Rockland Chamber changes name to reflect broader midcoast mission

ROCKLAND – There’s a lot in a name, Bob Hastings believes.

For the past four years Hastings has been CEO of the Rockland-Thomaston Area Chamber of Commerce. Now, he holds the same title with the Penobscot Bay Regional Chamber of Commerce.

It’s the same organization, yet in a way it isn’t, Hastings said Tuesday, a day after the organization announced its new name and broader mission.

The Chamber hopes the new name will both reflect the reality of its larger geographic service area, which includes members from Lincoln, Knox and Waldo counties and even some in Hancock County, as well as encourage businesses from the region to conclude the Chamber can serve them and persuade them to join.

It’s been a busy four years for Hastings, and the organization reflects his dynamic leadership.

Since he’s been on board, the Chamber has:

. Added some 300 members.

. Launched a successful branding campaign around “The Real Maine” with a tourism-oriented Web site, therealmaine.com.

. Opened a 15,000-square-foot Maine Discovery Center that hosts the Maine Lighthouse Museum.

. Won approval from the state to designate several area towns as a Midcoast Pine Tree Zone, thereby making tax credits available to certain businesses.

On the other side of the ledger, a consideration of merging the Rockland-Thomaston Area Chamber with the Camden-Rockport-Lincolnville Chamber resulted in the Camden group failing to endorse the idea.

Almost a year ago, the boards of both Chambers voted unanimously to investigate a merger, but in January, the Camden-Rockport-Lincolnville board called for a vote on the concept and just 55 percent approved it, short of the two-thirds majority needed.

Calling itself the Penobscot Bay Regional Chamber is not an end run around its neighbor organization, Hastings said, but rather a continuing effort to brand the region and give members a sense of identity.

Members now hail from some 83 zip codes, Hastings said, with just about half from Rockland and Thomaston.

“The old name seemed exclusive” to those members not based in Rockland or Thomaston, he said. “We’re pursuing any business in the entire region who feels we have something to offer them.”

The Chamber is a business, Hastings said, and members should not join unless they see a benefit. But with economies of scale, he believes the Penobscot Bay Regional Chamber may make as much sense for businesses in Belfast and Searsport as for those in nearby Cushing and South Thomaston.

The organization began as the Rockland Chamber in 1924, then morphed into the Rockland-Thomaston Area Chamber in 1991. Members in the small communities on the St. George peninsula, in towns such as Union, Warren and Waldoboro, and in Waldo County prefer the name drawn from the central geographic element that defines the region, he believes.

Even in Wisconsin, where Hastings lived before coming to Maine, Penobscot Bay is known.

Since the new name was announced Monday, two new members have joined, from Belfast and North Haven, he said.

While tourism has been a major focus for the Chamber, with the visitor center that draws 4,000 to 6,000 people each week in the summer and the Web site results of that effort, Hastings and the organization is now turning its attention to broader economic development.

“Rockland has become a national model for the creative economy,” Hastings said, with business occupancy on Main Street up significantly in the past five years.

But at the same time, “We need to be concerned about job growth,” he said. Even though unemployment in the area is low, many are underemployed and wages are low.

The newly named Chamber is still in forward motion and will launch its own magazine – with legitimate editorial content in addition to listings and advertisements – later this year, to be called Maine Coastal Discovery, Hastings said.