May Meeting

The TribLocal was the headline speaker at our meeting this month. They have a great opportunity for businesses to post their own events and news stories. Members in attendance agreed that learning of these kinds of opportunities is one of the many benefits the Chamber is providing. We are moving ahead with our Shop Gurnee campaign, as plans are developing for the new program. Keep an eye out on the website for the updates. We are working closely with the Village of Gurnee to make the campaign a big success.
The official member count is at 135 and growing! Keep up the networking, and keep spreading the word. Email this blog link and/or our website to your friends and peers.

Kenosha Chamber

Did you know the chamber has friends all over the country? We are partnering with our friends to the north, the Kenosha Area Chamber for a networking event. This is their bi-annual speed networking event that is designed to introduce you to new faces and potential business partners across the Wisconsin border. In this day and age, business knows no boundaries. Kenosha is one of the fastest growing and progressive city centers in the midwest. See what opportunities exist for your business. The possibility of meeting a new client or several new prospects, makes this lunch event an easy choice. See you there!

March Lunch & Learn

Wow, what a great event! 150 attendees came to hear the Commanding Officer of Great Lakes Naval Base, Captn. John Malfitano speak. Everyone got the opportunity to make new business acquaintances from other local chambers. Grayslake, Waukegan, Kenosha, GLMV, and LLV Chamber were present with their members. Feedback thus far has been all positive from the attendees. We will continue to strive to provide our members with ways to promote and expand their businesses through networking and group meetings. As always, we need your ideas. If you want to see a speaker or have a program idea, please let us know.

Keep following us on www.gurneechamber.com for upcoming events.

Play Ball!

60 members and nonmembers joined together to hear about the new Lake County Fielders semi-pro baseball team's upcoming season. The new team is owned by the famous actor Kevin Costner. They are currently constructing the $15 million facility in Zion and are out in the community making sure everyone knows about this exciting new team. Some might ask what a new baseball team has to do with a chamber of commerce. The answer is marketing. The team offers a local opportunity to advertise and market your business to an expected 300,000 attendees for the season. Some businesses may choose to use the team's proximity to conduct client appreciation events at the ballpark, while others may use the many opportunities to advertise in the programs or on the stadium itself.
As a chamber, we want to provide our members with as many options to promote your business as possible. Maybe the Lake County Fielders can be an opportunity for your business.
As always, don't forget to check out www.gurneechamber.com to keep up to date on our upcoming events.

Check this out!

We set a goal to be the number one spot on Google in the first year. I'm happy to report that as of today, when you search for Gurnee Chamber, our website is first! Village of Gurnee Chamber of Commerce was started in July of 2009, so our ascension in the ranks of Google is pretty amazing. Thanks to all our members and their links to their websites, we've become a trusted host in the search engines. Thanks goes mostly to Craig Hathaway for his help in managing the web project. Tim Kobb has provided further assistance in cleaning up our web presence.
What can you do to help out your chamber?

Join the Chamber!

JOIN YOUR LOCAL CHAMBER

Great news. For any of you that have not joined the chamber yet, or if you know of anyone that is interested. NOW is the time. Any new business to join the Village of Gurnee Chamber before 2/12/10 will be our guest at the next 3 meetings. That's a savings of $50! Membership is just $150. Find out what over 100 members already know. JOIN YOUR LOCAL CHAMBER TODAY!

Social Media

If you haven't heard the term social media, you've been living in a very secluded area. It's no secret that social media is here to stay. Reading this blog means you're aware of it's presence. Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, MySpace, and many other websites have captured the essence of social connections. How can we as business people leverage those connections to benefit our businesses?
Come to our next Village of Gurnee Chamber of Commerce meeting on Jan. 20th and find out about this mega marketing tool called Social media!