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Former Utica McDonald’s employee tapped as company’s new COO
Tim Fenton, who started his McDonald’s career as a crew member in Utica, is set to become the company’s next chief operating officer. McDonald’s Corp.
Improvement in manufacturing conditions slows in April
Business conditions remained positive for New York manufacturers in April, although they improved at a slower rate than in recent months, according to a survey
Nirvana to boost production, add equipment and workers
BOONVILLE — A $4.3 million Small Business Administration (SBA)-backed loan for new equipment will help Nirvana, Inc. increase its production by 67 percent and boost
New York Fed president says economic headwinds remain
Despite more upbeat data in recent months, the U.S. economy still faces some serious challenges ahead, the president of the Federal Reserve Bank of New
Herkimer Motel & Suites completes upgrades
HERKIMER — When brothers James and John Brown became more involved in the running of the family business, the Herkimer Motel & Suites, nearly a
CABVI lands military procurement contract
UTICA — The Central Association for the Blind and Visually Impaired (CABVI) recently won a contract with the U.S. Army Security Assistance Command (USASAC) as a prime vendor for foreign military sales (FMS) programs. Under the contract, CABVI will provide troop-support equipment and clothing items in support of the Aberdeen Contracting Center Aberdeen Proving Ground.
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UTICA — The Central Association for the Blind and Visually Impaired (CABVI) recently won a contract with the U.S. Army Security Assistance Command (USASAC) as a prime vendor for foreign military sales (FMS) programs.
Under the contract, CABVI will provide troop-support equipment and clothing items in support of the Aberdeen Contracting Center Aberdeen Proving Ground.
“Our agency will supply U.S. allies, like Canada or Iraq, with individual troop requirements like uniforms, mess kits, and field packs, just to name a few items,” CABVI President and CEO Rudy D’Amico said in a news release announcing the contract. “These products will be produced by agencies that employ people who are blind or have other severe disabilities.”
CABVI’s job is to find the necessary products in military surplus, find the makers of the products, and make the products that it can, said Stephen Gannon, director of development at the agency.
The way the FMS process works is that a foreign military will make a request to purchase an item on the AbilityOne Procurement List from the Aberdeen Center, with most items in military surplus. Representatives from Aberdeen will forward the request to CABVI, who will then find the products or suppliers. If the items can be produced or picked from storage and supplied to the customer, Aberdeen will pay CABVI a prime-vendor fee.
While it won’t necessarily boost product at CABVI, the contract still helps the agency continue its mission to help people who are blind or visually impaired find employment., D’Amico said.
The agency expects a number of its employees who are blind to work on the contract and also expects it will need to hire additional workers, although it is not clear yet how many workers the agency might need. The agency currently employs 200 people, and about half of those employees are legally blind or visually impaired.
The AbilityOne program, formerly the Javits-Wagner-O’Day program, creates employment for thousands of people who are blind or disabled. AbilityOne coordinates its activities and participation with more than 600 non-profit organizations and employs more than 40,000 personnel with severe disabilities.
“Every organization that has products on the AbilityOne procurement list had the ability to compete for the prime-vendor designation,” Gannon said. “Ours was the most attractive proposal.”
Headquartered at 507 Kent St., Utica, CABVI also has facilities on Beechgrove Place and Dwyer Avenue, along with locations at the S.S. Stratton VA Medical Center in Albany; a Dolphin Express Store in New London, Conn.; a Galaxy Express Store in Westover, Mass.; a Shipyard Express Store in Kittery, Maine; and an Island Express Store in Newport, R.I.
Furniture store ramps up marketing efforts
RICHFIELD SPRINGS — During a recession, buying new furniture may be about the last thing on anyone’s mind, but now that the economy is showing signs of continued recovery, Jeffrey Sarafin is hoping to take advantage of that momentum and boost business at his furniture store. Sarafin established Jeff’s Handcrafted Amish Furniture four years ago
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RICHFIELD SPRINGS — During a recession, buying new furniture may be about the last thing on anyone’s mind, but now that the economy is showing signs of continued recovery, Jeffrey Sarafin is hoping to take advantage of that momentum and boost business at his furniture store.
Sarafin established Jeff’s Handcrafted Amish Furniture four years ago when he purchased the former Miller’s Furniture. He didn’t disclose financial terms of that deal. Sarafin spent eight years as a salesperson for American Homes in Richfield Springs before taking over the furniture business, located in the Price Chopper Plaza on Route 20.
The high quality of the Amish handcrafted furniture really appealed to him, he says. It has appealed to customers as well, just not quite at the volume he’d like to see.
Sarafin says he has built up business from customer referrals and the Amish name. “The Amish name is a trustworthy name,” he says. “When I bring up Amish, it sells itself.” Amish artisans in Holmes County, Ohio handcraft the majority of Sarafin’s offerings. He also works with a few local Amish crafters.
The store draws customers from New Hartford, Utica, Cooperstown, and even as far away as Albany, Sarafin says. He even sold furniture to a Texas couple passing through the area in their motor home that spotted a dining set they just had to have.
His goal this year is to make more people across the Mohawk Valley aware of his business and help draw them into the store. Once he has them inside, the furniture sells itself, he says. It’s just making people aware of the store and getting them there that has been the hard part.
To boost awareness of his store, he’s undertaking a marketing effort with WUTR, the local ABC affiliate, which airs on Time-Warner channel 7.
“That’s probably my biggest thing I have in the works right now,” Sarafin says. He’ll be meeting later this month with someone from the station to develop and create his commercials. At this time, he doesn’t know what his budget for the marketing effort is, and hasn’t set a goal on how much he’d like to see the advertising increase sales.
“I’m just trying to branch out to people,” Sarafin says. He also does some newspaper advertising from time to time in area papers including Utica’s Observer-Dispatch. “I’m just looking for more exposure,” he says.
Jeff’s 3,000-square-foot showroom displays an array of dining room and bedroom furniture, entertainment centers, desks, bookshelves, chairs, and cedar chests. The products are special for a number of reasons, Sarafin says. First, they are all handcrafted with real wood. There isn’t any furniture made of compressed sawdust in his showroom, he notes.
“The biggest thing is it is custom,” he says of his offerings. People have the choice of buying a piece from the showroom, or, if they like a certain piece but want it in a different wood or different finish, they can order that and have it handcrafted for them.
“Every piece gets built from scratch,” he says. People can also bring in a photo of a space or measurements and Sarafin will help them custom craft just the right piece of furniture to meet their needs. That’s something that larger retailers like Carl’s Furniture City or Raymour & Flanagan, both with Utica–area stores, just can’t do, he says.
Along with his other marketing efforts, Sarafin also promotes his store online at www.jeffsamishfurniture.webs.com and on Facebook, where he has 185 fans and features photos of the furniture. Sarafin is the sole employee with no immediate plans to hire anyone.
Mohawk Valley native launches gift product with ‘Beekman Boys’
Mohawk Valley native Michelle Roberts has a new product that she hopes will help her business take flight with a little help from some entrepreneurs and reality TV stars in Sharon Springs. On Valentine’s Day, Roberts launched a gift line called Messenger Birds, which features a handcrafted ceramic bird with a unique feature. Instead of
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Mohawk Valley native Michelle Roberts has a new product that she hopes will help her business take flight with a little help from some entrepreneurs and reality TV stars in Sharon Springs.
On Valentine’s Day, Roberts launched a gift line called Messenger Birds, which features a handcrafted ceramic bird with a unique feature. Instead of wings, the birds have a space where someone can slip in a rolled up piece of paper featuring a personal message.
“I started Messenger Birds a year and a half ago,” Roberts says in an email interview. “Messenger Birds began when I picked up my first piece of clay and held the lump in my hands. All I could think of is, ‘Oh, the possibilities!’”
After creating her first bird, Roberts says she knew she wanted the birds to have a function as well as beauty. That’s where the idea of creating a way for people to add their own message to the birds came from.
“I think that the power of sentiment is something that has been somewhat lost due to all the technology of today’s world, and this is a way to bring it back,” she says.
Roberts has already landed a deal with another area company — Beekman 1802 — that she hopes will help sales of Messenger Birds take off. Brent Ridge and Josh Kilmer-Purcell operate Beekman 1802, which consists of an online store and a brick and mortar store in Sharon Springs. The duo gained popularity as stars of the Planet Green reality TV show “The Fabulous Beekman Boys” in 2010 and 2011.
“I decided to reach out to the ‘Beekman Boys’ after meeting with a local photographer that told me to check their brand,” Roberts says. “He thought my birds would be great in their store. I had thought the same thing after researching them.”
Beekman currently works with more than 20 local craftspeople that design and produce products for them, Ridge says in an email. “Our B. 1802 Rural Artist Collective was created to help the talented craftspeople in our area making a living doing what they love to do, and they help us create the heirloom quality products that we’ve become known for.”
“Michelle came to us with her idea for the Messenger Birds last year, and we thought the idea was wonderful — a beautiful, subtle, yet lasting way to send a love note,” Ridge says. Beekman started selling the birds on Valentine’s Day both in its store and online and has already shipped out orders for the birds all over the world, he says.
“I am very humbled that they would sell my birds and look forward to a great business relationship with them,” Roberts says of her deal with Beekman.
She also sells the birds online at www.messengerbirds.com and through her own online store at http://www.etsy.com/shop/micmar002. Roberts also markets the birds and her other products, which include other giftware items and restored picture frames, on her Facebook page.
Roberts also operates Michelle Roberts Design (www.michellerobertsdesign.com), a design firm that specializes in illustration, graphic design, and website design. She runs both the design and ceramics businesses part time and works full time as a junior art director for a small ad agency in Rochester. She declined to name the firm for which she works.
Her design business currently has about five to eight steady clients — a number she is looking to grow.
Her ceramic business also has a small number of steady clients besides the ‘Beekman Boys’ including various stores in Rochester, Old Forge, Syracuse, and San Francisco.
Eventually, Roberts would like to sell her creations to national chains such as Anthropology, Hallmark, and others. In the short term, she’s working on developing packaging, a new website, and press kits to help market and expand her brand and product.
Roberts, who grew up in Barneveld, graduated from SUNY Oswego in 2006 with a degree in graphic communication.
Small-business optimism slips in March, ending six-month rise
Optimism waned among small-business owners in March, according to a monthly survey showing that owners who had been warming to their future prospects suddenly took a less rosy view of future hiring and sales. The Small Business Optimism Index from the National Federation of Independent Business (NFIB) slipped 1.8 points in March to 92.5. The
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Optimism waned among small-business owners in March, according to a monthly survey showing that owners who had been warming to their future prospects suddenly took a less rosy view of future hiring and sales.
The Small Business Optimism Index from the National Federation of Independent Business (NFIB) slipped 1.8 points in March to 92.5. The decline halted six consecutive months of increasing optimism among small-business owners.
The index remains higher than the 88.1 it notched in August 2011, the month before it started its six-month climb. However, nine of the index’s 10 components fell in March.
Future hiring plans represented one of the largest component declines. The seasonally adjusted net percentage of survey respondents who plan to increase hiring in the next three months fell 4 percentage points to 0 percent.
The net percentage of owners who expect higher sales during the next three months also fell by 4 points. A seasonally adjusted net 8 percent of owners expect higher sales, according to the NFIB’s survey.
New York director’s comments
Increases in gas and commodity prices threaten to derail what had been a fairly strong start to 2012, according to NFIB New York Director Mike Durant. The price of gas in particular is a cause for concern, he says.
“It impacts everything as it relates to small business,” he says. “It impacts the price of shipping goods. It impacts consumers and their ability to have discretionary income. It’s a whole host of issues.”
New York NFIB members are cautious, Durant says. He called this year’s state budget the second in a row with “responsible spending,” but expressed apprehension at state legislative rumblings about a potential minimum-wage increase.
“And sales are starting to stagnate,” he says. “Business owners have reasons to have concerns.”
Other survey findings
Earnings continued to struggle, according to the survey’s earnings-changes measurement, which compares earnings over the last three months to the prior three months. A seasonally adjusted net -23 percent of survey respondents reported higher earnings, down 4 points from last month.
That negative survey result indicates more business owners reported lower earnings than higher earnings. The NFIB calculates net percentages by subtracting pessimistic, or lower, survey answers from optimistic, or higher, answers. A positive net percentage indicates a majority of respondents were optimistic, while a negative percentage means a majority were pessimistic.
The share of business owners who view the next three months as a good time to expand fell 1 point to 7 percent, seasonally adjusted. The portion expecting credit conditions to improve over the next three months also fell 1 point, settling at a net -11 percent in March.
Fewer owners reported hard-to-fill job openings, which can indicate that the unemployment rate is likely to rise, according to the NFIB. In March, a seasonally adjusted 15 percent of small businesses said they had positions they were unable to fill, down 2 points from February.
Business owners expect business conditions will deteriorate over the next six months. Seasonally adjusted, a net -8 percent of survey respondents anticipate better conditions six months from March, down 2 points from the previous month.
Owners will not be increasing their inventories in the next three to six months, according to the survey. Seasonally adjusted, a net 0 percent of owners said they plan to increase inventories, a decline of 2 points from last month.
In fact, inventory satisfaction was the only optimism-index component that increased in March. Satisfaction with inventories increased to a seasonally adjusted net 3 percent, up 1 percent.
Poor sales remained the problem most often cited by small-business owners. In March, 22 percent of owners said poor sales were their single most important problem, the same percentage as the prior month.
Actual sales, which are not part of the NFIB optimism index but are tracked as part of its monthly survey, broke into positive territory in March. Seasonally adjusted, a net 1 percent of owners reported higher sales in the last three months when compared to the previous three months. That’s up 8 points from February.
The NFIB randomly surveyed 757 of its members in March to develop the Small Business Optimism Index.
Nationwide to relocate Salina claims center in September
SALINA — Nationwide Mutual Insurance Co. plans to move its Salina claims center this fall, leaving a building that it built and once owned for a smaller location about a mile away. Columbus, Ohio–based Nationwide will withdraw its Salina operations from their longtime home at 110 Elwood Davis Road this September and relocate them to
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SALINA — Nationwide Mutual Insurance Co. plans to move its Salina claims center this fall, leaving a building that it built and once owned for a smaller location about a mile away.
Columbus, Ohio–based Nationwide will withdraw its Salina operations from their longtime home at 110 Elwood Davis Road this September and relocate them to a facility at 225 Greenfield Parkway..
The move is a way to cut costs, according to Roy Kunkle, Nationwide’s associate vice president of corporate real estate. He declined to share the savings Nationwide estimates it will see from the relocation, but says the company will lease less space at its new location than it currently leases at Elwood Davis Road.
“We have a little bit more space than we need, and we thought it would be a good idea to lift folks out of there and get them in a new place without having to go through a reconstruction effort,” Kunkle says.
Nationwide has 50,000 square feet at Elwood Davis Road in a lease set to expire in October. However, it uses only about 27,000 square feet of that space, according to Kunkle. It will have 29,000 square feet at its new location on Greenfield Parkway.
The insurer needs less space because it reduced staffing at the claims center about 10 years ago, when new technology made its operations more efficient, Kunkle says. Nationwide declined to say how many employees worked at the building before those reductions. Currently, 130 claims associates and support staffers work there.
The smaller space at Greenfield Parkway will have enough extra room to allow Nationwide to increase staff levels at the claims center by 10 percent if it ever needs to do so, Kunkle says. He added that the insurer currently has no plans to add employees at the claims center.
Nationwide will leave behind an Elwood Davis Road building that it has been in for nearly 40 years. The company built the facility in the early 1970s and moved into it in 1973, according to Kunkle.
The insurer decided to sell the building in the mid-2000s, Kunkle says. It sold the facility to Ambani Realty Inc. of Warren, N.J. in 2006, according to records from Onondaga County’s Office of Real Property Tax Services, which lists the building as having a gross floor area of 78,656 square feet.
Kunkle declined to disclose the financial terms of the sale. The building had an assessed value of $4 million in 2011, according to county records.
“We made a strategic decision to sell it,” Kunkle says. “It’s kind of the smart way of doing business these days. Real estate has to be flexible to the work force.”
Nationwide chose the Greenfield Parkway building for its new location in part because it is close to Elwood Davis Road. The Greenfield Parkway facility is just over a one-mile drive from the company’s previous location, meaning employees will not have to overhaul their commutes when the center moves, Kunkle says.
The insurer also liked the Greenfield Parkway building because it will help maintain Nationwide’s visibility. Signs for the new location will be visible to drivers getting off of Interstate 81, which is similar to Nationwide’s current home, which can be seen from the New York State Thruway (I-90), Kunkle says.
The insurer’s space at Greenfield Parkway will be renovated with new carpeting, new lighting, and new office partitions. Nationwide declined to share the estimated cost of renovations.
Nationwide expects to split renovation costs with the building’s owner. The Edgewater Salina Co. of Salina owns the building, which has a gross floor area of 75,204 square feet, according to records from Onondaga County’s Office of Real Property Tax Services.
No general contractor has been selected for the work, Kunkle says. He expects to put the project up for bids within 30 days. BDHP Architecture, which is based in Cincinnati, is the project’s architect.
CBRE Syracuse, Nationwide’s commercial real-estate broker, helped the company find the new space, Kunkle says. Nationwide has agreed to lease the Greenfield Parkway space for five years.
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