Current News

Vermont Business Magazine In a razor-thin finish, Vermont has beaten out Montana in a beard competition to benefit the Make-A-Wish chapters of their respective states. After learning of the annual Vermont Beardies, a competition to find the best beard in Vermont, Make-A-Wish Montana’s CEO challenged Vermont that Montanans could grow better beards and put a case of bison steaks on the line. He even recruited the mayor of Missoula to deliver the message.

Photo courtesy of Dillon Mears of Barre Town

Vermont Business Magazine Plans for restoring Amtrak Vermonter passenger rail service to Montreal, electric vehicle initiatives, and other critical Vermont-Quebec border transportation projects made headway today, driven by a long-standing partnership between the governments of Vermont and Quebec.

Vermont Agency of Transportation Secretary Joe Flynn, Premier of Quebec Phillip Couillard, Minister of Transport Andre Fortin, and other Canadian delegates and members of the business community toured Montreal’s Electric Vehicle Show and continued dialogue on specific initiatives to establish an electric car charging corridor between the two territories and to promote transportation electrification. Premier Couillard’s participation in today’s conversations reaffirms the transportation partnership and expansion of efforts proposed for the Cooperation Agreement between the State of Vermont and the Province of Quebec.

by Bruce Edwards Vermont Business Magazine Sonnax Industries Inc, a maker of automatic transmission parts in Bellows Falls, was sold in early April to Marmon Holdings, Inc, a subsidiary of Warren Buffett’s company, Berkshire Hathaway. Sonnax was an employee-owned company, whose ESOP was sued by the US Department of Labor, as first reported by VBM in January 2017.

According to a press release and email, the new company will operate as Sonnax Transmission Company. Terms of the sale were not disclosed. The company will remain in Vermont.

Sonnax has been one of Vermont’s fastest growing manufacturers with three plants in Bellows Falls. Revenues over the last 10 years have nearly doubled.

At the end of last year, Sonnax had 246 employees with 200 in Vermont and 46 in New Jersey. In 2017 it reported to VBM that revenues were $67.5 million.

Vermont Business Magazine The Vermont Department of Labor announced today that the seasonally-adjusted statewide unemployment rate for March was 2.8 percent. This reflects no change from the revised February rate. The national rate in March was 4.1 percent. As of the prior month’s preliminary data, the Burlington-South Burlington Metropolitan NECTA was fourth lowest unemployment rate in the country for all metropolitan areas. Overall, Vermont’s unemployment rate was tied for the fourth lowest in the country for the same time period.

Vermont Business Magazine Norwich University’s Architecture Design Build program, called 802LAB, has partnered with Montpelier’s Union Elementary School (UES) and the community to design and build an outdoor classroom/playhouse as part of the school’s planned playground renovations.

​Vermont Business Magazine The sixth annual Vermont’s Greenest Building Awards, hosted by the Vermont Green Building Network (VGBN), recognized seven projects and design/build teams. The projects received awards for achieving the highest standard of demonstrated building energy performance for residential and commercial buildings, and were judged based on an expanded definition of “green” building.

by Adam Grinold Brattleboro Development Credit Corporation Each summer college students search for opportunities that allow them to apply their education and gain hands on experience. Internships are also important to businesses, especially in Vermont’s Windham region where low unemployment means employers compete hard to secure talent. The BDCC & Six College Collaborative Internship program works to partner currently enrolled college students and recent college graduates with local Windham County businesses through paid work opportunities. The BDCC Paid Internship program benefits both intern and employer. Almost 25% of interns have stayed on to accept a permanent position.

Vermont Business Magazine Seven Days, Vermont’s free and independent weekly newspaper, is excited for the 9th Annual Vermont Restaurant Week, a celebration of the state’s vibrant food scene presented by the Vermont Federal Credit Union. For 10 days, April 20 to 29, 115 restaurants from Brattleboro to St. Albans will offer special prix-fixe dinners at three price points — $20, $30 or $40 per person. Lunch, brunch and breakfast specials at select locations will also be available. The diversity in cuisine and participating restaurants will whet the appetites of diners across the state. The full list of menus can be found at vermontrestaurantweek.com.

Vermont Business Magazine FirstLight, a leading fiber-optic bandwidth infrastructure services provider operating in the Northeast, has announced that Tri State Area Federal Credit Union, formerly Hoosick Federal Credit Union, has selected FirstLight for Internet and Voice services for its Bennington, VT location. Tri State Area Federal Credit Union (FCU) is a small, up and coming ($24M) community chartered not-for-profit doing business in the Tri State area of New York, Vermont and Massachusetts. The company will utilize FirstLight’s services to support data processing in the cloud.

Vermont Business Magazine Vermont will be represented at the 2018 Special Olympics USA Games by 19 athletes, Unified partners, and coaches competing in athletics (track and field events), Unified basketball, and swimming. Every four years, Special Olympics presents the USA Games where athletes from across the country compete in 14 team and individual sports. Over 4000 Special Olympic athletes are expected to participate in the USA Games this July in Seattle, Washington.

Vermont Business Magazine Governor Phil Scott today signed an executive order creating a Community Violence Prevention Task Force. The Executive Order, he said in a statement, is one part of the governor’s broader efforts to ensure Vermont continues to be one of the safest states in the country.

Vermont Business Magazine The state Senate has quickly overridden Governor Phil Scott’s veto of bill S103, which sought to give the Vermont Health Commissioner more flexibility in regulating consumer goods, with special concern regarding those for young children. The bill also follows along from the PFOA contamination in Bennington from the ChemFab plant, discovered in 2016. The bill would require testing of new groundwater sources and potable water supplies for specified chemical parameters. The governor vetoed S103 last Monday night. In doing so, he said the bill is duplicative to the state's already strong standards on hazardous materials and could increase costs of goods to consumers and businesses.