Day: November 22, 2024

Community Spotlight

James Donahue says visitation at Old Sturbridge Village has nearly returned to pre-pandemic levels.

‘Converge.’

That’s the word you hear probably most often when people talk about Sturbridge. And with good reason.

That’s what families, wedding guests, members of trade associations, tourists, and other constituencies do. They converge here because … well, it’s easy to, given that this community of almost 10,000 residents is located at the intersection of I-84, the Mass Pike, and Route 20; sits just a short distance from Worcester Municipal Airport; and is not far from both Worcester and Springfield.

“Sturbridge has an amazing location — it’s right in the heart of Massachuetts,” said Monique Joseph, president and CEO of Discover Central Massachusetts, the regional tourism bureau for a 35-community area that includes Sturbridge. “It’s a very popular location for the meeting planner or the event planner, and for bus tours, and for weddings.”

But this convergence quality, if you will, is just part of the story in Sturbridge. Another part — and it’s related, and a reason why people meet here — is everything they can do after they converge.

They can take in some history — at Old Sturbridge Village (OSV), which recreates life in rural New England in the early 19th century, but also the historic town common and other spots. They can hike — there are dozens of miles of trails in this rural community, as we’ll see. They can shop and enjoy fine dining, craft beer, and some locally distilled spirits. They can camp, bicycle, and kayak. They can buy antiques — Brimfield is one town over. They can even do some axe throwing (although that’s mostly a ‘locals’ thing), and soon, they’ll be able to take in a movie with new ownership of an eight-screen complex at the Center at Hobbs Brook set to open later this year.

“It’s called Sturbridge Luxury Cinemas, a dine-in theater with luxury seating,” said Alexandra McNitt, executive director of the Chamber of Central Mass South, which includes 12 communities, including Sturbridge. She said the theater complex comprises one of several new businesses, including some retail, that will provide still more for visitors to do.

There wasn’t much converging — or much of anything listed above — during the pandemic, so Sturbridge suffered as much as any community in this region during the pandemic, losing several hospitality-related businesses, including the movie complex and the Stageloft Repertory Theater, while countless others experienced severe setbacks. But the town has made what most would say is an almost full recovery from COVID and the workforce challenges that followed, said Mike Harrington, a principal at the Publick House, an historic inn and restaurant known for its history, holiday-season activities, and even the occasional rumored ghost sighting.

“Our rooms business has been very good, up 6% from last year,” he said. “We see a lot more activity on weekends with people stopping through Sturbridge on their way to Maine, New Hampshire, or Vermont — they stay overnight — and we’re seeing corporate business come back, which is very helpful. We’re on a good path.”

James Donahue, president and CEO of OSV, agreed, noting that, while school field trips, a significant portion of total visitation, have not fully come back to pre-pandemic levels (transportation costs are certainly a factor), overall numbers are approaching those posted in 2019 and before, despite ever-growing competition for the time — and spending dollars — of families.

“Our rooms business has been very good, up 6% from last year. We see a lot more activity on weekends with people stopping through Sturbridge on their way to Maine, New Hampshire, or Vermont — they stay overnight — and we’re seeing corporate business come back, which is very helpful. We’re on a good path.”

“Technology plays a much bigger role in what people are doing now, and there continue to be more demands on families; the station-wagon trip isn’t as common as it was when I was growing up,” he said, adding that, despite these headwinds, ‘the Village,’ as it’s called, continues to draw visitors from across the region — and across the country.”

For this latest installment of our Community Spotlight series, we turn the lens on Sturbridge, where there’s a whole lot of converging going on.

Walking the Walk

McNitt told BusinessWest she recently welcomed an addition to the family, a new puppy.

Among other things, this canine companion has provided her with a greater (let’s say even greater) appreciation of the trail network in this community.

“The Sturbridge Trails Committee has created some really vast, fun, passive-recreation networks,” she said. “And they’ve made them accessible.”

Monique Joseph says Sturbridge’s location at the crossroads of New England makes it the ideal spot for weddings, association meetings, family reunions, and other types of gatherings.

There are more than 50 miles of trails in Sturbridge. They include the Grand Trunk Trail, also known as Titanic Railroad, because it follows the path of an old railroad bed, a project that was abandoned after its founder perished on the ill-fated ocean liner.

There’s also the Burgess Discovery Trail, located on the grounds of Burgess Elementary School, a short, family-friendly walk that offers many opportunities to interact with nature, including a wetland bog bridge, glacial boulders, and local wildlife; as well as the Tantiusques Reservation, where hikers can see remnants of New England’s first mining operation, a graphite mine operated by the native Nipmuc tribe and local English colonists until it was abandoned in the late 1800s.

The walking and biking trails, which often combine nature and history, are just one of the many converging (there’s that word again) stories in Sturbridge, where the phrase ‘something for everyone’ is certainly not hyberpole, Joseph said.

“It’s a charming town that strikes the perfect balance; it’s rich in history, and it’s modern-day fun, so it is a wonderful location to attract families,” she noted. “Whether you’re looking for history or outdoor activities, or you just want great food, Sturbridge has it all.”

One of the main attractions, of course, is OSV, the largest outdoor history museum in the Northeast, which includes more than 40 structures, everything from several houses and a law office to a bank and a blacksmith shop.

Donahue told BusinessWest that the Village had to close for several months at the height of the pandemic, a scary time during which gifts from donors helped the facility keep its employees, many of them with unusual skills, on the payroll.

“It’s a charming town that strikes the perfect balance; it’s rich in history, and it’s modern-day fun, so it is a wonderful location to attract families.”

“My fear was that, if I have to lay people off and I lose a blacksmith or a tinsmith or someone who’s an expert in textiles … those are difficult skills to find in the marketplace,” he said. “So the key, to me, was keeping everyone whole until we opened again.”

OSV has certainly been helped by the fact that it is mostly an outdoor museum, and over the past few years, it has seen overall attendance rise steadily — it was up 8% for the fiscal year that just ended in September — and approach the 250,000 mark that was the annual average pre-pandemic.

More recently, it’s been aided by several months of cooperative weather — a streak that has continued into November.

“I wrote a quick update to our board recently talking about the success of October, and one of the members said, ‘you’re doing a great job.’ I said, ‘it wasn’t me — it was Mother Nature all the way,” said Donahue, who is now gearing up for the holidays, perhaps the busiest time of year at OSV. Indeed, Christmas by Candlelight at the Village begins the day after Thanksgiving and includes decorations in all the houses, special food, bonfires, carolers, and, a new addition this year — a show in the museum’s theater on the history of Christmas carols called “Upon a Midnight Clear.”

If the Spirit Moves You

In addition to history, Sturbridge has a large and diverse hospitality sector that boasts several restaurants, lodging facilities, wedding venues, breweries, and a recent addition, Deep Roots Distillery, which is now also home to Into the Grain Axe Throwing.

Keith Devarenne, co-owner of both ventures, said the distillery, like many other recent entrepreneurial ventures, came about as a result of some soul searching during the pandemic.

“I retired from the Department of Corrections in Connecticut in 2020, and my wife started working at home,” he recalled. “She said, ‘we should open a distillery.’ I said, ‘you’re crazy.’ She told our other partner that, and he said ‘you’re crazy,’ too.”

They would put down the idea, but also research it — and that research told them there weren’t many distilleries in the area, which posed a business opportunity.

Michael Harrington, left, seen here with Michael Glick, general manager of the Publick House, says 2024 has been a solid year for the Sturbridge landmark, marked by an increase in business gatherings.

They seized it, moving from home experimentation to buying an old cotton mill, where they now produce a wide variety of rums, vodkas, whiskeys, and liqueurs.

“The hardest thing was making the jump to doing this professionally and opening the doors,” he said, adding that the venue draws visitors from across this region and well beyond, including many stopping at Tree House Brewing Co. in neighboring Charlton.

The axe-throwing facility, which opened in May 2023, came about through a desire to provide something else for locals — and maybe some visitors — to do, said Devarenne, adding that a portion of the old mill behind the distillery’s tasting room was renovated for that purpose, and they made a fairly modest investment in axes, targets, and the lanes that keep participants safe.

As in the few other locations where such facilities have been created, axe throwing is catching on in Sturbridge, said Devarenne, noting that groups will often come in after dinner at one of the local restaurants (including the one at the distillery), on weekend afternoons, or for the league on Thursday nights.

“We’re very weather-dependent — if it’s rainy on Friday and Saturday, we’re usually very busy,” he said. “So far, so good; people are coming in and giving it a try.”

While axe throwing is new to Sturbridge, the Publick House is quite old, dating back to 1771, when it was a stagecoach stop. Harrington’s family acquired the property in 2003 and has made significant investments in new rooms and renovations to existing facilities.

The complex is one of several lodging destinations that play host to a wide range of different events, from business and trade-association meetings to family gatherings to weddings, which are a huge business in this community — again, partly because of its location in the middle of the state and the middle of New England, right off major highways.

Each of those segments is solid, if not booming, said Harrington, noting that the facility is on pace to handle 153 weddings this year, which is about average, although it has done as many as 180.

Meanwhile, corporate business is coming back, to about 70% of what it was before the pandemic, he added, noting that, after years of meeting by Zoom, business groups and associations are meeting in person again, and taking advantage of Sturbridge’s central location — which remains, as always, an ideal place to converge.