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TAKING FLIGHT

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The Longmeadow firm Holland & Bonzagni has developed a national and international reputation for expertise in all facets of intellectual property law, including patents, trademarks, copyrights, and, increasingly, cyber law. The firm’s principals describe this specialty as rewarding work that requires a blend of law and science — and healthy doses of patience.

It’s called the kempshall welt.

That’s the term that has come to describe the buildup of plastic that occurs when the two hemispheres of a golf ball cover come together during the manufacturing process.

The method of removing the welt and creating a virtually seamless golf ball is a process — one that is protected from use by competitors by a patent, said Donald Holland, a principal with the Longmeadow firm Holland Bonzagni, which specializes in intellectual property law and helped secure the patent for the client.

Holland told BusinessWest that when most people think of patents, they think of landmark inventions, the formula for Coca Cola, or the mix of herbs and spices in Kentucky Fried Chicken. In fact, patents can be used to give individuals exclusivity on any new, useful, or unobvious process, machine, manufacture, or composition of matter — or a new and useful improvement to any of the above.

"That includes the kempshall welt and the method for removing it," said Holland, who told BusinessWest that trademark protection extends well beyond the name a corporation puts on a product, and that a copyright can protect everything from a literary work to a storefront design — but many people in business don’t know these things.

Protecting that which the client needs to protect is at the heart of intellectual property law, said Holland, who described his field — one that boasts some 11,000 lawyers in private practice or working for the government — as an intriguing blend of law and science that he and partner Mary Bonzagni both find extremely rewarding.

That’s because much of their work involves helping entrepreneurs get their ideas off the ground. And they have helped several people in the Pioneer Valley and beyond navigate the rigorous course required to turn an idea into reality.

The firm has also represented clients in cases where a product, a name, or even a look was being used improperly by another party. One such case involved Deerfield-based Yankee Candle, which had watched competitor New England Candle Company essentially copy the look of the front of Yankee’s retail outlets at its Enfield store.

This may sound like a case of Goliath squashing David, and the press portrayed it that way, said Bonzagni, but protecting what is yours is part of doing business.

"That was important to Yankee Candle because they wanted to expand their mall stores without being afraid that other people would copy the design and dilute their reputation," she said. "What prompted them to take action was the fact that so many customers were confused; one customer even went into New England Candle and, when making her purchase, wrote out a check to Yankee Candle — which the defendant cashed!"

Other customers were taking New England Candle products back to Yankee Candle, claiming they were inferior and wanting their money back, said Bonzagni, adding that any time a company’s reputation is on the line, it has to take steps to protect it.

If there is any downside to work in the field of intellectual property, said Holland, it is watching so many of the companies that the firm becomes involved with fail to reach maturity. "That’s the frustrating part … maybe one in 10 small businesses actually makes it," he said. "There are a lot of good things we’ve seen that just don’t succeed because people don’t know how to delegate — they don’t know how to let go.

"When we do get that one client that makes it," he added, "it’s a lot of fun."

Holland, who opened his practice 22 years ago, says the firm has enjoyed steady growth over the past several years as its reputation has grown internationally. Like other fields within the law, this one has its ups and downs depending on the state of the economy, and at the moment, business is booming overall — if not locally. But he expects the region, which is about a year behind the rest of the country in terms of recovery, by his estimate, to rebound in the year ahead, bringing more new products and startups into the pipeline.

BusinessWest looks this month at this unique firm and the work it does to help move ideas forward.

Down to a Science

When asked how she ventured into the world of patents and trademarks, Bonzagni said she was working with the solid waste management products firm Camp Dresser and McKee on a sludge-recycling project in Detroit when it occurred to her that there might be something else she could do with her degree in organic chemistry.

She enrolled at Western New England College School of Law and, while there, was encouraged by a professor to take her background in science and apply it to patent law.

Holland also took an intriguing route to his current profession. He earned a degree in statistics from Colgate University, but decided soon after graduating that he did not want to keep track of batting averages or chart trends in mortality.

He actually convened a group of professionals in various trades to gain input on possible career paths. One of the people he invited to lunch happened to be a patent attorney. "He fascinated me the most," said Holland, who told BusinessWest he first earned an Aerospace Engineering degree from UConn, and later his Law degree from the University of Miami.

He worked for several years at the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office working on rotary pumps and turbines for jet engines before creating Holland & Associates in 1981. Bonzagni joined the firm in 1989, and an associate, John Kramer — who holds an undergraduate degree in Electrical Engineering and a master’s in Intellectual Property, joined the company in 1999. The firm also has two legal assistants — Cari Mazza and Karen Alberts — who conduct research and provide other forms of assistance to the lawyers and their clients.

The Holland & Bonzagni team specializes in all facets of intellectual property law, and has helped a number of entrepreneurs take concepts off the drawing board and into the marketplace.

Bonzagni has done a good deal of work for paper companies, including one area firm that makes security threads for currency. She has helped secure patents for not only the threads, but the processes for embedding them in the bills. She has also worked recently with a Pittsfield-based venture — New Energies Solutions Inc. — that is moving forward with its development of fuel cells.

Holland, meanwhile, has represented individuals who have developed products ranging from golf ball dimple patterns to mufflers for jet engines, hand tools to security blankets for children called "Taggies." The engine mufflers, known as "hush kits," help plane owners keep older models in the sky longer, and they actually enable a plane to fly faster and more efficiently. The mufflers, selling for $1.6 million each, went on the market last month after several years of development and testing.

Holland has done quite a bit of work for those in the sporting goods industry, primarily golf. He has represented a company called Big Bend Inc., which has developed golf balls that reduce slices and hooks. He also worked with Chicopee-based Hoppe Tool on securing patents for new golf ball molds and the kempshall welt-removal process. He later did work for Wilson and Spalding on golf ball and club innovations.

The firm’s clients are generally industrial corporations, both foreign and domestic, and include manufacturers of aircraft, food, paper products, medical equipment, computer software, chemicals, electronic components, and other high-tech items. It also services chains of restaurants, hospitals, and other businesses to protect their products — and their reputations.

Indeed, roughly half the firm’s work is in the category of stopping counterfeiters and unauthorized copies of products, or knock-offs, as they’re known.

The Yankee Candle case was perhaps the most high-profile example, said Holland, but there have been many others.

Several years ago, he represented a manufacturer of printed placemats, towels, and other household items in an action against the Christmas Tree Shops chain of discount retail stores, which had commissioned Asian manufacturers to create cheaper knock-offs.

"I worked with eight teams comprised of sheriffs and employees of the client," he said. "We went in and seized 117,000 infringing units from Christmas Tree Shops. We first did some investigation into which of their stores were selling the products, and then we went to court to file a complaint. In the meantime, we had sheriffs in the stores with clickers counting the units sold so we could figure out what kind of damages we had.

"Christmas Tree Shops bought seconds from our client one year, and they sold out in no time," he continued. "The next year, they wanted firsts at seconds prices, and when our client said ’no,’ Christmas Tree Shops admitted under oath at a deposition that they took the client’s catalog, took it to two sources in India, and said, ’reproduce this.’ Within six weeks, the chain had written the plaintiff a six-figure check and become its best customer."

Getting a Rough Idea

Ferreting out knock-off artists and helping clients recover damages is among the most rewarding work in this field — "it makes it fun to come to work," said Holland, who told BusinessWest that both he and Bonzagni have worked with national corporations that make some of the most recognizable products in business.

Recently, for example, Holland mediated a case involving Ben & Jerry’s and its ice cream product known as "Chunky Monkey." A woman claimed the name was hers — she had put it on a children’s book — and sought damages. (He was not at liberty to reveal the nature of the settlement.)

However, most of their work would be considered much more mundane — although no less important — such as trying to help a client or potential client determine if a product or process has already been invented, and if an idea is "patentable."

This can be a fairly involved process — and a potentially expensive one — because a number of steps and government agencies are involved. Thus, the firm is committed to having clients and potential clients spend time, energy, and money only when it is warranted.

Much of the work that the firm does falls into the category of education, said Bonzagni, who told BusinessWest that most entrepreneurs, young or old, are too involved with the development of a product or service, and then the day-to-day operations of the venture they’ve created, to focus on protecting their rights and their trade secrets.

Thus, the firm gives tailored seminars on a wide variety of subjects, such as: Managing and Expanding Your Trademark Portfolio; Trade-secrecy Protection; Seizing Counterfeit Goods; Protecting Your Product’s Color and Packaging; Licensing Technology; Cyber-piracy; and Protecting Software.

The firm also posts regular newsletters on its Web site, www.hblaw.org. This fall’s edition, for example, has articles on the recently enacted Madrid Protocol (see page 72) — which dramatically reduces the costs of international trademark protection — and tips for deterring would-be copiers.

Holland has also authored a booklet — used by many major corporations — titled Corporate Guide to Patents, Trademarks, Copyrights, and Trade Secrets, now in its fourth edition.

These educational endeavors are components of the firm’s larger efforts to partner with clients and potential clients, said Holland. He told BusinessWest that, in that role, Holland & Bonzagni works to help companies and individuals avoid some of the costly mistakes and missteps they can make while trying to get a venture off the ground or protect a product, name, or trade secret.

The processes for obtaining a patent, trademark, copyright, or even a domain name, while not necessarily complicated, are more easily navigated when individuals or corporations have the right information, and this is what the firm provides.

Ideally, the firm would like to help improve a venture’s odds of succeeding, said Holland, adding that this starts by gauging the commitment of the party involved and its willingness to do the grunt work necessary to take an idea to the marketplace. This starts with a patent search and a determination of whether a product is actually new. Holland & Bonzagni can conduct that search, but it would rather the potential client do it.

"When people come to see us, we give them a homework assignment to try and weed out those who aren’t serious," he said. "We don’t want people to spend their money needlessly.

"We want them to invest emotionally, and we want them to invest time," he continued. "If we’re going to spend our time, we want to make sure they have the organizational skills to make their product fly. If they won’t commit to that amount of time, their business isn’t going to make it."

No Secret to Their Success

Holland told BusinessWest that his firm has a framed copy of the check made out to Yankee Candle by that confused customer years ago.

It’s a symbol, he said, of the importance of protecting that which identifies a product or a company — be it a name, a label, a color, or, in this case, a storefront design.

This is the essence of intellectual property law, he said, and it is both an art and a science.

For more information, visit the Holland & Bonzagni Web site atwww.hblaw.org

HIRE CALIBER

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Opinion

Mary Ellen Scott, president of United Personnel Services, has forged a successful career in the challenging staffing industry, a field she joined somewhat reluctantly nearly 20 years ago. She’s also made her mark in the community, taking a lead role with several business and economic development groups.
Like many women, Mary Ellen Scott said her early career path was defined largely by her husband’s professional travels. Manhattan; Teaneck, N.J.; Boston; and Springfield. Those were some of the places where her first husband, Jay Canavan, found management positions at non-profits ranging from the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston to the Quadrangle. As she followed her husband from city to city, Scott managed to find jobs, she told BusinessWest, but not a career.

But the last time she followed him, however, she did.

That was when Jay, then 51 and in search of work after a five-year stint at the Quadrangle, decided to start his own company, an employment agency, in Hartford. He asked her to join him in that venture, but she told him she already had a job — director of human services at Gemini Corp. in Springfield. She eventually acquiesced, however, and, after the company survived a rocky start, she took the lead role in making it one of the most successful staffing services in the region.

Jay Canavan passed away in 1999, several years after officially retiring from the business. Mary Ellen, who remarried in 2001, continues to grow the company now known as United Personnel Services. The company has three offices — Springfield, Hartford, and Easthampton — and recorded 20% growth last year, in the midst of sluggish economic times that usually pose stern challenges for this industry.

Meanwhile, Scott has taken an increasingly larger role in the community. She is currently president of the Springfield Chamber of Commerce, and board member

at the Economic Development Council (EDC), the Springfield Enterprise Center, and Springfield Symphony. She enjoys being active, and is upbeat about the region and its prospects for further development.

In a wide-ranging interview, Scott talked about the process of making the transition from employee to entrepreneur, and the risks and rewards that are part and parcel to that change. She also weighed in on the economy, and the prospects for the Pioneer Valley and the city of Springfield, which has been her home for 25 years.

"We’ve seen some good things happen in this city, but there are lot of challenges ahead," she said, referring to both the economy and the controversies that have damaged the city’s reputation. "There’s lots to do and no money for anything. But Springfield is resilient, and it has a lot going for it."

Work in Progress

Scott says she is asked often about the state of the local economy, especially during trying times like these.

She theorizes that her vocation might have something to do with that; those in the staffing business will often know what’s happening before those in other sectors. Also, her involvement with various business and civic groups helps keep her ear to the ground, and people want to know what she hears.

But she told BusinessWest that, despite all that, her crystal ball doesn’t work better than anyone else’s, and she admits to being puzzled by the current economic slump, which follows some, but not all, of the patterns of traditional downturns.

"Some sectors have really been hit hard, while others don’t seem to be impacted nearly as much," she said. "The economy is down — a look at the skinny help-wanted section in the paper will tell you that — but we’re having a very good year at this company; how do you explain that?"

Canavan has seen a number of economic cycles since she segued into the staffing industry two decades ago. She and her husband started in the booming mid-’80s and rode the wave that defined the end of that decade — expanding the operation into Springfield as they did so. They then toughed out the prolonged recession of the early ’90s, when many companies in that sector did not, and positioned itself to capitalize on a surge in the use of temporary and temp-to-hire workers in the mid- to late ’90s.

"It’s been a bit of a roller coaster," she acknowledged. "But that’s what this business is like. For the most part, I’ve really enjoyed the ride."

How she got on the roller coaster is an intriguing story. As she told BusinessWest, Scott initially rejected her husband’s requests to join his entrepreneurial venture. However, new management at Gemini — which saw things differently than Scott did on many personnel matters — and Jay Canavan’s difficulties with finding the right idividual to help him get the company off the ground eventually led them to team up.

"He couldn’t pay a ton of money, and joining a start-up operation was a risk that many people weren’t willing to take, so he really had a hard time finding the right person," she said. "Eventually, we decided that if we were going to do this, we should do it together, so I gave my notice."

The venture, known then as United Industrial Temporaries, struggled to get off the ground. "We didn’t have an order for three months," she said. "I got a paycheck, but Jay didn’t get one for nine months."

The economy was booming then, with unemployment at 2.3%, and companies were desperate for good help. The problem was establishing a reputation and breaking into the market. "Those were scary times," she recalled. "The phone didn’t ring."

Eventually, it did, however, as some of the larger insurance companies, like Aetna and Travelers, placed some orders. United opened a Springfield office soon thereafter, and that facility provided some cushion for the company when the Hartford financial services sector went through a period of downsizing in the early ’90s.

Scott said she quickly assumed many of the managerial responsibilities from her husband, who eventually retired in 1995. She presided over strong, steady growth and watched the company crack the Inc. 500 list of the country’s fastest-growing companies in 1993 and 1995. Current revenues are approaching $6 million.

Today, a staff of 18 works in the company’s Main Street offices in the former Springfield Five Cents Savings Bank building, where Scott says she acts largely as the company’s public relations person. "I’m the face in the community," she said. "I still do some sales, but mostly I try to promote the company and keep our name visible."

She described the staffing industry as one that is relatively easy to get into — despite her own personal experiences — but one that is much harder to stay in because of the heavy competition and the economy’s wild mood swings.

She said United has done well because of its diversity and also its ability to "go the extra mile," as she put it. "When one side of this business is down, the other seems to pick up."

Canavan described herself as a good delegator who doesn’t micromanage, but does like to challenge employees.

"I like to give people responsibilities — and then I expect them to handle those responsibilities," she said. "I try not to step on anyone’s toes, and I essentially just let people do what they were hired to do. We have a very collegial atmosphere here. I want people to say they enjoy working here; that’s important."

She said she has no real pearls of wisdom for women, other than advice to give their entrepreneurial talents a chance to flourish.

"It’s scary to go from getting a paycheck every week to the situation we faced when we started — when we didn’t know if we’d get a paycheck," she said. "But what makes it scary also makes it fun."

Getting Down to Business

As Scott’s status in the local business community has grown, she has become involved with a growing list of business and civic groups, including the EDC, the symphony, and the Enterprise Center at STCC. She told BusinessWest that she understands that some of the requests for her participation are made with the goal of achieving gender diversity on those boards, but she acknowledged that the pool of women business leaders is not particularly deep, and thus her phone rings often.

Two groups she has become very involved with is the Affiliated Chambers of Commerce of Greater Springfield, and, more recently, the Springfield Chamber — she’s the first woman to be named president of that group — which was created in 1996 and now boasts nearly 900 members.

Scott told BusinessWest she’s been involved for years with the thorny subject of tax classification — she’s one of the few business owners who also lives in the city and thus sees the issue from both sides — and the ongoing effort to bring the commercial rate down, thus making it more attractive to current and prospective businesses.

"That’s just a part of the larger issue of making the city more business-friendly," she said, adding that the Chamber and the Albano administration have made it a priority to not only attract new businesses, but work to retain those already here. "Retention is a very big part of that equation, and it often goes overlooked. Everyone’s focused on bringing new businesses here, but you also have to create an environment that makes companies want to stay."

Meanwhile, she says that perhaps a bigger challenge will be enticing people to live in the city.

"Young people are not opting to move to Springfield, and that’s a big problem," she said, noting that, while a long list of attractive suburbs certainly contributes to the dilemma, the city’s struggling schools and other quality-of-life issues don’t help, either. "Springfield is just not an attractive option for many people.

"I’m not sure how we go about changing that situation," she continued. "But it’s something we all have to work on."

She told BusinessWest that a confluence of recent issues — everything from the economy and the state budget to the controversy enveloping City Hall, to the pending departure of UNICARE and its 800 employees from 1350 Main St. — has created a number of challenges for Springfield that will certainly test its mettle.

"UNICARE’s leaving will have an effect on a lot of businesses downtown, especially the restaurants, bars, and clubs, and even the parking authority," she said. "It’s going to take some time to replace that many workers and fill that much office space, and that’s why we have to keep working to make the city business-friendly."

She said the controversy that continues to swirl around Albano and many current and former members of his administration, won’t help in the regard, but she’s not sure just how much damage the prolonged FBI investigation and the Feds’ almost weekly raids of downtown bars and city agencies will have on the city’s psyche and its economic development efforts.

"There’s a bit of a dark cloud over the city right now," she said, "and that’s too bad in a way, because Mayor Albano has done a lot to revitalize downtown and give it some life."

The Bottom Line

When pressed to comment on the prospects for the local economy, Scott said the region is in what she called a holding pattern.

"People are hesitant to make moves," she said, "because they don’t know what’s around the corner. They’re looking for some sign that things are better, and they’re just not seeing one they can believe in.

"Business owners are waiting for something positive to happen," she continued.

Plenty of positive things have happened to Scott since she arrived in Springfield. Some of her success can be attributed to the whims of the economy and some good fortune, but mostly, she’s made her own luck.

She believes Springfield and the Pioneer Valley can do the same.

"We have a lot to build on here," she said. "But we can’t wait for it to happen — we have to make it happen."

Remaking Easthampton

By
Opinion

Easthampton is finally shedding its old mill-town identity in exchange for a new image and commercial dynamic, a hybrid of grit and glitz, with strong hometown flavors. The change has been a long time coming and is the result of a variety of factors, including an emerging arts community, a reinvented government, strong and community-minded business leadership, and real estate assets ranging from recycled factory buildings to picturesque millponds reflecting the stunning escarpment of Mt. Tom.

Twenty-five years ago, local boosters were talking up Easthampton as a diamond in the rough poised for a renaissance like its neighbor, Northampton.

It turns out they were a couple of decades ahead of themselves.

The local business news in the late 1970s and early 1980s had mainly to do with factory closings and layoffs and halting attempts to spruce up a crumbling downtown. Still, to give the enthusiasts credit, they had, even then, some grounds for optimism.

The vast, previously abandoned factory complex on Cottage Street in the heart of the town, facing onto Nashawannuck Pond — Easthampton’s scenic crown jewel — had been taken over by Riverside Industries Inc., a non-profit agency serving the developmentally disabled. With prescient entrepreneurial spirit and skill, Riverside was rapidly bringing the building back to productive life with a vibrant, unique mixture of enterprises: its own collection of offices and program space and piecework assembly workshops, plus chunks of cavernous space it rented out to independent craftspeople who were converting the raw real estate into studios and workshops.

So the seeds of change had been sown. But that change was slow to catch on. The blossoming of One Cottage Street for years seemed to be a kind of hothouse phenomenon, little noticed outside the building; just this year Riverside has hired a community development director to actively promote itself. It wouldn’t be until the turn of the millennium that Easthampton convincingly started to turn the corner.

As late as the mid-’90s, the downtown’s four main commercial streets had a combined 30% vacancy rate, while a million square feet of traditional, red-brick industrial space was going begging, according to city planner Stuart B. Beckley, who arrived on the scene in 1989.

That was the nadir. The trend since has been one of dramatic recovery. The numbers have caught up with the hopeful rhetoric. Today, the downtown retail vacancy rate is down to 5%, and more than a half-million square feet of formerly vacant factory space has either been converted to business and residential use or is being actively developed, according to Beckley.

New independent shops, galleries, restaurants, and entertainment venues have cropped up on Cottage and Union streets. Existing, family-owned retail enterprises like Manchester’s Hardware and Village Pizza on Union Street have undertaken major downtown building projects. Manchester’s has just torn down a derelict furniture store and built a new addition in its stead to house a new equipment-leasing division. The city’s surviving manufacturing enterprises, concentrated now in modern, single-story plants in the outlying industrial areas, seem to be thriving, and, in the case of Tubed Products, the October Co., and Liebmann Optical Co., among others, investing in new or improved facilities is paying off.

BusinessWest looks this month at the remaking of Easthampton, and what the future holds for this community on the other side of the mountain.

A Work of Art

Unquestionably the single most important development in the town since One Cottage Street, which served as its original inspiration, has been the continuing transformation of the massive former Stanhome factory on Pleasant Street into a multi-use commercial and residential ’community’ called Eastworks (see related story, page 22). Eastworks has brought an important new wave of entrepreneurs and artists into town, many to live as well as to work. They in turn have been integral to the revitalization of the downtown, becoming customers for food, services, and hardware, as well as patrons of new restaurants.

Two other projects involving high-profile properties, while far smaller in scope and general impact than Eastworks, have been just as important as symbolic affirmations of the town’s new direction, according to Mayor Michael Tautznik, who calls them "investments of hope in the future of the community."

Silas Kopf, a nationally known master of marquetry (the art of decorative wood inlay) who was among the first group of craftspeople to move into One Cottage Street, bought the former fire station at 84 Union St. for $230,000. Plowing into it multiples of that sum he doesn’t wish to reveal, he has had it completely renovated into a spacious first-floor studio and showroom/office, and second-floor apartments.

Almost simultaneous with Kopf’s undertaking, Jo Roessler and Nora Kalina, owners of Nojo Design, formerly tenants in Eastworks, bought the derelict former X-rated Majestic Theater on Cottage Street, the downtown’s most embarrassing liability, and converted it into another high-end woodworking shop and showroom.

"Silas has done a wonderful job with the fire station. It’s exactly what I wanted there, from the point of view that it’s an interested business person in the community who’s making an investment in a very vital piece of property," said Tautznik. "More important than what’s going on inside the building is what the investment means. It represents a lot of hope in the future of the town and the belief that property values will continue to increase. We continue to be impressed by people who make those kinds of investments."

As a result of the progress that’s been made, Easthampton in 2003 is finally starting to deal with "problems" that, 15 years ago, it only dreamed of having. These include congestion, insufficient downtown parking, and lack of vacant industrial space, notes Thomas W. Brown, vice president for retail banking at Easthampton Savings Bank and president of the town’s Economic and Industrial Development Commission.

"The visible proof of a revitalization in the city today is Cottage Street; if you drove through there two or three years ago, you would have found vacant storefronts and no issues with parking," he said. "I remember getting together with merchants back then, and they said, ’we’ve got a parking problem,’ and I would say, ’no, we wish we had a parking problem.’

"Well, today we do have a parking problem. It’s real. Fortunately, we have a municipal parking lot being built on Cottage Street. Try to find an empty storefront in that area today; you’d be hard-pressed."

Among the catalysts for revitalization in Easthampton cited by Brown, Tautznik, and others are:

ï the adoption of a mayor/council form of government, which has proven more efficient and more responsive than a volunteer selectboard;

ï the municipality’s success, beginning in the late ’90s after almost a decade of drought, in landing key state and federal grants targeted to economic development;

ï the strong local presence of the non-profit, Northampton-based Valley Community Development Corp., which, funded with $200,000 in grants from the city, staffs a storefront on Cottage Street providing assistance to small, startup businesses;

ï ’spillover’ from nearby Northamp-ton’s growing regional and national reputation as a magnet for young professionals and creative entrepreneurs;

ï plenty of flexible, upper-story, former factory space at an affordable price;

ï the emergence of the arts in particular, and small independent businesses in general, as an ’economic engine’ in the community; and

ï the town’s fabled hometown spirit, reflected in such organizations as an Economic and Industrial Development Commission, the Chamber of Commerce, and Cottage Street Stations (a grassroots merchants group), which have worked hard to market Easthampton, provide a variety of business services, and physically upgrade downtown commercial districts.

The community still has plenty of its rough edge left. It remains a blue-collar town and proud to be unpretentious and community-minded, says Michael Garjian, a resident, indefatigable promoter of Easthampton, and small-business director for the Valley CDC. He can count numerous new enterprises in town, including the non-profit Flywheel Arts Collective on Holyoke Street and the Pioneer Arts Center of Easthampton on Union Street, among his clients.

"Easthampton is all about community," he said. "It’s what makes this a great city. It’s a blue-collar city … the sense of community in this town is strong."

Look to the Future

That the gritty old town is giving way, nevertheless, to some kind of hybrid of the old and the new is evident on Cottage Street at noontime on the first really balmy day of spring in mid-April. There hasn’t been energy and bustle like this since the heyday of the mills, oldtimers say.

The street is swarming with pedestrians, including fishermen who’ve spent the morning angling in the pond, school children who’ve been let out early for the day, and a variety of workers enjoying a lunch break. The latter include laborers who are constructing a long-awaited new municipal parking lot on Cottage Street and a number of people who work at One Cottage Street.

Pedestrian traffic is good news for the shops on Cottage Street, including Carl Charrette’s Sunrise Pastry Shop at 42 Cottage St. and, two doors down — just opened in April — his Sunrise Sweetie’s, an old-fashioned candy shop and soda fountain.

The bake shop is full this day; customers are lined up in rows three deep at the counter to place their take-out orders for homemade soup and sandwiches. Two doors down, youngsters are streaming into Sunrise Sweetie’s. Shiny metal lids chime as the kids, scampering down the polished wooden aisles, open and peer into some of the 300 glass candy jars laid out in gleaming, inviting rows. A couple of adult customers peruse a glass case containing the chocolates that are made in the large commercial kitchens that Charrette constructed in the basement of the building. He employs 11 people among the two retail establishments and his wholesale business.

Charrette says he’s fortunate that his retail businesses are perking along just when his wholesale trade, due to the sluggish general economy, has fallen off steeply.

He acknowledges he has reason to be grateful, now more than ever, that three-plus years ago, his landlord, Mai Stoddard, "cut me a deal to get me here."

Stoddard, who is a native of Estonia, is a longtime local travel agent and Realtor who owns the building where Charrette’s shops are located, as well as being the proprietor of the Nashawannuck Gallery at 38 Cottage St., which she launched five years ago in the storefront between Charrette’s two shops.

Before Stoddard and Charrette met, he was operating his wholesale-only bakery from a rented barn on the edge of town on Park Hill. Stoddard was looking for a solid, stable business to take root on the street and be a good companion business to her own. She was tired of renting to fly-by-night tenants who "would paint the places purple, then leave town after a half a year, owing me money," as she put it. To lure Charrette, she offered to let him occupy the space at 42 Cottage St. rent-free for six months and walk away after that if he chose, with no further obligation.

This was not a case of altruism on her part, but a practical decision aimed at furthering the "revitalization of the street," and thus strengthening her real estate investment over the long haul, Stoddard explains. To get good, reliable tenants to rent upstairs, something she’d had trouble doing, she needed to have viable businesses downstairs, she told BusinessWest.

"Good business decisions don’t always translate immediately into money," Stoddard noted. Her gallery, for example, isn’t making her money, she said, but it is paying off in a larger sense, she believes, by helping to change the image of Easthamp-ton and put it on the map as a haven for artisans and craftspeople, and a destination for their customers.

As the first shop in town to carry high-end fine arts and craft objects made by the artisans next door at One Cottage Street, the gallery "tapped into a real strength of the community,’’ she said. The gallery also has served as a venue for a variety of special community events, including the annual wine-tasting party put on as a fundraiser by Cottage Street Stations at Nasha-wannuck Square, a merchants group of which she and Charrette are active members. Cottage Street Stations is focused on making physical streetscape improvements to the Cottage Street area.

Road to Recovery

It’s one of her business maxims, Stoddard says, that — whether growing a business or growing a prosperous community — "sometimes it’s more important to look good than to feel good."

These days, Easthampton is doing both.

The renaissance predicted a quarter-century ago has been unfashionably late, but it was well worth the wait.