The Community, Connections & Commerce Podcast, presented by OUE & St. Clairsville Chamber - Community, Connections, & Commerce Episode 7 with Dan Milleson

Episode Date: September 13, 2024

Welcome back to Community Connections and Commerce. I'm Drake Watson with Wendy Anderson and our part two with special guest Dan Millison, again, the founder and owner of Waterfront Hall and Wheeling and president of Milestone Insurance. Dan, we had a great conversation with you on the previous episode. We wanted more. Yeah. We just want more.

Thanks. It's like, just keep digging. One of the first things we talked about when we were with you the last time, how you've kind of stayed in the valley. You've almost always been around the Ohio Valley. And we talked to a lot of the people that we bring on.

What brought them back? Because a lot of them leave and then have to come back. You've never quite left. And so I'd like to ask what you think is most attractive about the valley, why you continue to stay around here, And then what would bring folks in and be attractive to them? Well, for me, it's mom. For me, it's mom. And for a lot of people, I think it's mom. And it's the cost of daycare for a family. So I'm 36. A lot of people I know, a lot of people, have had kids and went in other places and went, holy cow.

And because the cost of living associated with city and daycare for a parent at this point is outrageous. And we could talk about wealth inequality if you want to. We'll save that for another day. But no, I think first and foremost, it's the family, you know, for those who were coming back from the place that they had been when they were growing up. And I see that more and more. And then it's the familial type atmosphere, right? Sure. It's the unit and what the unit does across units, you know, family units, familiar with family units and

some people you know get sick of us a small towns being so small right and then the gossip and all that stuff which is a bummer sometimes but ultimately what wins out is people that love one another and who see commonality in one another and even though facebook has has in just general media and the present day has done a lot to get in between that relationship between neighbors yeah um it still feels like a family around here and i i love that just about more than anything else you know but as far as people moving here um i mean that's also like an advantage it's like right it just feels like a more caring nurturing kind of place and um generally speaking i guess that's that's what i would that's what i would bring up first is the way that it feels which somebody kind of has to learn for

themselves but but yeah so um as far as as far as like solutions that need to occur in my mind, like the, one of the most important things is to communicate with the 15, 16, 17, 18 year old that, you know, there's a way not to leave in the first place. Yeah. Not that you can't, you shouldn't and can't go away to college, but just that, what is the compelling message that we're offering to these kids that can compete with Pittsburgh, Columbus, Cleveland, Cincinnati, and the like? What is the message, you know? And in a major way, maybe the main reason why I wanted to pursue something like Waterfront Hall

was to make a statement about that. And the key to that is that it's fun. Yeah. Right. You know, like you have to make a place fun. And I know that no mayoral candidate or, and no commissioner is going to talk about fun all that much but man you can bet that's why kids are leaving and going to other places can't you yeah so like i just think that there needs to be more focus and emphasis placed on how do we make this place exciting and fun and culturally relevant and and and how do we heighten and illuminate the creative class in the place that we live wheeling has a dynamic and awesome art scene yeah there is there are

there are artists and musicians lying all over the place that um we we have to put in front of other people you know and that's really what the music thing is about at Waterfront Hall. There's a place, there's an art studio in Wheeling called Clientele that if... It is amazing. That people don't know about it, they need to learn about it. It's amazing. Yeah. Clientele, if you want to be hip, go to Clientele. It's cooler than our place. And I, of course, say that was some hesitation I love Will Wallace the owner and his fiancee Jenna they they with the with a group of other cool people run it it's an East Wheeling and that right there is an example of

something that 15 16 17 year old kids need to know about yeah that a guy from here opened an art studio it's succeeding and people from all over the state want to have their art in there yeah and it's in a garage yeah which is also cool in its own way but ultimately like that's the thing it's like and the chamber does a lot of good in that respect too you know in in highlighting businesses and things like that but there's a whole creative class that that that might get missed there yeah and it's like okay well how do we heighten those voices and and what have you there's also a great magazine called ynst that just came out there's

been three editions of that i think up until now oh that's right yeah and there's a it's a very it's an art forward magazine there's fashion in there and it's based in West Virginia. And there's a guy named Adam Payne, I think is the editor of that. It's from right here in Wheeling. So, okay. How do, how do we get this into the arms of kids in, in high schools in the area? So they know that there is a scene, right?

Where is it fun? Where is there a scene where they can guarantee that it's, there's going to in the urban urban centers, that there will be. Sure. So that's where you see them go. Yep. And yes, economic opportunity is important, but so is like figuring out what you like

and what you think is fun. Yeah, no doubt. And it needs focus. Right. And we could talk forever about, you know, maybe creativity among young people being limited when they're coming up. Yeah. That's a could talk and we could talk forever about, you know, maybe creativity among young people being limited when they're coming up. Yeah. That's a whole conversation that we could very easily get into. But another day. Yeah, I think I think all of what you said is really

important about how, you know, there's more of the culture, the intangible things, maybe more so than than economically, but also economically as well. I want to ask you about some challenges that you may face with the waterfront and the things that you're doing. And one of that, we talk to everybody who's got things going on in Wheeling. We talk to them about the construction and the streetscaping and everything like that. And I want your take on potentially the impact that's had on you. I don't know. Has waterfront been open when that hasn't been going on? No. So, you know, I just maybe inserting myself into your head thinking about, well, what could it be when people can easily get here, get here more easily? Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I like thinking about that. I like thinking about what it would be like if 20%

more people came. Right. Yeah. But they,, they, I guess they might, you know, they might, or they might go to the Highlands, you know, I don't, I don't know. But I think what's important is that, um, Wheeling has a reopening, a grand reopening of Wheeling. Yeah. And that helps the whole area. As you mentioned earlier, you know, the value of the entire area kind of goes up a little bit. And that's something you think about. Small business ownership is exploding across the country. If you look at the statistics, there's more small business applications in the past year than like any point in history. Owning a business has been demystified by TikTok and all these other places where we can easily gather information created by the very best communicators out there.

So in this explosion of small business ownership Highlands, then to reopen Wheeling after the streetscape is finished, and then also create a downtown business alliance where the issues are geographically dialed in, because we all share the experience of the streetscape. We all share the experience of that person who's at the Capitol tonight, or whatever night. We all share the experience of the West Banco Arena's schedule of events. So why wouldn't we pull together, hire an executive director, get the ball rolling,

be a chamber member too, and like ultimately network the thing down into a place where the advertising is spot on. Right. down into a place where the advertising is spot on, the level of competition rises, and all of these small business owners who are risking their financial future on their ideas are supported in a network. I just think that that's an opportunity that exists as we come out of the streetscape,

right? As an opportunity to redefine Wheeling once and for all, right? I mean, and I don't know that that's ever finished defining what a city is, but ultimately it represents a great opportunity to say something's new now. And there's an awful lot of excitement downtown with all the projects that are going on. We talked maybe, you know, several weeks ago about how, you know, there might have been the sense of fear to open with everything that's going on to open up around here. Or if you have something existing, you know, you're fearful that, you know, your business is going to be limited. And now I think with the end or the completion being nearer and nearer, you're going to see a lot more come in because they think of what the great opportunities that are going to be there whenever everything's completed. Yeah. And for some of us, we were slightly ahead of the curve and hopefully that there's that,

to your point, there's that 20% bump maybe, or whatever it is on the back end where people are like, yeah, I'll go back downtown now. Because do you sense when you opened Waterfront last August, do you sense that that was at a time where everybody else still may have been hesitant because of everything that was going on? I followed the lead of the Bridge Tavern. I always am quick to point that out. The bridge, the bridge was early to the, to the scene, I think. And their confidence and examples is one that I've followed because without them, you know, breaking, I, in, at least in my case, cause it's, they're similar. They broke the mold and they took the risk and that provided me with a

certain level of confidence to, to go ahead, you know? So I got to commend them first and foremost, but yeah, they were ahead of it and then probably suffered because of that a little bit. I say suffered. But what I mean is, you know, their sidewalks were tore up for a while. And they were managing a very difficult situation. But they did it. They did it, yeah.

And they're open and they'll benefit here soon from this, too. But, yes, I am excited to see who else comes up with an idea after everything's nice and pristine down here. It might be hard to compete for a spot. Yeah, maybe. I hear of a lot of new projects popping up. And I just can't imagine a more exciting time to be downtown. Right. I just can't imagine it.

And I think sometimes with these small businesses, they feel like they just cannot do it anymore. Instead of closing, maybe press pause. Yeah. Just take a break. You know, maybe shut your doors for a little bit, but then have that reopen. You know, because I understand. I mean, it's got to be hard for a small business, especially with the streetscapes, not allowing their clients in to purchase anything that they have, that would be tough. Yes, yes.

And there's, I think there's been five businesses closed since the streetscape opened. So I don't mean to paint a jolly picture, I guess. I'm just looking at it from the angle that I've tried to look at everything which is as optimistic as possible but I think there is always an opportunity for these businesses to retool re-emerge in a new way exactly and I agree whatever the business is I mean whether it's shared space with another business whether it turns into a pop-up thing or an online business the key to anything anything is to evolve along with it or else you will get left behind, you know? And I, it's not that these business owners don't know that it's just like, man, sometimes it's painful, you know, sometimes there's pain involved in it.

Yeah. And sometimes you want to move on too, you know, like it's really up to the person that's operating it. Right. So. You've mentioned a ton of people in the time that we've spoken to you. And, you know, you've spoken highly of all of them. And I'm wondering if you had to give us like a short list of folks that you think would be great candidates for us to bring on, you know, who would you suggest? Will Wallace, owner of clientele, who I mentioned, who's hilarious and would be a lot funnier than me. Logan Schmidt, incredible artist, just did Tyler Childers' poster for his Burgettstown concert. Okay.

Made it. Like, is the artist who did it. He did a mural for us down at Waterfront Hall, too. Those are two amazing people. Rosemary Ketchum, dynamic public speaker, been involved in politics has phenomenal ideas is future facing in all ways and is optimistic there's Chris Dutton yeah who just did ranch night up in more well not more excuse me but flushing area yeah, and then I'll give you a list afterwards. Okay.

But those are a few names that come to mind. And yeah, I do feel John Russell is another one who has a newsletter that actually financially supports him. And then he also makes YouTube videos. He lives in East Wheeling. He's from Wellsville. also makes YouTube videos. He lives in East Wheeling from Wellsville. He makes YouTube videos for a nonprofit that, um, have millions and millions of views. Oh, wow. And they're usually on, uh, issues of workers' rights and things like that. But this

is somebody from Wellsville who went to Cornell, got an agricultural science degree, ran for Congress in Columbus, lost same time time I did. Moved back, lived in the upstairs of my little Bridgeport building over here. We bartended at Johnny's in Bridgeport together. And that gave us our chops to open Waterfront Hall. And then he started doing well enough shooting YouTube videos that he quit. He quit down at Waterfront Hall. But he's an amazing person and one of the coolest cats around. And that's what I'm saying about, like, kids in high school don't know that that man exists. You know, that somebody who grew up here is doing some of the coolest stuff that I can find on the Internet.

Yeah. And that's kind of the reason why we're here. I mean, that's an incredible example. Because we want to connect students, the 17, 18, 19-year-olds. Folks like myself. Yeah, for sure. We want to connect them to what we have going on because for my older generation, because I'm older, and I take advantage of what you do. I take advantage of the waterfront concerts.

You know, I go to clientele. I love these things. You know, I go to clientele. I love these things. You know, I go to the foundry. There's some cool things going on. Audrey's Kitchen is going to open up soon in St. Clairsville. That's awesome. And that is something we've not had something like that. Yeah, I think that's what I mean.

It's like there's a small business explosion taking place. And not to take anything away from franchises, the Cheddars and the Outbacks of the world. They have a place. Yep. Their headquarters are based somewhere far, far away. We just talked about that. Yeah, we did. And those profits go into yachts.

We saw a statistic several weeks ago that said 62% of all the money spent locally is reinvested locally. Yeah. So my argument there is not to say no longer go to franchise restaurants. It's to think about what you're doing because the money that you spend at a small business, and there's more and more and more every day to the point we just made, it means more to you. And it doesn't take long for that loop to travel back around to you. Yeah, no doubt. You can contribute to the positivity of your lived experience by the way that you spend your money.

And that includes not spending it on Amazon and instead going to center market. Right. We talk about the price of convenience all the time. Because the convenience, that's. Yeah. Price of convenience. Because the convenience, you know, that's a huge. That's easy. Yeah.

That's a huge life that goes off. And don't say, you know, because people are tired or they're working like crazy and they just get home, oh, I'm just going to scroll through, buy this. Like you said, go to Center Market. Go to downtown St. Clairsville. Go to Steubenville. Go to Weirton yeah you have to ask yourself how am I complicit in creating the conditions that I say I don't want so yeah yeah you're if I don't if I want my community to thrive why am why am I buying these particular goods on Amazon?

Right. If I want downtown restaurants and bars to be where I get to go out, or if I want there to be some kind of scene, why are you not buying local art and going to the places where the business owners live where you live? Right. Because the profits are coming back around to you i can tell you that i have 10 things i want to do with whatever profit

eventually shows itself if any does yeah because right now we we are breaking even and we're trying to dial in the the expense side of the business and it's not easy because distributors want so much money and that continues to rise and then i I don't want to charge you 15, not you, but you $15 for a cocktail. You know, like, so when the profits do eventually come, there's 10 things that I want to do at Waterfront Hall that are going to hopefully make it a cooler thing. Whereas the profits that come back to Outback Steakhouse are going to wind up in Monaco on the Outback Steakhouse CEO's yacht. You know what I mean? Exactly.

So that's a major picture that everybody needs to see in their head. And if there were a downtown business alliance, these are the billboards that I would create, right? It would say profits for downtown businesses, and there would be an arrow, and it would go, I don't know, back to a picture of the valley itself yeah and then on the other side of it profits for franchises and it would go you know to uh cancun mexico some condo building like but i think that's the image people need to have in their head you know can't just be small business saturday no you're right and i i know there's um

stacy longinette has route 40 lumberjacks she also has a bunch of us she has um rustic salon and um the sudger duds she has a gold mind out there um lumberjacks is so cool because you can go and it's an adult playground basically i've been there yeah and we have a good time but somebody like stacy local and that's what she does and i'm going to ask her to be on the show um but she also sponsors local she sponsors our things that we have um for the chamber or the local um softball team or baseball team or basketball team or cheerleaders. So that's what you're missing. If you go to those franchises, they're not going to really, they don't, they don't sponsor. That's the loop I was referring to.

If you're a regular at a small business and then you go in there and you're like, my kid's trying to sell candy bars, we're going to buy all of them. Right. You know, and Outback's going to say, call this 1-800 number. Yeah. And I'm sorry to dig on Outback. I don't know why I'm doing that. I'm killing them. I feel like they gave you a really stiff stick the other day. I actually don't mind it.

Yeah. But yeah, unfortunately, they are the catch all. But yeah, these have been great conversations. One thing I do want to touch on before we get you out of here is Ohio University. And I have a role to make sure that's a part of our discussion. And I also think it's important in what you feel like, how you feel like that prepared you for what you're doing now. And also, if you had to go back and be a student again, with everything that you've been through and everything that you've done since then, what would you do differently? And just kind of your whole thoughts on everything.

Good question. Yeah. Wow. Well, first off, let me point out the importance of branch colleges. You know, when I was having my crisis of conscience through the ages of, and get ready, Drake, because through the ages of 20 to 24, right? And it might happen sooner or later for all of us. I don't know. But when I was having that crisis of conscience about what do I do? What do I do? What do I do? Which I think happens too early in a person's life anyway, for some of us, because I didn't know you know took me a while to figure it out but the branch college caught me at an important time it was like a it was like

a beautiful blanket I was wrapped in because I could still live at home with dear old mom and dad and at the same time I could I could further the experience of the education while while still maintaining all those deep and important familial and friend connections that I had. And if the OUE wasn't there, I would've maybe tried to find that somewhere else, but it wouldn't have felt as. Because it wasn't home for you.

Right, and it wouldn't have felt as... Because it wasn't home for you. Right. And it wouldn't have felt as big to me because it still connected me back to a big time university. I still could say like, yeah, I'll go to OU at some point. And I felt proud about that portion of it. And so this is a PSA to keep branch colleges out there. There's a big smile in that other room. Because, you know, I would never have had, if OUE didn't exist and my family didn't have the patience for me, and Ohio University didn't have the patience to see OUE through, I mean, my entire story would be totally different. I don't know what it would look like necessarily, but it sure wouldn't be as good as it feels right now. And I also want to say that I was able to go to OU,

not feeling ill-prepared, but instead just like trying to acclimate myself to how much fun it was. But also, as far as the classes were concerned, it didn't, I wasn't like out of bounds and not knowing what was going on. I felt pretty comfortable about where I stood in the classroom. And that was after a couple years of being at OUE. And I know this doesn't exist anymore, but man, the Hoops program.

I loved that too. And OUE presented me with an opportunity to have a locker room and a hallway full of people that I got to make friends with. And that was cool. That extended my connections throughout the Ohio Valley. And I met so many cool people from Belmont County, Monroe County, Ohio County, West Virginia. And that probably helps me today. Oh, yeah.

Nice. I mean, in the insurance business, it helped me enormously. Right. And, yeah, so there's all, and I guess that's part of the name of the show, right? The connection part. I was just about to bring that up. I was more than pleased with the way you did that because I think what we could have summed that all up as is regional campuses do a great job of connecting you with your community. Yeah. Because you still can stay there and get the education that you need.

And I love that you said it felt like a warm blanket, like a very comfortable warm blanket. Yeah. That's really nice. Warm green blanket. With a bobcat on it. Well, that's been a super productive couple episodes that we've had with you we we greatly appreciate your time once again dan millison the founder and owner of waterfront hall

we can't advertise that enough i mean it's incredible what you've done there and the president of milestone insurance um we really appreciate your time we also would like to remind the viewer that there is a a a way for you to to give us feedback at ouepodcastatohio.edu. You can send any kind of submission or comment, any kind of feedback you'd like to that email, and we will consider what you've submitted. Once again, that is ouepodcast, P-O-D-C-A-S-T, at ohio.edu for your submission.

Dan, we appreciate your time. Thank you so much. For Wendy, for Dan, myself, this has been Community Connections and Commerce. Thanks for listening.