCTL class was the largest class in the 10-year history of the program with 40 students from 13 area high schools. Represented schools include: Ashwaubenon, Bay Port, De Pere, Denmark, Green Bay East, Green Bay Preble, Green Bay Southwest, NEW Lutheran, Notre Dame Academy, Oneida Nation, Pulaski, Seymour and West De Pere.

Brown County Teen Leadership small group projects included: ‘A Night of Hope’ suicide/self-harm concert at Harmony Café for the Brown County Suicide Coalition; ‘Zumba Day by the Bay’ Zumba® class event at Lambeau Field; ‘S.E.L.F. self-esteem campaign including a countywide no makeup day; and ‘Veterans Speak,’ a program that logged the stories of area veterans for archival purposes.

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DID YOU KNOW?

The upcoming 2013-2014 Brown County Teen Leadership class included a record-breaking 75 student applications.

BCTL implemented a steering committee of professionals in the Greater Green Bay community and graduates of the Leadership Green Bay program. Members for 2012-2013 included: Todd Thiel, Ameriprise Auto and Home Insurance; Heather Milbach, Schreiber Foods; Kurt Goehre, the Law Office of Conway, Olejniczak and Jerry S.C.; John Smith, Georgia-Pacific; Jennifer Naze, Rasmussen College; Glenn Buntin, Integrys Energy Group; Katie Hopkins, BCTL alumni 2011 and West De Pere High School student and Mitchell Cole, BCTL Alumni 2011 and Ashwaubenon High School student.

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BROWN COUNTY TEEN LEADERSHIPCLASS OF 2014 APPLICATION

YO U N G P R O F E S S I O N A L S

CURRENT young professionals is a program of the Chamber that works to attract, engage, develop and retain young talent.

Current has an estimated $16.7 million economic retention impact.


Current has grown to more than 1,200 individual members, continuing its strong membership growth. This represents more than a 3,000 percent growth rate over the past five years.

Current has 80 corporate members. Initially launched in 2007, corporate membership provides an accessible and affordable way for an employer of any size to become actively engaged in Current’s programming.

Current now hosts 36 main events per year including countless group activities that allow members to self-coordinate an event/activity related to a group theme such as Arts & Entertainment, Read to Lead or Business & Industry Tours.

Current has experienced more than 200 percent growth in event participation over the past year.

Current received 89 applications for its Future 15 & Young Professional Awards in 2012. This is a 65 percent increase from its first year. (54 in 201, 71 in 2011 and 89 in 2012).

Current has grown to more than 110 active committee members serving on any number of formally structured committees including steering, ambassadors, event planning, marketing & public relations and membership relations or one of several ad-hoc committees such as the Future 15 & Young Professional Awards, Current Kickball Classic or CityDeck Tailgate.

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DID YOU KNOW?

Current is celebrating its 10th anniversary and conduct a social media campaign revolving around our next 10 years. #currentnext10

Current offers a sustaining partnership opportunity that provides substantial logo exposure in front of a young professional audience. Green Bay Packers, Prevea Health and U.S. Bank were among the founding partners with a capacity of eight partners. In addition to logo exposure, sustaining partners provide altruistic support to advance Current’s mission by engaging young professionals for long-term community development.

Current has an estimated $16.7 million economic retention impact based on the percentage of members who have indicated they are more likely to stay in Green Bay because of Current multiplied by their average salary and using a conservative economic indicator of 1.2. It’s generally accepted among economic development professionals that for every dollar an employee in your community earns, it cycles through the economy 1.2 times. This is a conservative figure; some economists use a multiplier of two to seven times the employee’s income.

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Our vision is to make the Greater Green Bay Area the healthiest community in the nation. The mission is to create environments in the community that support and promote residents in daily eating 5 fruits and vegetables, drinking 4 bottles of water, watching less than 2 hours of screen time, being active for at least 1 hour a day and sleeping 8 hours a night. The equation is two-part – education and promotion of individual behavior change combined with the implementation of evidence-based strategies to create policies, systems and environments that support healthy choices and decrease the burden of chronic disease.


Lead a countywide Walk to School Day Oct. 3 with more than 10,000 students participating!

Secured sponsorship for Bike to School Day for three years – kicking off with 6,000 students participating in May 2013 and a train-the-trainer bicycle safety education campaign reaching more than 150 students in summer 2013.

Increased Farm to School from three districts to eight, awarded four school garden mini-grants, surveyed more than 250 local farmers and increased nutrition education efforts through a Harvest of

the Month Program including classroom lessons, cafeteria taste testing and monthly newsletters.

Awarded a $19,000 grant from the Greater Green Bay Community Foundation to increase access to locally grown fruits and vegetables for low-income residents through the Downtown, On Broadway and Oneida Farmers Markets.

Engaged the community through more than 33 presentations, 15 interns hosted, more than 50 earned media hits and a campaign to increase our Facebook presence.

L I V E 5 4 2 1 8

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DID YOU KNOW?

The Chamber has been recognized nationally for housing Live54218 – a strong statement in support of the interconnectedness of a community’s health and economic vitality.

www.Live54218.org is packed with free, downloadable resources, a community calendar and a blog to help you stay active and eat healthfully.

Due to strong community support, Live54218 has grown from a staff of one to a staff of four this past fiscal year!

Live54218 has many partners - including eight school districts, three health systems, two health insurance companies, city and county administration, and many private and public entities throughout the Greater Green Bay Area.

Live54218 has a monthly column in the Press-Gazette. Check us out on the 2nd Saturday of the month in the Family Time section.

Knowing that many organizations and businesses are already working to improve the health of Brown County, Live54218 has found its niche as the backbone support organization for obesity prevention. Built upon the theory of Collective Impact, Live54218 strives to provide strategic direction, facilitate dialogue between partners, create data collection infrastructure, coordinate community outreach and mobilize funding.

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G O V E R N M E N T A F F A I R S

Access, connectivity and solutions; government affairs serves all three of these member needs. Our goal is to serve as a source of information on public policy that affects member businesses—policy including legislative acts and ordinances, administrative rules and judicial decisions at the local state and federal levels. Government affairs also acts as the voice of business, representing the business interests of our members to regulators, media and elected officials; and assisting members with tools to help them effectively communicate.


Legislation we advocated was passed on: state venture capital, electric transmission, mining regulatory reform, labor market information, workforce training, unemployment insurance, employee electrical licensing, transportation fund integrity, I-41 truck weight limits and more.

10 of 12 candidates we endorsed in November were elected to state and national offices.

Legislative Breakfast on workforce development united business, educators and state legislators on needed local/state initiatives.

Public Policy News monthly emails were read by more than 850 members.

Four “Let’s Wrap” informational seminars on regulatory compliance were attended by nearly 250 members.

12 Public Policy Council meetings plus special meetings were held with Joint Finance, Senator Johnson, Congressman Ribble, Governor Walker and others.

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DID YOU KNOW?

New Action Call system incorporated into Chamber website improves your ability to communicate with elected officials.

Special October edition of Bay Business Journal on the Affordable Care Act featured member experts explaining effects of the law on local business.

Legislative Agenda for 2013-15 approved by Chamber board and communicated to elected officials explains the business position on all issues of interest (available at titletown.org)

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M E M B E R S E RV I C E S

MEMBER SERVICES is a department at the Chamber that includes membership sales, retention and events, but member services is also a mind-set. In reality, all of us at the Chamber are part of member services through the touchpoints we have with members every day. Our goal in these is to take a consultative approach to members’ needs, asking the question, “How can we help?” Our member sales representatives in particular are focused on listening to members’ needs so we can customize and connect members to relevant Chamber offerings.


Redefined the Chamber’s mission statement to better reflect our efforts: To strengthen member businesses through enhancing economic and workforce development, resulting in improved quality of life in our community and region.

Created an amazing quarterly member magazine, Collective Impact, that delivers positive messages related to economic, workforce and community development in the Greater Green Bay area, as well as contributions from our strategic partners in these areas and members’ expertise in the emerging trends section.

Our member services team brought 176 businesses into the Chamber, representing 3,027 employees in the Brown County area.

Streamlined our membership sales collateral so we can narrow the content we share with prospective members to information that’s relevant to them.

Began holding listening sessions with members to uncover what each defines as “value of investment” and then providing the accessibility, resources and connectivity to execute that.

Engagement continues to be high; 451 people attended our Power Networking Breakfasts, nearly 500 people attended Business & Breakfasts and 1,000+ people attended Business After Hours.

Nearly 500 people attended the 2013 Business Recognition Luncheon to honor these award recipients: Entrepreneurial Award, NorthCoast

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DID YOU KNOW?

Our online business directory at members.titletown.org received 122,207 hits in the past fiscal year by people searching keywords to find member businesses to serve their needs. (Have you revisited your company’s website description lately? People search the site on keywords, so be sure to have descriptive words in yours!)

The Chamber and its ambassadors conducted 61 ribbon cuttings and groundbreakings in the last year – a free benefit of membership!

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Productions LLC; Environmental Stewardship Award, The Solberg Company; Growth Award, AmeriLux International, LLC; Special Accomplishment Award, Green Bay Symphony Orchestra; Cornerstone Award, ProSolutions, Inc.; and Business Person of the Year, Dana VanDen Heuvel, The MarketingSavant Group.

More than 500 people celebrated the Chamber’s 130th annual dinner to honor Greg Gauthier, Foxwood Associates Inc. as the outgoing chairman of the Chamber board of directors; Nancy Steffel, The School That Comes To You as the Daniel Whitney Award recipient, Suzy Pfeifer, Encompass Early Education and Care Inc. as the ATHENA Award recipient and Ameriprise Auto & Home Insurance as the Excellence In Business Award recipient.

Caring for theCommunityCaring for theCommunity*local companies

making an impact

JULY 2013

*local companies

making an impact

Caring for theCommunity

G R E E N B A Y A R E A C H A M B E R O F C O M M E R C E

Sometimes, we get so busy setting and pursuing goals that it can be easy to forget to pause, observe progress, reflect on where we’ve been and even more importantly, where we’re going.

It’s hard to believe I’m embarking on my third year as Chamber president. I’m pleased to say I can see very methodical, purposeful and crucial shifts in the Chamber that are positioning us to fulfill our mission in more ways and with new depth. That includes our finessed mission statement: To strengthen member businesses through enhancing economic and workforce development, resulting in improved quality of life in our community and region.

F R O M T H E P R E S I D E N T

Lookingforward.

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When I assume this role, I conducted a member-wide survey and listening sessions throughout the community to gain a better understanding of the business community’s needs. With members’ input, feedback and guidance, we’ve been working on a number of internal alignments that will position us to best serve our membership – many of which continue into this new fiscal year. One of these relates to how we position and brand our organization. Research showed we need to do a better job of telling our story, as well as showcasing what we all have to offer. In many cases, feedback we received revealed member “wish lists” for things that in actuality, we already offer! That pointed to a need to better message our offerings, and to the right audiences.

I’m excited to report we’re in the midst of a branding exercise that will help us better position ourselves and tell our story. Because, as I’ve known all along, we have a lot to tell – many chapters, in fact! – related to economic development, advocacy, young professionals, recognition, partnering for workforce development, recognition of best practices, connectivity to business resources and much, much more.

As a follow-up to the LIFE Study and Brown County 20/20 Visioning Conference, the Greater Green Bay Community Foundation, Brown County United Way and Green Bay Area Chamber of Commerce took a focus on Cradle to Career to yet another level. We came together to host a summit in mid-September to launch a civic infrastructure for Brown County to provide alignment for a communitywide agenda focused on Cradle to Career. Other communities that embrace this level of civic infrastructure are experiencing transformational changes.

In September, we launched a new fiscal year for the Chamber and I am once again putting on my listening ears to solicit input on where we’re heading. To that end, we’re going to conduct a survey by January to solicit more feedback from our members and strategic partners. YOU are the ones best suited to tell us why you invest/engage in Chamber membership. We are working diligently to identify gaps and fill the gaps that are in keeping with our mission or, in other instances, to connect members to the appropriate owner in the community. While HOW we execute our mission continues to evolve, we remain fastidious about collective impact, solutions, access and connectivity.

In the meantime, thank you to the 1,282 member businesses and the 92,777 employees you represent for helping us to fulfill our mission and explore new and better ways to build a strong workforce, economic vitality and quality of life.

forward.

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Laurie Radke president, Green Bay Area Chamber of Commerce

TITLETOWN.ORG920.437.8704

2013 Annual Report

Documents

small businesses

member companies

economic development

chamber board

memberbased organization

talented workforce

advance microloan program

state legislators