Month: March 2026

By Paul Post

Great Escape, one of the area’s oldest tourist attractions and largest seasonal employers, is expected to maintain regular operations following its sale to Kansas City-based EPR Properties.

The $331 Million deal includes six other Six Flags theme parks in the U.S. and Canada.

Founded as Storytown USA by the late Charles R. Wood in 1954, the amusement center was renamed Great Escape in 1983. Thirteen years later, Wood sold it to Premier Parks, which later purchased Six Flags and adopted its name.

“This move allows Six Flags to concentrate on the parks that we believe offer the greatest opportunities for growth and long-term success,” company President and CEO John Reilly said. “Since joining the company, I have been clear that Six Flags’ earnings power has been under-realized. This transaction will simplify our portfolio, strengthen our balance sheet and position us to execute with greater clarity and discipline.”

The transaction is expected to close by the end of the first quarter or the beginning of the second quarter.

Great Escape will maintain the Six Flags brand in 2026 and honor all season passes sold, including multi-park pass privileges at other parks within the Six Flags portfolio.

By Paul Post

Glens Falls-based Arrow Financial Corp. expects to double its geographic territory with the proposed $89.1 million acquisition of Utica-based Adirondack Bancorp, which has 19 branch offices from the Mohawk Valley north to the Canadian border.

“Part of our strategic plan is mergers and acquisitions,” Arrow President and CEO Dave DeMarco said. “To continue to provide shareholder value in our business, you have to grow. We’re celebrating our 175th year. The timing couldn’t be better to find a willing partner to join forces.”

“We’ve been actively looking for a bank or banks that fit our mold, a community-based bank that looks, feels and acts like we do,” he said.

Adirondack Bancorp serves the same types of communities as Arrow, which makes the deal a good one culturally, DeMarco said.

But with $4.5 billion in assets, Arrow is much bigger than Adirondack ($942 million in total assets) and offers a broader range of services including wealth management and insurance. Based on financial results as of Dec. 31, 2025, the combined company would have pro forma total assets of $5.4 billion, total deposits of $4.8 billion and total gross loans of $4.1 billion.

When completed, the merger would make Arrow upstate New York’s fourth-largest community bank, ranked by assets.

By Paul Post

Maple producers comprise a pretty tight-knit community, always willing to lend a helping hand.

Just ask Ryan Veitch, who started making syrup eight years ago at his family’s 191-year-old, eighth-generation Twin Leaf Farms at 200 Hyspot Road in Greenfield Center.

“In 2019 we added a parcel of land that had sugaring on it,” he said. “That’s when we jumped back into full-time farming here. The property had aging maple infrastructure on it and the owner wanted to sell. It was next to our property so we bought it to keep it green instead of someone building another housing development. That’s when we decided to revamp and modernize the maple operation.”

They did it with help from the Monica family, longtime owners of Maple Valley Farm in Corinth.

“They held our hand and helped us get set up the right way so we didn’t have to guess a million times,” said Ryan. “The first year or so they would truck all our sap up to their place and boil it. Over time we added our own equipment and made it in-house.”

“We’re super fortunate that they were there to help us out in the beginning because I had never done any of this before,” he said. “It was a totally new thing. I did a lot of ‘YouTube university’ to figure out what we were doing. They helped us out big time.”

Business for Good Foundation and the Social Enterprise and Training Center announced a $25,000 partnership Thursday to expand trade skills programs in the Capital Region. The grant is part of $100,000 the foundation earmarked for workforce development during the first half of 2026.

The announcement followed a tour of SEAT’s Schenectady-based Construction Lab, where local leaders and media observed students gaining hands-on experience in high-demand trades.

“The old stigma surrounding trade-based careers is dead, and we have to stop pretending a four-year degree is the only viable path to success. The reality is that while AI is rapidly disrupting office-based roles, it cannot replace the essential, hands-on work of a skilled HVAC technician,” said Maire Masterson, Executive Director of the Business for Good Foundation. “By investing in the “Build Up” program we are providing young people the opportunity and tools to secure high paying, high demand careers right here in the Capital Region.”

“Partnering with the Business for Good Foundation is a powerful validation of our mission to bridge the gap between untapped potential and industry need,” said Jennifer Lawrence, CEO of the SEAT Center. “Their support allows us to deepen our trade training in fields that are resilient to economic and technological shifts, while the new digital home for Hattie’s Culinary Lab ensures our hospitality students have a platform that matches the high level of skill they bring to the Capital Region workforce.”

By Carol Ann Conover

Guy Bucey has never done anything small.

The founder of Inovabed — a 100,000-square-foot manufacturing operation in Brunswick with 85 employees and about 20,000 beds installed at Disney properties worldwide — Bucey is also the driving force behind Mixed Breed Brewing, a craft brewery that began as a therapeutic hobby after two combat deployments to Iraq and has quietly grown into one of the Capital Region’s most decorated small brewers.

Now, after seven years, a pandemic-era basement speakeasy and a successful run in Guilderland, Mixed Breed is making its most ambitious move yet: taking over the former Unified Brewing location in Malta and launching a full-scale beer garden at Van Patten Golf Course in Clifton Park.

“I’ve always wanted to get into an opportunity where I could make choices based off of it being the right choice or just being a good opportunity — versus backs up against the wall, kind of have to do it,” Bucey said. “This was just one of those nice first times where a really good opportunity presented itself.”

By Jeffrey B. Shapiro

For many local businesses, Google reviews function as a public trust score that can influence whether a customer chooses one company over another. Because online reviews play such a significant role in consumer decision-making, regulators have increasingly focused on preventing review manipulation.

In response to widespread abuse, the Federal Trade Commission’s Rule on the Use of Consumer Reviews and Testimonials (16 CFR Part 465) took effect Oct. 21, 2024. The rule gives the FTC a new enforcement tool: the ability to seek civil penalties for knowing violations.

This column outlines the rule’s primary prohibitions and offers practical compliance steps for businesses.

What Does the Rule Cover?

The rule targets specific review-manipulation practices across platforms, including Google Business Profiles, Yelp, industry directories, retailer sites and social media. It focuses on fake or false reviews or testimonials, improper incentives, insider reviews without disclosure, review suppression, review hijacking (repurposing reviews) and fake indicators of influence such as followers, likes and views.

The rule prohibits creating, selling, buying or disseminating reviews or testimonials that are fake or false, including reviews from people who did not have the claimed experience. This can include fabricated Google reviews, AI-generated reviews presented as genuine consumer experiences or reviews from individuals who never used the product or service.

One important nuance of the rule is that it does not appear to ban incentives for reviews across the board. Instead, 16 CFR § 465.4 prohibits providing “compensation or other incentives” in exchange for, or conditioned (expressly or by implication) on, a review that expresses a particular sentiment (positive or negative). As a result, offering a discount only if a customer leaves a positive Google review is likely prohibited.

By Rod Bacon

After an 11-year planning, engineering and permitting process, site work is underway on Phyllian’s Bluff, a 31-lot development being built by Witt Construction.

O’Connor Construction, of Glens Falls, is approximately one-third of the way to completion of earth work, road construction, underground utilities, and sewer installation. 

According to President Pat O’Connor, the company is installing two roads that end in cul-de-sacs. They will also install a sewer line along NY-9P that will tie into the development’s sewer system via County Route 71. Finally, they will pave all roadways. 

An important aspect of the earth work is the installation of storm drainage, on which the company is currently working. To prevent storm runoff from polluting Saratoga Lake, each homesite will have what is referred to as a rain garden or depression area that will filter the water back into the soil, preventing it from running downhill. In addition, the roads will have an elaborate system of independent catch basins that allow water to flow into other catch basins so it can slowly filter into the ground.

O’Connor Construction started this work in September and estimates it will be completed this summer.

By Rod Bacon

A haberdashery that has kept men looking their best for over 60 years has a new location.

J. Reid Menswear is now at 174 Glen Street in Glens Falls, two doors away from where they’ve served customers for the past five years.

“It’s important that I stay on Glen Street,” said owner Jeffrey Ives. “This store is a small business that specializes in serving the community.”

Ives purchased the multi-story building, formerly the local office of Albany-based Aeon Nexus Corporation, for $750,000. He worked with Leslie D’Angelico and Zane Smith at Arrow Financial Corporation on the small business loan. His real estate agent was Christine McKee of Hunt Real Estate ERA. Improvements were done by Argyle-based StraightUp Concrete & Renovations, owned by Jack Ash.

The menswear company was founded in 1965 by Seymour Segan as Jonathan Reid, named after his son. The store was first located in Queensbury’s Northway Plaza. In 1975, he opened a store in Saratoga Springs’ Pyramid Mall and later moved the original store to the Aviation Mall. Throughout the 1980s and ‘90s he expanded to 12 stores in New York, Vermont and Massachusetts. Segan retired in 1994 and turned the business over to his son, who downsized it to focus on the Glens Falls and Saratoga Springs markets.

“Within six months of starting work I knew I was going to buy it,” said Ives, who joined the company in 2000. “I didn’t know when and I didn’t know how, but I knew I was going to. So I started keeping a log of everything that worked and everything that didn’t. I did that for fifteen years so the day I bought it I was ready.”