Ep 19: REI MBA - Chamber of Commerce: Resources & Benefits for Real Estate Investors
In this episode, Alison Pickel joins us for an interview where she shares the benefits and resources that the Lehigh Valley Chamber of Commerce provides to business owners and real estate investors and developers.
Alison is the Senior Vice President of Member Relations for The Lehigh Valley Chamber of Commerce. In this role, she has the privilege of helping entrepreneurs, small/medium/large businesses, non-profits, charities, and community organizations.
Some of her responsibilities include:
Planning networking/community events
Brainstorming business growth ideas with members
Making business connections and forging new partnerships
Mapping out strategic member branding/marketing campaigns.
You can reach Alison through the Chamber's website at https://www.lehighvalleychamber.org/.
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Interview Transcripts
Jeremy Moyer: Hello! Welcome back to Real Estate Investor MBA for another great interview that we have lined up for you today. My name is Jeremy Moyer, and I'm one of your hosts. Please check out our website RealEstateInvestor.MBA.com where we have all the past interviews in video, audio, and written transcription formats. We are also available on several podcast platforms such as iTunes, Stitcher, Spotify, Google Podcast, iHeartRadio and TuneIN. Please subscribe and download all the past episodes to listen to them. A lot of great content has been shared to date by our prior guests. If you think we're providing value, please give us a 5-star review and leave us some feedback. In doing so more people would be able to find us and listen to the insight from our interviewed guests. I'm excited to announce our guest today...Alison Pickel. So Alison is the Senior Vice President of Member Relations for the Lehigh Valley Chamber of Commerce. In this role, she has the privilege of helping entrepreneurs, small / medium / and large businesses, non-profits, charity and community organizations. Some of her responsibilities include planning networking/ community events, brainstorming business growth ideas with members, making business connections and forging new partnerships, and mapping out strategic member branding and marketing campaigns. Alison, thanks so much for your time this afternoon and joining us for the interview.
Alison Pickel: Yeah, thank you so much for having me. I'm excited to be on today's podcast. Thanks Jeremy.
Jeremy Moyer: Absolutely. Now, can you tell our listeners just a little bit more about yourself and how you ended up getting started working with the Chamber?
Alison Pickel: Sure. Absolutely. So I am from the Lehigh Valley originally and I went to school in Philadelphia. Went to Temple University. I graduated in 2008. I probably would have stayed in the city for a little bit longer, but you know, needed a job. So I moved back home and waitressed and found some jobs here and there to pick up. And then I ended up landing with the Chamber in 2008, in November. So I'm actually celebrating 12 years this month, which is very exciting. But I started as an Executive Assistant, there supporting our Easton and Phillipsburg initiatives. And then I just worked my way up through the organization and they've been so incredible to me. Our President and CEO Tony Iannelli has offered every opportunity to grow and I just, so that's where I started, as an assistant supporting or Easton / Phillipsburg communities and also our Chief Operating Officer at the time.
Jeremy Moyer: Great. Thank you for that. So outside the Chamber itself, does the Chamber work with other organizations in the area, like to spearhead different projects or just to collaborate in general?
Alison Pickel: We do. So one of our tag lines is "Power of Partnerships" and we are all about Partnerships with outside organizations. And we also...I probably say the word "collaborate" at least three dozen times a day because it's really who we are at the core of our organization. Our mission is to improve and enhance the quality of life here in the Lehigh Valley. And it is a really straightforward Mission and it allows our communities, our chambers and counsels, and our staff to just do a lot of good things, and cool community events, and those partnerships, and those collaboration opportunities. That's really who we are at our core.
Jeremy Moyer: That's wonderful. So, I don't know if you follow the real estate market here locally. Right now investors are experiencing a very competitive environment. Simply probably due to supply and demand, you know interest rates are a crazy low time right now. Any type of competitive advantage that investors can leverage can make a really big difference. So I'm not sure if investors here locally or you know, listening in other markets and they can reach out to their Chambers, are aware of the valuable resources the Chamber has to offer for the business community. Can you just kind of touch base upon and explain some...what the Chamber does for local businesses and entrepreneurs within the market?
Alison Pickel: Sure so actually I'll start there if that's okay. We are a business membership organization. We're the 6th largest in the country, which is pretty incredible. There's 33 Councils and Chambers that are part of the Greater Lehigh Valley Chamber. So what's incredible, is that our members, they could be your small mom-and-pop retailers and restaurants in our downtown's and urban cores, to our larger corporations and companies that are with us... Olympus, Lehigh Valley Health Network, PPL. Those are all members and they’re active with the Chamber. And we have every sector of business that's engaged with our organization. So our members receive the benefit of being part of all of those Councils and Chambers and that includes our geographic groups. So we have our City Council's and Chambers like Allentown, Easton, Bethlehem, Phillipsburg. We have our smaller Nazareth, Hellertown, Lower Saucon. And we are very proud of our diversity councils that we have at the chamber as well. So we have African American, Hispanic, Women's Business Council, Veterans. And the reason I always make a point to mention those various Chambers and Councils is because you know whether real estate developers or anyone within that industry or market has full access to the benefits that the chamber provides and networking opportunities. The Lehigh Valley is great. I mentioned I went to school in Philadelphia. But the reason I came back here because it is such a tight-knit community and the access to the resources are there for those in the real estate market, those who are looking to have a competitive edge really no matter what industry they're in. And the Chamber and membership offers those opportunities. We do in April actually, we have a very large Real Estate.... Commercial Real Estate Outlook event. This year, you know again, we had to move that to a virtual setting. But we typically have between 500-600 developers, anyone real estate professionals, anyone within that industry participating to see what the trends are, what we're seeing as a community, and where people should be investing as a business.
Jeremy Moyer: That's great. Did you say the 6th largest in the country?
Alison Pickel: We are yes. We're the 6th largest. Yep. All through the Partnerships and again that collaboration over 22, 23 years has got us to where we're at today. And there's no stopping us now. We are always open to new opportunities and new partnerships just to again support our communities, support our businesses, and support those that live in all of our, in all of our Lehigh Valley communities. And they're all fantastic in their own right. They have their own, it's you know, their own flavor, their own uniqueness, but I think that's what makes our Valley so incredible to play, to work, and to live.
Jeremy Moyer: Absolutely. Now you touch based upon resources that are available. Can you just go into a little more specifics on what those resources might be?
Alison Pickel: Sure. So as the Chamber we do offer networking opportunities. We have events...community events and festivals. We have been able; we were able to mobilize very quickly as a Chamber in March when this really all hit and we moved everything online. All of our staff were working really around the clock and just supporting our members. Particularly when all the rules and regulations depending on the industry was shifting so quickly. So we, when I mentioned resources, I think one of the most, I would say, challenging times for businesses, but as in an organization, we really pulled together our resources, contacted legislators. We were just able to get through a lot of the red tape because we have those relationships. So a phone call into any one of your chamber employees, you know, we're able to find answers for our members, for anyone very quickly. And then one of the resources we did pull together and still are offering our members is, we have some of our partner strategic law firms. We're offering free consultations. Same thing with accounting firms. Because many of our are small businesses (small businesses are the lifeblood of our organization), they didn't have access to those legal resources and they had dozens of questions. So we were able to directly connect them with some attorneys to help answer and provide some clarity on all you know, everything that was shifting and changing so quickly and all of our worlds and still is.
Jeremy Moyer: Absolutely. It's a... We are living in a very different time right now. That's for sure. And is business is... can be complicated to begin with sometimes right and just adding this layer of complexity really changes a lot. So if a business is looking at expanding to new locations or they're just, they just have general questions about marketing or whatever, can they, is the Chamber a resource for that as well or?
Alison Pickel: Absolutely...absolutely. I always say when in doubt contact the Chamber. Because if we don't have the answer we will more than likely have that connection or that relationship to someone that will have the answer for you. You know, it's funny. I get phone calls and texts and emails...you know this probably isn't a question you can answer...but I always encourage anyone who is either a member, interested in engaging with the Chamber, just pick up the phone and call us. We all have cell phones and we're happy to help in any way possible. Even if one of us doesn't have that answer, we more than likely know the person who does.
Jeremy Moyer: That's awesome. I didn't even know that resource was available for businesses. So that's good to know. You mentioned a few smaller subchapters. If you know one's a member of the Chamber are they also members of the subchapters that they can leverage and take advantage of?
Alison Pickel: They are. So that's what's really cool. If a business invests in the Chamber, they're a member across the board. So our recommendation as part of the Member Relations team is to align yourself with where you're located geographically and then also finding one of our Diversity Councils or Chambers to align yourself with. So I interface with all of those Councils and Chambers and the leaders that lead them internally. And they all have their own Boards of Directors and Committees that are active. We have hundreds, if probably not close to a thousand volunteers that are active with us and they're just all incredible professionals and leaders and individuals in their businesses, in their industry. But yes. They are considered a member across the board. And at any time they can engage with any of those Councils and Chambers. They can attend events. Maybe sit on a Committee because that really widens your network as a business professional and then serve on a board. Again and it's just they're here. Those leaders, those volunteers are there to help each other and lift other businesses up. And we have, we actually have a Council called the Ambassadors Council that works very closely with our Member Relations Team. So they help us with onboarding new members and it's great because it's that member to member conversation, working with them throughout their membership, again leveraging those opportunities, cultivating new relationships. And at any given time you have at least 12 people that are a phone call away. They're happy to help you, to guide you and just to help you navigate this really wild world of business right now.
Jeremy Moyer: That's tremendous. That's an awesome service that you guys provide. So this is a Real Estate podcast. I'm going to ask some real estate related / slanted questions.
Alison Pickel: Sure.
Jeremy Moyer: So we have just regular landlords out there that's just looking to...do I buy rentals in Allentown or Bethlehem or Easton are you know the surrounding municipalities? Or maybe there's a developer out there looking, you know, ‘do I develop self storage spots’, or ‘do I develop, you know, do I want to expand the commercial buildings or even apartment buildings’. Like are there good resources within the Chamber that they can reach out to maybe discuss the job market in a municipality? Is there more jobs potentially coming to this area that it's worth taking an investment risk of building more residential units, for example?
Alison Pickel: Absolutely. So I think it's dependent on the request. We have really good friends and partners worth "Workforce Board Lehigh Valley" who again have those relationships with the job seekers and the employers here. We work very closely with a number, many number of their staff there. Of course, Lehigh Valley Economic Development Corporation, Discover Lehigh Valley. So we all were closely and again and we look at the request and the nature of the request and then pull in the necessary folks to help answer those requests. I will say to what we've done as a Chamber. We've done walking tours of downtowns. We've done a "Real Estate Inside Look" so developers that are coming in that are developing medium-sized, large-scale projects projects, you know mixed use. We've done inside looks where we've actually had kind of this Open Door tours where it's safe. We've had the developer speak and just talk about the project. And what's nice is that it really, the Chamber there serves as a catalyst and kind of bringing everyone together to see the big picture of what that project is going to be. We've done that, oh my goodness, at least two dozen times within the last two years and it's it's a great networking event to meet others in the industry. But also to, rather than reading about maybe a development project in the paper, it's that one-on-one interaction that our business professionals can have with the developers and those that are engaged in the project and I think it just really puts that project on a pedestal, you know, and offers the additional opportunities for others to work together if they're looking for, they're looking for renters, if they're looking for, you know commercial if they have a commercial space available and they're looking maybe for business wants to open a second location or you know, there are so many various success stories when it comes to doing those kinds of, and we call them "Inside Look" events. Just again that one-on-one personal opportunity to meet those that are engaged with a project.
Jeremy Moyer: That's tremendous. So is the... I wasn't aware of that. Is the "Inside Look" is that all posted on the website.
Alison Pickel: It is. So we have a Chamber calendar that's on https://web.lehighvalleychamber.org/events. And then we also communicate to our members through social media. I always recommend just following us on social media. We also have weekly emails where we highlight all of those upcoming events. So there's at least four different communication vehicles in which we use to get the word out on these kinds of events. Because we're all in a virtual setting right now, I foresee us being virtual probably until spring, but we're proud to continue to provide that content and we will at any time we can, although it will be virtual. But as soon as we can be back in person and doing those kinds of events and we're going to be, I promise you that. We're all missing it. We're missing it. There is nothing like that energy being the room with someone.
Jeremy Moyer: Absolutely. I was talking with someone about going to networking events the other week and he's...he used to go to them all the time and he's going; I think it's going through withdrawal.
Alison Pickel: Yeah, I think we all are. I mean that's how we do business. And I know since I've been here the last 12 years, that's how I did business and that other members of the business community and we'll be back. We'll be back better than ever. It's just a matter of when.
Jeremy Moyer: Exactly. So outside the "Inside Look" events and the annual, you mentioned there is an annual real estate....was it conference? Is that what it was?
Alison Pickel: Commercial Real Estate Outlook event.
Jeremy Moyer: Okay. Outside those two are there any other like subgroup committees or those are mainly the main real estate-related, I guess you can say committee / events that the Chamber has?
Alison Pickel: I would say that those are the most focused. You will see as you look at those Board Members and Leadership positions across the Chamber, you'll see representation from Real Estate, but those are really the priority areas. We do have a very active public policy board with subcommittees, manufacturing, healthcare, tax and regulatory, but I would say those events that we host this major spring event and then the events that we host in all of our respective communities are where were most active and engaged at least on the real estate front.
Jeremy Moyer: Okay, that makes sense. So what are the best ways for investors to reach out if they're interested in just (1) learning more information or (2) they're like, you know what this sounds amazing. I want to get involved. What's the best way for them to do that?
Alison Pickel: You can contact me of course Alison Pickel. None of our staff members hide easily. We shouldn't. But our contact information is on the Chamber's website. I'm always happy to help. Happy to connect. That's what really...we call ourselves the connectors. That's what we do day in and day out. But certainly I'm a resource as is anyone on the staff with the Chamber.
Jeremy Moyer: Okay, so just go to the website and then peruse to find a way to contact. Okay. And you said social media was a good way too, right?
Alison Pickel: Social media absolutely. Social media as well as our whole Chamber staff is right on the website there, so you can contact our cell phones listed, our emails and that's the best way to get in touch with any of us. And like I said, any question that one may have, you know, send it to us because... We joke that we should write a book of all the questions we received. There's some doozies out there, but it's funny how things come in and it's coming to picture for us, how these event concepts come to be, how these new partnerships. I mean, we really keep our eyes wide open when it comes to opportunities to work with our members.
Jeremy Moyer: That's tremendous. All right, so I have probably the most important question... Okay. It's the toughest.
Alison Pickel: All right.
Jeremy Moyer: So out of all the restaurants in the Lehigh Valley, which one's your favorite?
Alison Pickel: Well gosh, I would be in so much trouble if I answer that question. I don't think I could do it. It really depends on the mood that I'm in. But I will say we probably eat out, since March we were doing Take out, supporting our restaurants...still are today. I'm 5 minutes from downtown Easton. So I do have to kind of give a shout-out to our downtown Eastern restaurants. Because I think I was at the Bayou on Sunday. I was at Setta Luna on Friday. I was at…….. on Wednesday. So yeah.
Jeremy Moyer: You have a lot to choose from there.
Alison Pickel: Absolutely Showing the love. It's important. Our restaurants need us right now.
Jeremy Moyer: Absolutely. I'll take that answer as an answer.
Alison Pickel: Okay, good. I could be in a lot of trouble.
Jeremy Moyer: Awesome. Well Alison, thank you so much for your time.
Alison Pickel: Thank you. It was fun. It was exciting maybe next time, I know it's a podcast but maybe next time we can do something in person.
Jeremy Moyer: That'd be tremendous. Absolutely. So to our listeners, if you're seeing us providing value, just please leave us a 5-star rating on iTunes or other platforms that you use. Also tell five other people about our show to help grow our audience. Everyone, this is Alison Pickel with the Lehigh Valley Chamber of Commerce. I'm Jeremy Moyer with Real Estate Investor MBA. We look forward to seeing you next time. Thank you.
Alison Pickel: Thank you.
