Where food tells a story and farmers are rock stars
Green Bay Packers, NFL officially set dates for draft
August 12, 2024
APPLETON – Wisconsin’s second-largest chamber of commerce recently experienced an historic first.
Last month, at the annual conference awards show of the Association of Chamber of Commerce Executives (ACCE), the Fox Cities Chamber of Commerce earned the distinction of Chamber of the Year.
Competing in a category of chambers with comparable annual revenue, populace and other factors, the ACCE – a professional society of civic organizations and businesses with more than 1,600 members worldwide – honored the Fox Cities Chamber of Commerce for having “demonstrated organizational strength and made an impact on key community priorities.”
Becky Bartoszek, president and CEO of the Fox Cities Chamber, said the award was made all the more special having coincided with the chamber’s 150th anniversary.
Bartoszek and her team traveled to the ACCE awards show in Dallas, where she said the award was announced in person.
“We found out with everybody else,” she said. “When the announcement went off, our CFO – I swear – he was a foot up in the air. It was absolutely the most exciting moment you can imagine.”
‘A beast of a process’
To have even been asked to apply for the Chamber of the Year award, Bartoszek said, was a unique honor for the Fox Cities Chamber.
She said application eligibility for ACCE members begins by filling out an annual dynamic benchmarking survey.
“Everything from every employee’s salary, to our expenses, to the programs we do – every last detail about our organization, we’re asked to enter into this survey,” she said. “Based on those results of our performance, (ACCE) will come back to certain organizations and say you qualify to apply for Chamber of the Year. This was the first year I’m aware of that they came to us and said, ‘you should look into this – you qualify.’”
Deciding to apply, Bartoszek said, meant completing the application in less than a month – describing it as “an unbelievable roadmap of everything we do” and “a beast of a process.”
In addition to providing full details of the chamber’s operations and financial records, she said applicants select two initiatives from within the last two years to highlight.
One of the initiatives the chamber chose, she said, was Appleton’s Octoberfest – the annual gathering of hundreds of thousands to enjoy live music, food and beer.
Bartoszek said the Fox Cities Chamber organizes the volunteer-driven event each year, facilitating the charitable donation of more than $2.5 million from vendors’ profits over the decades.
“A lot of people don’t realize that Octoberfest is a gigantic give-back,” she said. “Every single penny raised at Octoberfest goes to the nonprofits of our community. Every food vendor has to have a sign that prominently displays which nonprofit they’re sharing their funds with. All of the money that comes back from the purchase of beer sales goes into a grant fund that helps support nonprofits… It all drives that quality of life.”
The other initiative the chamber highlighted in its application, Bartoszek said, was a more recent creation – the Connect Free membership model.
She said the Connect Free model was created to help the region’s small businesses gain access to the network and select benefits of the chamber without having to pay membership fees – which are the most traditional source of funding for chambers of commerce.
“Small businesses drive two-thirds of our economy in our country, and we found a cool way to help our small business owners get to the next step up,” she said.
Eligibility for Connect Free was determined based on the following criteria:
- Small businesses with five or fewer full-time employees (or equivalent)
- Nonprofits with 10 or fewer employees
- Freestanding restaurants
- Location in Outagamie, Calumet or the northern part of Winnebago County
As this was a groundbreaking model, Bartoszek said she was keenly aware of the risk the initiative posed – right up to its high-profile announcement on Aug. 29, 2022.
“I remember saying to my husband that morning, ‘we’re about to do something unbelievably cool for our community – or I am never going to be able to find another job,’” she said. “I waited a year before I told the team that was my perspective going into it.”
Bartoszek said one of the chamber’s measurable goals for Connect Free was to double its membership within five years – a goal she said it has already nearly achieved in less than two years.
“It does change your perspective because we’re leading the way in some ways for people in our industry,” she said. “It makes you want to continue to take chances.”
Taking the chance on applying for ACCE’s Chamber of the Year – an application compiling 249 pages of information – would also pay off, Bartoszek said, when the Fox Cities Chamber would be named one of three finalists for the award.
The next step, she said, was a timed, in-person interview before a panel of experienced chamber professionals the night before the award event – representing two-thirds of the panel’s points for determining the winner.
Bartoszek said she and Laura Weigert – the Fox Cities Chamber’s executive vice president of events and marketing – were given 45 minutes to answer 11 questions.
“We had to speak equally – the same amount of time – and we had to answer the same amount of questions,” she said. “They were watching for culture of the organization, to understand how well we knew our community, how much our programs and our initiatives were serving the needs of our community and if we were cutting-edge – and they felt that those two programs (Connect Free and Octoberfest) definitely were. We literally used every last second to answer questions.”
The next night, she said there was a big awards banquet – “and that’s when they announced that we were the Chamber of the Year.”
Bartoszek said the award is a credit to the Fox Cities Chamber’s 12-person team, with representation from four generations.
“I am unbelievably proud of the team we have built here,” she said. “I think the people that report to this organization are here because of the mission and the family that we have that gets to work together – and that is not easy to find.”
Opportunity ahead
Bartoszek said the Chamber of the Year award provides further encouragement that the Fox Cities Chamber has the right people to foster continued growth for the community and its economy.
She said the region will not be immune to the macro factors impacting the global economy, such as remote work, artificial intelligence and real estate and energy issues.
“The world is changing more rapidly than it ever has,” she said. “Our biggest challenge is making sure that we’re leading the way and providing the most relevant support we can with the limited resources that we have as a nonprofit. And that’s exciting and fun, but also scary at the same time.”
Part of the solution, Bartoszek said, is to simply lean into the unique identity of the region.
“It’s our job to out-small the big communities, and out-big the small communities,” she said. “We have the great safety and quality of life of living in a small community, but we genuinely have all of the (big city) amenities – whether you’re looking at the Performing Arts Center, or Appleton International Airport and all the direct flights we have out of here, and the Fox Cities Exhibition Center and all the things tied to that.”
Bartoszek also said collaboration with other chambers of commerce via groups like ACCE and the Northeast Wisconsin Chambers Coalition (NEWCC) provides resources and inspiration.
“I don’t see chambers of commerce competing with each other very often,” she said. “In our industry, we call it ‘R&D’ – rip off and duplicate – because everybody shares with each other.”
That sense of community, Bartoszek said, was further proven when the Fox Cities Chamber team returned to their office after being named Chamber of the Year, and found it full of congratulatory flowers from other chambers, including from the other finalists.
“They sent us flowers and said, ‘we’re so impressed with the work that you’re doing,’ and wanted to share best practices,” she said. “Coming back and having that experience may have even meant more than getting the award itself.”
Bartoszek said she is optimistic for the future based on an “absolutely thriving” local economy, a nimble mindset earned from enduring the COVID-19 pandemic, the constant feedback and communication with the local business community and exciting insights into the projects, plans and dreams of area businesses and entrepreneurs.
“You can’t look at something like this (industry) like pressure – you just have to look at it as a privilege to be able to be part of it,” she said. “If I find anything daunting, it’s making sure that when I retire eventually, we’ve helped develop the team so that they continue on and that we’re confident. You have the first 150 years behind us, but this organization will be needed easily for another 150. We just want to make sure we position it in a good spot to make that happen.”
