Kane Borough has several exciting projects in store for 2021, centered on revitalizing the community and providing training and assistance to businesses. Kane Mayor Brandy Schimp and Kate Kennedy, Executive Director of the Kane Area Development Center, sat down with The Era to discuss two of the major projects in store for the near future.
One topic which Kennedy discussed in detail was an upcoming hospitality training that will be offered to those in the hospitality industry, as well as an additional training for business owners and managers. The training was originally slated to be held in 2020, though COVID-19 restrictions delayed progression.
“In 2019, a group of mostly volunteer boards were planning different types of projects that can be done in a year,” said Kennedy. “We committed to doing that in a year’s time, but then COVID-19 hit.”
In January, the North Central Pennsylvania Regional Planning and Development Commission offered a one-time opportunity to apply for mini grants and the Northern Pennsylvania Regional College aided the group in applying for funding, which was approved.
The training is slated for 9 a.m. until 4 p.m. on June 14th and will be open to people in the PA Wilds and North Central PA region.
The training will be divided into a morning and evening session with the morning session focusing on sharpening customer service skills and being geared towards frontline hospitality workers, such as those who work in hotels, bars and restaurants. Individuals who are currently looking to get into the hospitality industry and want an addition to their resumes are encouraged to join as well. Lunch will be provided and there will be many networking opportunities.
“We want to train the people visitors are going to encounter first, to answer the question of what there is to do around here and tighten up customer service skills,” explained Kennedy.
“There’s nothing more heartbreaking than when people are working to make their region a great place and someone walks into an establishment to ask where there is something to do and they say “nothing”,” Schimp added. “This training will help people support their community and know where to point people in the right direction.”
Kennedy said the evening session will be geared towards business owners and managers in the hospitality industry, focusing on topics like workforce development/retention and marketing.
“Where are you now, where do you think you need to be and where do you need to be headed,” said Schimp when discussing potential topics for the evening session. “We did have a few businesses that opened during the pandemic and their plan now doesn’t look like it was originally supposed to be; we’ll be providing resources to help them.”
Individuals are invited to ‘save the date’ and contact Kate Kennedy at director@kanepa.com
with questions. More information on registering will be released soon.
Schimp and Kennedy were also both excited to talk about the Kane Branding Project.
“For years, Kane has had several different identities: the ice box, star in the forest…,” said Schimp. “Each organization would come up with something but nothing was very cohesive as a town brand that tied in with places like our parks, school districts and historical society.”
Kennedy said with the revitalization happening in the community, they felt it was right to have a cohesive look and feel. They were able to secure grant money and donations to hire Arnett Muldrough from Arnett Muldrough and Associates as a consultant to walk them through the branding process and create a brand toolkit.
“A lot of our communications in this town and when they do new signage — when people are selling memorabilia in Kane — it will have the same look and same tagline,” she said.
“A Star in the Forest” is the new chosen tagline, as an overwhelming amount of people showed support for it.
Some businesses have already started creating mugs and t-shirts with the brand and the next step for the Kane Chamber of Commerce is to redo their website with the new branding in mind.
