Paul Szmal: And welcome back to FLX Morning. It is 838 and we're at 54 under sunny skies. And Tara Sovey is here from the FLX Chamber and we've got a lot to talk about here today. Well, first off, good morning. How are you?
Tara Sauve, Dave Jocolone: Good morning, Paul. Good. How are you?
Paul Szmal: Good. Good.
Let's go ahead and get right into it here with the membership harvest celebration that is coming up here in, uh, well, a little less than a month's time.
Tara Sauve, Dave Jocolone: Yeah. Our membership harvest celebration is going to be on Thursday this year. We changed the dates. Usually it was on a Wednesday, so it's going to be Thursday, September 25th from 530 to 830. And we have a new location. We're going to be over at Climbing Binds in Penn Yan this year.
Paul Szmal: Yeah. Nice location to be at. And, uh, plenty of community sponsors helping out as well.
Tara Sauve, Dave Jocolone: Yeah. Thank you to all of our sponsors. Our community sponsors this year is Empire Access, Finger Lakes Federal Credit Union, Laguna Plumbing, Lions National Bank, GoNetSpeed, and Wayne Bank. And our promotional sponsors this year is Potter Heating, Cooling, and Plumbing and Optimum Pest Pros.
Paul Szmal: Well, speaking of Potter Heating and Cooling, we happen to have Dave Giacalone, who's the owner of Potter Heating, Cooling, and Plumbing on the line with us. Uh, Dave happens to be an annual partner as part of the FLX chamber. Uh, Dave, what does it mean? Uh, first off, good morning. How are you, sir?
Tara Sauve, Dave Jocolone: Hey, good morning, Paul. How are you?
Paul Szmal: I am doing well. Thank you, sir.
What does it mean to be a sponsor of the Membership Harvest Celebration?
Tara Sauve, Dave Jocolone: Well, you know, so, um, it's been, it's been such a great experience with, uh, being a member of the chamber and being offered these opportunities to be annual partners and sponsorship partners with, uh, you know, for the Harvest Fest. It, you know, it brings a lot of light to the business. It helps, uh, you know, get the name out in the community and you get to be involved in some of the, uh, you know, goings on with the planning of the things. And, uh, you know, it really is a great benefit to the business and to the people in the organization as well.
Paul Szmal: Yeah, it certainly is. And do you have any advice for any like up and coming businesses or maybe someone that's taking over a business in relation to joining something like an FLX chamber?
Tara Sauve, Dave Jocolone: Yeah, I, I would highly recommend it. It really is a great way to network with other business owners in the area, as well as, uh, get your name out in some, you know, with some, you know, good advertising that the, that the chamber will do for us. Um, being that it's FLX, finger legs, it's, it's, it spans a wider area than most of these chambers that are small and kind of localized. This one really does stretch out for us and get our name across a couple of different areas, which is fantastic for new businesses.
Paul Szmal: So it sounds like you are more than satisfied with being a member of the, uh, FLX chamber and it's done some good, solid work for you.
Tara Sauve, Dave Jocolone: Oh, a hundred percent. We, uh, we just recently did, uh, one of the mixers at our shop where all the, uh, the different businesses come in and we meet and we talk about our business and you get to make some real good connections with people. And that was a, that was a fantastic event. I really enjoyed doing it and it was a great benefit for sure.
Paul Szmal: Um, Dave, I was just going to bring that up too, that you hosted our June business after hours. Um, I just wanted to give you the opportunity to, to say, or tell us the audience to a little bit about Potter when you took over anything that you guys have going on now as well.
Tara Sauve, Dave Jocolone: Oh yeah. So I took the business over in 2018 and, uh, it's been phenomenal. It's been, uh, we've been doing some really great things, uh, with the business and, uh, we are. A carrier factory authorized dealer. So we sell carrier equipment and, uh, we're a Mitsubishi, uh, elite diamond contractor. So our two big brands are carrier and Mitsubishi, and we have a lot of great promotions going right now. Um, we're doing 0% interest rates for 36 months on carrier equipment. And then the clean, the New York state clean heat program has really been, uh, pushing, uh, the heat pump stuff on the Mitsubishi side. So we have a lot of really great, uh, promotions and incentives going on, you know, right now and going all the way through February. In fact, they just released it. So we have a lot of really good things to offer for our customers.
Paul Szmal: Well, Dave, I appreciate you taking a few minutes of your time to step in, join us. And again, thank you for being the promotional sponsor for the harvest celebration this year.
Tara Sauve, Dave Jocolone: Oh, it's our pleasure. Thank you so much for the opportunity, everybody. And, uh, looking forward to it.
Paul Szmal: All right. That is Dave. Yeah. It is Dave Jockelone. He is the owner of Potter heating, cooling, and plumbing. And, uh, he is not only an annual partner, but a promotional sponsor for the membership harvest celebration that is coming up. Uh, let's get back to, uh, talking about the business after hours. Uh, the, uh, last, uh, networking mixer was held at Geneva on the lake. What a great location.
Tara Sauve, Dave Jocolone: I know they did an awesome job hosting our August mixer that was hosted on August 13th at their property. And that was the most attended mixer so far for us for 2025. So it was a great chance for a lot of our members, new members to attend. We had some, um, potential new members that were there too. Um, so they did a great job of hosting, um, Jayhan Wick, the general manager and Kristen Welch, the assistant general manager at Geneva on the lake put on a beautiful night for everybody. And they got to see a little bit of the property and there was a few people that haven't been there before. So it's always kind of see, we want to take people to different properties and see kind of behind the scenes and get to meet with these owners or managers of these places. Um, so we were very happy that they were able to host us and bring people to their property.
Um, I also just wanted to let everybody know too, that they are doing, have an event this weekend on Sunday, August 31st. It's their third annual spectacular event. Um, so this is kind of, uh, it features food and wine, um, followed by music and stuff like that there. So you can find that information on their Facebook page as well. But it's Sunday, August 31st, and I believe it starts at 3.30.
Paul Szmal: All right. And, uh, there is no after hours, uh, business after hours mixer in September because of the membership harvest celebration. So they'll pick back up in October.
Tara Sauve, Dave Jocolone: Yep. So, uh, um, the next mixer won't be until Wednesday, October 8th, and we are going to be over at Finger Lakes Textiles in Waterloo, which they are a partner with Mosaic. So we're very excited for them to host and bring people to their property to learn a little bit more about them.
Paul Szmal: We're talking with Tara Sauve from the FLX Chamber here on FLX Morning. A couple of member milestone celebrations to talk about here.
Tara Sauve, Dave Jocolone: Yes. This has been very popular this year. Um, we hosted Ravine's Wine Cellars, um, on Thursday, August 14th, we celebrated their 25th anniversary. Um, so we were able to celebrate with them. We would bring, um, some of our board members and ambassadors to their property to do a photo op, meet the owners, meet the team there, take a behind the scenes tour and look at all of their operations and everything that they have done over the years. Um, and it was great. We did a Q and A with the owners as well. So people could ask them questions, learn a little bit more about the business. Um, and they are famed for their bone dry wine. So we got to, people were able to take a sample as they came in too.
Um, so you'll see photos from both of these events, um, on our Facebook page and on our website. And, uh, I just saw the television commercial for these guys, uh, this morning. One of their television commercials, the gang from Four Winds Chimney.
Paul Szmal: Yes.
Tara Sauve, Dave Jocolone: Yep. So they're going to be next with our member milestone celebration. It's been a busy year with us. Um, we're excited to have a member milestone celebration with them. It's going to be on Thursday, October 2nd, um, from four to six and they are relocating and they'll have a new showroom. So, um, potential clients can go in there and get an idea of what they're looking for, which I think is awesome before they decide. Um, so they were up in East Rochester and they just moved to a location in Victor. Um, so people will be able to see the property, meet the team and learn a little bit more about them.
Paul Szmal: The Lunch and Learn program has been going on in the midst of everything else that has been happening here, which is why I've said we, we have a lot to talk about here. So most recent one was, uh, held back on August the 20th.
Tara Sauve, Dave Jocolone: Yep. So it's been a busy August for our team, but we were very excited to host this Lunch and Learn. We kind of started this back up last year, um, with different topics that our members wanted to learn. It was all about trying to bring the experts to our members to learn about whatever questions, topics they wanted to know more about. Um, so on Wednesday, August 20th, we had Bea Murray with Bowers CPA and Advisors. They're out of Rochester and Syracuse. She covered QuickBooks Desktop, QuickBooks Online and the Build platform. We've had a lot of our members kind of say, we're pushing to QuickBooks Online. We don't know much about it. Do we have to do this? So she kind of went through each, um, step and different ideas of people for, to learn different reportings for businesses to pull, especially if you're just starting out or a smaller business and you're doing it all yourself. Um, it was very great for her to do that. So at the end of the class, we were like, I think we should try to do a part two and dive a little bit deeper. So we are going to be kind of planning that with her as well.
Paul Szmal: Sometimes it deserves a sequel.
Tara Sauve, Dave Jocolone: Yes, it does.
And, uh, then there are a couple of new members from the last time that we spoke that we want to acknowledge.
Paul Szmal: Yeah. So we have two new members, um, from the last time that I was here, Point of the Bluff Hospitality. Um, you might have heard of Concerts at Point of the Bluff, the winery. They have so many, um, different, um, properties under this brand. Um, so you'll see, we just did the new member welcome post on our Facebook page where you can check out their website and learn about all the different properties and what they have going on. Um, and then Family Hope Center. They are one of our newer members too. They're located in Geneva. They offer relationship support to the community and you'll be able to see and learn more about them in our upcoming digital newsletter and a feature post for them as well.
Tara Sauve, Dave Jocolone: Oh, wow. That is, uh, that is certainly a lot that's been going on here. It's been a busy month. And it's just going to get busier here as we continue to run up to the membership harvest celebration.
Paul Szmal: Yep. Yep. So, uh, let's go ahead and, uh, as usual, I'd like to, uh, give you the opportunity to thank the annual partners.
Tara Sauve, Dave Jocolone: Yeah. So thank you to our 2025 annual partners. This program, it's offers a little bit of everything in our events and advertising bundle. We couldn't do what we do without these annual partners. So thank you to all of them. Um, Canada National Bank, Casella Waste Systems, Community Broadband Networks, Fairfield by Marriott, Finger Lakes Federal Credit Union, Four Winds Chimney, Guardian Glass, Massa Constructions, Enhance of the Finger Lakes, Padulas Wine and Liquor, Potter Heating, Cooling and Plumbing, Sonic Lake Resorts, and Finger Lakes Partners Insurance. And Waterloo Container.
Paul Szmal: And, uh, once again, the membership harvest celebration is coming up Thursday, September 25th at Climbing Binds in Pinon. Now this is a members only event?
Tara Sauve, Dave Jocolone: Member only event. And you must purchase tickets, um, before the event as well. Um, so we'll have food, wine, we'll have a band there, silent auction, raffle. So it's going to be a very fun night. And how do members get tickets for that?
Paul Szmal: Um, they're right on our website. So if you go to our homepage, you'll see an icon for our membership harvest celebration with that logo. So you can click on that page. The registration form will be on there so you can download it, fill it out and just send it, email it to us at info at flxchamber.com.
Tara Sauve, Dave Jocolone: All right. Beautiful. I think we managed to get through everything. We did. Thank you so much.
Paul Szmal: Yeah. Wonderful. That is 8.50 on FLX morning. Thank you, Tara. Thank you.
