Ansbro
TOWN OF WALLKILL – The arts is an important part of the culture
of an area, but they also translate into economic importance. That assessment
came from Dawn Ansbro, executive director of the Orange County Arts Council,
who spoke to the Orange County Chamber of Commerce on Thursday.
Ansbro and her copresenter, president of the Tuxedo based toy company
Gui Decraft Gary Bilezikian, said sometimes people overlooked contributions
of the county’s arts businesses.
“I really wanted to talk about the business of art here in Orange
County,” said Ansbro.
“There’s so many arts businesses that fly under the radar
here in the county and I thought it was important to bring them to the
attention of the chamber so that the rest of the business community understands
that they’re here and they’re peers and they potentially have
opportunities to work together.”
There are an estimated 702,711 arts related companies nationally and they
constitute $151 billion of spending. In Orange County, there are 795 arts-related
businesses and the county arts industry is responsible for $33.1 million
in annual economic impact.
Bilezikian’s corporation is part of a network worth more than $200
million and is part of the county’s contributing arts related businesses.
He said although Guidecraft is an international company, they hire new
people from Orange County every year and keep their base in Tuxedo.
Guidepost makes toys for consumer and educational purposes and their markets
range from domestic all the way to Asia. The global appeal of Guidepost
products is one of the main reasons the company is doing so well, said
Bilezikian. One of his strategies that was implemented to achieve this
was hiring designers from Asia to work with U.S. designers on ways to
merge Western and Eastern flavors into their products. “We thought,
wouldn’t it be great if we hired somebody with a design background
that could bring their concepts of Asian design and Asian toys into the
U.S. way of thinking, or Western way of thinking to start interspersing
it and it worked out really well,” said Bilezikian.
“Our goal is, each year, to add another continent to that design
process.” Innovative ideas like Bilezikian’s are what Ansbro
hopes the Orange County business community will utilize from the local
arts community. “The artists and creative people tend to think about
things a little bit differently and that, really, I think can be very
helpful to business people who are trying to think about where to take
their business in the future,” she said.
Ansbro belives if the local arts industry and greater local business community
have more opportunities like the breakfast to meet each other, they can
achieve improved success within the county.
