Providing Business Leadership in The Greater Menomonie Area Since 1938

December 2009

Volume 73, Issue 7

Chamber Statistics

Referrals Given 805

Walk-ins Served

Chamber office 413

Gift Certificate $19,020

Phone Inquiries

574

Chamber calls 258

Tourism calls 205

Misc. calls 111

Relocation Packets

29

Visitor packets 28

Website Hits 53,743

CV Rally 2004 1 Annual Banquet/Awards Night 1 Tourism Coordinator Update 1 Thank You Renewing Members 2 Welcome New Members 2 Chamber Ambassador Update 2 Ambassador News 2 Business After Hours 2 Board of Directors 3 Business to Business 3 Business Seminar 3 Annual Banquet Sponsors 4

Inside this Issue:

342 E. Main St. Menomonie, WI 54751 Phone: 715-235-9087 Fax: 715-235-2824 www.menomoniechamber.org

FreedomFest 1, 2 New Members 3 Renewing Members Business After Hours Ambassador News Meet Menomonie 5 Ribbon Cuttings 6 Summer Social Business to Business 8 Beverage Sponsor Leadership Menomonie Nature Valley Bike Race 10 Calendar 11 Partnership Opportunity 12 Contest Results

Inside This Issue

Chamber Statistics Referrals Given 288 Walk-ins S erved Chamber 141 T ourism 184 Depot 829 Total Walk-ins 354 Gift Certi ficate Sales $6,070 Phone Inquiries Chamber Calls 182 Tourism Calls 130 Misc. Calls 64 Total Phone Inquiries 376 Relocation Packets 10 Visitor Packets 13 Menomonie Bags 50

The Greater Menomonie Area Chamber of Commerce News July 2011

The Greater Menomonie Area Chamber of Commerce & Visitors Center would like to take this oppor-tunity to say thank you to the 2011 FreedomFest sponsors. This event would not be possible without your generosity and support of this important community event. We are also thankful to the FreedomFest plan-ning committee for their continued dedication to coordinate FreedomFest. Lastly, we are appreciative of the dozens of volunteers who are signed-up to work. We hope that you will bring your family to come and join in the fun and festivities at this 4th of July celebration! Be sure to check out our entertainment lined up for you this year: Menomonie’s Got Talent, upper music Rada Dada, Fantasy Coral Petting Zoo, Happy Hill Train Express, National Guard Activity Zone, food & craft vendors, area information booths, Senior Center Bingo for all ages and much more. Lower level music by The Cutaway’s and Sassy Magoo and Spectacular Fire-works by T & K Fireworks! Have a safe and enjoyable 4th of July. Title Sponsor:

Major Sponsors:

Special Event Sponsors: Media Sponsor:

All American Sponsors:

Stars and Stripes Sponsors:

Supporting Sponsors: Contributing Sponsors: 24-7 Telcom, Cardinal Glass, Cedar Corporation, RCU, University of Wisconsin-Stout, Wipfli,LLP, Tractor Central, Hoof & Paw Clinic, Monkey Business, Sam’s Club, Painted Pony Equine Services, RCU, Country Inn & Suites, Menomonie Thunderhawks, Menomonie Disposal and Menomonie Super 8

Thank You...to our members that have renewed their Membership investment!

Business After Hours

Date: Monday, July 18, 2011

Time: 5:00 - 6:30PM

Location: Menomonie Golf & Country Club, 802 Heller Road

Sponsor: E. O. Johnson Office Technologies, Menomonie Golf & Country Club Cost: $5 members ~ $7 non-members Bring business cards & bring a friend! Don’t forget your raffle items. **Golf Scramble option: 3PM Start, 9 hole scramble, field events, prizes, $5 green fee. Sign up by July 15th, individually or as a four-some. For reservations call 715-235.3595.

Big K-Mart, Bookends on Main, Chippewa River Industries, Country Inn & Suites, Dean and Sue's, Dunn County Pottery, J.F. Ahern Co.,

Knaack's Advertising, Menomonie Public Library, Motel 6, Myers Septic Service, LLC, Pleasant Valley Tree Farm, Quality Inn & Suites- Menomonie, Tri-County Advisor

.

Ambassador Corner I am sure you are in the midst of your busy summer season with your own visitors, many tourists in the area, family vacations and everyone looking for fun and relaxing things to do. The Chamber Ambassadors are also experiencing the summer rush of events. Many of them have been involved as volunteers for Business After Hours, the Nature Valley Bike Race, FreedomFest, welcoming new businesses to our area through participation in ribbon cuttings and delivering welcome bas-kets. And after last year’s thorough committee examinations, the Ambassador Committees have become more effective to all Chamber members. We encourage you to let us know how you feel about the work of the Ambassadors and any suggestions you might have to help us with our growth. You can email any comments you might have to Nancy at projects@menomoniechamber.org or contact the Chamber office to voice your opinion. Have a great summer and make sure you put some fun and relaxation into your summer experience.

On Wednesday, September 7th, the Greater Menomonie Area Chamber of Commerce will host the 2011 Meet Menomonie, where an esti-mated 1800 freshmen and 600 transfer students will be arriving at UW-Stout. Here’s a great oppor-tunity for your business to help us welcome our newest residents while promoting your business products and services. UW-Stout Students spend thousands of dollars throughout the year in our community, you can help make sure they know

what your business has to offer by participating in this annual event held right on campus. I have attached a registration form; please consider filling it out and sending it back to us. We hope to see you at this year’s event. For more information please contact Nancy Ohvall-Meet Menomonie Co-ordinator Email her at projects@menomoniechamber.org or call the Greater Menomonie Area Chamber of Commerce & Visitor’s Center 715-235-9087. Sponsor:

All American Vacation Homes (715) 529-2791 407 Walnut Drive Woodville www.allamericanvacationhomes.com Description: We are trying to provide a nice getaway in the Dunn County area to promote the use of the beautiful area and integrate local businesses in with our vacation homes. Data Hut (715) 231-3012 390 Red Cedar Street Menomonie www.data-hut.com Description: Home and business com-puter repair. Tooskies, LLC 603 South Broadway Menomonie www.tooskies.com Description: Small retail store focusing on modern cloth diapers, baby carriers, nursing wear and quality baby items as well in free educational classes on mod-ern cloth diapering.

2nd Annual Synergy Event July 27, 6PM Eau Claire Express, Carson Park Join YPCV and Young Professionals of Menomonie for the second annual Synergy Event. Attendees will enjoy summer net-working on the upper fan deck (reserved just for us) of the Eau Claire Express Baseball. The Express will play the Wis-consin Woodchucks. Cost is $25 for unlimited food and drink (served through the 7th inning). Spouse/guest may at-tend. Please register so we have an ap-proximate count and be sure to include spouse/guest in your total number of at-tendees. The upper deck can accommo-date 50 people and there will be seating below if we have more than 50 atten-dees. Attendees will not be invoiced in advance but will pay that night at the ticket window. The gates and deck open at 5:30 pm. Game time is 6:35 pm. To register, visit http://eauclairewicoc.weblinkconnect.com/External/WCPages/WCEvents/EventDetail.aspx?EventID=6616 or call the Eau Claire Chamber at 715-834-1204, If you register online, please put YPM in the comments box.

Come one come all to a fun gathering with great conversation to help you network!

Join Us

at Jakes Supper Club on

Thursday, July 15th from 5-7PM.

Feel free to stay afterwards for some great music!

Brought to you by your Chamber of

Commerce Networking Sub-Committee!

To register email

Thank You Cake

Come one come all to a fun gathering with great conversation to help you network!

Join Us at Jake’s Supper Club

on Thursday, July 28th

from 5-7PM.

We are having a new format this year. Event starts at 5:00PM and registration is

open until 6:00PM. The format is open ended networking.

Feel free to stay afterwards for some great music!

Brought to you by your Chamber of

Commerce Networking Sub-Committee! For more information or to register contact

info@menomonichamber.org or call the Chamber Office at 235-9087.

Pictured L to R: Kari Loomis, Mark Kalscheur, Lisa Montgomery, Mike Dusso, Jay Ouellette, Jon Menz, Robin Buck and Kay Pershern. The Ambassadors will be delivering thank you cakes and balloons on a monthly basis to a business that is deserving of recognition for a job well done contributing to the Community. The thank you cake was presented this month to Stout Ale House. In appreciation for all of their support to our community!

Anderson Chiropractic and Wellness opened March 14, 2011 to provide the City of Menomonie and its sur-rounding areas with excellent chiropractic care. Our clinic offers complete chiropractic care, several different thera-pies, and nutritional counseling to provide the patient with all the tools to achieve optimum health. With a focus on a professional yet comfortable atmosphere, Anderson Chiro-practic and Wellness has a friendly and courteous staff whose goal is to meet the patients’ needs. Anderson Chi-ropractic and wellness was opened by Dr. Craig Anderson. Dr. Anderson has been practicing chiropractic for 9 years. Working with him at the office is his wife, Julie. Located at 1202 N. Broadway in Menomonie in the lower level of the building. The office staff can be reached at (715) 231-2222.

Recent Ribbon Cutting...

2011 Chippewa Valley Wage Survey The 2011 Chippewa Valley Wage Survey is coming up and we need YOUR participation! The survey is intended to be a tool for your business for compensation planning. We survey over 150 recognized non-executive jobs in our area. All participants fill out the “General” survey. We also have specialty surveys including: Financial Institution, Health Care, Manufacturing/Distribution and Not-for-Profit. Data from the survey is sorted by industry type and reported in sum-mary form only with 25th, 50th, and 75th percentiles, aver-ages, and sample sizes (number of employers reporting for each job description and total number of employees in the job description). If you participate in the survey, you will receive a DIS-COUNT on the results booklet. Join over 100 companies that participate in the survey! For more information, please contact Katy Kiley at the Eau Claire Chamber at 858-0614 or at kiley@eauclairechamber.org.

Beverage Hosts: Thank you to July’s sponsor:

Thank you to June’s sponsor:

Business to Business—News Briefs

Wipfli LLP, a national CPA and consulting firm with an office in Menomonie, has an-nounced the launch of a corporate financial services entity called WCF Advisors LLC. The entity will provide investment banking and corporate finance services, including merger and acquisition advisory services, capital raising and financial advisory services. Culver's helped victims of tornadoes and floods on the June 14th "Day of Giving" by dedicating 10% of sales. In an effort to assist in the relief efforts for those affected by dev-astating tornadoes and floods that have rav-aged the country this spring. 10% of sales were donated to the American Red Cross Disaster Relief. Big Brothers Big Sisters is excited to announce the BIG success of the 2011 Bowl for Kids’ Sake that took place at Broadway Bowl on Fri. April 28th. About 100 people participated in raising over $18,600 to sup-port one-on-one mentoring relationships in Dunn County; an almost 40% growth over 2010! Anyone interested in becoming a vol-unteer or learning more about Big Brothers Big Sisters is encouraged to call 715-835-0161 or email christina.thrun@bbbsnw.org. U.S. Rep. Ron Kind, D-Wis., has announced that the department of mathematics, statis-tics and computer science at University of Wisconsin-Stout has been selected to receive $214,837 from the National Science Foundation to host a Research Experience for Undergraduates — REU — site in mathe-matics. UW-Stout will use the NSF award to host an REU site where students will attend a summer research program during each of the summers of 2012 through 2014. The REU site will prepare and motivate participants for graduate school through professional devel-opment seminars, visits to industry locations and guest lecturers to expose the partici-pants to a broad range of possible research careers. Jenna Fuhrman, Menomonie High School graduate, and Bailey Benedict, Eau Claire North High School, were chosen scholarship recipients from the WESTconsin Credit Union Menomonie and Spring Valley Offices.

Insty-Prints and Star Marking Systems, your local business printer and rubber stamp supplier, are proud to announce two new staff additions. Tammy Simon Stoddard is our new Assistant Director of Marketing, and Leah Haefner joins our graphic design staff. Stoddard will be responsible for marketing, customer service, and sales in our Menomo-nie office. Haefner will call the Eau Claire office home. Summer hours for the Meno-monie store are 9:00-5:30 Monday through Friday. Stop in to say hi and check out all we have to offer! For more information, contact Tammy Stoddard at 715-235-1920. Construction will soon be underway at the WESTconsin Credit Union Menomonie – East Office located at 3333 Schneider Ave-nue. A 14,400 square foot addition will be built on the southwest corner of the existing building. The space will house offices for the credit union’s Service Center department as well as additional training facilities and a com-munity room that will be available for public usage. Representatives of the Greater Meno-monie Area Chamber of Commerce will be participating in a groundbreaking ceremony on Tuesday, July 5 at 9 a.m. Construction is scheduled through the end of the year. Mem-bers will have full access to the East Office’s lobby, drive up and administrative offices throughout the duration of the construction. WESTconsin is working with two Menomo-nie businesses for the project’s construction services - Architectural Design Group and Shefchik Builders, Inc.

The Chippewa Valley Home Builders Association is excited to announce the People’s Choice award winners for the 2011 Parade: Category I ($140K-$200K): Wurzer Builders Inc, Category II ($210K-$298K): C&E Wurzer Builders LLC, Cate-gory III ($300K-$400K): Peterson Custom Homes LLC, Category IV ($401K-$600K): Storybook Custom Homes LLC. This year’s show featured 15 homes showcas-ing quality craftsmanship and innovative products and features. Approximately 3500 attendees viewed this year’s Parade homes during the nine day event.

Leadership Menomonie 2011-2012 Applications The Greater Menomonie Area Chamber of Commerce is excited to announce that we are now accepting applications for the next class of LEADERSHIP MENOMONIE! Build your leadership skills, develop a new pro-fessional network and learn about the Menomonie area in ways that aren’t avail-able to everyone! Through Leadership Menomonie you have the opportunity to meet local government and business leaders for a behind the scenes look at our community and find your leadership style and build your leadership skills. You can obtain an application for the fall session by contacting Joan at 715.235.9087 or tourism@menomoniechamber.org

Do you have news to share about your business? Contact Toni at the Chamber office by the 20th of each month to be included in the following issue of The Chamber News. E-mail info@menomoniechamber.org or fax to 715-235-2824.

Menomonie welcomed back for the second year the Nature Valley Bicycle Festival on Saturday, June, 18th. New this year to the race was the addition of a Gran Fondo race. Combined with the spectator race the total was 237 riders who braved the weather and headed out to the rolling hills of Dunn county before the pros took to the roads. This is in addition to the regular pro and amateur races taking place throughout the day. The attendance was approximately 3000. Our primary objective to offering the race was to promote cycling as a healthy lifestyle and to promote cycle tourism through this event. Stretching from the 15 mile spectator ride to the 88 mile Gran Fondo we connected with a wide variety of cycling fans, from recreational to dedicated biking enthusiasts. Many of the participants (particularly the Twin Cities cyclists) said they could not believe the beau-tiful landscape, quiet roadways, challenging terrain and close proximity. Cyclists came from as far as California and the east coast to ride the Gran Fondo, some of the comments from the riders included: • "Tough, very tough!" • "Everyone was great out on the road and at the food stops." • "I don't want to see another hill ... for about a week." • "I am getting ready for a mountain bike ride in the Rockies. I am better prepared, now!" • "Ahhh, a shower never felt better." We hope you had the opportunity to come down and enjoy the Nature Valley Bicycle festival, if you did not you truly missed out on a unique festival in Menomonie, but plan on being at the 2012 event as we are hoping they come back for another year.

Board of Directors

Officers President

Steve Lindberg Mayo Clinic Health System - Red

Cedar President-Elect Stacy H. Wigfield

REACH, Inc. Secretary/Treasurer

Jeffery Jaeger RCU

Past President Merry Lienau

Workforce Resource, Inc. Members at Large

Dave Williams UW-Stout

Gary Barnett Menomonie Recreation

Department

Directors

George Brewe WESTconsin Credit Union

Jim Boecker 3M Company Steve Cook

Northtown Ford Karen Hofland

Century 21 Premier Group Jon Menz

Workforce Resource, Inc. Grady Richartz

University of Wisconsin-Stout Jacob Spies

Dairy State Bank Tom Johnson WIPFLI, LLP

Roxann Vanderwyst Chippewa Valley Technical College

Brad Waznik WMG Waznik-Moseler Group, LLC

Chamber Staff

Lisa Montgomery Chief Executive Officer

Brent Bauer • Accountant

Toni Oas • Administrative Assistant Joan Friedenfels • Tourism Coordinator Jolene Sterry • Weekend Staff Sarah Lannon• Weekend Staff Nancy Ohvall • Special Projects

Questions or Comments? Contact Us!

PH: 715-235-9087 FAX: 715-235-2824

EMAIL: info@menomoniechamber.org WEBSITE: www.menomoniechamber.org

TOLL FREE: 1-800-283-1862

342 East Main Street Menomonie, WI 54751

Looking for Business Partnerships As technology shrinks the world and creates a global economy, we all realize that changes in the workplace will be the most significant factor in our future workforce. One of the most valuable resources to meet this challenge is located right here in Menomonie. It exists in the form of our youth. Menomonie High School’s Senior Internship Program is looking for businesses to participate in the program. Students combine a year-long class with a genuine work experience in a career area of their choice. We are cur-rently looking for student learner positions in areas related to Agriscience, Business, Marketing, Family & Con-sumer Science, Health Sciences, and Technology. If you would like more information about the program, contact a coordinator via email during July and August.

Agriscience – jean_d’angelo@msd.k12.wi.us Business/Marketing – kelly_hoyland@msd.k12.wi.us or robert_bundy@msd.k12.wi.us

Family & Consumer Science/Health Sciences – sue_halama@msd.k12.wi.us Technology – stanley_phillips@msd.k12.wi.us

“Protect Our Waters” Contest Winners Announced The “Protect Our Waters” contest sponsored by the Tainter/Menomin Lake Improvement Association, Inc. (TMLIA), Sustainable Dunn, and the Menomonie Chamber of Commerce was judged on

Thursday, June 09, 2011. Judges were from left to right: Linda DeZurik (President Menomonie Chapter DX P.E.O.), Peggy McAloon (Chair Education/Outreach TMLIA), Mayor Randy Knaack, Lynn Dickman (Menomonie City Council), Jeanette Spencer (TMLIA Education/Outreach) Kathy Feuker (President Arts Coming Together-ACT), and Dick Lamers (President TMLIA). Entries were received from Lucas Charter School, Menomonie High School, Colfax High School, Oaklawn Ele-mentary School, River Heights School, Wakanda, Downsville Elementary, and Knapp Elementary,. The winner of the Poster Contest was Charis Colson, Grade 11, Menomonie High School. Honorable Mention went to Danielle Edwards, Grade 11, Menomonie High School and Drake Heim, Grade 11, Menomonie High School. The winner of the Essay Contest was Erin Simpson, Grade 12, Menomonie High School. Honorable Mention went to Jamie Peterson, Grade 12, Lucas Charter School. For the younger children, Danielle Amundson, Grade 2 Oaklawn was the winner in the 2nd and 3rd grade category with Honorable Mention going to Caden Berg, River Heights School Kindergarten and 1st Grade winner was Marji Goss, Grade 1 River Heights School with Honor-able Mention going to Jamari Walker, Grade 1 River Heights School.