Midcoast Chamber Shares Seven Business Updates for Spring 2026

Every few months, Cory King, executive director of the Bath-Brunswick-Topsham Regional Chamber of Commerce, clears his desk and shares what's been building behind the scenes. His latest column, "Midcoast chamber empties its notebook," dropped this week with seven updates ranging from a breakfast speaker event to a candid look at the slow, steady work happening on housing and transportation. Here's what the chamber wants the region to know as spring gets underway.

Breakfast with Cary Ouellette at the Brunswick Hotel

The most time-sensitive item on the list is a breakfast event at the Brunswick Hotel on Tuesday, Feb. 24, featuring speaker Cary Ouellette. Ouellette's work sits squarely in the territory that most business leaders recognize but rarely talk about openly: the mental and emotional friction that stalls decision-making and breeds inertia. King describes Ouellette as someone "who works with a variety of business leaders on the mental hurdles and the emotional hurdles all business leaders face, and how to, in a way, get unstuck and get out of your ruts." King's assessment of the topic is straightforward: "It's a very relatable topic." The event is open to anyone. "All are welcome," King notes, directing interested attendees to the Bath-Brunswick-Topsham Regional Chamber Facebook page or midcoastmaine.com for tickets and details.

Housing and Transportation: Slow Work, Real Progress

Perhaps the most substantive section of the column addresses two issues that come up repeatedly across Midcoast Maine: housing availability and transportation access. King is careful to frame this section with appropriate caveats, but he's equally clear that something is actually happening. "I know this is vague, and it has to be, but I want you to know that I regularly attend two to five meetings per month about housing and transportation," he writes. The analogy he reaches for captures the scale of the challenge: "The development of solutions is difficult, like turning around an air craft carrier, but not impossible, and I need you to know that incremental progress is being made."

King also addresses why residents may not have heard more about it. "Often, we don't mention it because we don't want to get expectations too high for immediate solutions, but intentional and incremental progress is being made, and that should be known." He stops short of offering a timeline or naming specific initiatives: "I can't be more specific yet or give any kind of a timetable, but yes, local leaders are focused on these two big issues, and the chamber has a big role in that." For a region where both housing costs and transit gaps are felt daily, it's a notable signal that coordinated work is underway even if the results aren't visible yet.

High School Internship Placements

The chamber's internship program for high school students has been moving quickly. King reports that five more students were placed into internships in just the past week, bringing fresh momentum to a program that connects young people with local businesses before graduation. Just as importantly, King notes that the window for businesses to participate hasn't closed: "it's not too late to become an internship host site." Businesses or organizations interested in hosting a student intern can reach King directly through the chamber for details. The program represents one of the more concrete pipelines the chamber maintains between the region's workforce future and its current business community.

Lunch and Learn Events on the Way

The chamber is signaling an expansion of its educational programming this spring and into the coming months. King teases the format without yet naming dates or topics: "Look for more Lunch & Learn–style education events from the chamber in the coming months." These sessions are a familiar fixture for chamber members and local professionals looking to build skills or gain knowledge without a major time commitment. The promise of more events suggests the chamber is building out a fuller programming calendar as the warmer months approach.

Brunswick Downtown Association Launches Speaker Series at Curtis Memorial Library

King takes a moment in the column to recognize a milestone from a partner organization. The Brunswick Downtown Association held its first speaker series event at Curtis Memorial Library on Thursday evening. King's mention is brief but pointed: "kudos to the Brunswick Downtown Association for its first speaker series event at Curtis Memorial Library on Thursday night." Curtis Memorial Library has long served as a community anchor in Brunswick, and pairing it with a new speaker series from the Downtown Association signals an investment in programming that goes beyond retail and foot traffic. Whether this becomes a recurring series remains to be confirmed, but the debut appears to have landed well enough to merit a public nod from the chamber.

Multi-Stop Ribbon-Cutting in Bath

Main Street Bath and the Bath-Brunswick-Topsham Regional Chamber are jointly organizing a multi-stop ribbon-cutting event in Bath, with details expected to be announced shortly. King writes that the event is "in a few weeks" with specifics coming soon: "look for details next week." Multi-stop ribbon cuttings are a signature way to celebrate multiple new businesses or locations in a single community event, letting residents move through a neighborhood and meet the people behind new ventures in an informal, festive setting. Bath's downtown has seen consistent activity in recent years, and a multi-stop format suggests there's enough new business energy to fill an itinerary. Check midcoastmaine.com and the chamber's Facebook page for the schedule once it's released.

The Column Itself: A Regular Habit Worth Following

The seventh update is, in a sense, the column itself. King writes this kind of notebook-clearing piece as a regular practice, and the range of topics in this edition reflects how much the chamber operates across different layers of civic and business life simultaneously. From workforce development to downtown celebrations to the grinding, meeting-by-meeting work of housing policy, the column captures the connective tissue that often goes unacknowledged. Cory King is executive director of the Bath-Brunswick-Topsham Regional Chamber of Commerce. For the latest on all of these initiatives, visit midcoastmaine.com or follow the chamber on Facebook.