Pemaquid Communications

Our year as an inaugural entreverge award recipient officially concluded last week with the selection of new winners at the June 16 gala at Port City Music Hall. So now is a good time to reflect.

When you win an award like entreverge, naturally people often ask how the award changes your life and makes a difference in your business. One thing’s for sure – 2009 was a very tough year, but it would have been much tougher without entreverge.

Entreverge definitely helped build an awareness of Pemaquid, what we are all about, and our coworking experiment at Wycwah. The award’s endorsement has helped to solidify the support of the creative community here in Portland behind what we’re doing.

It’s been great to get some face time with entreverge advisors like former governor Angus King, IDEXX Founder David Shaw, Swardlick marketing group principal David Swardlick, the management consultants of the local ACE chapter, and many others (I was particularly pleased to see that long-time Client Gabrielle Melchionda of Mad Gab’s was among them).

Those connections forged will always be there, and who knows what opportunities they might lead to down the road, and the advisor’s perspective on business and what Pemaquid is doing has been helpful.

On the other hand, no magical secrets were revealed. No great bolts from the blue that have transformed the business. In that sense, it reaffirmed one of life’s basic truths: there’s no substitute for hard work, and when the lights dim and the cameras get turned elsewhere things still boil down to you, your own personal energy and your belief in yourself and what your doing.

Perhaps more exciting than meeting some high-powered advisors was the opportunity to meet and get to know my fellow 2009 entreverge winners. Karen Farrell of Top Line Marketing, Emilie Sommer of emilie inc., Adrianne Zahner of Turtle Love Committee and Jeremy Litchfield of Atayne are all doing amazing things, right here in Portland, Maine, and it’s been so great to get to know them and compare notes. I’m so glad that entreverge decided to select five winners each year instead of just one.

What’s next for Pemaquid? More and more of the same. Smart, bulletproof, common-sense Web design and development, delivered with style, by people who speak English (not geek) and don’t talk down to you, is needed more than ever.

We’re so glad to be doing it here in Portland, Maine, and we’re jazzed that our fair city has entreverge, a fantastic way to recognize, build awareness and support great business ideas and the spirit of entrepreneurship.

When it comes to 2009, one thing’s for sure – there was never a dull moment. In fact, it had more ups and downs than the SooperDooperLooper. I like excitement, but I’m hoping 2010 will be a year of steadier, more balanced growth.

The year started off with, shall we say, a “subdued” business climate. Then in January two long-time collaborators decided to go their own way and haven’t looked back. No calls, no emails, no coffee, no beer, no lunch. (I blame myself). For someone who went into business in part to try to build a better kind of workplace, that one still hurts bad. Real bad.

In February, with the commercial real estate market being what it was (at a low ebb, that is), it was time to head downtown and see if I could score some office space. I got very lucky and hit the jackpot with a top floor space at 28 Maple Street, formerly occupied by Lapchick Creative. I couldn’t rent the entire floor space, but worked out a deal w/our landlord, Portland Pie (Best. Landlord. Ever.) to rent part of it and then see if I could bring in like-minded creatives to fill it out as a coworking space.

I had heard about the idea of coworking, through Twitter of all places, and in April it became a trending topic in Portland, thanks in part to a great article in The Switch by Avery Yale Kamila. Then Space Gallery held a Jelly – a coworking open house of sorts – and we followed suit (we hosted Jellies on a monthly basis throughout most of 2009 and we intend to continue this year). Our space now has four full-time members, two part-time members and a funky name – Wycwah (you’ll have to ask a member how we came up with that one). You can follow Wycwah on Twitter, naturally.

In February, I decided to try a NoonHat lunch, organized by the folks at Portland Greendrinks. There, purely by chance, I ran into Sheila Reiser, a gal who was in-between jobs and to some extent was trying to find herself. Needing a Creative Services Coordinator, after the departure of an aforementioned collaborator, I decided to take a chance, and hired her.

Here’s the thing you need to understand about Sheila: she didn’t have a computer, a Facebook page or a Twitter account. Her mobile phone was an ancient model, and I don’t think she sent very many text messages outside of those we exchanged. Quite an unusual hire for a company that does Web design and development.

What Sheila did have, however, was a keen interest in typography and a can-do, supportive attitude. She was not in this game of life for the money (she had turned her back on her career as an officer in the Coast Guard – she graduated from the Academy), she actually wanted to help Pemaquid make a difference, and see if it was in any way fulfilling for her. She had a courteous, military bearing, but was not “professional”. Refreshing, just right for Pemaquid (courteous but not “professional”), and a very good fit as it turned out.

In March, I caught another break, bumping into Jordan Warren, while giving a presentation on e-commerce to her class at the University of Southern Maine. Jordan quickly became Pemaquid’s first summer intern, and the experience went so well that she has continued on as a part-time employee, and she’s doing a bang up job as my Humble Apprentice. When Sheila left in mid-December, Jordan assumed her role as Pemaquid’s new Creative Services Coordinator. You will be hearing much more about her soon enough.

In June, Pemaquid was nominated for one of the first-ever entreverge awards by a Client, Curtis Picard of the Maine Merchants Association. We were nominated for advancing the idea of coworking in Portland, and we were lucky enough to be one of five companies (out of 50+ nominees) to win. Winners have access to an Advisory Committee that includes former governor Angus King, Idexx founder David Shaw and David Swardlick of Swardlick Marketing Group. Happily, one of our Clients, Gabrielle Melchionda of Mad Gab’s is also an advisor. Over the coming weeks, I will be writing about my experience with entreverge advisors.

My entreverge has been wonderful, and has quite possibly saved my business. It’s mission – to celebrate and promote good, creative business ideas and innovation here in Maine – is something that should be supported year after year. Kudos to Johann Sabbath and the folks at Propel for bringing it to life.

I’ve met many wonderful folks through coworking, and many through social media connections. Portland has many wonderfully talented “digital creatives” and I’m hoping there will be many opportunities to collaborate in the coming year.

Like a lot of folks, I’m looking forward to a better 2010, but there’s definitely going to be a lot of very hard work to be done to be successful. The business of Web design continues to evolve, forcing those of us in the market to adapt quickly. The economy still isn’t exactly rainbows and unicorns like it was a few years ago, and competition for the best gigs will be tough.

But bring it on. I’m convinced you learn much more about what your business is made of during the tough times, because you’re forced to be more introspective about what you need to do to be successful.

You may have noticed that after being very active during the course of the spring and summer, this blog has been pretty quiet for several weeks now. We’re doing some soul searching, refocusing and we’re asking a lot of questions of others and ourselves.

I feel it’s important to make sure that I have a voice that’s worth hearing, that what I say on this blog counts and makes a difference. I’m asking myself whether I’m really capable of doing that in some way.

I feel very fortunate to have won an entreverge award earlier this year. I have met with several of the advisors, including Gabrielel Melchionda of Mad Gab’s (and a Client of ours) and David Shaw, founder of Idexx. Several more are on my calendar for the upcoming weeks.

Lots of soul searching taking place…

Pemaquid Communications has been nominated for an entreverge award for our work pioneering and promoting the concept of coworking here in Portland this spring.

It certainly is nice to be recognized. What began simply as a search for office space evolved after a conversation with Chris Messina, founder of the original coworking space – San Francisco’s Citizen Space – and now seems to have captured the imagination of many Digital Creatives in town.

We got some media love from The Maine Switch, we had a successful and well-attended social last month, the coworking social Jelly has come to town, and now there are two Facebook groups on coworking here: Portland Coworking and Portland (Blueberry) Jelly.

Best of all, there are now four of us (five if you count Jordan, Pemaquid’s intern) at our little coworking space at 28 Maple Street.

Entreverge is an organization formed recently to promote entrepreneurs and business innovators in Maine.

Five award winners will be selected from the nominees at a party at Port City Music Hall this Thursday evening.