Business View Magazine | August 2019

261 BUSINESS VIEW MAGAZINE AUGUST 2019 multiple restaurants, clothing stores, boutiques, an olive oil store, and an ice cream parlor. Many of the restaurants have added outdoor dining, so it’s a great place to come for lunch or dinner and enjoy the atmosphere. New Milford has a great appeal to visitors and they are working on a hotel market study to add to the amenities that made the community recognizable in the movie Mr. Deeds starring Adam Sandler and the TV series Gilmore Girls. New Milford is the starting point of the Litchfield County Antiques Trail and Elephant’s Trunk Flea Market taking place every Sunday during the season has been featured in Flea Market Flip. In addition to attracting more visitors to New Milford, Pollard is also intent on attracting more permanent residents by bringing in smaller businesses that are looking for up to 20,000 square feet of space and have under a hundred employees. Pollard reports, “Currently many people commute to New York City, New Haven, and Hartford, and they would certainly benefit from businesses locating here so that those commutes could be reduced. I think people who like this area and enjoy the quality of life here, would rather work closer to home.” New Milford’s largest manufacturer is the Kimberly-Clark Corporation, a producer of paper- based consumer products. “They have quite a large campus,” says Pollard. “It’s a major regional hub of activity for them.” The community also has a host of small independent manufacturers in a variety of industries – metalworking, assembly, chemicals. MedInstill with 40 employees is in a high growth segment, bioscience. The community will be partnering with Naugatuck Community College and the Northwest Regional Workforce Investment Board on a training program for new entrants into bioscience careers. The Corporation for New Milford Economic Development is seeking to create a bioscience cluster of small firms in a former Nestle lab space. This effort is viewed by Pollard to have significant potential for quality job growth and associated business attraction. New Milford Hospital is another major employer which is a key part of the Western Connecticut NEW MI LFORD , CONNECT I CUT