Chamber History
The Cutlerville Chamber of Commerce was officially organized in April of 2000, but its roots go back much farther than that.
For more than 30 years previous, local business owners had met monthly as the Cutlerville Businessmen's Association; later becoming the Cutlerville Business Association.
The focus was on making Cutlerville a better place to live and do business. Some of the local businessmen banded together to help restore Cutler Park around the time of the nation's Bicentennial. Other efforts included community Christmas decorations and help with the Cutlerville Day celebration and activities.
In the 1980s, the businesss community spearheaded the effort to seeing whether Cutlerville should incorporate as a separate entity or not. In the late 1980s, the businessmen started honoring an individual who had made significant contributions to the community with an award known as the Cutlerville Business Association "Person of the Year" who also then served as the Grand Marshal for the Cutlerville Community Day Parade.
In the late 1990s, interest in the businesss association had started to dwindle, but a few business owners knew that Cutlerville still had a lot going for it. Plans were laid to re-organize and re-energize the business community by forming a non-profit Chamber of Commerce. By-laws were drawn up by local attorney Jim Schepers, and the first Board of Directors was elected with Dave Offringa as President.
In 2008, the Chamber voted to expand it's borders to include all of Gaines Township so that the businesss communities of Cutlerville and Dutton could partner, network, and help one another to grow. Due to this expansion, the Chamber also officially changed its name to the Cutlerville-Gaines Chamber of Commerce.
Since its inception, the Chamber has continued to add both quantity and quality to make the Cutlerville-Gaines area a better place to live and do business.
Visit http://www.cutlerville-gaineschamber.org/
