Chamber of Commerce Ambassadors take the lead

BY KADIE TAYLOR

THE LAFAYETTE SUN

CHAMBERS COUNTY — The Greater Valley Area Chamber of Commerce recently concluded accepting applications for its ambassador positions. Executive Director Carrie Wood said she is thankful for all that the ambassadors do for the Chamber and for the new ambassadors joining this year.

“Our ambassadors are adults within the local businesses,” Wood said. “They are kind of our voice in the Chamber, the ambassadors are our goodwill servers in the community.”

Wood said the ambassadors attend Chamber events and encourage local businesses to get involved.

“Whatever the Chamber is doing, the ambassadors are the feet on the ground, and are volunteers,” she said. “The Chamber is celebrating our 62nd year, and as far as I know, it’s had ambassadors for all 62 years. I’ve been here for 11 years, and the program was well established before I came in.”

During her time at the Greater Valley Area Chamber of Commerce, Wood said she has seen the ambassador program grow to better promote local businesses.

“The program has grown quite a bit over the past years,” she said. “I think when I started here, there were maybe seven or eight [ambassadors], and now we’re up to 18. So the program has definitely grown. We have a wonderful, great group of ambassadors. We’re very blessed for the leaders that we have here in our county.”

Along with attending ribbon cuttings and other Chamber events, Wood said that ambassadors are responsible for promoting the mission of the Chamber to the community and local businesses.

“Our mission here at the Greater Valley Area Chamber of Commerce is to serve as a catalyst for business and commerce promoting growth, education and program development,” she said. “We serve small and large businesses, industries, schools and nonprofits. We promote businesses, we try to develop community development events and events in our community.”

Wood said she wants to make sure that local business owners know they are appreciated by the Chamber and that she wants to see them succeed.

“We just want to make sure that our businesses know that we appreciate them giving their time and support to our community the way they do,” she said. “We are also thankful for our current ambassadors, and we have a few new ones coming on this year, and we’re excited to work with them. We know they’re going to do great things, and we’re going to continue pushing forward here at the company and give back to our community and the businesses that we serve.”

Along with the ambassador program, the Greater Valley Chamber of Commerce also has a Junior Ambassador Program.

“We have a junior ambassador committee that is local high school students, ninth through 12th grade,” Wood said. “We have 52 registered for this upcoming year. We run it like a school year, so they will be here from September, and they kind of graduate from us in May. We have student representatives from all schools.”

According to Wood, junior ambassadors go to monthly meetings and participate in volunteer activities.

“They meet once a month here at the chamber office at 5:30 p.m., and we provide a speaker for them each month as well as an activity,” she said. “So if the chamber has an event, they are asked to volunteer at those events. We also create things for them to do, whether it’s going to city council meetings, commission meetings and whatever we have that can be on top of their meeting each month.”

At the meetings, junior ambassadors are taught important skills that prepare them for life, jobs and entrepreneurship.

“We have taught Banking 101, which goes over how to write a check, because our kids nowadays don’t know how to do that,” Wood said. “The teacher talks about the importance of credit and what credit means, banking in general and how to keep up finances correctly.”

Through the Junior Ambassador Program, participants have the opportunity to network with local business owners and members of the government.

“When they’re finished, they know a lot of the business owners,” Wood said. “They know the bankers, our commissioners, mayor and city councilmen or women. It gives them a step forward. If they are going out of town for school and come back home, they already know who the leaders are, and [this] really helps getting a job. [It] is also a huge [positive] on their resume as well.”

Wood said that she has seen many ambassadors transform through the program and that she enjoys seeing ambassadors grow in confidence. She said that she has watched one of the junior ambassadors enter the program shy and quiet and has watched her grow over the past couple of years.

“One of our junior ambassadors has been with us for three years,” she said. “It is probably her senior year. Now, she is one of the most social butterflies. She’s the first one to answer a question that’s asked. It’s just a total turnaround. So, I don’t like putting stipulations on things because everyone deserves that opportunity and chance.”

For more information, visit www.greatervalleyarea.com/ or the Greater Valley Area Chamber of Commerce.