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Brandon Burton 0:00
This is the Chamber Chat Podcast, the show dedicated to chamber professionals to spark ideas and to get actionable tips and strategies to better serve your members and community.
Hello, Chamber Champions. Welcome to Chamber Chat Podcast. I’m your hosts Brandon Burton. And it’s my goal here on the podcast to introduce you to people and ideas to better help you serve your Chamber members and your community. You’re joining us for a special episode as part of our 2023 ACCE Chamber the Year Finalist Series.
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Becki Womble 1:03
I’ve been using Community Matters for probably six or seven years now. And in a previous life, I sold commercial printing so I can highly recommend Community Matters because it’s a complete turnkey job for any busy chamber exec and it’s a wonderful, beautiful printed product whenever you’re finished. And I just I’m very sold on Community Matters. And with a printing background I just big endorsement from me.
Brandon Burton 1:44
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I’m excited today to have Kelly Goodman Schaffer with us on the podcast for those of you don’t know. Kelly is the President and CEO of the Bedford County Chamber in Pennsylvania. She also serves as the Executive Director of their 501 C three Bedford County Chamber Education Foundation. Kelly was named to the chief executive posts of the chamber in February of 2010. Prior to her entrance into the chamber profession, Kelly served as a marketing director for the Allegheny Mountains Convention and Visitor’s Bureau and Game Director of the PS FCA east west all star football game and Administrative Manager for the Pennsylvania scholastic Football Coaches Association. She also spent more than 20 years as a broadcast sports journalist in Johnstown Altoona State College Television market, most notably leading the award winning sports department for their local CBS affiliate from 1998 to 2008. And host slash writer of the Emmy award winning Penn State Women’s Basketball Coaches shows for WPSU. She was the first woman to hold the post and sports director at the Pennsylvania television station, a multimedia professional, she has additional experiences that have included writing a weekly sports newspaper, column, and magazine features and serving as a play by play announcer for women’s college and high school basketball games, both in television and radio. Kelly served the chamber industry as the 2020 and 2021, Chair of the Board of Directors for the Pennsylvania Association of Chamber Professionals and served on the organization’s board for six years. She’s a graduate of Penn State where she captain, the Lady Lions, varsity softball team. Kelly, we’re excited to have you with us today, you’ve got quite the background there. But I’d love for you to take a moment to say hello to all the Chamber Champions that are out there listening. And if you can think of anything else interesting to share with us just so we can get to know you a little better.
Kellie Goodman Shaffer 3:59
I think that was a pretty, pretty thorough, you know, view of my background. But um, it’s very nice to be with you today. And I guess I would just say, you know, I started in, in television and thought really that was like the ultimate dream job, doing sports on television and having that be your job every day. But I am very blessed to say that I have found chamber work to be another dream job. And and I’m glad I get to use the experiences that I’ve had in my previous careers and in the work that I do every day to to promote our business community and, and I love the chamber industry. I love how how generous we all are in sharing our ideas and our successes and what we’ve learned from our failures. And so I appreciate that, that you give this opportunity for chambers to talk about what they do and hopes that we can help each other along.
Brandon Burton 4:51
Absolutely. That’s the whole idea of this platform. Let’s share those successes and failures and for those people who are vulnerable enough Why don’t you take a few minutes tell us a little bit more about the Bedford County Chamber just to give us an idea of the size of the chamber, the scope of work, you’re involved with staff budget, that sort of stuff just to kind of set the course.
Kellie Goodman Shaffer 5:13
So our chamber was incorporated. The modern day chamber was incorporated in 1986. We have found records of our chamber dating back to 1921, we found a ledger of like paper or paper and pencil minutes of a more localized chamber here and in the early 1920s. But our modern day chamber is a county wide chamber. We have about 48,000 people in our county, but we serve the Bedford County region. So we have quite a number of members who are located in counties around us but do business in Bedford County. Today, we have 652 members, we represent over 24,000 employees in our region. And, you know, our job is we really live by the Chamber three cities to be a catalyst for business prosperity, a convener of leaders and influencers and a champion for strong communities. And every single thing that we do, whether it’s an event Initiative Program is measured against those those three aspects of services that we provide to our community. We have a fairly small staff, we have three full time people, including myself and a contracted bookkeeper, we do have another contracted person who helps us with one of our leadership programs, youth leadership, Bedford County, but we are heavily supported by a volunteer community here that have ambassadors, volunteers, volunteer board members, we have an incredible network of servant leaders in our county, many of whom have gone through our own leadership programs, but others who are just very committed to to making the community around them a better place. And so while we have a small staff, we have a lot of power because of all of the of the help that we get from volunteer leaders in our area.
Brandon Burton 6:56
Absolutely. And we just did a couple episodes on volunteer engagement and leadership program. So for people that have been listening to all the episodes, they understand the value of leveraging those those two opportunities specifically. Well, I am excited about our topic for discussion today is a as everybody heard, as I went through Kelly’s background, she’s she has a great background in media and specifically sports media. But our topic that we settled on today is going to be about how we can help your chamber kind of get some of that attention and spotlight from media and news outlets to shine a light on the work that you guys are doing in your own communities. So we’ll dive deeper into this conversation as soon as we get back from this quick break.
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Brandon Burton 10:20
All right, Kelly, we’re back. So as I mentioned before the break, we’re talking today about getting your chamber in front of media and news outlets to really showcase the work that your chambers involved with. And I like that you have a background in the sea, you know, to some degree with these news outlets are looking for for stories, and, and maybe some connections, I don’t know, you can get into that a little bit more maybe as he tell the stories, but what are some of these ways that that you’ve found successful to kind of put the spotlight on the chamber and the work you guys are doing?
Kellie Goodman Shaffer 10:57
Well, I think as with most chambers, you know, so much of what we do is about relationships, and about networking and building that network. And I think it’s every bit as important to build your network of media partners and friends, as it is to build sponsors for events, and attendees to come to your events. So, I mean, obviously, I have some natural connections with members of the media in our region. But you know, there’s been a lot of new people who’ve come into the media since I moved from the media to the chamber. So you know, we really try to, you know, make welcome anybody who comes into new media outlets in our community, we invite them to our programs and events, not just to cover them, but to to be part of them as a business. You know, your media outlets are also businesses within your community. So recognizing the needs that they have, I think is important. We always have members of the media on our board, whether it be a television representative, a newspaper, representative, or radio, I think that’s really important. We have a lot of partnerships with our local media outlets. So once a month, we provide a full page of content about the chamber and our members and things that we’re doing for the local newspaper. So that’s a win win, because local newspapers need content, they, you know, like many businesses, they’re doing more with less. And if you can provide them with quality, professional content, they will likely use it because they need they need it, they need it as part of their paper. So we have a full page, once a month in our local newspaper, we also contribute feature stories to an annual magazine that we do, we’ve actually had a number of magazine partnerships over the years and magazines tend to come and go or, or evolve and in in what they and what they do. We’ve done a couple of print magazine partnerships, and they’ve transitioned to online, things like that. We also have a partnership with our radio stations, we do a an agriculture, little agriculture minute. So it goes over four stations, we actually have it sponsored by a local business. So we’re able to share information about the importance of the agriculture industry on the radio, and it’s a win win because the radio gets content and they get the advertising dollars, it’s paid for by local business that is positioning themselves as a champion for local agriculture. And the chamber gets the credit for championing that industry in our community. So I think a lot of media, a lot of the media partnerships, and a lot of the media work that we do is under that champion banner of our mission. But the other thing too, I think is really important is to not just use the media to promote yourself, use the media to promote your members. Because if we, you know, I will call I have I have a Monday morning call every week with a local newspaper reporter to give them ideas. Every reporter that will take my phone number, I give them my number. And if they have a day, or they don’t have anything going on, they’ll call me and say do you have a story idea and 99% of the time, the story ideas I offer them are not about the chamber, they’re about our members and about our community and are things that that lift our community up. So whether it’s a nonprofit, or a young entrepreneur, or a new business or whatever, to position your chamber, as you know, a conduit to promote your business community actually promotes your chamber in the process, because those members are appreciative and they’re and they’re your member. So, you know, hopefully they buy into into your mission. So I think that’s another very important piece of it is, you know, the Chamber should be a media outlet in terms of your social media, your website, things like that. And you should also be a conduit to helping your members get media exposure and positioning yourself as kind of a, you know, that convener of leaders and influencers and matching media with stories from your business community.
Brandon Burton 14:49
Right? No, so you hit on a lot of great points there. So one of the things I wanted to highlight is as far as a reporter any reporters out there you need to know your local chamber President right Right, I know that there’s a website out there called HARO, it stands for Help a Reporter Out. And where people can do reporters can go there to find stories or freelancers can post stories on there to help reporters out. And really, chamber is the best help for a reporter because you’re full of stories, you’re plugged into the community. So any any reporters listening, take advantage of that. But I wanted to circle back to you had mentioned that these media outlets, their businesses, so as a chamber to understand what the needs are of those businesses, and I think you’ve touched on some of those, but as far as understanding some of the stories that they need, or what would be applicable for them and helping them be successful. Are there other needs that you think of when you look at a media company as a maybe a magazine or a newspaper or news channel? That is, as far as understanding their needs are things that have stood out? Right?
Kellie Goodman Shaffer 15:56
Well, you know, they’re all businesses. So most of them are in need of employees, just like a lot of businesses now, right? I mean, I think our local media outlets are always looking for salespeople, always looking for reporters, looking for all kinds of different positions. So we plug our media into our career fairs or job fairs, and to have like the local television station roll into a high school career fair. It’s such a nice Win win, because they’ll take they’ll typically cover the story if they have people attending. But it’s a, it’s a really cool thing for students to see, you know, a media truck or even a newspaper, or radio, it’s just kids like technology. So it helps it helps build interest in that career and industry in the future. And then also, like I said, just get putting them in leadership positions, because media outlets want the community to be successful as well, media outlets run on advertising, it is in their best interest for businesses to be successful, because businesses that are successful, have money to spend on advertising. So you know, it’s just allowing them to be partners. So we have media partnerships, on almost every event that we do, they’re in kind partnerships. So we we list, you know, a television, radio and newspaper on every event. And we generally get free advertisement from all of them to promote those events. Now, there are some events that we do paid advertising, and we try to recognize that we shouldn’t expect everything for free from the media, because again, they are a business. So you know, we kind of tried to balance that giving them certain benefits that goes with with membership or with event promotion. But also understanding that we need to do some some paid buys, as well, when when we’re able to do that. And then just letting them be part of the conversation. Like I said, we always have a member of the media on our board of directors, and it helps them be tapped in with other other community leaders and other industries. And it also helps those other industries recognize what those media outlets need as well. So really just building those relationships and making those connections.
Brandon Burton 18:01
So I want to that was the next thing I want to touch on is building those relationships building that network, do you just have a section of your say Rolodex, but wow, that data is right. Now? Do you have a tag in your contacts list? It says media so you can you know, kind of keep track of these people? Or are there just you know, a certain certain ones that you know, you know, with this story, this needs to go to this outlet? How do you approach that? And? And really, how do you build those relationships? So it’s nurtured enough. So when you do have a story, they listen and are willing to run with it?
Kellie Goodman Shaffer 18:35
Right? Well, I think part of it is, you know, making an effort to be to have a relationship with decision makers. So you know, we’re a small market here, we get a lot of entry level reporters that come in cover things here. And we want to help them as much as we possibly can. I think sometimes that can be a little frustrating, because they are new, they don’t always get things, right, whatever. But some coverage is better than nothing. And having those relationships and building them as those reporters get better as they, you know, improve in their careers is important, but also having having the decision makers at those stations or radio or newspapers. So like at this time, I have a promotions manager of a television station on my board even though the television station is not located in Bedford County, but they appreciate what we do. They appreciate the connections that they make through our chamber. And so they’re part of our leadership. We also have the associate publisher of the local newspaper on our board of directors, they have to kind of be a little bit careful and have a conversation with them beforehand saying that what you hear in the board meetings is confidential and they can’t use that, you know, as stories that kind of thing and we’ve never had that problem with you know, we we we set the expectations for our board members and have them sign confidentiality agreements and we’ve never had somebody from a media outlet on our board you know, betray a confidence and, you know, report something About that another member has, has shared in the board meetings, all of the the relationships that we’ve built through the board and the leadership have been positive. But we’ve had quite a few stories that have come out of board meetings, positive stories about anniversaries of businesses, or new products or new relationships, new partnerships. So just to make sure that those that those people have influence and people that make decisions are included in your chamber, and a lot of that is just calling them and introducing yourself inviting them to things. You know, if they’re able to go to lunch with us, sometimes we’ll invite them to do that. Or just, you know, just to reach out, I think that we rely so much today on texts and emails, and you know, electronic newsletters and social media, but a personal touch, I think really goes a long way. And that I make sure that the media has my cell phone number. And I know part of me hates that I give that out. Because I will I will get texts and calls at all hours of the night. Do you know about this fire? Do you know that this is going on. But I feel like that’s kind of a necessary evil to help to keep those relationships going. And if if they’re calling us about, you know about something that’s happening in our community, sometimes they know before we do if it’s happening, like in the middle of the night or something. So just being part of that conversation, so that you can react to it to help your business community and also, you know, for the media to trust that you’ll give them the right information and help them to the degree that you can, I think is is valuable.
Brandon Burton 21:34
Yeah. I appreciate that. That gives good perspective. And I really appreciate, you know, touching on the, I guess the touchiness of what it could be having a member of the media and your board, because I know that’s a question that a lot of listeners may have is just how do you navigate that? That sounds like just having that open conversation. And it’s worked well for you guys. And it’s worked well all around is what I get out of that.
Kellie Goodman Shaffer 21:59
Yeah. And we have built in safety nets. I mean, our board members signed confidentiality agreements, and if they violate them, we have the right to remove them. So I don’t Yeah, we’ve never had to do that. So I would hope that that would never be the case. Yeah,
Brandon Burton 22:12
that’s good. So I’m curious to have you share maybe any interesting ways you’re able to attract the attention of media outlets, or maybe some some innovative ways that you guys have approached this. anything come to mind?
Kellie Goodman Shaffer 22:29
Um, yeah, I think that one of the ways that we’ve garnered a lot of media attention is through programs and events that we’ve done. And this is one thing I would say to to my chamber friends, and that is, don’t, sometimes we downplay what we do, I think in general chambers do not champion ourselves enough. We don’t value what we provide to the business community enough, we don’t express that value, and we don’t promote ourselves enough. So we do a lot of news releases, both for our own organization, and also for our members. We write stories and send them to the media, as I said, but we also when when we do something innovative, or when we’re part of something in our community that’s innovative, we want to make sure that the businesses we’re working with, and our community gets credit. So when we’re planning events, there’s three things we think about when we plan events, we, you can raise funds, you can make friends, and it can make you famous, and we would never do an event that just makes fun. It has to make funds, and either make you friends or make you famous. But the perfect trifecta is an event that raises funds, makes you friends, and makes your community famous. And we have two of those that we have done in recent years actually, pandemic through the pandemic, that the pandemic actually helped us get these things done. And and they they, you know, were off the charts on all three of those things. So one of them was during the pandemic we share Yeah. During the pandemic, the height of the pandemic. So this is the summer of 2020. Actually, it was in May 2020. I took this idea to our board, you know, what if we if we put up a temporary drive and movie screen, so that we could hold some outdoor events, because here in Pennsylvania, there were very strict rules about gathering inside and everybody was moving events to outside under tents or whatever, because that’s where you were allowed to get people together. So I called a local contractor and I said, you know, if you were going to build a temporary screen, how would you go about doing it? And this tremendous community leader said to me, Oh, this is a great idea. Give me a minute, I’ll get back to you. He called me back the next day. He had engaged an engineer, they had plans and he’s like, we’re not building a temporary screen. We’re building a permanent screen for doing it. We’re doing to do it right. And I’m in 50 days from the time that I got permission from our board to pursue this project. So that was the middle of May, to the day that we cut the ribbon which was July 2 Right before the Fourth of July weekend. We we got to watch our business community come together. 22 to businesses to build a 72 foot wide by 55 foot tall drive and movie screen. It is made with power poles from Bedford Rural Electric Cooperative, the face of it is eight foot by four foot wide fiberglass panels that are fabricated by a local company that in the real world would cost $900 each. And they they did it for us for a song. It was painted, the phrase was painted by a local painter, it was framed by, you know, local construction guys who weren’t allowed to work at the time, like their their projects were all shut down. But they could do this. And we partnered with the Bedford County Fair for a spot on the fairgrounds that we could put this big screen with lots of room for, for parking. And you know, in 50 days, like we say, it was hope, hard work and hometown magic that, that this project came about. And as a result of that, I mean, we got tons of we’re still getting publicity for this. I mean, I’ve gotten calls from, oh, seven or eight people from other states who’ve seen this online or, you know, searched how do you build a drive in movie theater, found our stories on on YouTube or whatever, and ask how you get it done. And it was just, it was the perfect combination of circumstances of businesses that had resources and wanted to do something great in their community. And it was just such a really tough time, you know, for the community. And it was such a good news piece, a good news story, I got a ton of of media and continues to, but we call it the silver lining driving because it was mining in a bad you know, we didn’t call it you know, the Bedford road electric drive, and they would never have wanted us to do that. But because of that we were able to hold church services, we’ve done community theater there, we held our annual dinner there the first year that we had, like 300 people in their cars, beeping their horns for the winners instead of clapping. And and it just, it’s just been such a huge boost for our community. And the other thing too, is one of our big initiatives here is we try to do things that will help us to retain youth, you know, we’re in a rural community. So we lose a lot of young people and to be able to have an event, a resource for events that are family friendly and young people can go to is really nice, it connects young people to the community. So it’s part of our bigger mission, which is to, you know, to enhance the life experience of young people here. So hopefully they want to stay. And because of the support of businesses, I mean, we had almost nothing out of in fact, I will say this, we had nothing out of pocket from the chamber. In this project. It was 100% supported by local businesses, either donating materials, time, talent, we had sponsorships that helped us cover the movie licenses and things like that. But we have so much support for this project, that we make it free for anyone 18 and under to attend, and 19 and over is $5. So we have people coming every Saturday during the summer for old movies, you know, like old Disney movies and Greece. And you know, the classics, we don’t compete with the local movie theater at all. We don’t really show any new new releases. But that was a that was a project that really, I think shows what chambers can do. You know, we could not build that. But we couldn’t get the people around the table that all had the right resources to do it. So we were a catalyst. We were a convener and we were a champion. So yes,
Brandon Burton 28:36
that is awesome. And you guys still use that today? The theater?
Kellie Goodman Shaffer 28:39
Yes. Yeah. So we’re getting ready for our fourth season. So we had 2021 22. There’s 23. So the fourth season of of community movies, and we partner with the Bedford County Fair. So we run the theater, we share the profits, profits with the Fair, which is also a nonprofit entity, and they support agriculture. So our number one industry, it all just is such a great, a great partnership.
Brandon Burton 29:01
That is perfect. So you had mentioned that there were two programs that came to mind what is the what’s the other one? The other one
Kellie Goodman Shaffer 29:09
actually, we started the year before the year before COVID. But it really blew up during COVID. So I’ve had this this dream for years and years to put together some kind of drive thru holiday light display, because there’s a really huge one like an hour away from us. And by the time we drive kids up there and sit through the line that’s like several hours long, they never get to see it. So we partnered again with the Bedford County Fair. And because it has lots of barns and electricity and stuff like that, and we said let’s try to do a drive through Christmas light display that promotes our local businesses. So rather than going out and buying commercial lighting, we put it out to our community businesses, organizations, schools, churches, families, if you want a free spot at the fairgrounds to build a light display, you know we’ll we’ll manage it and then we have you know cars that drive through from Thanksgiving to Christmas. We we put it out on I’m on Halloween 2019. And we said we picked a little small spot in the campground at the fairgrounds, and said if we get 30 businesses, we could make this work. We had 72 businesses sign up, we had to put it in a much bigger spot. Last year, we had over 150 participating businesses, the light display is like a mile or just over a mile long, we had, you know, the license plates on the cars from 18 Different states that came through, it’s a really inexpensive family friendly thing to do, it took off during COVID. Because again, it was something people could do in their cars, all the other Christmas events were cancelled. This was a safe, socially distant thing to do. And it just, you know, snowballed. But again, it wasn’t something we could not set up 150 displays ourselves, it has to be things that your business community can do together. But the chamber gets so much credit for it, even though we could never do it by ourselves. You know, so I think positioning ourselves, you know, knowing what we can do, knowing what we’re good at. And what we’re really good at is connecting people and sharing ideas and letting people you know, be part of our ideas and, and letting them build on it is what really has been successful for us. And those two things have gotten our community probably more attention than, you know, much of anything else that I can think of in the last few years.
Brandon Burton 31:18
That’s both make for great stories for any reporter anybody looking for content?
Kellie Goodman Shaffer 31:25
Well, we actually even have people like they’ll bring a drone over and fly over the drive in and then they will put it on their website, you know. So that’s, you know, amateur drone operators, but you get that on, you know, on Facebook and stuff. And we couldn’t pay for that advertisement, honestly,
Brandon Burton 31:41
right. Now, that is fantastic. Well, as we start to wrap up here, I wanted to ask you, if there’s any tip or action item that you’d want to share with listeners who are looking to take their chamber up to the next level, maybe something related to this topic, or or totally unrelated, what would you have to offer?
Kellie Goodman Shaffer 32:00
Well, I think I would just say, you know, we spend a lot of time talking about really serious topics. You know, we we spend a lot of time talking about the latest government affairs, you know, news, businesses, closing people needing work, all those kinds of things. And it’s really important for chambers to be engaged in all of those serious conversations. But I think that the the most traction that we have gotten from our chamber, and that I think chambers have an opportunity to do is really focus on being that champion for your community, tell great stories in your community and tell great stories about your members. So like, here’s one more quick example, we have a new program, we decided that we wanted to support young entrepreneurs, so any entrepreneur under the age of 21, gets a free chamber membership, until they turned 21 In our community, because that’s our way of supporting them, you know, starting their business, our very first one was a seven year old second grader who has a tie dyed t shirt business. And he has been one of the greatest champions for our chambers that I could possibly imagine. And we love being his greatest champion. Yes. And you know, people love stories about young people doing great things. And when we could have our name associated with helping him along the way. And he’s so proud to be a chamber member, when he got his little plaque from our ambassadors, he was just beaming. And just so so proud to be part of something bigger. And I think it made our Chamber members proud to to be Chamber members because he was so excited. And so just all those those kinds of things to just tell the good stories, tell the good news, and be the champion for your chamber. Because in the process, you get so much credit back, I don’t feel like we deserve the credit that we get sometimes. But we’re grateful to have it because that’s what allows us to continue to tell more good stories, and to really be the champion that our business community deserves.
Brandon Burton 33:51
I love that and these days are so many ways to get your story out there. So in the stories of your members is your your highlighting. Kelly I like asking everyone I have on the show as we look to the future of chambers of commerce, how do you see the future of chambers and their purpose going forward?
Kellie Goodman Shaffer 34:08
Well, I think that coming out of the pandemic chambers have an opportunity that we have never had before. I know for our chamber and many of the chambers that I work with here in Pennsylvania through the PACP. We did such good work as an industry during the pandemic. We were truly that conduit between government and businesses like we were I think oftentimes chambers were the ones that businesses called looking for help with PPP looking for help with, you know, SBA loans needing information about how to keep your business clean, and even if all we were doing was passing along information from the government or the health department or whatever. We were the ones that our communities turned to in that really dire time. And I think because of that the Chamber industry enjoys a certain degree of loyalty from businesses that maybe we didn’t have before. I think many of our members have have gone from being transactional saying, Am I going to get my money’s worth for this membership to really understanding the aspirational value of our organizations and why it’s important to be connected to something bigger than yourselves, when we could put on, you know, when we could share a, you know, a town hall over the phone with one of our legislators trying to help businesses navigate the waiver system, or, or whatever it was, the chamber was chamber industry was such a key player in trying to keep businesses going through the pandemic. And so these few years since the pandemic, I think, have been an incredible opportunity for chambers to build on that loyalty and to build on the success and the value that we showed during that really hard time. And we would be, I think, remiss if we didn’t take advantage of that opportunity. I think for many, many years, chambers have worried about how, how cheap their dues need to be to get people to invest. And I think we really need to start giving ourselves more credit, and understanding how important Chambers of Commerce are. And if you’re in business, you absolutely should be in the chamber, you should be part of the larger business community, and not just for what businesses get out of it, but for what businesses bring to it by being part of the larger conversation. So I mean, that’s what I would say that we’re trying to do in our chamber, that’s what we talk about in the PACP is really understanding our value as an industry and then working toward, you know, providing what our members need in the future and what our communities need going forward.
Brandon Burton 36:36
I’d love that. That is a great response. So Kelly, I wanted to give you an opportunity to share any contact information for listeners who might want to reach out and connect with you or learn more about how you’re gaining the attention of the media outlets in your community. What would be the best way for them to reach out and connect with you
Kellie Goodman Shaffer 36:56
are you can reach me by phone at 814-623-2233 or by email at director@bedfordcountychamber.org. Our website is BedfordCountyChamber.com. We have you know, Facebook, you can reach me on Facebook if you want to. But we always love talking to other chamber people. I’m always inspired by how how much chamber people want to help each other. My best friends are chamber people. And I just feel so fortunate to have found this industry and the great people that are in it. So anything we can do to help someone else we’re more than happy to.
Brandon Burton 37:33
Absolutely, I appreciate that. And I’ll make sure to get your contact information in our show notes for this episodes, anyone can pick those up and reach out and connect with you and learn more. But thank you for spending time with us today on chamber chat podcast for sharing your experience, your knowledge, your background, and especially these, these two examples that you shared with us are really highlighting the ways that chambers can be champions in their community and, and go about highlighting the businesses in their community as well. So thank you for for being with us today. Kelly,
Kellie Goodman Shaffer 38:06
thank you so much for having me. It was nice to talk to you.
Brandon Burton 38:10
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