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Brandon Burton (00:01.106)
Hello, Chamber Champions. Welcome to Chamber Chat Podcast. I’m your host, 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. Today’s guest is someone who brings both journalistic rigor and strategic insight to the world of business policy in Colorado.
Ed Sealover is the vice president of strategic initiatives for the Colorado Chamber of Commerce, and he’s the editor of the Sum and Substance, a news site he launched in 2023 to dive deep into the intersection of business and state government. Before stepping into his current role, Ed spent nearly three decades in journalism reporting for
represented outlets like the Denver Business Journal, Rocky Mountain News, and the Colorado Springs Gazette. His exceptional reporting earned him 140 state, regional, and national awards, including the prestigious title of Colorado Journalist of the Year in 2020. Now, Ed leads the impactful initiatives at the chamber, including workforce development and environmental sustainability through the chamber’s Climate Action Task Force.
Ed lives in Wheat Ridge with his wife and two children. He’s here with us today to share his insights on Colorado’s evolving business landscape and what’s ahead. Ed, welcome to Chamber Chat podcast. I’m excited to have you with us today. Love to give you an opportunity to say hello to all the Chamber Champions who are out there listening and if you would share something interesting about yourself so we can all get to know you a little better.
Ed Sealover (01:37.432)
Well, thank you, Brandon. I appreciate it. Hi again. I’m Ed Sealover, VP at Strategic Initiatives and editor for the Colorado Chamber of Commerce. I’ve been here since February, 2023. And in my prior life, it was not just a journalist for 28 years, but I’ve actually authored two books. One in 2011 called Mountain Brew, a guide to Colorado’s breweries. That was a look at all 101 breweries that were open in Colorado at the time. And then the 2016 book.
called Colorado Excursions with History Hikes and Hops, which is a 30-day guide to traveling Colorado, stopping each day at one historic site, one natural site, and one drinking site, what I like to think is the best of Colorado. So that’s what I do in my spare time. Travel, be a dad, and find great beers.
Brandon Burton (02:27.085)
That’s awesome. also drive tourism in the state of Colorado too with your book, right? That’s awesome. Right. That is awesome. Well, tell us a little bit about the Colorado Chamber, obviously a state chamber, but help give us an idea of
Ed Sealover (02:31.597)
I hope so, and certainly with all the trips I take, I drive in as well.
Brandon Burton (02:46.094)
size involvement that you guys are involved with staff just to kind of set the stage for our discussion today.
Ed Sealover (02:54.699)
Yes, thank you. The Colorado Chamber of Commerce, we have about 400 direct member businesses, but we also represent about 80 local chambers and trade associations. So we like to think we represent thousand plus businesses when we’re going out there and speaking on things. We have a staff of 15 people. So we keep it pretty tight and on budget.
and we, we do a lot in the state policy realm. That’s kind of where we play our part where we’re very active at the Capitol, in both, proposing and opposing and pushing, for certain pieces of legislation, and in regulations, we’ve gotten very involved in trying to make sure that state regulations are realistic in what businesses can do. So, we’re kind of a, a big policy wonk group here.
speaking for the businesses of state of Colorado.
Brandon Burton (03:52.316)
That’s great. you know, occasionally I’ll have somebody on from a state chamber here on the podcast. And I love to just have the reminder of what a great resource the state chamber, whatever state the listeners are in their state chambers, such a great resource.
for the individual communities, the regional chambers, just as that really the advocate to help understand what’s going on in the state level and keeping things aligned. So appreciate the work that you guys do.
Ed Sealover (04:22.317)
Absolutely. And again, we oversee the Colorado Chamber Alliance. So we hear directly all the time from our chamber members across the state. I’m often speaking to those groups as our other members here. And we understand that we can’t represent business without representing the small local businesses that are asking their local chambers for help.
Brandon Burton (04:42.236)
Yeah, absolutely.
Well, our topic for discussion today, we’ll spend most of our time talking about what I’ve termed this topic as a sane center media. So we’ve obviously got the left and the right focused media, you know, in the traditional media outlets. But when we talk chamber work, when we talk, you know, really moving the needle in communities and the things that affect business, really it’s aligning in the center and being able to see where the truth lies amongst
all the chaos that’s out there. So we’ll spend most of our time on this topic as soon as we get back from this quick break.
All right, Ed, we are back. As I mentioned before the break, we’re talking today about Sane Center Media. I know you’ve launched something pretty unique, pretty interesting there at the Colorado Chamber. You want to tell us what that is and kind of what the origins for this?
I’ll say it, this new site, what it came from and what the dream was and how it’s evolved. you
Ed Sealover (05:48.141)
Absolutely. And thanks for asking about it. The Summon Substance is a website, tsscolorado.com. It’s free for everyone to see. That came about kind of from my decision in 2022 that I was done with journalism after two and a half decades in the field. I needed to move on to something and I wanted to do something a little more proactive as well, but I didn’t want to stop writing. And so I had
I had talked with the Colorado Chamber CEO. She was one of my best sources in covering the state house. And just talked about, what could a guy like me do? And she thought it would be a good idea to bring me on and to actually launch this site. And one of the reasons was, and I told her, if I leave the publication that I was at right now, they’re going to give up on the Capitol. though they didn’t right away, they eventually did pull out of covering the Capitol.
And I said, because of that, nobody is going to be covering the business issues of the Capitol the same way. So I suggested, look, if I come onto the chamber, I need to write a pretty detailed newsletter for the members. And Lauren Furman, our CEO, was the one that had the vision. She said, no, no, no, the heck with the newsletter. She said, let’s put up a website, because the website not only will allow our members to see what’s going on, but will allow policymakers to see and understand the business issues as well, because too often, and think this happens in every city,
media outlets focus on kind of the hot button issues. There’s guns, there’s social issues, there’s things like that. But we need people to think more about business issues and how that affects everyone even more so than these hot button issues do. And so she had the idea, we’re gonna put up the website, we came to the name Summon Substance to try to really show that this…
This shows every angle of what we’re trying to do here. And the one, I don’t want to say demand, but the one thing I said is, look, but if we’re going to do this and people are going to pay attention to is this cannot be chamber communications. This can’t be just PR on our side. We need to show both sides. And she said, yes, go for it. And so what it is, it is a
Ed Sealover (08:00.589)
a business policy news site and I admit I work for an interest group but as I tell everyone I try to write down the middle because I want people talking about business issues and this is the way to do it.
Brandon Burton (08:12.141)
I love that. The fact that it, yes, it’s sponsored by the Chamber, it’s a Chamber site, but not necessarily with the angle or the perspective of.
this is chamber, but just being right down the middle covering both sides. So when you talk about what are some of these topics that are important for everybody, not those hot topic things that make the newsreels all the time, but what are those things that are important for everybody that you see maybe drawing a little bit more attention on the site?
Ed Sealover (08:41.74)
We focus a lot on our state legislature. State legislature runs four months out of the year and it’s extremely active and they’re doing a lot of things with business. So we’ll go in there, I’ll go in there. I should say it’s me. There’s not the staff of people at the sum and substance. And follow bills really closely. Get stories out as soon as they’re coming about or as soon as we even see bill drafts to start the conversation on it.
and explain what it means to businesses. you know, sometimes that’s going to overlap with what other media outlets are covering. We had a big issue on property taxes in 2024. And everyone wanted to talk about property taxes. The difference was I focused a lot on how that affected commercial property and business property taxes rather than some of the residential taxes that most others focused on. And in a lot of cases, I’ll write about things that others may not be writing about.
of business regulations come up. have a legislature that is often looking for good reasons to help out consumers, but is looking to do it by raising regulations that are going to be problematic for businesses. just this past session, I focused a lot on a law that would have made it easier for people to sue over Americans with Disabilities Act violations, sue businesses, and what that would mean to it. Laws about
wage laws about unionization and making it easier to unionize. And then issues like artificial intelligence regulation that directly affect one sector of our economy, but really in many ways affected everyone who uses an artificial intelligence program in state of Colorado. And so I dive pretty deep into these in ways that I don’t think others do. And I always say, you know, in my last publication,
my editors would say sometimes, hey, cut it down. People don’t want to read a thousand words on this topic. Well, now I write about business policy. And so I write pretty long articles thinking if you’re coming to the sum and substance, you want to hear about business policy in depth. So we go into that. The other thing, I’ll be quick here as I realize I’m talking a lot, that I tend to cover are regulatory hearings. The way our state legislature works, a lot of times they set up a framework for
Ed Sealover (11:04.992)
how we’re going to do things like reduce emissions and what that means. And then we have regulatory bodies that decide how to do it. So our air quality control commission, for example, is very active in putting new restrictions on businesses that have emissions coming from them. And so I’ve spent a lot of time explaining what are the rules that they’re looking at, how would this affect them.
And hopefully trying to get not just businesses to hear about this, but the policymakers to understand businesses concerns as well. So anything that comes out of the state government or that affects a wide swath of businesses in the state is what I try to dive into.
Brandon Burton (11:43.356)
Yeah, as you’re given that explanation, I’m thinking, you know, when you see a commercial on TV for a pharmaceutical drug, you know, there’s the level one, you know, effects that, you you take this pill for this outcome.
But then you get the 90 seconds at the end of the commercial where it’s talking about all the potential side effects. And I think same thing when it comes to regulations, when it comes to different regulation that affects businesses. Yes, there’s the top layer. There’s the things that you’re trying to address, but then there’s all the secondary effects, the long tail effects that happen. And I see that as what you’re really getting into. How is this really going to affect business aside from what’s getting the headlines in the news?
as far as what that legislation, that piece of legislation is supposed to address versus how is this really gonna shake out for the average business and who’s gonna win, who’s gonna lose on this? Is that kind of an accurate description?
Ed Sealover (12:41.804)
It really is. you know, for example, we just had a special legislative session and they needed to close a budget shortfall. so they went after they being legislators went after a couple of longstanding business tax breaks and decided to roll them back. And a lot of folks said, well, look, if we cut this tax break, we can save a hundred million dollars and put that back into closing the budget shortfall.
And I would try to go in and say, okay, I will get into the nitty gritty here, but one of them, for example, was a tax break for insurance companies who have a certain percentage of their national workforce in Colorado. It’s called a regional home office tax credit. And legislators looked at it like, okay, we need to get this money back. And my story is trying to point out, okay, I see why, but understand.
that this is how insurers are looking at this tax break and this is what it could mean to Colorado’s insurance workforce at a time when we’re already losing members of that workforce to neighboring states like Nebraska and Arizona because the cost of living and the regulations are so much lower there. So those are the kind of things I try to put in perspective. Like yes, you may think about this, but here’s what it would have to do.
At the same point, I’m trying to explain to businesses who may just come to this and say, this is awful. You’re stealing my tax break and say, okay, here’s why the state is doing this. They don’t see it working for the following reasons. So it’s almost like trying to facilitate a dialogue between the policymakers and businesses about why these things are important, but always being sure to bring up both sides of that and to bring up what business concerns are. I think I tend to write about some stories.
that are broader with the here’s how it affects business angle because I don’t see that being out there a lot and that’s something I like to do to let local businesses especially know, hey, you may not be paying attention to what’s going on, but this is the direct impact on your company.
Brandon Burton (14:43.922)
Yeah, I see it as showing the other side of the coin. However, a lot of these issues, there’s not just two sides of the coin. get into it and it gets a lot deeper and more complicated than that.
Ed Sealover (14:44.723)
Yeah.
Brandon Burton (14:55.678)
So for the local chambers, the work that you’re doing out there in the state level, let’s tie it back to the local chambers. How can we draw attention to them to offer the support to them? How can they benefit from their state chamber doing something like what you’re doing with this approach? What’s your thoughts on that?
Ed Sealover (15:06.187)
Absolutely.
Ed Sealover (15:20.619)
There are a couple ways I think you could think about that one is and again if you go to TSS Colorado comm You will see that the stories are free and in local chambers just pick them off and put them in their newsletters I have a couple chambers that are just like what’s going on? Here’s what you need to know
So I like to think of it as a service that local chambers can pick up and say, look, local members, you want to know what’s happening, you know, especially, you know, we’ve got a wide state. If you want to know what’s happening six hours away in Denver, here is, here is something you need to know. So that’s, that’s a service to local chambers in that way. And the other way it’s, it’s a two way door. have really good relationships with a number of our local chambers, or at least I like to think I do, um, where they’ll call me up and say, Hey, you need to pay attention to this or.
I will call them and say, this sounds like they would hit your part of the state more than others. Tell me about it. So I’m, I’m understanding what they need to be watching at the Capitol and getting their voice into it too, because too often, and this is true of everything in Colorado, it tends to be a Denver centric focus. and, and, and this is a way of at least getting into a publication. Look, here’s what the folks in.
grand junction need or here’s what the folks in Durango need, things like that. it’s a way for local chambers to bring their concerns to the state level as well. And thirdly, we tend to use what goes on TSS as a blueprint, both I and our our SVP of governmental relations.
tend to do a lot of talks in local chambers about, here’s what’s happening. And this is a great way to be able to summarize it and say, and by the way, follow it here. So I guess think of it like an Associated Press newswire for local chambers as well. I may not be able to follow what’s going on with your city government, but I will be able to help your folks understand what’s going on at the state level and what they need to pay attention to.
Brandon Burton (17:13.438)
Yeah, now that’s.
That’s great. So I know on your website, it very much looks like a news site, but curated for business. I noticed you also have a newsletter, although the idea was to start with the newsletter and you guys were like, no, let’s do a website. But it looks like there’s both, right? So is that pushing out the news stories or how does that work?
Ed Sealover (17:29.451)
Yeah, basically the newsletter. Yes, yeah, I mean, because I don’t expect people who are busy running businesses to be checking in every six hours to see if I have a new story up. So the newsletter is you sign up for the newsletter and every three stories that I put out, I’ll put out a new newsletter saying, here’s what’s going on during the legislative session that could come once a
Brandon Burton (17:42.334)
Yeah, and I love that you make it available.
Ed Sealover (17:53.312)
day that you’re getting a newsletter in the off season like it is now that may be every week to two weeks thankfully but yes that’s a way to make sure that people are informed too of what’s going on.
Brandon Burton (18:09.542)
local chambers can pick off certain stories or topics that you’re covering and bring it to their local awareness. Are there other ways that a local chamber can maybe piggyback on the efforts that their state chamber does like this? I know from an advocacy point, just to be able to lean on the state, just what are your thoughts around more of how the local chambers can.
can really piggyback and lean on the expertise of the state chamber.
Ed Sealover (18:40.349)
You know, it’s a great question because I don’t think in most cases, local chambers can expect to do something like this. We have deeper resources than most local chambers just because we have a statewide base. So yeah, I mean, just kind of picking it off is very helpful. But I would say for local chambers that are hearing this saying, boy, I wish I had that service.
Brandon Burton (18:48.635)
Right, if they’ve got one staff or a couple staff, yeah, yeah. So.
Ed Sealover (19:03.315)
it may be something they could as a group go to the state chamber and say, we are not the first state chamber to do this. This was an idea that the Kentucky Chamber of Commerce put into play a number of years ago. We do ours a slight bit differently, but it’s something that local chambers could work with state chambers to say, look, we need this lifeline to know what’s going on.
Now, maybe in other states, the state government isn’t quite as active. I know there are some states where they meet once every two years. And so it’s not quite that pipeline that’s necessary. But in some states, it’s a year-round proposition. I think local chambers teaming up with the state government to say, hey, how could we support you doing this kind of reporting back to us is something they could think about as well. And even in a sense,
Knowing that if you go and you cover these things in a fair way, people will talk to you. think local chambers could even think about establishing more of a partnership, if you will, or more of a relationship with local governments in that way. If you have a local government that is very active in setting forth regulations, just sending someone to attend their council meetings and writing things up.
and saying, look, we’re watching, is a good way for local chambers to kind of raise their voice in this too. And if you cover these things fairly, I think you actually grab the attention of local policymakers more and say, hey, I saw this story on it. I appreciate that. Let’s talk about this more often. So it’s not just the chamber reacting to what’s going on, but being proactive and saying, this is coming. How do we get people involved in the conversation?
Brandon Burton (20:44.853)
Yeah, and I’ve seen local chambers take a topic and then host a
podcast or webinar or town hall or something as a platform to be able to say, let’s talk about this further. Like obviously there’s feelings on both sides, there’s perspectives on both sides. Let’s hash this out and kind of get to the bottom of things. So I like that just, you know, as a, your perspective, you’re able to draw attention to these things. And then on the local chamber level, if they want to dive deeper or if they want to go in with their local government to be able to share their perspectives
or cover something on the fair and center, you know, the centric way. I think that’s a great model to follow. Given that you do the reporting on the what I call the sane center, you know, it down the middle. It is still news that is still reporting. Do you get feedback one way or the other? I don’t know the primary audience. Is it just chambers and your business members or is it the community at large?
Ed Sealover (21:48.907)
It’s interesting, the primary audience, I think started out as our members, but as I mentioned, if it’s just an internal echo chamber, you don’t really do anything with this. And so I’ve noticed more and more state groups or state representatives, senators, their offices are signing up to get this now. And then a lot of other policy groups, both those are in the business space and those that we sometimes clash with.
Brandon Burton (21:49.504)
What do you see? Right. Good.
Ed Sealover (22:18.926)
are actually signing up to get this now too. I’m hoping that is a way to open dialogue with them. We actually have cut a couple of media partnerships as well. We have one newspaper, The Gazette, which circulates in Bethanger and Colorado Springs, that will pick my stories up because it took them about a year watching it and said, you’re doing this journalistically.
And we don’t necessarily have the staffing to cover every business nuance like you do. So we’ll literally pick the story up and put it out there. And so that’s been a good audience growth too. I think it’s also helped some folks who normally would clash with the chamber, the Colorado chamber on issues to say, he actually is doing this fairly. This is not chamber publicity. He’s trying to educate people on it. And so to go back to your question about
Who’s the primary audience now? I guess primary audience is anyone who is a businesses Because as I mentioned we always focus on what is this going to do to business and be anyone who is concerned with business policy? The idea that you may be involved in policy. Maybe it’s tax. Maybe it’s regulation Maybe it’s it’s economic development incentives anything along those lines that may impact businesses We hope people are reading it to say even if they’re just saying
hey, what’s the other side saying right now? At least they’ll be able to understand that and see and incorporate that into our discussions going forward.
Brandon Burton (23:49.842)
That’s really cool that the Gazette and these other publications are picking up the stories and recognizing that you got some real street cred. they’re taking it and running with it. So that’s awesome. Yeah, I was curious with how polarized certain news topics can be. Now, I don’t know if you’re covering housing or child care, if it gets super polarized one way or the other, but covering it from the business
business first kind of lens. Do you get voices that come at you from their polarized point of view of how can you cover it this way? I’m just trying to get my mind wrapped around what’s a reception like from those that are on the complete opposite ends of the spectrum.
Ed Sealover (24:41.424)
It’s, it’s a good question. I think I have the luxury in that if you’re not a thoughtful person, you’re not going to tune into a website that’s writing 1200 words about a policy. so the reception is, it’s generally pretty good. I don’t have people that are writing in like corporate blah, blah, blah, blah. They’re, you know, they’re, tuning in to see, wait, why? And are you doing this? And then there were people who say things like, I don’t buy this, you know, you you, published a
Brandon Burton (24:50.856)
There you go. It’s a great point. Yeah.
Ed Sealover (25:11.262)
hole from somebody who we think is not a legitimate source or here are some of the faults with it. You’re quoting someone who we don’t like. There’s always going to be that. the general reception is, you know, here’s what business is thinking, but here’s what we need to highlight also. I have groups that I I refer to in general media as
Brandon Burton (25:23.706)
Sure.
Ed Sealover (25:39.886)
liberal think tanks who will call me sometimes like, hey, do you want our thoughts on this? I have one particular environmental group I have a good relationship with where the executive director who is often sitting on the opposite side of bills from the Chamber of Commerce government relations team calls and say, hey, do you want my thoughts on this regulation? So I think the reception has been that some groups have looked at this and said,
I want to make sure my voice is in here. want to make sure that if this is going out and it’s already talking about what businesses want, because I’ve got great access to businesses so I can get their voices in there all the time, we get our voices in there too. And so I’m thankful for that. I think it furthers the conversation. And it took time. I will say this, in 2023 when this launched,
I would put in calls to groups like that that went unreturned. And I think that’s fair. If you say, I’m with the Colorado Chamber of Commerce publication, they’ll be like, why on earth would I want to talk to you? But I think they’ve seen my commitment to trying to bring this out over time. And so I think that also furthers the conversation. And to be truthful, to kind of work in some of the other things I do with strategic initiatives, I oversee our environmental sustainability task force here.
Brandon Burton (26:32.124)
is new.
Ed Sealover (26:52.521)
We’ve been able to, one of the goals of the task force was to get business and environmentalists at the same table rather than shouting across the room at each other and talk about what sustainability policies are realistic and how we can work together to clean up the environment. And we’ve been able to bring in some of those groups to talk with us, to talk about how we move forward on this. And I’m not going to say that’s a direct link to the sum and substance. Those are kind of two different hats I wear there.
but I don’t think it hurts when they, when they can see, like, we actually want to hear your opinions. We may disagree with you, but we care about your voice and we’re looking for that way to find a compromise.
Brandon Burton (27:27.336)
We care about your voice.
Brandon Burton (27:34.232)
Yeah, I think your point is well taken when there’s not the hot button bits, you know, that can be shared out on Twitter X or, whatever platform people are on, but it has to be more of a thoughtful read to be able to go through and see the research and the effort that’s been put into whatever the topic is. But then to have, you know, those different organizations reach out and say, would you like to know our opinion? Of course. Yeah, let’s bring all voices to the table.
Ed Sealover (27:58.674)
Yeah.
Brandon Burton (28:00.724)
and let’s find the best solutions, right? So that’s awesome. I love hearing that. Well, Ed, for those listening, those chambers listening who are wanting to take their chamber up to the next level, what kind of tip or action item might you share with them in trying to accomplish that goal? Yeah.
Ed Sealover (28:18.941)
Well, I was thinking about this. I want to step back a little bit from just talking about the sum and substance. And I want to talk about how the sum and substance works into our greater vision. We put forward a statement. was, I should say, we being the chamber before I got here called Vision 2033. And this is something I would recommend for any chamber is lay out a vision statement for the next 10 years of what the chamber stands for. Because this is a comment I’ve heard repeatedly is that
We want to be a part of where you’re going because we see what you want to do. It’s not just the chamber is reacting based on members. It’s not just we are seeing things and saying no or yes. We’re saying this is what we’re going to do and this is how we’re proactively going to achieve it. And so for any chambers listening, I would say if you haven’t thought about and this goes beyond just the mission statement. Mission statements are great because they tell in the very short form.
why people should pay attention to you. But larger statements and Vision 23 for us is, it’s about a 50 page report about here are the four areas we are going to concentrate on over the next 10 years, including areas like housing and workforce development. And that’s actually allowed me, one of my other hats as an initiative is to be very proactive in workforce development. How do we work with the state to improve a system that frankly isn’t preparing
Colorado students for the jobs that are looking to hire them right now. So this is something we didn’t just react to. We worked with the state, with a number of other organizations to put forward a five-bill workforce development package not long ago in 2024 and pass it because we said this is the positive steps we need to take. So that’s a long way of saying for other teams who listening, think about
proactively what you want to do and what you want to stand for. Lay it out in kind of, even if you’re worried it’s too detailed, but very detailed form and then other organizations will see you and want to jump on based on that because they know you’re not just yes and no, you’re about the bigger picture and how we move toward it.
Brandon Burton (30:30.554)
I love it. The proactive versus reactive chamber is going to make all the difference. So being proactive is going to catch more of that vision and having your members and community recognize the visionary leaders that you are. So I always like asking people that 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?
Ed Sealover (30:57.265)
I think chambers need to be on the front line of what is an increasing battle over a question that bothers me, is business a good thing? I think we are seeing more and more of this trend toward business is bad and that comes from both ends of the political spectrum at this point. On one end, saying socialism is good and on another end, they’re saying we don’t trust business anymore.
and chambers need to be out front in showing what business is. Chambers need to be out front and showing business is that mom and pop restaurant you go to down the street when you want to sit with your friends and complain about business. you know, business, business is, is not a, a, you know, an amalgamation of things that, works itself into big business and business is awful. It is the individuals who
Brandon Burton (31:39.23)
You
Ed Sealover (31:56.719)
employee people. It is the individuals who work at those companies. And I think chambers have to stand up and always emphasize that. We try to do that when we are testifying for bills or going into things and saying, look, I know what you’re looking to do here, but if this costs people their jobs, that’s business. That’s business losing because people don’t have jobs anymore.
I think chambers need to be out front representing themselves, not just as a place where people can get together and talk and socialize and meet and network, but as a place where the community can see this is business, this is our community, and we need to safeguard business because they are ours.
Brandon Burton (32:40.412)
I that’s a great response. They need to have a place to sit and gather and complain about business. that’s great. Well, Ed, this has been great having you on the podcast. I wanted to give you an opportunity to share any contact information with listeners who may want to reach out and connect with you or to follow The Summit Substance. What would be the best way to have them reach out and connect with you?
Ed Sealover (33:06.446)
Absolutely. Again, the Summon Substance is tsscolorado.com. If you’re interested in what’s going on in Colorado or just interested in how I’m doing this, sign up for the newsletter. Again, it goes out every three stories. So try to keep people involved there. And I’m happy to talk to people directly if you want to talk about business issues or if you want to talk about how to do something like this. My email is
eclover at cochamber.com. That’s E-S-E-A-L-O-V-E-R at cochamber.com. My phone number is 719-659-7907. And you can hit me on LinkedIn too, under Ed Sealover as well. But happy to talk about this project and happy to talk about business issues for anyone who may be interested.
Brandon Burton (33:59.838)
Perfect, I’ll make sure we get all that in our show notes for this episode to make it easy to find you and connect with you and for people to check out this platform that you’ve developed. This is really something pretty cool. I’d like to see more state chambers get on board with this because it is such an incredible resource for the local chambers and to really push good business advocacy. So thank you for sharing your experience and what you’ve developed and really just how it’s working for you guys there at the Colorado Chamber. I appreciate it.
Ed Sealover (34:28.048)
No, thanks for doing what you’re doing, Brandon. This is an important thing to let Chambers know how they can prosper as well. It’s an important thing that I realize. I love my relationships with local Chambers and anytime the state and local Chambers can work together, that’s when business is really succeeding.
Brandon Burton (34:48.824)
Absolutely. Well, thanks a lot Ed. This has been great.
Ed Sealover (34:52.389)
All right, thank you.
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