Fake snow is in high demand; just don’t ask how it’s made
The nightly holiday show on Disneyland’s Main Street culminates with soaring music and fireworks exploding high over Sleeping Beauty Castle. But the faces in the crowds really light up when the music fades and something unexpected gently falls from the sky. A toddler, sitting on her father’s shoulders, spreads her arms and exclaims, “It’s snow!” Spoiler alert: It’s not really snow. The white puffs drifting to the ground at the...
The Exit Interview: Samantha Stanford, Owner and Founder of Dirty Dog Mobile Grooming
Americans spent $6.6 billion on pet boarding and grooming services in 2017, according to the American Pet Products Manufacturers Association, and the U.S Bureau of Labor Statistics predicts that jobs in pet grooming will grow by 11 percent through at least 2023. Add to that a 2018 American Veterinary Medical Association report that shows almost 30 percent of Vermont and 24 percent of New Hampshire households own at least one dog, and...
The food truck industry is growing in Vt. and N.H. and shows no signs of slowing down
On a humid June night, hundreds of people waited in Lebanon’s Colburn Park to sample fares from 13 food trucks. While the patrons stood in line, generators buzzed and chefs pivoted through the hot interiors of the trucks, filling orders for everything from lobster rolls to fried cauliflower to Thai food. “It seems very popular,” said Meagan Henry, an administrative assistant with the city’s Recreation and Parks Department and...
In the Spotlight: Vermont trio competes in ‘The Great Food Truck Race’
Times Argus Competing in national TV contests has become something of a family affair for the Aldriches in Montpelier. Most recently, Sue Aldrich was a member of Team Make It Maple in “The Great Food Truck Race” on The Food Network, which premiered in June. The Aldriches are no strangers to national TV competition. Sue Aldrich’s husband, Alex, the former executive director of Vermont Arts Council, was a quarter-finalist on...
The HR Pro: How to cope with sudden layoff? Here’s some ideas
Star Tribune You’ve been laid off unexpectedly and need to get a job fast. Readers offered their advice on what to do next. Before you jump into next steps, take some time to catch your breath. It’s really important to process what happened, especially if you weren’t ready for it. It would be natural to be angry, sad, afraid or a combination thereof. Don’t be hard on yourself for these feelings; just notice and let yourself feel them....
Score Stories: Country Kids Clothing bucks ‘retail apocalypse’ theory
While some of the country’s most prominent retailers are closing their doors due to the rise of e-commerce, Liz Joyce, owner of Country Kids Clothing, a boutique in the Power House Mall in West Lebanon, is bucking that trend. Since opening her brick-and-mortar location in July 2012, she’s turned a profit all seven years, and she’s only getting started. “People have called it ‘the retail apocalypse’ and the consumer shift to online has...
The Business of Agriculture: Female Farmers Lead the Way in New Hampshire
A young child wearing a pink dress, fairy wings attached to her back, watering seeds in the family greenhouse. That is Forrest Barker’s favorite photograph of herself. Now 23, she may not have the fairy wings, but Barker’s passion for the farmland on which she grew up has only swelled. She took that zeal to Cornell University to study agricultural sciences, and returned after graduation to the multiple-generation farm off Route 33 in...
Leadership Upper Valley: Employers Tap Into Program to Equip Workers, Bolster Community
Employers and their workers have lots of choices when it comes to investing in professional development. Workshops, conferences, degree programs, mentoring — there’s a range of opportunities locally, regionally and beyond to help employees build their job and leadership skills, and companies are increasingly seeing the value in investing in their employees. But there’s more to professional development than the hard skills necessary to...
As Joblessness Falls, Skilled Workers Might Be Harder to Find
Are America’s employers at risk of running out of skilled people to hire? The U.S. economy has become a seemingly perpetual job-generating machine, having steadily added workers for nearly eight years. Even with the unemployment rate now at 3.7 percent — its lowest point since 1969 — hiring hasn’t stalled. So far this year, job agrowth has averaged a robust 208,000 a month, up from a pace of 182,000 for all of 2017. The trend has...
On the Hunt for Help: Upper Valley Employers Fight for Workers
The signs are everywhere, and are hard to miss. Now hiring. Help wanted. Jobs available. Apply online. All positions needed. They appear outside manufacturing plants, stuck in the ground at fast-food establishments and big-box retailers or posted just inside the door. They can be spotted on rural roads with no surrounding buildings, or along a town’s main thoroughfare. Applications for employment are prominently displayed as customers...
