Genesis Financial Solutions, a Beaverton-based financial services company which services credit cards and lending to consumers and suboptimal credit, announced this week that it has rebranded as Concora Credit. The rebrand features a new website, and comes after a year of forming business partnership with retailers looking to service lower-credit customers.

Jason Tinurelli, chief marketing officer at Concora Credit tells Oregon Business over email that the name Genesis Financial Solutions was not performing as well as desired. “As a company, we are 20 years old and have helped millions of people access credit, but our name and branding were not breaking through in the market. We took rebranding as an opportunity to stand out with our name, branding, and ‘Do More’ tag line,” says Tinurelli.

Genesis Financial Solutions was founded in 2001, and specializes in subprime consumer credit and student loans, and work with merchants, retailers, educational institutions and healthcare providers to offer credit to customers with FICO scores between 300 and 689 — scores considered subprime by most financial services providers.

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In March of this year, Genesis partnered with Michigan-based Gardner White to become the primary servicer of the furniture retailer’s secondary credit program, which offers revolving credit lines of up to $6,000 and deferred interest programs for customers with lower credit scores.

In May,  the company partnered with the Texas-based Upbound Group Inc, owners of lease-to-own furniture retailers Rent-A-Center and Acima, to issue its credit cards  to consumers. The Upbound Group reported $979.16 million in quarterly revenue in June, an 8.6% year-over-year decline.

In addition to the partnerships with Upbound and Rent-A-Center, Tinurelli says Concora Credit has two businesses it is looking to expand.

“The Mastercard programs are big and well-known, and we want to continue to expand those markets. On the Private Label Credit Card side, we want to continue growing with Upbound while adding other retailers and healthcare services where a second-look credit card program makes sense to help them do more business,” says Tinurelli.

The company’s credit cards will also be rebranded. According to the release, Concora’s headquarters will remain in Beaverton.

A previous version of this article said Concora Credit issued credit cards. The cards are issued by banks. Oregon Business regrets this error.

Per an Instagram post shared last fall, Astoria legend holds that Xanadu stands at the former location of an ice cream shop and, more recently, the Voodoo Room. Former employees of the latter say they’ve seen a male figure dressed like the ice cream shop’s owner. 

Now it’s a popular haunt for residents and visitors to the bustling coastal town, who enjoy cocktails named after queer historical figures like Harvey Milk and Rock Hudson, as well as LeRoy Adolphson, a longtime resident who served as the grand marshal of the second Astoria Pride festival. Xanadu opened on March 9 next to the Columbian Theater on Marine Drive and takes its name from the cult-favorite 1980 roller-disco fantasy film starring Olivia Newton-John. 

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Pop culture and queer historical references are important to owner Scott Justus, who serves on the board of the Lower Columbia Q Center and as membership director of the Astoria-Warrenton Area Chamber of Commerce.

“[H]aving that conversation with younger people is important and fun. It’s a fun way to make [education] happen. We don’t make people feel bad for not knowing,” Justus says. “That’s how you learn. That’s why we’re asking for LGBTQ+ education in classes, because if no one teaches it, how would you know?”

Justus said that visitors have quickly warmed to Xanadu. It offers something for people settling into the coastal town, and for younger patrons who need a safe space to have fun and figure themselves out. 

Gay bars have served as crucial meeting spaces for decades. The reason most Pride celebrations take place in June, after all, is to honor the anniversary of the Stonewall riots, which were precipitated by the 1969 police raid of the Stonewall Inn in New York City. 

And while queer life has long been associated with large, urban centers, including Portland — where more than a dozen bars service the metro area’s LGBTQ+ community full-time, and at least twice as many bars give at least once a month to queer programs like drag shows and dance parties — LGBTQ+ nightlife, businesses and activism thrive  across Oregon, from the state capital to wilderness retreats. Oregon Business spoke to owners of queer bars — and other businesses — about how they thrive year-round, how they support their customers and communities, and how they’ve responded to a backlash that has their businesses and events in the crosshairs of a culture war. 

Trapdoor Bar and Grill opened in 2020 in the heart of Ashland, near Lithia Park. It’s situated at the site of the Vinyl Club, which hosted queer-focused events but also had a reputation for violence, including a 2018 incident where a bouncer inflicted serious injuries on a patron and ultimately cost the former venue its liquor license. The new space is an upscale cocktail bar; the new owners have continued to host queer-friendly events while working to make sure Trapdoor is a space where everyone feels welcome and safe.

“We wanted to eventually be a tradition where more or less everyone feels included or we are more of an all-inclusive location. We thought that it was extremely important to keep that Pride event going on because it was such a big part of the venue, and what Ashland is as a town,” says co-owner Ron Morairty. 

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Trapdoor hosts drag and burlesque shows as well as standup comedy and live music, with the goal of creating a space where members of the LGBTQ+ community and straight people can feel comfortable every night of the week. 

Morairty says he doesn’t have any direct connection to the LGBTQ+ community. But he views Ashland — where he has lived for most of the last 14 years, save a stint in the military — as a place uniquely positioned for the kind of inclusive environment he has been working to create.

“Ashland is kind of this weird bubble that isn’t like the rest of the towns around it and isn’t like the rest of Southern Oregon in general,” Morairty says. “It’s a big mixing pot of a bunch of different ways of thinking, cultures, mindsets and ways of life. In my opinion, that’s what we want in America: a giant melting pot of mixed ideas, action and thought that creates this wonderful location where everyone feels included, as if it’s a place that you’ve been before or wanted to be, and you couldn’t find it.”

He says Trapdoor’s staff are trained to lead with respect, and on how to assist if queer patrons feel uncomfortable or worse. “Thankfully, we’ve never had to use our [safety] procedures, and I hope that day never comes,” Morairty says. 

The safety of customers and staff isn’t a new issue for bars in general, nor for queer bars in particular. In the 1980s, groups of skinheads in Portland and elsewhere reportedly lurked outside gay bars, attacking patrons as they left. But in 2023, LGBTQ+ people — as well as events and businesses that affirm them — are at targets in an intensifying culture war. This year alone, the big-box retailer Target pulled some Pride Month merchandise in response to harassment of staff, and conservatives announced plans to boycott Budweiser after the company made a sponsored-content deal with a transgender influencer. And events like drag queen story hours — the first of which was organized in the Bay Area in 2015 as a way to include more queer parents — are increasingly the focus of protests and violent threats, as well as legislation to ban such events, or ban drag altogether. 

While more Oregon communities are holding Pride events and host queer spaces than ever before, the state is not immune to the rising backlash. As this issue went into production, for example, two people were arrested after a sidewalk fight broke out between two groups protesting Oregon City’s first-ever Pride festival.

Jason Wood is a voice coach in Florence, a town on Oregon’s Central Coast with a population of 9,475. He also performs in drag as Fanny Rugburn, regularly hosting all-ages events like storytime readings since 2017. 

Wood says neo-Nazis heckled and harassed his show at the Florence Golf Links on April 29, during his second campaign for Siuslaw County’s school board. 

“Many of the people who came to protest my show had out-of-state license plates on their cars,” Wood says. “I’m not naive enough to think there were zero community members involved, but many of them were not from our community, so it points to something being organized on a larger scale. I have way more support — and Fanny Rugburn has way more support — in the community than there are people speaking out against her.”

Wood says he told his fans online not to engage with the harassers in any way. Police kept the neo-Nazis and their counterprotesters separated, and the event ended with no physical violence. 

It was also a great show, Wood says; he describes that performance as Fanny Rugburn’s best production to date, entirely unrelated to his harassment, but that he still has mixed feelings about the day. 

“The fire is a lot hotter, and someone turned it up, and the fact that I [was] also running for school board probably also added to the heat, especially since the banner at the bottom of the hill said, ‘Keep pedophiles out of our schools,’” Wood says. 

“And let’s not [dance] around it: That is the worst thing you can say to someone. That’s the worst thing you can call someone. I’m not bothered personally, because I know I’m not a pedophile or a groomer, but it’s upsetting that people have the audacity to say that about someone they’ve had very little, if any, contact or experience with,” Wood says. 

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Wood is not alone. In October about 50 protesters — some of them armed — showed up to protest a Drag Queen Storytime event at Old Nick’s Pub in Eugene. They were outnumbered by counterprotesters, about 200 of whom showed up to circle the pub during the event, which took place early on a Sunday. 

Pub staff told Oregon Public Broadcasting that the pub has hosted drag story hours for years — with organizer Jammie Roberts saying they also help organize similar events in Southern Oregon — but such events have recently come under the scrutiny of far-right commentators and protesters, who accuse the performers and organizers of using the events to groom children. (The logic is, apparently, that all drag performance is inherently sexual, though that idea is difficult to square with an honest definition of drag.) 

Just a month after the Eugene event, a man who ran a neo-Nazi website shot and killed five people — and wounded 25 others — at the Colorado Springs’ Club Q before patrons stopped him. 

Colorado Springs has a population of half a million people, making it the second-most populous city in the state and comparable in size to Portland. But the city is probably better known as the site of Focus on the Family’s headquarters as well as the U.S. Air Force Academy, and some national media coverage of the Club Q shooting was couched in surprise that any queer spaces existed in Colorado Springs to begin with.

Entrepreneurs and organizers in smaller Oregon cities — including Eugene as well as Salem and Bend — have worked in recent years to carve out queer-friendly spaces, more often in the form of event nights than dedicated gay bars. 

Daniel Young is not the father of Bend’s queer nightlife, but he is D’Auntie Carol, host of drag bingos and brunches at Bend’s Campfire Hotel & Pool Club, which holds Bend’s Winter Pride celebrations — a snowy spin on the traditional summer event. He also hosts the pop-up party Hey Honey, which takes place at the queer-owned restaurant Spork.

Young moved to Bend in 2011 and wanted to bring with him a vision for queer nightlife that was beginning to blossom in Portland at that time, when producers were just starting to host queer parties — like Blow Pony, Gaycation and Booty — outside the safety net of gay bars. That not only brought newfound freedom for creatives to mold venues to their vision but also brought LGBTQ+ people together to socialize in new settings.

Young says people often tell him that he should open Bend’s first full-time gay bar, but Young counters that he will give all the advice he can to anyone else with the funds and resources to make it happen. Same goes for young queens who want to host their own drag brunch, bingo or pop-up party in the meantime. 

“There’s been a lot of ‘You should do this,’ and for me, it should be ‘You should do this,’” Young tells OB. “I’ll sit down to coffee and show you how I do things, and you can throw another drag brunch or do this sort of thing, and the more people that do it, the more visible we are as a community,” Young says.

Campfire is not a gay bar but does advertise itself as an explicitly queer-friendly space. So far, general manager Daniel Elder says, that seems to have been enough to deter homophobic and transphobic people from visiting. 

Salem’s sole gay bar, the Southside Speakeasy, is situated in a secluded corporate park south of the city’s municipal airport. That relative isolation has also kept patrons safe, says co-owner David Such. 

“We don’t really have problems with people because we’re in an area where you know you’re going to a gay bar if you’re going there,” Such says. “We’re not downtown, but we’re seeing people being more open in public and holding hands, and you never saw that 18 years ago.”

And like many gay bars, Southside Speakeasy gets its share of straight-identified patrons, all of whom seem to enjoy themselves. 

Such says parents visit on weekends, taking a break during their kids’ basketball games at the neighboring court. A swingers club and a fetish group also started holding dinner parties at the bar after they met with less accepting spaces in town, Such adds.

 “They went to another bar and were asked to leave because people there didn’t agree with the choices they were making, even if they weren’t performing any of those choices in their space,” Such says. “There are people all over the board who come in, like straight people with gay best friends, or our parents and relatives, so people feel welcome and not uneasy being here.”

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Drag story events are relatively new, and the right-wing focus on them even newer. The recent backlash has prompted legislative attempts to ban drag performance altogether: Idaho legislators tried to ban drag performances in public facilities during this year’s session, but the bill failed to advance. Tennessee’s Legislature successfully passed a bill limiting drag performance to age-restricted venues, though at the beginning of June that bill was struck down by a federal judge who said it violates First Amendment protections. (Laws against masquerading, or costumed dress, were used to arrest queer-presenting and gender-nonconforming people for much of the 20th century, and such laws were often a pretense for bar raids like the one that sparked the Stonewall riots.) 

Even the conflation of queer identity with pedophilia, and rhetoric about indoctrination of children, have a familiar ring. In 1977 singer Anita Bryant argued that homosexuals should not be protected from discrimination because they used school teaching positions to “recruit” children into their lifestyle. And in 1992 Oregon voters narrowly defeated a ballot measure that would have amended the Oregon constitution to define “ homosexuality, pedophilia, sadism or masochism” as “abnormal, wrong, unnatural and perverse.” 

In those days, businesses that welcomed queer people were far more difficult to find, says Jill Nelson, treasurer of Oregon Pride in Business, an LGBTQ+ business alliance connecting queer business owners across industries in Oregon and Washington. 

“Thirty years ago, if you wanted to find people like us, your two choices were gay-
affirming churches and the bar. That was it,” Nelson tells OB.

Nelson remembers being an out lesbian in the 1990s, and she says the current backlash doesn’t scare her. She is confident that the LGBTQ+ community is better organized and equipped to fight together against the current backlash. She also thinks the business community is more committed to equality than people may realize. 

“I think that the business community is leading LGBTQ+ acceptance nationally and culturally. You can see that with Disney,” Nelson says, referring to an ongoing dispute between the Walt Disney Company and the state of Florida, which has culminated in legal action by the latter against Gov. Ron DeSantis. Disney’s suit says Florida’s government has retaliated politically after company officials publicly criticized Florida’s Parental Rights in Education Act, colloquially known as the “Don’t Say Gay” bill. “Politically, we are divided as a country, but in the business world, we are not as divided.

“There are fiscal conservatives who run businesses who are definitely going to look for conservative financial strategies, and that’s going to be important to them. But they realize they have to create environments for their employees and the people they do business with to succeed, and they‘re becoming less biased in who they want to do good business with,” she adds.

Nelson acknowledges homophobic and transphobic discrimination against business owners still happens in the United States but believes it to be an overall rare occurrence in the Pacific Northwest, pointing to more than a decade of positive business interactions across three separate financial institutions her business has used. She believes that the work of LGBTQ+ activists and business owners, supported by the overall accepting spirit of the Pacific Northwest, will make legislation against the community difficult to implement. 

“I’ve seen the LGBTQ+ news that comes out of Florida, and I’ve seen 300-plus drag protesters in heels, and it makes me think ‘Yeah, they don’t know what’s coming at them if they keep this up,’” Nelson says. “I think we are better prepared to fight this bigotry and negativity as a community than ever before.And especially in this area, I don’t think we will see it rear its ugly head as much, and if we do, there will be pushback.”

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Wood says allies from urban cities can support rural LGBTQ+ communities by visiting, even if they don’t have boldly out and proud destinations like gays bars or coffee shops. He recommends Southern Oregon Pride and Yachats Pride. 

“It is difficult to get something like a Pride celebration going in a rural area, so even though it looks like it might not have a lot to it, it always does. There’s a lot of heart and thought that went into it,” Wood says. 

Justus says rural populations especially need people who are both trained for the jobs people like him hire to fill, but also people who can afford to live in the area without scraping by to make ends meet. Justus says Xanadu proudly pays employees more than minimum wage. He works with Clatsop County Community College’s Small Business Development Center to develop training opportunities for future employees, and to help other queer business owners in Astoria thrive. 

Even for his immersion in Astoria’s broader community, Justus can’t help but find comfort in seeing a rainbow flag at businesses like Xanadu. 

“It’s like when I moved to town and I asked where my people were. I mean, ‘Where are my gay people?’ Because they’re going to understand my life and experiences a lot differently than people from the straight community because of the issues that we deal with,’” Justus says. “It’s not that we don’t want to be part of that community, it’s that we want to be able to relate to someone on that level so we can go out and be ourselves in the broader community.”

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Editor’s Note: The version of this story that ran in the July/August 2023 print edition of Oregon Business incorrectly identified the co-owner of Trapdoor Bar & Grill as Todd Morairty, not Ron Morairty. Oregon Business regrets the error.

Per an Oregon OSHA press release, boxes at the store were stacked more than seven feet high and unsecured. The agency cited the stack as a serious violation during an initial inspection visit. Management at the store submitted documentation intending to show the hazard was abated, but investigators didn’t consider the documentation sufficient, and also received an anonymous complaint saying the unsecured merchandize hazard had not been sufficiently addressed.

That prompted a follow-up inspection, which included employee interviews and a review of internal documents that showed the hazard had “only briefly” been abated. Investigators also found that an employee had tried to correct the hazard, but the stack of boxes collapsed, trapping an employee who had to be helped by a coworker to get free.

“Ensuring employees are protected from harm by implementing clearly recognized and legally obligated safety measures must remain a priority for any employer,” Oregon OSHA Administrator Renée Stapleton said in the release. “Willfully and knowingly disregarding such safety measures is absolutely inexcusable.” 

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According to Oregon OSHA spokesperson Aaron Corvin, since November 2021, the agency has cited Dollar Tree 11 times at different store locations across the state for violating requirements. Three of those citations went to the Forest Grove location and three to the Wilsonville store. The rest involve a citation each to locations in Redmond, Oregon City, Aloha, Eugene and Salem.  

“To be sure, some of the citations involved more than one violation and also different types of violations,” Corvin wrote in an email to Oregon Business. “We have cited the employer for violations of rules governing secure storage, prevention of slipping and tripping hazards, access to exit routes, and the requirement that employers maintain a safety committee.”

In March, the New York Times reported that since 2017, Dollar Tree has been cited for 90 violations and fined $14 million by the federal Occupational Safety and Health Division; Family Dollar, which Dollar Tree acquired in 2014, has been cited 54 times and fined $5 million.

The store has 30 calendar days to file an appeal.

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“We are focused on maintaining a safe environment for our associates and customers and ensuring our stores comply with all health and safety regulations,” a company spokesperson for Dollar Tree said in a written statement shared with OB. “We take the issues identified in our Forest Grove store seriously, remediate them as quickly as possible and continue to enhance our safety program and protocols.”

Dollar Tree Inc. is a Fortune 500 company headquartered in Chesapeake, Va. Per its website, as of January of this year the company operated more than 16,000 stores in 48 states and five Canadian provinces; it employs more than 200,000 people. The company has stores, which are known for offering merchandise at extreme discounts, in 65 Oregon cities. It is publicly traded and as of Wednesday, shares were worth $147.67.

A study published in the American Journal of Public Health this January, which surveyed 50,000 households on their food purchasing practices, found that dollar stores are the fastest growing food retailers by expenditure share, growing by 89.7% between 2008 and 2020 and by 102.9% in rural areas, though still accounting for just 2.1% of food purchases overall in 2020.

Dollar stores are also one of the fastest growing sectors of retail overall: in 2022, Dollar Tree opened 464 new stores, relocated 120 stores and closed 205 stores. The company reported a 9% net sales increase of $7.72 billion.

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Oregon’s restaurant and hospitality sector shows encouraging signs of growth, but workforce challenges remain a significant issue, according to data from the Oregon Restaurant & Lodging Association.

There are more than 7,000 job openings in Oregon’s hotels and lodging sector and 24,000 job openings in restaurants, with 197,000 currently employed in both sectors, according to ORLA’s data.

“The all-time high points for employment in the industry was August of 2019 when we had 223,795 [filled] jobs. If we could fill all the jobs that are available, then we would be beating the peak industry employment all time,” says ORLA president and CEO Jason Brandt.

The number of restaurants in Oregon has also returned to 2019 levels, ORLA’s numbers show. Brandt says that the state lost approximately 750 restaurant locations out of 10,000 prior to the pandemic, but now the number of restaurants in the state has surpassed 10,000.

Brandt attributes the restaurant and lodging sector’s recovery to increased travel.

“There’s a term out there called ‘revenge travel,’ which I think is is kind of a real thing. That term represents people that feel like they had travel taken away from them, but are now getting their revenge on the pandemic, and getting out there to stay overnight at a lodging establishments and go out to eat,” Brandt says.

A spokesperson for Travel Oregon tells Oregon Business over email that Oregon experienced a 26.5% year-over-year increase in direct travel spending from $10.9 billion to $13.9 billion in 2022.

In recent years businesses have struggled to find employees, especially on the Oregon coast.

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Brandt says one of the factors constraining the industry is the perception of poor pay. Data from the federal Bureau of Labor Statistics says food and beverage service workers make a median wage of $12.49 per hour; BLS data say Oregon food service workers make a median wage of $15 per hour, with waiters and waitresses making a median wage of $14.32 per hour. Brandt contends those numbers don’t necessarily reflect what service workers really make because they don’t account for tips; according to data from the National Restaurant Association, tipped workers make a median of $27 per hour. 

“This represents a considerable salary that can sustain someone for a lifetime, if it’s a career they truly enjoy,” says Brandt. “One of the things that I don’t feel gets a fair shake in our industry is the wage reporting data that we see often from the US Department of Labor, as well as the Oregon Employment Department. We’ve, talked to our friends at the state agencies about this, and we’re trying to figure out some solutions.”

For kitchen and other back-of-house jobs, Brandt says employers who institute a tip sharing policy could increase equity in the sector, as well as make positions more attractive to job seekers. (BLS data show back-of-house workers like head chefs have a higher median wage than waitstaff: chefs and head cooks make a median wage of $24.03 per hour in Oregon.)

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Increases in job demand and tourism spending have not been felt as strongly in Oregon’s largest city. in April of 2023, 167,000 hotel rooms were sold in Portland Central City, 12,000 more than in 2022, but still 22% lower than April of 2019, according to Brandt.

Brandt says media perceptions of Portland as being unsafe are still holding tourists back – a perception he says is not in line with reality, when compared to other cities across the country. 

Complete data on summer tourism will be available for ORLA to analyze in the fall. Until then, there is no way to know just how much of a drag so many opens jobs will have on Oregon’s hospitality sector. But even with so many open positions, Brandt says Oregon’s hospitality industry is on the right trajectory, and that he expects the sector to break even more records as time goes on.

“My advice would be to not underestimate the ability of the hospitality industry to break more records relating to demand over the next decade. And as people experience the amazing typography we have here and the different climates and cultures, I think our industry will be well served for future growth and opportunity,” says Brandt. “The future is very bright for our industry.”

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The bakery’s eighth Oregon location will be situated in the Main Street Commons, a multilevel food and drink hub on the southeast corner of East Main Street and 2^nd Avenue. It will offer delicious rustic bread, all-butter artisan pastries baked on site, and other locally sourced, made-to-order menu items.

Claire Randall, Grand Central’s CEO, says the company is expanding to Hillsboro because of the continued growth that’s happening there, and it aligns with the company’s overall strategy for expansion.

“We were excited about the opportunity to take part in the revitalization of downtown Hillsboro and the community-building opportunities it provided,” Randall says. “Hillsboro is one of the most rapidly growing areas in our region. Plus, from a business standpoint, our Cedar Mill café is our most successful bakery and we’re assuming that enthusiasm for our brand would continue west down the Willamette Valley corridor. Our strategy has always been to grow slowly and thoughtfully while taking advantage of opportunities that support our mission. Our plan is to open a new café every two to three years in line with our resources and customer demand.”

Grand Central was established in Seattle in 1989. Last year, the company announced plans to transition from private ownership to a perpetual purpose trust, but has since  paused the transition. Randall says the company plans to resume the project when conditions are more favorable both internally and within the broader economy. She adds that while sales continue to recover after the pandemic, staffing shortages and rising ingredient costs have impacted the company’s financials.

“We are reluctant to take on investors and additional debt obligations before these conditions improve,” Randall says. “The rise in interest rates over the past year means that we will likely have to provide higher base dividends to investors than we originally modeled. We’re currently in discussion and planning about how to structure financing the trust transition in a way that won’t be unduly burdensome to the company. Our hope is to re-ignite the project later this year.”

An official ribbon cutting ceremony for the new Hillsboro bakery is scheduled for July 8. 

The immersive tasting room will be open daily and will feature a range of experiences for visitors, including complimentary guided tastings of their distinctive nonalcoholic spirits and delicious craft cocktails for purchase. Additionally, a rotating specialty cocktail will be available, along with Wilderton Spritz happy hours each week this summer. For those wanting a more up-close look at where all the magic happens, scheduled tours of the facility are available, along with an exclusive peek into Wilderton’s research and development lab. 

“Hood River has been my home for over 25 years,” Brad Whiting told Oregon Business in a written statement. “Over that time, I have seen the town mature into a globally recognized mecca for outdoor lovers and groundbreaking beverage brands across spirits, wine and beer. The pervasive ethos around living an active, balanced lifestyle is a perfect fit for Wilderton’s team and consumers who celebrate life here to the fullest every day!” 

The new distillery is attached to the tasting room and features all distillation and production equipment, including a 1,500-gallon stainless vessel for extraction of whole, raw botanicals and a 1,000-gallon stainless vacuum pot still. The distillery will serve as a center for brand and category education, community engagement, and the exploration of nonalcoholic craft spirits. 

The Wilderton team and Christina Tello of Tello Interiors worked closely to bring the building’s design to life. The company’s love of the Pacific Northwest radiates throughout the building. Most notably, the tasting room features an impressive 40-foot-by-16-foot hand-painted botanical mural by Jess Brinkerhoff that serves as a signature anchor and pays homage to the botanicals that comprise Wilderton’s signature spirits. In its commitment to sustainability, Wilderton ensured that the building was constructed to LEED Gold standards. 

Wilderton sources its botanicals from around the world. The team draws from traditional methods of tea-making, perfumery and spirits distillation to transform raw botanicals into products that take beverage aficionados on a sensory journey. Prior to building this state-of-the-art facility, Wilderton products were crafted at partner facilities in Portland. The opening of this new location speaks to the company’s excitement for the future and its potential growth. 

“I’m excited to watch the [nonalcoholic] category evolve as it grows exponentially,” shares Seth O’Malley. “As a distiller, the categories you’re typically working within are centuries old, so it’s thrilling to be on the forefront of something entirely new. That said, we’re bringing those traditional craft sensibilities to the world of [nonalcoholic beverages], and we believe that as the category matures, consumers and bartenders will become increasingly discerning about what’s in their spirits and how/who/where they’re made.” He continues, “We’ve strived to set that craft standard from the very inception of Wilderton and believe that will be at the heart of our long-term brand value. Our distillery and tasting room are concrete examples of that commitment.” 

The tasting room and distillery are located at 407 Portway Avenue, Suite 100, in Hood River, with outdoor seating facing the Columbia River. Walk-ins are welcome for tastings, while tours of the facility will require reservations.

Oregon Business spoke to Charlie Tilt about the vision he and Julie have seen realized, and how an EOPT will protect that vision and support the employees that have been so central to the success of Hummingbird so far. 

After 20 years of running Hummingbird Wholesale, what inspired you to consider transitioning to an EOPT? 

When Julie and I took the Small Business Class from Lane Community College’s Small Business Development program over 17 years ago, one of the takeaways was that every business owner needs an exit strategy. We considered selling to individuals we know, having one of our daughters take over, and even just selling to an investor — but were not able to find a good fit with these options. So I did a deep dive into employee-owned business strategies and discovered that the EOPT model would [be] an opportunity to uphold the current mission and values of the company we had worked so hard to build, while also putting the most important asset of the business—our coworkers—in the driver’s seat as owners.  

Importantly, the EOPT does not require a specific decision-making structure and allows us to create a management approach that fits our business and allows for that approach to continue to develop over time. 

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Ultimately, what made this transition right for Hummingbird Wholesale?

Hummingbird has played a certain role in increasing the market and supply chain for Certified Organic food grown in the Pacific Northwest, which includes a regional distribution focus. We have a unique mission and culture that prioritizes long-term relationships, environmental health, and the kind of daily work that allows us to support life-sustaining farming and farmers. We have a dedicated and extraordinary set of coworkers who work hard and care about what they do at work. The EOPT transition allows those coworkers the opportunity to experience ownership and be direct beneficiaries of the financial outcomes that the company creates through their shared efforts. The benefit to Julie and me is that we are able to have an exit strategy that meets our financial needs, while protecting the future for our team and providing a company direction that will continue to provide value for the many customers, farmers, vendors and partners with whom we work. 

What has the transition process looked like so far? 

It took about a year and a half in total to come up with the final plan that we implemented in January of this year. We hired a company that specializes in employee ownership (Project Equity) to help us evaluate our options and provide resources, so we could complete this project while continuing to manage daily work demands. A small team of coworkers formed a Transition Team to evaluate the options for governance and decision-making, which took about seven months. With the change in ownership in place, we will need to focus in 2023 on building our understanding of how the new structure works and implementation of a new governance structure.

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Tell us about your employees and why you’ve chosen to entrust them with the future of this business? 

Julie and I see business as a means to meet the needs of people and to be of service. A focus on improving the environment and offering service — in our case, healthy food and a smile to our customers, and fair returns and respectful treatment for suppliers and farmer partners — naturally leads to an interest in ensuring that coworkers have a safe and respectful work environment and are getting a fair share of the profits.

It turns out when you have a meaningful mission and you treat coworkers like owners, the business attracts extraordinary individuals who are a delight to work with. The EOPT creates a model of governance and ownership that more closely aligns with and supports this outcome. 

Becoming an EOPT ensures that your legacy will be preserved. Can you tell us what you consider your legacy to be? 

There are two parts to this answer, one that I am proud of and the other is a bit embarrassing. The business legacy Julie and I wish to be preserved is the way that, as a profitable business, Hummingbird has sought to better our society’s common opportunity for a healthy community and world. Specifically, we believe how we get our food and what we eat is a critical activity to get right so we have a healthy future. There is plenty of work to do in this area, so we would like to see Hummingbird continue with that effort.  

The second part, which maybe other owners will recognize, is that it would be wonderful if all that effort over the years, many hours of time, many challenges faced and decisions made, has a future that outlives us and continues to do good — to keep on contributing even after our time has passed.

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Over the last 20 years, can you remember a time when that legacy felt clear? A time when you saw your vision for Hummingbird Wholesale realized? 

There have been a whole series of those experiences! Farmer Appreciation events at Hummingbird that farmers traveled hundreds of miles to attend, our first abundantly successful crop of Organic pumpkin seeds grown in the Willamette Valley, the flour we could offer from grain grown in the PNW and ground at a local mill that we supported, being able to offer locally grown wholesale food to local schools for kids’ lunches, seeing coworkers grow and develop their careers, speaking engagements to share about farming and the impacts of agricultural practices, now having three organically-certified cleaning facilities in the state of Oregon that can clean beans and grain (there were none when we started) – the list is long!

What has been the biggest challenge to that vision/legacy? 

What any rational owner will likely admit — the biggest challenge is always the owner’s competency and self-understanding in conjunction with what they don’t know about business. When Julie and I started, we were the only workers in the company. Today, there are 48 coworkers. We have learned that having a vision will cost you your complacency, sharpen your realism, and allow you to overcome ignorance and obstacles — if you want it badly enough.

You’ve mentioned that it’s important that Hummingbird Wholesale “maintains environmental, social, and economic sustainability and acts as a force for good in the food system.” How do you hope to see Hummingbird Wholesale acting as a force of good in the food system moving forward? 

Internally, Hummingbird will remain an independently owned company in perpetuity, directed by its purpose and owner members to consider the impacts of its policies and practices on the environment, and on people. 

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I would say our current focus to act as a force for good is necessarily on our coworkers and suppliers as a response to the economic and worker consequences from the past three years. We will continue to support a regional and national increase in acres under organic certification, as that has proven beneficial for clean air and water, and the health of farm communities and consumers.  

We are working to refine Oregon’s plan for supporting organic acreage through business planning and increased support for organic farmers.

 Why do you think more small businesses don’t become EOPTs? It seems pretty rare. 

The model is more common in Europe, but recent changes in tax law have made the model more useful in the United States and I expect we will see a significant increase in the number of businesses that choose this model, especially as younger workers expect to have a greater say in business outcomes and need more than a paycheck to want to contribute.

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What will it like to no longer be owners of this business you’ve run for so long? 

Great question! I will continue to be an active part of the business for the foreseeable future, but I can already say that I have to be intentional at giving away control and unilateral decision making power. I have been setting my sights firmly on trusting that shared responsibility with a group of dedicated individuals will have far better outcomes than I can achieve independently. It helps to keep in mind a vision of what the company can be in 100 years, to remind me how to behave in it today.

On Tuesday, workers gathered on the street outside of the store for a strike and protest, holding signs that read “Starbucks stop union busting” and “An injury to one is an injury to all.” 

This follows a string of rallies, strikes, and protests by Starbucks workers in response to the company closing stores and firing employees across the country following unionization efforts. 

The SW 5th and Oak location has been the site of multiple labor protests, including last year’s May Day rally and a walk-out in November as part of the “Red Cup Rebellion” strike. The company claims the closure is due to safety concerns, but workers are confident it’s a union busting move. 

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“Long ago, we had numerous safety concerns,” Lunette Wimberly, lead organizer at the store, tells Oregon Business. “And we as a team decided to come together to create a safe space. And now after so much work and dedication, they’re just going to close us.” The store voted in favor of unionizing in May of 2022. 

According to Starbucks Workers United, a wave of union elections across the U.S. in 2022 and 2023 has prompted retaliation from Starbucks in the form of firing participants, cutting hours, firing pro-union baristas and closing stores. 

The union says three union organizers have been fired from Portland Starbucks locations in recent months, including Arthur Pratt, a six-year employee fired from the West 23rd and Burnside St. location for minor attendance infractions (one of which happened a year prior); Matt Thornton, union organizer at the Jantzen Beach store; and Heather Clark, union organizer at the Clackamas Crossing store. 

During a March Senate hearing, Senator Bernie Sanders called Starbucks’ response to unionization “the most aggressive and illegal union-busting campaign in the modern history of our country.” 

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In a statement from the company regarding the May 5 announcement that several stores will be closed across the U.S., including the location at SW 5th, Starbucks says that counter to union claims, the decision was made based on a regular business review. The company says “extraordinary efforts” have been made to support Portland-area stores and mediate safety issues, including “closing patios, modifying store formats and proactively engaging with local law enforcement and the community on other collaborative solutions.” But efforts at the SW 5th store were not successful. 

Additionally, the company states that “Starbucks has proposed more than 425 single-store bargaining sessions and has appeared in-person and ready to bargain at more than 105 sets of negotiations, to-date. According to Starbucks, Workers United has only confirmed 22% of the bargaining sessions proposed by the company. 

The stated proposals of the SBWU for partners across the country include the right to organize, protections against racial harassment and bigotry from customers, zero tolerance of sexual harassment, a process to fix safety issues at stores, affordable and 100% employer-paid care, and seniority wages that reward longevity, among others. 

At SW 5th and Oak in Portland, where the store closure is already confirmed, workers’ mission for the strike and rally is to negotiate employment at different area stores for employees, along with details regarding their schedules and working conditions. 

Company representatives will meet with union organizers of SW 5th and Oak tomorrow to begin effects bargaining discussions. Workers announced midday on Tuesday that they will continue their strike on Wednesday. “We’re in bargaining tomorrow and we want to bring all pressure to bear for a fair outcome,” said Wimberly.

Tory is a graphic designer and Jeff is an outdoor guide, and they were both able to continue making a living in Burns. Tory is also a visual artist who works in a variety of media; she’s painted murals in downtown Burns and also works in watercolor. But they struggled to find the space to work at home — and they wanted space to continue their creative endeavors. 

So they decided to rent some space. They found a retail space downtown — it had been vacant for years when they showed interest but previously housed a JC Penney and a flower show, Tory says — that they could use as office space but also as creative space. 

“We all just needed a place — a professional place to meet our clients that wasn’t at our home,” Tory says. “We wanted to stop running our businesses off our kitchen counters.”

In collaboration with the Corvallis-based Foundry Collective, they launched Spark Collaborative Studios. It’s a workspace for local artists. It’s a gallery and retail store. It’s also a community space. And it’s a small-business incubator for artists and craftspeople in the area.

There are more artists in Harney County than you might think. Burns has a population of just under 3,000, and the county as a whole had 7,495 residents at the time of the 2020 Census. It’s the seventh-least populous county in the state and the most sparsely populated, with a population density of .72 people per square mile; 75% of Harney County is federal land, including the U.S. Fish and Wildlife-managed Malheur National Wildlife Refuge — the site of a 2016 takeover by far-right extremists, largely from outside the area — that attracted national media coverage. (While Harney County leans conservative — the county hasn’t carried a Democrat in a presidential election since 1964 — most residents didn’t join the occupation themselves.)

In the 1970s, Harney County was the wealthiest county in the state, as measured by per-capita income, but the county has suffered economically in subsequent decades, largely due to the closure of mills in the area. 

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By 2023 the median household income was $43,387, according to Census data presented in a 2023 report from the Biz Harney Opportunity Collaborative, an economic development organization formed under the umbrella of the High Desert Partnership. That’s a 10% increase from 2019, but the cost of living in the area has increased by 19% — and incomes in the area are about two-thirds the median household income for the state. Agriculture is still the backbone of the local economy, with 20% of the local economy being directly tied to farming or ranching, but like many parts of rural Oregon, that’s beginning to change. 

Tory Schmidt says she has seen analyses suggesting that as many as 50% of people in Harney County identify as artists or craftspeople, and derive at least some income from making art. Oregon Business wasn’t able to independently verify those numbers or locate the study she referenced. Most of the artists who belong to Spark, Tory says, have other jobs — they’re farmers or ranchers who make their own saddles and tack, or work in health care but crochet or paint when they find the time.

“We kind of have the full gamut,” Tory tells OB of the 35 or so artists who belong to Spark. “You know, we’ve got leather workers in our studio, we’ve got ceramicists, we have people who do sculpture.” 

About half of Spark’s 3,000-square-foot space is retail space for artists, who pay as little as $30 or as much as $110 in monthly rent. The wares on display include oil and acrylic paintings and printed photographs — but also a combination gun cabinet and coat rack Tory describes as “very Harney County,” and leather journals by a local artist named Doug Furr (yes, that’s his real name, the Schmidts assure me) who also does metal work.

Beyond a partial wall lies what the Schmidts refer to as a “room of requirement” — a space that can be and has been adapted to whatever needs arise. Some members of the collective have dedicated workspaces in the area, but it’s also a space used to store tools and supplies — “and of course, our Christmas decorations are still out,” Tory says, laughing, as she walks past a pile of tinsel and lights. 

The tools include Jeff’s industrial sewing machine: He makes outdoor gear as part of his guide business, Calamity Butte Guide Service, but also takes on other large-scale sewing projects, like covers for covered wagons — as well as woodworking projects like walking sticks and picture frames. 

Different people make art for different reasons. Some Spark members are full-time artists or artisans making a living or engaged in a lucrative side hustle; some do it for more therapeutic reasons (Spark partners with Symmetry Care, a local mental health organization, to offer art-therapy classes for people who use its services). 

In many cases, there’s a little bit of both in the mix. 

“This is my occupational therapy,” says Amy Roads, gesturing at a rack of jewelry she makes from vintage and locally sourced beads. Roads is retired but worked in retail and as a cake decorator. She’s also relatively new to the area, having moved here with her husband from Illinois three years ago. 

Roads used to play three instruments, but after having two strokes she lost the ability to read music, putting a damper on her creative expression. 

One day Roads’ husband brought home a box of items he bought at an auction. At the bottom of the box was a small collection of vintage necklaces. On a whim, Roads started taking them apart. 

“He challenged me to put it back together,” she says. Gradually, she started making new pieces. “It’s turned out to be really fun.”

She started seeking out beads — she’s really fond of turquoise, jasper and agate — and eventually selling her work. She’s been a member of Spark for two years, and when OB visited, Roads was getting ready to sell necklaces at the Harney County Migratory Bird Festival, an annual festival that takes place in mid-April, when a wide variety of birds stop at the refuge. 

Not all of Spark’s artists have registered as official businesses, Jeff says, but he and Tory encourage them all to do so — and to join the Harney County Chamber of Commerce. 

Tory says she also coaches artists to value their work properly. 

“Artists are notorious for undervaluing their work,” Tory says. Roads chimes in that when she first started selling her jewelry, she wanted to charge just $3 to $5 per necklace — an idea Tory quickly disabused her of.

“You have to at least cover your costs and your time,” Roads says.

The original vision for Spark was to form a maker space and coworking space, renting out “hot desks” to remote workers. But the organization has pivoted from that to being more of a retail space. Spark charges a 10% commission on art sales — at first they didn’t want to charge anything, Tory says, but they do have a small amount of overhead on top of rent, including credit card fees, plus things like bags and tissue paper, which the commission covers.

“We want to encourage the artisan maker-creator world as much as possible in rural communities because it has the highest net economic impact in a community,” says Brad Attig, founder of Foundry Collective, a Corvallis-based nonprofit created specifically to foster economic development in rural parts of the state. Spark is one of Foundry’s partner organizations, of which there are several in other small Oregon towns, including Estacada and Coos Bay. That’s particularly true in cases where makers are selling objects made from local materials, with local labor — like a hat knitted from locally raised wool. (Jeff notes that most of Spark’s retail sales are from people passing through the area, particularly during warmer months.)

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But businesses like that are difficult to scale, he says. 

“By having locations like Spark Collaborative Studios, you create kind of on-ramps that are easier [to get started],” Attig says. “I can come in and I only need 50 square feet. But then I build my business: Now I’m 100 square feet. It was a hobby, but now it’s kind of a side gig.”

On the afternoon she spoke with OB, Biz Harney coordinator Andrea Letham had just finished teaching a Co.Starters boot camp — a 10-week training for budding entrepreneurs developed by a Chattanooga, Tenn.-based organization of the same name. Its graduates included three budding food-cart owners — one who plans to open a taco truck and two others focusing on vegan Israeli food and Korean fusion. 

“We’re a little low on restaurants right now. We’ve had two close within the last year,” Letham tells OB. “People retired and moved on.”

But while downtown Burns still has a number of vacant storefronts, there’s also a new crop of businesses opening — including others selling locally made arts and crafts, and also a brewery. And her most recent Co.Starters class included several artisans interested in turning their craft into a business — including a Spark member who is looking to scale up her business.

“I think the wonderful thing about Spark is people don’t always have the money to start,” Letham says. “They need an incubator, a place to start. That’s what Spark offers, and especially for artisans and makers. It’s a really good launching place for them.”

The Schmidts estimate they spent about $1,200 to rehabilitate the space, and Jeff says it’s been a “really expensive hobby” for the couple, rather than a profitable business. 

Attig says since COVID hit, his organization has leaned into working to create virtual hubs so that rural entrepreneurs can connect and discuss the resources that are available to them — and to build relationships, which can be as important as access to capital or space.

Spark hosts regular artists’ receptions and classes, and meetings for community groups, like the Wild Women of Harney County, to which Amy Roads belongs. (“We’re planning a community cleanup. That’s how wild we are,” Roads says.)

“If there’s a need we can fulfill, we try to make space for people,” Jeff says. 

Editor’s Note: The print version of this story, which appears in the May issue of Oregon Business, inaccurately described Harney County’s Co.Starters’ classes as being offered by Spark. This version has been updated to reflect that the classes are offered by the Biz Harney Opportunity Collaborative. Oregon Business regrets the error.

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Freeland Spirits launched in 2017 with Freeland Gin, a small-batch, artisanal gin made using both a copper pot still and a vacuum distillation machine. The Northwest Portland distillery also produces Freeland Bourbon and Freeland’s Geneva, a genever-inspired gin that showcases Oregon rye and includes notes of local botanicals, including Oregon hazelnuts. Grain for the spirits is supplied by Carman Ranch in Eastern Oregon; the distillery’s spirits are available in Oregon, Washington and California.

Oregon Business spoke with Troupe via email to learn more about her background and approach.

Tell me the story about how you got into distilling. 

I was attending college with the goal of using my degree in chemistry (with an emphasis in forensics) to become a forensic anthropologist. My junior year, I realized that while I loved chemistry, I did not necessarily love how it was applied to forensics. I started looking at different ways in which to apply my degree, and I thankfully stumbled into spirits. I looked into how to gain entry into the industry, and I decided on a master’s program in brewing and distilling at Heriot Watt University. This gave me the opportunity to meet some amazing people and spend a year in Scotland, which is where I learned about all sorts of spirits, as well as beer.

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What led you to work with Freeland Spirits? 

Jill [Kuehler], our founder and CEO, and I were connected through mutual friends. Jill was at the early stages of starting a distillery and has always wanted to highlight women in leadership positions. She was on the search for a woman distiller, and her friend happened to know of my work at a different distillery in Oregon. She connected us and as soon as Freeland was ready for me, I joined forces with Jill.

You’ve been named one of the youngest female master distillers. While that’s impressive and amazing, could you speak to any challenges that you’ve had to overcome because of your age or experience in the field? 

Currently I’m 33 years old, entering my 10th year in the industry. Getting started in any industry has its challenges. There were times when I would be giving tours, and attendees didn’t believe I was old enough to be the tour guide. More often than not, however, my youth has been an advantage, offering a different viewpoint — and that has been welcomed.

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Do you have a specific process or routine that helps get you in the “zone” when you are working on crafting spirits? 

I find that I have two different sides to my personality: analytical and creative. I like to research, collect data, and let that guide my creative process. The more time I spend exploring flavor composition, botanicals, distillation parameters and more, the better recipe I can create.

Where do you think the distilling industry is heading in the future and how are you poised to be in the midst of any changes that may come? 

Our industry is heading toward more diversity and inclusion. One of the wonderful ways that representation works is that it brings acknowledgement that there are people like you doing the thing that you want to be doing. When I was looking for inspiration in the industry, I had Rachel Barrie. Now, there are even more women who are showing the world that spirits are accessible. Diversity brings more diversity. I hope to be here, participate in the change, and watch how our industry benefits.

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What do you most look forward to as you look at the future of your distilling career?

I look forward to continued growth, good spirits, and the people I will meet along the way.