Greenwich Village-Chelsea Chamber of Commerce

Continuum Health Partners

Address: 555 West 57th Street, New York, NY 10019
ph: 212.523.5555
http://www.chpnyc.org/
Type of Business: Hospitals, Healthcare Providers

Who are Continuum Health Partners?
Continuum Health Partners is a non-profit hospital system encompassing four historically distinguished New York City hospitals: Beth Israel, Roosevelt, St. Luke’s, and NY Eye & Ear Infirmary. A response to healthcare deregulation in the mid-1990s, Continuum Health Partners was formed to bring together the clinical strengths of each of its member partners into a multi-site, multi-specialty healthcare system. All of the member hospitals in the Continuum network have made direct and lasting impacts on the quality of life in New York City.

Continuum Health Partners in the Village
Both Beth Israel Medical Center and Roosevelt Hospital have served as trusted community healthcare resources in Chelsea and lower Manhattan for over one hundred years. After the closing of St. Vincent’s Hospital in 2010, patients and doctors were forced to venture elsewhere for their healthcare needs. As a response, Beth Israel and Roosevelt readily opened their doors to the community, providing a standard of quality care that softened the blow of a devastating loss in the village.

Continuum Health Gives Back
As renowned healthcare institutions with long-standing missions of service to diverse patient populations, Beth Israel and Roosevelt are very much community hospitals, treating patients residing in their local catchment areas, as well as newly vulnerable population of residents in the village.
“The most unique thing about serving Lower Manhattan is unquestionably the diversity amongst our patients (ethnically, religiously, and culturally),” says Brad Korn, Director of Government Relations for Continuum Health Partners.
Beth Israel and Roosevelt make a point to implement initiatives intended to meet the needs of specific patients (outreach to Chinese community in Chinatown, another one for the Orthodox Jewish population, one for the Latino population, etc.), all to ensure that they are appropriately sensitive to the needs of these patients. Their latest endeavor includes the development of a program for the LGBT community. Requiring that all their staff go through special training, these facilities strive to uphold a standard of professionalism and care. This is keeping with their 100 year old tradition – these hospitals were established to meet the needs of underserved population who were not getting the appropriate care.

The Continuum Health Experience
Having both recently doubled their state-of-the-art Emergency Rooms, Beth Israel and Roosevelt offer extensive emergency care, as well as various other clinically excellent programs. Beth Israel is renowned for cancer care programs, cardiac care programs, tremendous ENT medicine, orthopedic services, a commitment to HIV/AIDs care, and strong Psychiatric services that range from children to Geriatrics. Roosevelt Hospital boasts outstanding cancer programs (including a nationally renowned breast cancer service center), psychiatry services, and strong HIV/AIDS care.
Both facilities are world-renowned for their neuroscience programs. While Beth Israel focuses on neuro-disorders, emphasizing their treatment of movement disorders (MS, Parkinson’s, Lou Gehrig’s Disease ), Roosevelt targets interventional neurology (brain aneurysms, etc). Both host a team of doctors that people come from all over the world to see.
In addition to being a healthcare service pioneer, Beth Israel is also a healthcare business pioneer, developing a flexible self-pay policy that New York State mostly modeled their program off of. Two-thirds of the patients that utilize Beth Israel and Roosevelt have health insurance covered under either Medicare or Medicaid.
With a healthcare model that puts the patient-physician relationship at the heart of its practice, Beth Israel Medical Center and Roosevelt Hospital continue to serve the village community with respect, commitment, and care.

TD Bank

Address: 655 Avenue of the Americas (20th & 6th)
ph: 212.255.2090
http://www.tdbank.com
Type of Business: Financial Services, Banking

150 Years of Service
TD Bank, America’s Most Convenient Bank has been serving the financial needs of their customers since it first opened in 1852, in Portland, Maine. Over the past 150 years, through a series of mergers and acquisitions, TD Bank has expanded to include Cherry Hill, a New Jersey-based Commerce bank, and Carolina First Bank, in North and South Carolina Bank in Florida.

Currently, TD Bank is the 10th largest bank in the US, with over 1200 stores that span from Maine all the way down to Florida. The company is one of three banks in the country that is publicly traded and rated AAA, and has an estimated $168 billion in assets.

Customer Service
TD Bank’s approach towards customer service is to be open and welcome, which is clearly portrayed by their transparent glass walls and friendly staff members. TD Bank refers to their banks as “stores” to provide a retail front instead of a typical closed-off financial establishment. TD’s businesses model is focused on the needs of the customer, and is centered around the statement, “all customers can benefit from better service”.

TD Bank’s unique community model is dedicated to meeting customer’s needs. The stores are open seven days a week, with extended hours (7am to 8pm). Customer service representatives, supervisors, tellers, and advisors are all on call, and make it a point to help customers as soon as they walk through the door instead of referring them to other locations. TD Bank is only closed four days a year (Christmas, Easter, New Year’s, and Thanksgiving). On top of all this, TD Bank offers a 24/7 live call service, 365 days a year. With this service, a customer can call and will be in touch with a live person, any time of the day, any day of the year.

TD Bank also tries to help customers by providing “next day availability”. As long as a customer deposits a check before 6pm, it is guaranteed to be cleared overnight, for convenience. The bank also prides itself in it’s “penny arcade,” a machine that counts all those pesky coins that accumulate in your pockets, purses, and couches.

To further their community-based feel, each store has a mural tied to the community. TD Bank hires historians to research the community’s history and provide resources such as pictures to connect to the people who live in the area. Attention to detail is not a foreign concept to TD Bank, and their customer appreciation shows it.

TD Bank and Small Businesses
Although our economy has faced hard times through the past several years, TD Bank has made a point to continue lending to small businesses. Throughout this economic crisis, lending at TD Bank has reach an all time high. They understand the situation in which many small businesses find themselves and want to see these businesses keep their doors open. All of their lenders are local, meaning that the representatives in the stores . They strive to input and utilize authentic input rather than algorithmic methods to make decisions. TD Bank does not view hand-holding as a bad thing; rather, they are happy to help walk customers through the process. Every customer is more than account to TD Bank, and deserve to have their needs met.

Future for TD Bank
In an effort to connect to New York residents, TD Bank continues to search for new ways to support the community. TD Bank has hosted seminars on topics like how a startup company can attain capital and how to finance a business. The NoHo Art Walk, held in April, and the TriBeCa Film Festival are just two local cultural events that the bank supports each year.  Several store managers hold seats on the boards of local nonprofit organizations. TD Bank writes grants for many of these nonprofits as well, supporting green initiatives, education, and other social causes. To learn more about their community and business endeavors, pay a visit to their website <http://www.tdbank.com/>. And be sure to come say hello at their newest Manhattan location at 6th Ave and 21st Street (655 Avenue of the Americas).

Lucille Lortel Theater Foundation, Inc.

Address: 121 Christopher Street, New York, NY 10014
ph: 212.924.2817
http://www.lortel.org/
Type of Business: Non-profit; Theater

60 Years of Theatrical Excellence
The Lucille Lortel Theatre opened on June 9, 1953 with the production of Maya, which was directed by Simon Gantillon. After only seven performances the theatre closed, but was reopened in 1955 when Louis Schweitzer purchased the building as an anniversary present for his actress wife, Lucille Lortel. Shortly after, Lucille Lortel was nicknamed the “Queen Off-Broadway”.

The theatre was known as the Theatre de Lys until it was renamed in 1981. Throughout its history, the theatre has been regarded as New York’s premiere Off-Broadway Playhouse, and has produced several award winning performances. One of these award-winning productions includes Three Penny Opera, which starred Lotte Lenya, and won the Tony Award for best Off-Broadway show in 1955.

In 1999, Lucille Lortel donated the theatre to the Lucille Lortel Theatre foundation, and created a new booking policy that only allows non-profit productions. The famous Steel Magnolias was a production at the theatre before becoming a very successful movie in 1989.

Role in the Village
Located in the West Village, the Lucille Lortel Theatre prides itself as being an anchor to Christopher Street. People come to see excellent productions, and then venture out into the community for food, shopping and other activities. Attracting over 50,000 theatre-lovers a year, the theatre is an engine for the community, providing financial stability and awareness for surrounding businesses. The first-class Off-Broadway Theatre is a destination in the West Village that keeps people coming back.

Come to the Theatre!
Each year the Lucille Lortel Theatre produces several outstanding performances open to the general public, geared towards different age groups. Tickets are easily accessible through the online website. Don’t feel like paying for a show? Anyone can apply to volunteer as an usher and see a free performance! Non-profit companies can also rent this historically prestigious theatre for their own productions. This summer for example, from July 19- August 19th, Theatreworks USA, a non-profit theatre company for young and family audiences, is presenting Yellow Brick Road, a salsa-infused musical inspired by The Wizard of Oz.

Honig Conte Porrino

Address: 129 West 27th Street, 6th Floor, New York, NY 10001
ph: 212.777.7113
http://www.honigconte.com/
Member since: Chamber Champion 2007
Type of Business: Insurance

Who is Honig Conte Porrino?
Honig Conte Porrino Insurance Agency is a family owned and operated business that offers personalized insurance services.  They operate as generalists who are hands on and invested in the satisfaction of their customer.  From Mom & Pop’s to Fortune 500 companies, they treat each client with the same attention and respect for their needs.  Honig Conte Porrino helps people make decisions based on realistic expectations for their life circumstances, their comfort level and their budgets.

Honig Conte Porrino a Neighborhood Business
Greenwich Village and Chelsea feel like small towns in a big city, where neighborhood and community are essential to how businesses operate, and this is at the core of how Honig Conte Porrino business model.F. Michael Conte’s family has been in Greenwich Village for over 100 years He asks, “Why would we want to be anywhere else?  The Village, Chelsea, it’s our home, and our business is these neighborhoods.  People still say hello and know each other; families like my own and my partners can really thrive and develop roots here. We make it a point to patronize our customers and give them business in turn for theirs.” In 2005 Honig Conte Porrino began their search for a new office space, finally settling at 129 W. 27^th Street. “We didn’t bother looking anywhere else.”

Honig Conte Porrino and the GVCCC
Michael Conte’s father was appointed President of the GVCCC in the 1977, so their agency has been membe ever since.  Four years ago they decided to make the jump to Chamber Champions to “take a more active role in the community.” The agency also sponsors the Pirates, a team in the junior minors division of the Greenwich Village Little League.  And co-founder Michael Honig is treasurer of the PS3 School Community Council.

Unique Customer Service in Insurance
“We still try to give that old world service that people deserve. We believe this is what truly drives customers to our firm over others.”   Their corporate culture is one of community and personal service; they encourage their staff to create a bond with their clients.  Both Michael Honig and Michael Conte readily admit that insurance is a boring business, “No one wants insurance, it’s a need.  The difference here is that we’re a lot of fun.”

They still file by name, and work collaboratively; the owners themselves work on 90% of the files.  They believe in the added value of personal consideration and care.  “You don’t simply purchase the policy but the quality time and attention.”  They don’t want their customers to feel blind in the process.  It’s about a deep understanding of the services they’re paying for and walking the clients through each step, helping identify customer needs and finding them the best fit.

How Honig Conte Porrino Stands Out
“At our agency we try to make the process as simple and painless as possible. And live up to what is promised.  We do not have the marketing budget of a large company. We cannot just say we are better, we have to actually be better by providing better service and better coverage options.  The insurance industry is so maligned because it makes the process of buying insurance a nightmare.”

Google

Address: 76 9th Avenue (111 8th Avenue)
ph: 212.565.0000
http://www.google.com/
http://www.google.com/corporate/nyc/index.html/
Member since: 2010
Type of Business: Technology

Google’s mission is “to organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful,” a purpose that has kept it at the forefront of technological innovation. The brand Google, most notably the search engine, has become a part of our permanent technical lexicon. But Google doesn’t just exist on our computer screens or as a part of our vernacular, they are also our neighbor.

In 2006 Google moved into their current home at 76 9th Avenue (also 111 8th Avenue), and in 2008 they expanded across the street into Chelsea Market. In December of 2010 they bought their space, the former Port Authority building in the center of Chelsea. They announced their investment on their official blog stating “We believe that this is a great real estate investment in a thriving neighborhood and a fantastic city” (Read the whole post here). Their building stretches between 15th and 16th streets, housing their over 2,000 employees, a number they are continuing to grow with the assertion that they are “hiring across the board.” The Google offices have a distinctive corporate culture with thousands of Lego blocks, 150 Razor scooters, a game room, and a vintage computer exhibit, all at the disposal of their employees, called “Googlers.” These unique amenities aim to promote employee productivity and creativity, two of the characteristics of “Googleyness.” Their environment is meant to motivate and this motivation is what has kept Google’s list of products and services expanding. Click Here for full a list of Google Products and Services.

Googlers take pride in their community and their policy is both to integrate with and to enhance their neighborhoods. East Coast Community Affairs Manager, Alex Abelin, emphasized the importance of being a good neighbor and an active member of the community: “To Google being a good neighbor is not just being here, but investing in our surroundings, through local schools, community organizations, and non-profits.” Education is also a large part of Google’s community outreach. Googlers conduct small to medium seminars to promote awareness of their products and services in order to improve capacity for small businesses and to bring companies into the 21st Century.

Please join Google and the Chamber, on Tuesday March 22 for “Expanding Past Your Storefront,” a seminar targeted to small businesses and demonstrating the various uses of how Google’s products can help widen your online presence to connect with old and new customers. Visit the Event Calendar for more information! Email Cat@villagechelsea.com to RSVP!

This futuristic coffee bar in the heart of Greenwich Village is not your average coffee shop. Through the use of their automated coffee roasting and brewing system, the Javabot™, the Roasting Plant brews every cup of coffee on site from raw beans to final product. “Our goal at the Roasting Plant is to consistently make the freshest, most flavorful cup of coffee available, and Javabot™’s automation makes that possible,” said Roasting Plant Founder, Mike Caswell.

While their coffee is incredible, they offer other specialties as well.  This year the Roasting Plant won Serious Eats award for the “Best Chocolate Chip Cookie in the Whole of New York City!”  Undoubtedly the coffee and fresh out of the oven cookies are amazing, but the customer service is also exceptional. The workers create a casual and friendly environment, and guide you through the vast menu options so you are not intimidated when you step up to the counter.

The Roasting Plant chose Greenwich Village because of its diverse population. “Villagers have a sophisticated palette, are discriminating in their choices, and have a lot of life experiences. They specifically chose Greenwich Ave. because of its close proximity to St. Vincent’s Hospital, which offered an automatic built in customer base.  Since the closing of St. Vincent’s, the Roasting Plant, like many of its neighbors, has taken a hit with the dramatic fall in foot traffic to the area.

The Roasting Plant understands what it means to be part of a community. The store donates its leftover coffee grounds to a garden across the street that uses them for fertilizer. In turn the gardeners (who are, of course, Roasting Plant regulars themselves) give the staff free vegetables out of pure gratitude (the cherry tomatoes are delicious and are a favorite of Mike’s).

The Roasting Plant hopes to become a part of your daily life, so stop in for your daily dose of java.  It will change the way you look at coffee and community.