wbjournal.com | January 20, 2020 | Worcester Business Journal 3
Worcester Business Journal (ISSN#1063-6595) is
published bi-weekly, 24x per year, including 4 special
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England Business Media. 172 Shrewsbury St., Worcester,
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Worcester Business Journal
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A division of:
Worcester Business Journal
WBJ
Editor, Brad Kane,
bkane@wbjournal.com
News Editor, Grant Welker,
gwelker@wbjournal.com
(Higher education, health care)
Staff Writer
Thomas Grillo, tgrillo@wbjournal.com
(Real estate, manufacturing)
Contributors
Susan Shalhoub, Livia Gershon,
Sarah Connell
Lead Researcher, Timothy Doyle,
tdoyle@nebusinessmedia.com
Research Assistant, Heide Martin,
hmartin@nebusinessmedia.com
Production Director, Kira Beaudoin,
kbeaudoin@wbjournal.com
Art Director, Mitchell Hayes,
mhayes@wbjournal.com
Senior Accounts Manager
Matt Majikas,
mmajikas@wbjournal.com
Senior Accounts Manager
Christine Juetten,
cjuetten@wbjournal.com
Senior Special Accounts Manager
Mary Lynn Bosiak,
mlbosiak@wbjournal.com
Marketing & Events Manager
Kris Prosser, kprosser@wbjournal.com
Distribution and Database Coordinator
A Guide to STUFF, a publication
of New England Business Media
Patty Harris,
pharris@nebusinessmedia.com
COO, Mary Rogers,
mrogers@nebusinessmedia.com
Accounting Manager, Sabrina Mondor,
smondor@nebusinessmedia.com
Accounting Assistant, Rae Rogers,
rrogers@nebusinessmedia.com
Collections Manager, Raki Zwiebel,
rzwiebel@nebusinessmedia.com
Human Resources, Jill Coran,
jcoran@nebusinessmedia.com
Director of Audience Development,
Valerie Clark,
vclark@nebusinessmedia.com
Publisher, CEO, Peter Stanton
pstanton@nebusinessmedia.com
Associate Publisher, Mark Murray
mmurray@wbjournal.com
President, Joseph Zwiebel
jzwiebel@nebusinessmedia.com
Y
ou can't pay any bills with
buzz. As much as hype can
build up momentum, you can't
take it to the bank. Eventually,
the sizzle needs the steak.
I'm extremely wary of buzz, having seen
its hollow effects firsthand. When I lived
in Southwest Florida in 2006, I bought
a one-bedroom condo for $175,000 in
a market real estate agents swore would
never stop increasing. Even aer the bot-
tom started to fall out, agents in the region
said if we could only get the hype back up,
prices would follow. I eventually had to
let my condo go into foreclosure, and the
next buyer paid $35,000 for it.
In June 2018, WBJ News Editor Grant
Welker did a deep dive into the economic
indicators surrounding Worcester's so-
called renaissance, attempting to deter-
mine whether the buzz around Central
Mass. was yielding economic growth. In
what remains one of the proudest stories I
have ever been a part of, Welker found the
hype had yet to achieve the desired results.
In his follow-up last year, the numbers
showed the region was making progress
but hasn't gotten all the way there yet.
e buzz is undeniable around the
planned arrival of the Worcester Red
Sox in 2021. Every press release we get
announcing a new development project in
Worcester seems to mention the WooSox
as a rallying cry. e buzz, though, has
yet to yield major economic impact. e
planned revitalization of the Greendale
Mall site (see Staff Writer omas Grillo's
on Page 10) or the announced two-story
restaurant in the Mercantile Center are
certainly good for the city, but plans need
to be realized before actual residents and
visitors and business start spending mon-
ey on food and retail. As the WooSox pub-
lic costs keep escalating (see Page 4), keep
in mind the buzz remains just a promise
of economic development.
Similarly, in our main focus of this
edition, the Central Mass. real estate mar-
ket has benefitted from hype. Increasing
demand for a limited supply of homes has
spiked the price of residential real estate
(see Grillo's story on Page 12). is hype
has yielded actual substance, too, where
homeowners selling their properties and
the agents helping them can take the in-
creased value of the homes to the bank.
I N T H I S I S S U E
Buzz is a good thing. It draws attention
you might otherwise never have gotten.
But hype only takes you so far. Projects
must be seen to fruition before the impact
truly is realized.
- Brad Kane, editor
Worcester's buzz has to turn into substance
Bruce Mathieu
Senior Vice President
Business Development Officer
978.353.1331
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NEWS & ANALYSIS
DEPARTMENTS
5 Briefs
8 Focus on Real estate
14 The Lists: Top real estate agents and firms
17 Starting Up, by Peter S. Cohan
18 Know How
19 Movers & Shakers
21 Opinion
22 Shop Talk: Katie Benison-Camell,
MBB Foundation
6 Admissions upheaval
Central Mass. colleges face a rise in
applications and technology, as selectivity
and yield decline.
17 10 Things I know about …
Healthcare and human services
integration
Having carried Open Sky Community
Services through a merger, CEO Ken Bates
offers reasons why further consolidation in
health care is necessary.
W
