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11/20/2019 07:00 AMOn a chilly but bright morning in mid-November, the Shoreline Women’s Breakfast Club had its inaugural meeting at Julie’s Cup of Joe in Westbrook. The group, organized by Nell McCusker, owner of Best Rates Insurance Group (BRIG) with her husband, Jim, is an effort to bring together businesswomen each month to network, share ideas and information, and advocate for local change. Meetings will be held for an hour starting at 9:30 a.m. on the first Tuesday of each month at Julie’s Cup of Joe and are open to women from the entire shoreline area. The next meeting is Tuesday, Dec. 3.
“We wanted [the group] to be more than just networking to improve our own lives,” McCusker said. “We wanted it to be networking to improve the community, to have an effect.”
For each month’s meeting, McCusker plans to invite a local woman to give an informal 10- to 15-minute talk about her business and/or community efforts. She’s spoken about this to Tess Taft Edge, for instance, who works to raise money for Embrace Rwanda, a Christian charity based in British Columbia that, among other things, provides hens to families in a small village in Rwanda, where a local veterinarian teaches them how to care for them. The hens’ eggs are shared with neighbors.
McCusker arrived at the first meeting with BRIG employee Riley Haston. They were joined by Linda Nolf, a realtor at William Raveis in Old Saybrook, and Beth Rankin of Waddell & Reid Financial Advisors. A few minutes into the informal meeting, Darlene Briggs walked in the door and, having been enthusiastically invited to join in, brought her breakfast to the table. Briggs co-owns Cominfortainment, a marketing, communications, and graphic design firm. Julie Campbell, who owns Julie’s Cup of Joe with her husband, Joe, was able to spend a few minutes with the group as well.
The conversation was friendly and enthusiastic, with the women discussing local businesses and their impact on the community, possible collaborations, their business’s philanthropic efforts, and ways they might involve local adults with disabilities in various projects.
Nolf served as chair for the Westbrook Chamber of Commerce “for a couple of years,” she said. By the mid-1990s, the local chamber had dissolved, with members opting instead to join the much larger Middlesex chamber.
“It was so small,” Nolf said of the Westbrook chamber. “The businesses in Westbrook weren’t really getting to grow out of the people we all knew...People weren’t turning out [for meetings] because they weren’t meeting new people.”
The Middlesex chamber has around 2,200 members, Nolf said, and a lot of resources. She often advises business owners to seek assistance from the chamber before contacting state government entities, for instance, as the chamber has a stronger, louder voice.
McCusker continues to reach out to local women in business and has had a lot of interest, she said. She and Haston expect many more people to show up for coming meetings. The two will be creating a group Facebook page and will post signs to promote the group.
Asked about her expectations, Nolf said that a women’s group provides “a style of networking which is good to get to know people, not just in the businesses, but in the area...As a woman’s group, we have different interests than if it’s a mixed group.”
Campbell agreed. As part of her day-to-day business as a café owner, she often shares contact information about other local businesses, such as a painter or a company that will power wash a house. The café sells items made by local artisans, such as pottery and aprons. And Julie’s Cup of Joe t-shirts and sweatshirts are made locally, she said.
Conversation flowed from the Westbrook Garden Club’s plantings in the flower boxes on the Green (“They outdid themselves” this summer) to Papercraft Clubhouse, a local scrapbooking, card making, and paper crafting business that quickly outgrew its location on the Green. Its new home on the Boston Post Road, across from Water’s Edge Resort & Spa, has more parking as well as more space. Independently owned, the store networked this summer with other scrapbooking businesses in New England to create a passport program that provided discounts and other incentives to local enthusiasts. Nolf took part and traveled with friends to a scrapbooking store in Massachusetts.
Discussion then turned to efforts on behalf of the community. BRIG will soon kick off a food drive for Shoreline Soup Kitchens and Pantries and William Raveis in Saybrook will collect coats for those in need. Campbell talked about reaching out to organizations like SARAH, Inc., which works with adults with disabilities, to enlist their help with these and other projects. Julie’s Cup of Joe works with SARAH, Inc. in its efforts to employ people with disabilities. One young man comes into the café every other Thursday for a half hour to place stickers on cups.
“We give the stickers to his aide,” Campbell explained, “because he likes to tear things.”
The half-hour sessions are perfect for this young man and provide help to the café, which “pays” him with a glass of milk and a donut. Many of SARAH, Inc.’s clients can’t be paid, as employment can negatively affect support programs.
Campbell recommended focused projects, no more than an hour long, such as carrying coats collected via a coat drive out to a truck. Adults with disabilities are a large part of the Shoreline community, she said, and it’s important to connect them to the community. The Shoreline Women’s Breakfast Club might just generate ideas for doing more of that.