What's happening now is leading to what's next
Mainebiz presents a number of awards throughout the year. We have the Business Leaders of the Year. This year we honored Doug McKeown, CEO of Woodard & Curran; Jim Wellehan, co-owner of Lamey-Wellehan; and Donna Dwyer, executive director of My Place Teen Center.
For our Women to Watch, we named Lois Skillings, president and CEO of Mid Coast Health Services; Kristen Miale, president of the Good Shepherd Food Bank; Gena Canning, a managing partner at Pine State Trading Co.; and Heather Sanborn, co-owner and director of business operations at Rising Tide Brewing.
At the awards events, it is always heartening to see the honorees surrounded by family. Doug McKeown used the occasion of getting his family together to shoot the annual holiday card. At the Women to Watch awards presentation, I was gratified to hear the hearty cheers for Lois Skillings, who continues to demonstrate the tenacity and creativity it takes to be a health care executive in this day and age. More than that, it's neat to see the connections and relationships people have to the honorees and other attendees. In business, there are so many personal connections and relationships in Maine; many are from school or from clubs or neighborhoods.
With that in mind, I am sure that many from the 2015 NEXT List will be well-known to readers.
Chris Gardner, executive director of the Eastport Port Authority; Leigh Kellis, owner of Holy Donut; Jennifer Olsen, executive director of Waterville Main Street; Laurie Lachance, president of Thomas College; Derek Volk, president and co-owner of Volk Packaging Corp.; Aaron Anker and Nat Peirce, owners of GrandyOats; Kevin Lewis and Rob Hillman, top executives at Community Health Options; and Benjamin Shaw, CEO of Vets First Choice.
Many of them will be familiar to Mainebiz readers, not just because they've been written about here, but because they're out there in the business and consumer worlds. We feel strongly that they are people shaping business in Maine, but check out their profiles and see for yourself. And please mark your calendar for our NEXT List party, to be held Nov. 5 at the Woodlands Club in Falmouth. I'm certain you'll see many old friends and colleagues — and I'm guessing you'll meet some new ones.
Camden OTR yields interesting viewpoints
Camden has always seemed like a prosperous place.
Now, after our Mainebiz “On the Road” event there, I'm again staggered by how much is going on.
I'm not going to name everything, but one of the biggest changes is the acquisition of the Wayfayer boatyard by Lyman Morse, which is based in Thomaston. A casual visitor might not know the boatyard, but it occupies much of the commercial waterfront on the opposite side of the harbor from downtown. We will have more on Lyman Morse's new site in a future edition.
It's nice, too, to see new faces in that area. This summer alone, Karen C. Brace took over as the town's community development director and Thomas G. Peaco was named executive director of the Penobscot Bay Regional Chamber of Commerce, whose footprint includes Lincolnville, Camden, Rockport, Rockland and Thomaston. On the business side, Matt and Karen Sutton, who own Uncle Willy's Candy Shoppe in Houlton, opened a store in Camden. All good news.
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