Tag: Business

Another High Tech company at Venture 13

John Draper

A Silicon Valley company that started in Northumberland (Warkworth), moved to Cobourg and then to Palo Alto has now decided to occupy a space in the VentureZone in the Venture 13 facility.  The product is a personal flying vehicle called the Black-Fly that works like a drone – electrically powered and capable of vertical take-off and landing.  It qualifies as an ultralight aircraft in the US and Canada and has a range of 25 to 40 miles (depending on jurisdiction).  Funding was initially helped by Northumberland CFDC in 2012 but they moved to Silicon Valley in 2014.  The first flight of the high tech aircraft happened in Northumberland on October 5, 2011 but it was first publicly demonstrated in Palo… Read complete articleAnother High Tech company at Venture 13

Major Upgrades Planned for Mall

John Draper

On July 1, 2018, Timbercreek Assets Management took over ownership of Northumberland Mall – they then appointed Sandalwood to take over management.  New money, new senior management. This promises to completely change the future of the mall. Timbercreek is “well financed” and they want to put a significant investment into the mall. They are looking at all options which range from (as a minimum) a facelift with many overdue repairs being done, to possibly a complete revamp. They are currently reviewing the options and hope to start work on the chosen changes in January although the work would likely proceed in phases.  Mall Manager Paul Kiidumae, who now works for Sandalwood, told me about some of the options which would possibly mean… Read complete articleMajor Upgrades Planned for Mall

Busy Saturday in Downtown Cobourg

John Draper

The second annual Art Walk on Saturday had good participation from the Cobourg stores on King Street, both operating and closed.  It was not clear how many people were aware of the fact that these stores do not normally display Art in their windows – I took photos of 17 stores who had Art in their windows but there were more.  A couple of the photos are below – quite an impressive show.  There were also a lot of vendors in booths on Second Street plus Mercedes tested the waters to see if there was interest in a street car show.  The event ran from 10:00am to 3:00pm and was followed by a pub crawl – but that’s not photogenic… Read complete articleBusy Saturday in Downtown Cobourg

Report on Northam Industrial Park – 30 June 2018

John Draper

Northam Industrial Park is managed by the Town as a separate entity and able to provide a dividend to the Town; this is like Holdco which is the holding company for the Electricity and Water Utilities.  In 2017, the Town was paid $241,000 from its investment in Northam.  In a report to be provided to Council at their Committee of the Whole meeting on September 4, there is no prediction of how much of the large profit will go to the Town.  The profit before amortization for 2018 is expected to be $2,700,000 but most is expected to be paid to reserves (already $1,000,000) as “suggested in the soon to be completed asset management report”.  A good part of the… Read complete articleReport on Northam Industrial Park – 30 June 2018

Sidewalk Sale – 2018

John Draper

With the weather heating up now that we are heading into August, on Thursday most of the downtown merchants in Cobourg put their wares out on the sidewalk – well really on the road – and invited customers.  It is an annual 4 day event with Saturday being the big day with a Sandcastle Festival but I checked it out on a quieter day – today, Friday.  Although the forecast said it might rain, merchants had their stuff out in the open – they would  be busy protecting them if it actually rained although some did have canopies.  As well as shoes, clothes and DVDs, there was also furniture, paintings, jewelry and more.  There were also some booths unrelated to… Read complete articleSidewalk Sale – 2018

New Window Wrap on King Street

John Draper

Carol McCann, Chair of the Downtown Coalition, this morning “unveiled” a window wrap for another empty store. On June 27, the Town launched the “Start here program” to help attract businesses to Downtown so that they would occupy empty stores and together with the C.I.P. program, the Downtown Coalition hopes that Downtown, particularly King Street, will become more attractive and thriving. Carol feels that already we are getting more visitors from Toronto and the wraps certainly do improve the look of empty stores. She also said that the quality of Community Improvement Program applications is improving and that the size of the grants is increasing (see link below).  Carol reported progress to Council last March and expects to make another… Read complete articleNew Window Wrap on King Street

Young Entrepreneur at Beach Booth

John Draper

Rachel Lalonde operates the Surfside Tuck Shop at Cobourg beach and so far is doing well.  Her business sells beach toys, candies, mats, souvenirs etc and is helped by a couple of programs.  One is the Youth Entrepreneur Partnership Program run by the Town and their help is primarily free rental of the booth.  There are two booths at the beach, the other is run by the Town and rents out bicycles (more at links below).  The other program is called Summer Company and is run by the county and funded by the Province. It provides startup money of up to $3,000 and mentorship for full-time high school, college or university students, aged 15-29 years of age.  Rachel is going into… Read complete articleYoung Entrepreneur at Beach Booth

Cobourg’s Cannabis Facility needs a lot of Hydro

John Draper

A press release today provided some more information on Cobourg’s Cannabis factory.  The operating  company is FV Pharma but it is getting $55M of finance from Auxly Cannabis Group – formerly called Cannabis Wheaton Income Corp. (they get paid by getting 49.9% of the output) – so it’s really a joint venture.  FV Pharma still plans to be the “largest hydroponic indoor cannabis facility in the world” and in May they named  Belleville based Cornerstone Builders Ltd as the construction contractor for the first phase. They still expect the “first phase of construction to be complete and ready for Health Canada approval by the end of December 2018”.  But they also announced some changes: the facility will now include “a research… Read complete articleCobourg’s Cannabis Facility needs a lot of Hydro