VALDOSTA, GA- The Chamber Ambassadors recently held a ribbon cutting at Little Angels Pre-School & Child Care Center.

The school is owned and operated by Chanita Irvin. Ms. Irvin has been in business for 18 years, and has recently expanded by adding a new infant and toddler facility, and will be ready to receive 80 “little angels” on February 22.

In 2016, Little Angels Pre-School and Child Care Center received the Early Learning Expansion Grant, a grant available to child care and education organizations located in Early Education Empowerment Zones, or E3Zs, in order for those programs to serve infants and toddlers with high needs. “Not only does the grant allow us to serve more children, but we can now provide new jobs and increase pay for current employees,” said Ms. Irvin.

For more information on Little Angels Pre-School & Child Care Center, call 229-253-9678 or visit the campus at 512 N. Forrest Street in Valdosta.

For pictures and further information about this event, visit ValdostaChamber.com.

Good morning. I’m earlier than usual, but I hope you can tune in. It’s 8 a.m. instead of 8:30 and I’m filming from my car. Oddly enough this is one of my favorite places to be on a Tuesday morning. Every other week we are invited to Talk 92.1, the Scott James Show, to talk about the Chamber and what it’s doing. That kind of ties in to part 4 of the four prongs of the Chamber which is promoting. We are huge advocates for your business in every avenue of the media, but we wouldn’t be able to do that without our Media Cares Partner and Talk 92.1 is one of those. Our Media Cares Partner is a group of media that gives us in kind sponsorships for advertising. Some of our partners include: Fairway Outdoor, WALB, Talk 92.1, Motion Wave, Fusion Creative Marketing and tons of others. I will be posting a picture today listing our fabulous Media Cares Partners’. We could not do what we do to promote your business without them. I won’t keep you guys, but I want you to tune in to 92.1FM, the Scott James Show, we will have our 2017 board chairman James McGahee as well as our 2016 board chairman Michael Lee on the show. They will fill you in on what’s going on so tune in and enjoy. Have a great day!

VALDOSTA, GA – The Chamber Ambassadors honored Commercial Cleaning Industries as Leading Business of the Week this week.

Commercial Cleaning Industries is a full-service cleaning company with more than 25 years experience. They offer janitorial services, commercial cleaning and VCT floor cleaning as well as grout carpet and tile cleaning.

From schools, office buildings, movie theaters and more, Commercial Cleaning Industries makes “cleanliness their business.”

Commercial Cleaning Industries is located at 4246 Zipperer Road in Valdosta, but you can contact them by calling 229-292-3721or by visiting http://www.commercialcleaningvaldosta.com.

The Leading Business of the Week program is designed to recognize members who have partnered with the Chamber for at least five years.  The 2016 Leading Business of the Week program is proudly sponsored by Ashley’s Business Solutions.  For more information, visit www.ValdostaChamber.com/Leading-Business-of-the-Week.

Good Morning and Happy Valentine’s Day! I hope you guys are having a good week so far. This morning I’m going to talk to you a little bit about part 3 of the 4 prongs of the Chamber. Over the past 2 weeks we’ve talked about the advocacy efforts of the Chamber, building your business through the Chamber and today we’re going to talk about connecting. Connecting is a quintessential part of the Chamber, any good chamber does that for you, but we try to take it to the next level. We offer so many networking events, meetings, and so much more. We offer events such as Business after Hours and Another Cup with the Chamber which can be seen as the morning version of Business after Hours. We also offer the Link and Valdosta Networking Professionals. Valdosta Networking Professionals actually meets noon today at Wooden Nickel Pub. So if you’re looking for a way to connect with professionals in the area, you’re new to the area, or you just haven’t quite figured out the direction you want to go with a business make sure you go hang out with them. Taylor Hutchinson is the chairmen for that organization; they are a great group of people. The Link meets at the Chamber on Thursdays. If you’re interested in either of those groups you can contact Betty Morgan, SEEDS Business Resource Center director. For other Chamber networking opportunities check out our calendar at www.valdostachamber.com. Here you will find tons of things that are offered to you to help you get involved in the community. We have the Chamber Annual Awards coming Feb. 23 and that’s also a great way to network. Tickets are still available for the Chamber Annual Awards and you can contact me if you are interested. So make sure you check out our events and come hang with us. For the most part events are free, but every so often we have an admission fee for things such as the Chamber Annual Awards. So contact me if you have any questions and we look forward to seeing you. Have a great day!

VALDOSTA, GA – The Chamber Ambassadors honored Nu-Smile Family Dentistry as Leading Business of the Week this week.

Nu-Smile is a family-oriented practice committed to providing patients with the best in dental care. The business opened in 2009, when Dr. Colvin moved to the Valdosta area. Nu-Smile began with little to no patient base, and the practice has been built on simply treating patients like family.

At Nu-Smile, the staff is like family too, according to Jennifer Youmans, Dental Practice Administrator. “I can speak for all of us and say that we absolutely love coming to work. We have so much fun with our patients, while still maintaining our professionalism.”

Joining the Chamber as a new business in 2009, Nu-Smile Family Dentistry has been a member for nearly 8 years. “The people that work with the Chamber truly love our community and are always there to lend a helping hand, especially to new businesses. If you haven’t joined the Chamber, let me encourage you to do so! It will make a tremendous difference in getting to know the community,” says Youmans.

You can visit Nu-Smile Family Dentistry at 1657 River Street in Valdosta or give them a call at 229-244-8884.

The Leading Business of the Week program is designed to recognize members who have partnered with the Chamber for at least five years.  The 2016 Leading Business of the Week program is proudly sponsored by Ashley’s Business Solutions.  For more information, visit www.ValdostaChamber.com/Leading-Business-of-the-Week.

Good Morning. I hope you survived your Monday and welcome to part two of the four prongs of the Chamber. For those of who don’t know me I’m Kaitlyn the Communications Coordinator here at the Valdosta-Lowndes Chamber of Commerce. This morning were going to talk a little bit about “Build” the A.B.C.P’s. B obviously stands for build. I don’t want to steal too much of Mrs. Betty’s thunder because she’ll be talking a lot more about what she does at the SEEDS Business Resource Center on Thursdays, but I will give a little bit of an overview. I’ll also be posting a link for you guys so that you can check out her Facebook page and her website. The SEEDS Business Resource Center hosts classes called Business University. These classes cover a wide range of topics that you will need in your professional life. They also host networking groups for your business. If you’re interested let myself or Mrs. Betty know and we can put you in touch with the right person. Another thing that she’s really diving into are her new databases. She’s got a couple that are really cool. I always tell people that she has some heat map features that allow her to tell me how many people cross by the Chamber on Patterson Street every day and that’s so cool to me. Again, I won’t steal her thunder but she’s got some really cool stuff going on. I won’t keep you guys, but Thursday morning at 8:30 I will be filling in for Mrs. Betty at Rainwater Conference Center. We’re hosting the Business Outlook Breakfast along with Southeastern Credit Union so I’ll be giving you a little background on that. Maybe we’ll sneak in and get a little bit of footage from the event. I’ll post the link so you guys can tune in because if you didn’t buy tickets to the event I want to see you on Facebook. Have a good day.

If you don’t know me already, I’m Kaitlyn Redish and I’m the Communications Coordinator here at the Valdosta-Lowndes Chamber of Commerce and I’m Betty Morgan and I’m the Director of the SEEDS Business Resource Center. So if you’re not a member of the SEEDS Business Resource Center Facebook Page, which you should be, you’re probably not aware that Betty and I are going to start doing some Facebook Live Videos. I’ll be live every Tuesday morning at 8:30 and Ms. Betty will be live every Thursday morning at 8:30 just to give you guys a little bit of insight on the benefits to being a chamber member as well as some tips and tricks on networking and what the SEEDS Business Resource Center can offer you whether you’re a chamber member or not. So join us on Tuesdays and Thursdays at 8:30 and bring your coffee because we love coffee. We also welcome questions and we’ll hopefully be able to get you some answers right away, if not afterwards. So this morning I want to start by telling you a little bit about the Chamber. There are 4 parts to the Chamber: The advocacy, the building, the connecting, and the promoting. We’re going to start today by telling you a little bit about the advocacy efforts. Whether you’re a chamber member or not the Chamber is working for you every single day at the local, state and federal levels as the voice of business for you because obviously you guys are busy as business owners and entrepreneurs. We want to work for you so if you’ll stay tuned and tune in on Tuesdays and Thursdays hopefully we can convince Ms. Myrna, President of the Valdosta-Lowndes Chamber of Commerce and also a registered lobbyist, to come chat with us. We’ll have her kind of give you guys a feel for what’s going on in the area and how the advocacy efforts can affect you daily so tune in on Thursday right? Absolutely, come join me every Thursday morning at 8:30. We have a great number of resources that we can offer you and if you don’t know about them you don’t know how to use them; so give us a try. Yes, absolutely, we’ll see you Thursday. Have a great day.