Jake Van Ness, Author at Glens Falls Business Journal

Jake Van Ness

2231 Articles

Couple’s Companies, Northern Living And Lake George Design, Have New Location

February 22, 2022

Katelyn Moskos poses in the new office of Northern Living on Route 9 in Lake George, one of the businesses she and her husband John own.
Courtesy Northern Living

By Christine Graf

Northern Living and Lake George Design have relocated offices to 1849 Route 9 in Lake George. The vacation rental, property management and interior design businesses are owned by Katelyn Moskos and her husband, John.

In 2016, the couple depleted their savings in order to purchase and renovate their first short-term rental property on Lake George. At the time, Moskos was working in hospitality management, and her husband was a medical sales rep.

“Because I had been working in hospitality management for quite some time, I saw the potential and demand for vacation rentals,” said CEO Moskos. “It was risky. Very risky. This was before Airbnb’s and VRBO’s became what they are today. I jumped in head first and it was sink or swim. I had no choice but to swim.”

Today, they own seven lakefront rental properties and manages 36 additional properties. Northern Living offers high-end rentals and markets its property management services to people who own second homes in the Lake George region.

Moskos started out with one employee and worked out of her Queensbury home. Today, she has a staff of more than 25 year-round employees. That number exceeds 50 during the busy summer months. Her husband joined the company full time in 2018 and serves as head of maintenance.

In addition to Northern Living, the rental and property management arm of the business, Moskos also owns Lake George Design, an interior design company. She works with customers who want to purchase second homes in the area to use as short-term rental properties.

‘Luxury Box’ Sports And Entertainment Center In Queensbury Grows In Popularity

February 22, 2022

Dave Brindle is the owner of the Luxury Box, a Queensbury-based indoor sports and entertainment facility that opened in the fall.

by jennifer farnsworth

It has been just over a year since David Brindle first broke ground on his business venture, The Luxury Box. The Queensbury-based indoor sports and entertainment facility opened in the fall, and since then, Brindle said they have been growing at a steady pace.

“Business started slow in October when we first opened. The week of Thanksgiving things increased. December was slow with people playing but we sold a lot of gift certificates. January really picked up with players coming in to use the facility,” said Brindle.

The facility is for any age and skill level, and can be utilized any time of year. Brindle said they have seen the units used for family nights, girls nights and game nights. He expects there will be more weekly golf tournaments starting this month.

He said all of the sports simulators are popular, with golf in particular.

Wing Fest Returns To Glens Falls In April After A One-Year Hiatus Due To Pandemic

February 22, 2022

The Glens Falls Collaborative returns to hosting its annual Wing Fest in downtown Glens Falls on Saturday, April 30. Tasting tickets are $1 each.
Courtesy Glens Falls Collaborative

After canceling last year’s event due to the ongoing pandemic, the Glens Falls Collaborative returns to hosting its annual Wing Fest in downtown Glens Fallls on April 30.

Courtesy Glens Falls CollaborativeThe event is a competition between restaurants for the best wings. There will be an awards ceremony at the bandstand in City Park at 3:30 p.m. to close out the event, with multiple categories of winners.

There will also be live music in Downtown Glens Falls.

This year’s event is dedicated to Michael DuBray, also known as DeeJay DuBray, who helped found the event and served as its chair and champion for many years. He passed away in January and will be honored during Wing Fest.

Restaurants are invited to participate by applying online at www.glensfallscollaborative.com.

Tasting tickets are $1 each, and the number of tickets to taste varies by restaurant.

Participating Downtown restaurants will serve from their storefronts, and restaurants from outside the city will serve from locations along Glen, Ridge, Bay and Maple Streets and in City Park.

Voting will take place online at www.glensfallscollaborative.com. QR codes for voting will be displayed around town and votes must be cast by 3 p.m.

Hudson Headwaters Mobile Health Center Brings Services To SUNY Adirondack

February 22, 2022

The Hudson Headwaters Mobile Health Center began seeing patients at SUNY Adirondack on Feb. 10. Access to health care became a priority when the campus added a residence hall in 2013.
Courtesy SUNY Adirondack

Hudson Headwaters Mobile Health is now delivering primary care services at SUNY Adirondack. The mobile health center will be on campus twice a month to serve students, faculty and staff.

This is the first time medical services will be offered on the SUNY Adirondack campus, which does not have a student health center. Access to health care became a priority when the campus added a residence hall in 2013.

The mobile center is staffed by a family nurse practitioner, Christine Calistri, a registered nurse and a medical assistant. Hudson Headwaters Mobile Health Program Lead Kristin Waller, who also serves as the onsite medical assistant, recently attended SUNY Adirondack’s winter student orientation day.

“We brought the unit onsite so students and other campus community members could tour through and get to know us,” said Waller. “The mobile team is thrilled to offer services to SUNY Adirondack and hope our flexible options, such as online appointment scheduling and same-day sick appointments, appeal to busy students and campus staff.”

“SUNY Adirondack is excited by the opportunity to advance our relationship with Hudson Headwaters Health Network and bring affordable, top-notch health care to campus for our students and their dependents,” said Kristine D. Duffy, Ed.D., president of SUNY Adirondack. “Hudson Headwaters’ Mobile Health Center offers SUNY Adirondack students convenient, safe care to help our students make their health a priority.”

SUNY Adirondack is the fourth site served by the mobile health center. Other locations include Salem, Lake Luzerne and Whitehall.

Hotel & Lodging Association Predicts Move To Recovery Will Be Uneven, Volatile

February 22, 2022

The hotel industry will continue moving toward recovery in 2022, but the path will be uneven and potentially volatile, and full recovery is still several years away, according to the American Hotel & Lodging Association (AHLA)’s 2022 State of the Hotel Industry report.

The report, which reveals shifts in consumer and business sentiment, was created in collaboration with AHLA Silver Partner Accenture and is based on data and forecasts from Oxford Economics and AHLA Platinum Partner STR.

The top findings of the report include:

• Hotel occupancy rates and room revenue are projected to approach 2019 levels in 2022.

• The outlook for ancillary revenue, which includes food & beverage and meeting space, is less optimistic.

• Hotels lost a collective $111.8 billion in room revenue alone during 2020 and 2021.

• Leisure travelers will continue to drive recovery: in 2019, business travelers made up 52.5 percent of industry room revenue; in 2022, it is projected to represent just 43.6 percent.

• Business travel is expected to remain down more than 20 percent for much of the year, while just 58 percent of meetings and events are expected to return. The full effects of Omicron are not yet known.

Work Ongoing For Car Dealership’s New, Larger Facility As Business In Region Grows

February 22, 2022February 22, 2022

Work is progressing on a new 21,000 square foot home for Krystal Chrysler Jeep Dodge in Warrensburg. The dealership plans to move in early this summer.
Paul Post

By Paul Post

A Warrensburg car dealership is planning an early summer move into a spacious new facility, nearly triple the size of its current home.

Krystal Chrysler Jeep Dodge is relocating from a less than 8,000-square-foot site at 4488 Route 9, to a 21,000-square-foot building 2.5 miles closer to the village, adjacent to Oscar’s Smokehouse, one of the North Country’s most popular retail stores.

Owner Steve Lofrgren said the move is necessitated by business growth spurred by the popularity of the Ram and Jeep brands, and the need for larger service capacity.

There are several other Chrysler Jeep Dodge dealerships in the region including Nemer, in Queensbury, but Lofgren said the new Warrensburg site will have unique features such as a Jeep-only showroom.

“We would be the only one north of Albany with this type of facility,” he said.

When facing the building, the Jeep showroom will take center stage in the middle. A separate showroom for Chrysler and Dodge vehicles will be on the left, with service to the right on the south end of the structure.

Krystal, which now employs 42 workers, plans to add about five jobs including technicians, sales staff and office help.

Stewart’s Shops Plans Construction Of Many New Stores, Plus Renovated Shops, in 2022

February 22, 2022

Stewart’s Shops is pursuing capital projects at 20 retail shop sites in 2022 including this new store, being built directly behind an older facility on Broad Street in Glens Falls.

By Paul Post

Stewart’s Shops is pursuing another year of aggressive capital projects by putting stores in seven new markets, and replacing older facilities with large new buildings at 13 other sites including one on Broad Street in Glens Falls.

This comes on the heels of $50 million the Saratoga Springs-based company spent last year for construction on 18 shops, of which 12 were replacements, the company said.

The other six previously belonged to the Central New York-based Blueox Neighborhood Market convenience store chain, which Stewart’s purchased and rebranded as its own.

But retail shop upgrades are only one part of the company’s capital program. “We are continuing to invest in our manufacturing facility in Greenfield,” spokesperson Erica Komoroske said. “We recently completed a 54,000-square-foot dry warehouse expansion project and we are currently expanding our deli cooler to address our ever growing customer demand for expanded food-to-go options.”

Founded in 1945, Stewart’s is among the Top 25 convenience store chains in America with 354 shops across 32 counties in New York and Vermont. Its territory stretches from Canton near the Canadian border, west to Oswego County, south to Orange County in the lower Hudson Valley, and east to Rutland, Vt.

The firm employs about 5,000 people, 4,400 in shops and 600 between its manufacturing and administrative departments, according to the company.

Dun & Bradstreet Business Directory says Stewart’s has gross sales of about $1.67 billion per year.

Construction Employment Numbers Show Companies Still Struggling To Get Workers

February 22, 2022

Construction employment in December remained below levels reached just before the start of the pandemic in more than half the states as firms struggled to find enough workers to hire, according to a new analysis of federal employment data released by the Associated General Contractors of America.

But the Biden Administration’s decision today to withdraw its emergency vaccine mandate for firms that employ 100 or more people will help firms avoid losing workers unwilling to comply with the new measure, officials said.

The decision by the Occupational Safety & Health Administration to withdraw its emergency temporary standard requiring workers at firms that employ 100 or more people to be vaccinated or tested weekly comes after the Supreme Court signaled its strong support for legal challenges filed by the Associated General Contractors of America and other entities against the measure.

The association challenged the rule late last year noting that the measure was unlawful and would do little to boost vaccination rates among construction workers, citing the fact that 64 percent of the construction industry works for firms that employ 99 or fewer people. With nearly 90 percent of construction firms having a hard time finding workers to hire, the rule would simply have encouraged vaccine-hesitant workers to move to smaller firms.

“The Biden administration is right to abandon its misguided vaccine emergency rule and we encourage them to do the same with a similar measure affecting federal contractors that we are also challenging in court,” said Stephen E. Sandherr, the association’s chief executive officer. “At the same time, we will continue to work with the administration to ensure its planned permanent vaccine rule applies only to workers in industries like healthcare that OSHA deems at high risk from the coronavirus.”

Employees Working At Home Creates Issues For Businesses, Including Cybersecurity

February 22, 2022

Martin A. Miranda, senior counsel at Tully Rinckey PLLC.
Courtesy Tully Rinckey PLLC

By Jennifer Farnsworth

Part of owning a small business is having a good understanding of the laws that effect it over time. In recent years, understanding codes and protocols is more important than ever.

Law firms and human resource consulting agencies can be important resources to help small business owners. They can even ultimately protect their livelihood.

Martin A. Miranda, senior counsel at Tully Rinckey PLLC, said his firm has seen an increase in cybersecurity concerns, as well as pandemic-related issues faced by small businesses.

“Due to the pandemic small businesses have relied more on their online business platforms. As more employees work from home, there has also been a significant increase in cyber attacks aimed at small businesses,” he said.

“Hackers may find small businesses particularly vulnerable for lacking adequate technology infrastructure and data security expertise.”

Miranda said to compound problems, networks outside of the workplace may not possess sufficient security measures to prevent cyber attacks, which have become increasingly more sophisticated and targeted.

Common methods of cyber attacks include phishing schemes, social engineering, malware, ransomware and password hacking, said Miranda.

He has also seen an increase in small businesses reaching out on how to best follow COVID protocols, a completely new area for small business owners to have to navigate.

“I receive many questions regarding how small businesses can maintain a safe work environment for their employees as COVID protocols evolve in response to the multiple variants. Implementing these protocols can be burdensome for a small business and enforcing the protocols can often lead to differences of opinion among employees,” said Miranda.

Business Report: Dealing With Cryptocurrency In A Divorce

February 22, 2022

Ryan J. McCall, associate at Tully Rinckey PLLC.

BY RYAN MCCALL ESQ.

Cryptocurrency has become one of the newest and most prevalent investments of the last two years. As a result, the courts are now faced with the prospect of having to evaluate and distribute cryptocurrency as a marital asset during a divorce proceeding.

What makes this new and innovative technology so complex is figuring out how much each cryptocurrency is worth.

Assuming a spouse is using a U.S.-based exchange, determining the value of an individual cryptocurrency is relatively simple. All that is needed is a subpoena duces tecum to that institution to obtain the necessary documents. Under these pretenses, the subpoenaing attorney would receive statements detailing how many funds were listed with that exchange and the assets could be easily valued as of any given date just as if dealing with stocks and investment assets.

However, what has become increasingly difficult is the rise of popular international cryptocurrency exchanges. Many of these exchanges are unregulated and will not comply with United States federal regulations. Courts should not be deterred by this in establishing a value for cryptocurrency as a marital asset.

In theory, certain cryptocurrencies—with the most popular one being Bitcoin—utilize blockchain technology, with each individual Bitcoin having a different identification number than the next. Blockchain technology has a continuous ledger of ongoing transactions that are performed and tracked.

With that being said, there are numerous ways savvy investors can attempt to hide their funds. The most popular way for someone to do this is through a “tumbler” which can issue a separate Bitcoin or fraction of a Bitcoin from the one currently in your possession. This creates a very difficult scenario for lawyers who would be faced with the task of attempting to track down these funds.

What is beginning to take place in the court system is identifying the value of a cryptocurrency based on funds that were withdrawn from an account.