Current News

Vermont Business Magazine Comcast today announced it will increase speeds for its most popular Xfinity Internet tiers across 14 northeastern states from Maine through Virginia and the District of Columbia. The company will also roll out new download speeds up to 2 gigabits-per-second (Gbps) – combined with up to 5x-to-10x faster upload speeds – for Xfinity customers in markets across the Northeast, including Baltimore, Boston, Hartford, Philadelphia, and Washington, DC, before the end of the year.

VermontBiz Gifford will distribute meals for Upper Valley Everyone Eats this month on Tuesday, October 25 between 5 – 5:30 p.m. at Gifford’s South Parking lot. The frozen meals, provided by Global Village Foods, are available by reservation. To reserve a meal or for any other questions, please contact Gifford Community Relations Coordinator, Katja Evans at 802-728-2377.

Upper Valley Everyone Eats is the local hub of Vermont’s coronavirus relief program, Vermont Everyone Eats (VEE). VEE provides nutritious meals to Vermonters in need of food assistance, as well as a stabilizing source of income for Vermont restaurants, farmers, and food producers. This program is open to all Vermonters looking to stretch their food budget as a result of the pandemic or otherwise. Check giffordhelathcare.org for updates on future Upper Valley Everyone Eats meal distributions at Gifford.

VermontBiz The Vermont Working Communities Challenge (WCC) has released its Initial Report sharing the new approaches made by the eight Vermont teams over the first three years to address systemic challenges in Vermont like housing, childcare, poverty, workforce development, racial equity, and more. The report was shared with Vermont’s decision-makers and community builders on October 14 and is now publicly available.

WCC was launched in Vermont in 2019 as a partnership between the State of Vermont and the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston (FRBB) to advance collaborative efforts to build healthy economies and communities in northern New England’s rural towns, regions, and smaller cities. The eight Vermont teams are focused on Greater Barre, Lamoille County, Northeast Kingdom, Northwest Vermont, Southern Vermont, Springfield Area, White River Valley, and Winooski - covering approximately 62% of Vermont.

VermontBiz Lawson’s Finest Liquids is making its classic maple ale, Mad River Maple, available to fans across the Northeast. Beginning this week, the Vermont favorite will be available to craft-beer lovers throughout the brewery’s entire nine state distribution area of VT, CT, MA, ME, NH, NJ, NY, PA, and RI.

Mad River Maple is a robust, rich maple ale brewed with 100% pure Vermont maple syrup. At 8% ABV, the beer delivers a smooth, palate pleasing feel with a slightly sweet finish. The beer’s name pays homage to Green Mountain State’s legendary Mad River Valley, home to both Lawson’s Finest Liquids and some of the region’s most sought after maple syrup producers.

VermontBiz Average gasoline prices in Burlington have fallen 1.1 cents per gallon in the last week, averaging $3.82/g today, according to GasBuddy's survey of 100 stations in Burlington. Prices in Burlington are 5.6 cents per gallon lower than a month ago and stand 49.8 cents per gallon higher than a year ago. The national average price of diesel has increased 18.7 cents in the last week and stands at $5.06 per gallon.

According to GasBuddy price reports, the cheapest station in Burlington was priced at $3.59/g yesterday while the most expensive was $3.99/g, a difference of 40.0 cents per gallon. The lowest price in the state yesterday was $3.29/g while the highest was $3.99/g, a difference of 70.0 cents per gallon.

VermontBiz The Agriculture Development Division of the Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets is seeking feedback on our weekly newsletter.

What started as a way to distribute up-to-date resources to the food and farm community during the COVID-19 pandemic has become a weekly newsletter highlighting funding and educational opportunities. As we move forward, we are looking for concrete feedback to inform the direction of the newsletter. We are also looking to better identify our audience so we can find and distribute content that is most relevant and useful to you!

Whether you love the newsletter, can't stand it, or think there's areas where we could do better, we sincerely hope you'll take a minute to help us improve this community resource.

VermontBiz U.S. Senator Patrick Leahy and GlobalFoundries (Nasdaq: GFS) (GF), a global leader in feature-rich semiconductor manufacturing, today announced the award of $30 million in federal funding to advance the development and production of next-generation gallium nitride (GaN) on silicon semiconductors at GF’s facility in Essex Junction, Vermont. With their unique ability to handle significant heat and power levels, GaN semiconductors are positioned to enable game-changing performance and efficiency in applications including 5G and 6G smartphones, RF wireless infrastructure, electric vehicles, power grids, solar energy, and other technologies.

VermontBiz This weekly report is a list of planned construction activities that will have traffic impacts on state highways throughout Vermont. Please remember to drive safely in all work zones. Lives depend on it.

Interstates

I-89 Richmond – A culvert repair project is underway. Motorists will encounter a mile-long lane closure in both directions just south of Exit 11 as southbound traffic is merged to the northbound lane using a crossover. A “zipper merge” traffic pattern is in place. Crews have begun building the culvert stream bed to get the stream flowing into the new concrete box culvert and will soon begin backfilling. Work hours are 24 hours a day, six days a week.

VermontBiz Near the end of the 2019-20 ski season, Vermont was thisclose to having a banner year. As has become typical over the last decade or so, the snow season has trended later and even into spring. March has become vital to the business of skiing in Vermont. And then COVID hit. Governor Phil Scott closed most businesses by executive order on March 14, 2020.

But despite ongoing restrictions at the Canadian border, a tight workforce and sketchy weather early last season, the ski industry did pretty well.

VermontBiz The history of alpine skiing in Vermont has been nothing short of breathtaking for skiers and journalists. Vermont was home to the first commercially available ski lift. Celebs came to ski at “Mascara Mountain,” the so-called “in” ski resort at Sugarbush frequented by New York fashionistas, led by Oleg Cassini.

Mount Snow, Stratton and Bromley were able to make fashion statements of their own. Ski resorts were playlands in the 1950s and ’60s. They featured gondolas and heated pools and ice rinks suitable for folks who preferred a leisurely weekend away from what was otherwise a leisurely life.

VermontBiz Talking to Matt Dunne, the founder and CEO of the national nonprofit Center on Rural Innovation, or CORI, which is based in an old general store in Hartland, is like hearing the history of economic development in Vermont — the one that is not based in Chittenden County.

Dunne, 52, and CORI are leaders in a growing national movement to develop rural entrepreneurship and, along the way, help end the digital divide. As consultants, they begin by helping a rural town increase its broadband and then go on to support business incubators — all of it designed so that tech development does not have to live and die in cities.