Boston Buzz: Housing Hopes, Pharma Stays, Celtics Sale, and Coffee Craze

On today’s program, Boston Business Journal reporter Greg Ryan talks about efforts to alleviate the housing shortage in Boston. The CEO of EyePoint  Pharmaceuticals,Jay Duker, joins us to discuss his decision to stay in Massachusetts. Scott Kirsner, Innovation Reporter  for The Boston Globe, talks about items that are still made in Massachusetts. Skip Perham, Suffolk University Professor of Sports business, explains the upcoming sale of the Boston Celtics. And finally, Rob Whitten, founder of Ping, explains how his new drive-through coffee machine works.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
This is the New England Business Report with Joe short
Sleeve and Kim Carrigan, a weekly roundup and discussion of
the top business news impacting our New England economy.

Speaker 2 (00:09):
Good morning, and welcome to the New England Business Report
on this Sunday, November. I hope you enjoyed that extra
hour of sleep, Miskim. We turned back the clocks waving
Steime kicks in.

Speaker 3 (00:24):
You know, is that why I feel the way I
do this morning?

Speaker 2 (00:28):
Rested, ready to go?

Speaker 4 (00:30):
Here we are.

Speaker 2 (00:31):
I looked at that interesting. A couple of states still
don't do it. Arizona and Hawaii do not take part.
And of course there was that legislation down in Washington,
DC called the Sunshine Protection Act, which everybody was talking
about a couple of years ago. Oh yeah, and anyway
that so far it's just sitting around.

Speaker 3 (00:50):
They're still just talking about it.

Speaker 2 (00:52):
Sitting in the shade. Apparently it's not happening. The other
thing I want to mention to you, Kim, is okay,
so here we are in November. I mean Thanksgiving, you know,
the Christmas shopping season, and I'm looking I think it's
fifty shopping days to Christmas.

Speaker 3 (01:05):
Oh please, yeah, usually by this time November first, I
have at least my first gift of the season purchased,
but not so not so much this year, so I'm
gonna have to get get on it.

Speaker 2 (01:19):
All right, all right, today's program, we're going to be
covering a lot of bases. We're going to start with
Greg Ryan. Now, he's the senior reporter of the Boston
Business Journal. One thing that we talk a lot about
on this program is housing, availability of housing, the cost
of housing. And Greg Ryan has an interesting story. He
talks a little bit about how there are certain projects

(01:40):
underway in the city of Boston, pending projects that could
bring some twelve thousand new housing units to the marketplace.
And these projects, you know, spread across the city, including
kim One of them is my old building I worked
in for Liberty Square in downtown. Really yeah, I noticed
that that building where I work for like five years,

(02:02):
they're now trying to turn into apartments. Also on the
program today, the CEO Jay Duker, now, he's the CEO
of I point to Pharmaceuticals. They're located in Watertown. And
you know it's a story, it's a headline you don't
really hear very often here. Mostly we hear these companies saying, well, see, yeah,
you guys are too expensive, We're out of here. Well not.

(02:25):
I point to Pharmaceuticals in Watertown. They're staying. They had
a ribbon cutting, They've got a new facility up there
in north Bridge, and we have the CEO and the
program today Kim to talk all about it. They had
quite an extensive search kit.

Speaker 3 (02:37):
You just took the words out of my mouth. It's
not for a lack of trying to take it somewhere else,
but the offer was just too good here in Massachusetts.
So it's a great story for the state. It's a
good story for iPoint, and he'll be coming up here
in just a short amount of time. In second half
of the show, we're going to as we speak of manufacturing,
do you know what is still made in mass to

(03:00):
choose its?

Speaker 2 (03:01):
I was surprised at this list, you Yeah, I was
surprised some of these.

Speaker 3 (03:06):
Yeah, it's it's extensive. There are things that are still
made here that I didn't know. And there are things
that are made here that I didn't know were made
here at all. You know, So like I had no
idea that golf balls were made here, right or.

Speaker 2 (03:18):
How about the symbols from Ring those Stars.

Speaker 3 (03:22):
Yes, rum Set, Like, why, that's a very that's a
very famous, uh famous company, and they are still making
them here, which is well, you know, yeah, it's a
great story, so forget which, by the way, the only
time I ever eat junior Mints. I don't know about you,
but the only time I ever is when I'm at
the movies. If I go to the theater, I have

(03:44):
to have junior Mints.

Speaker 2 (03:45):
And you have to have twenty six of them, you know,
and I have to have.

Speaker 3 (03:48):
The full box no one could share. Boston Globe reporter
Scott Kersner is going to be with us. He's going
to share some of those things that are still being
made right here in Massachusets. And then our old friends
Skip perm. He's the director of the sports management program
over there at Suffolk University. He's going to join us
to talk about the Celtics. Of course, they're off to

(04:09):
quite a start here, which is terrific, our champion Celtics,
you know, amazingly enough, I think I don't know if
there's even been enough discussion about this.

Speaker 5 (04:18):
Joe.

Speaker 3 (04:18):
You know, it was like four days after they won
that championship when Wick Grossbeck announced that he and his
family would be selling, and of course he is the
majority owner. So you know, there's been some reports out
about how much this team is worth and what that
sell you know, what that cell might look like. So

(04:38):
Skip's going to join.

Speaker 2 (04:39):
Us five to six billion as well as see.

Speaker 3 (04:42):
Which you know, they've had quite an investment on their
dollar because they bought it for the hundreds of millions
of dollars and now we're up in the billions.

Speaker 2 (04:52):
I was surprised to hear, though Kim in the championship
run for the eighteenth banner, they were saying that the
team barely made money.

Speaker 3 (04:58):
Yeah, I know, well, you know, and what I want
to ask Skip about. You know, what I think is
really so interesting is are these NBA teams spending too
much money on their players and then ultimately they just
cannot make any money. I'm just wondering if that's what
this is all about. And finally, can you imagine a
coffee shop that anticipates your arrival and then when you

(05:19):
get there, your coffee is ready for you and you
just drew it right through and pick it up. Now,
that is heaven. As far as I can tell.

Speaker 2 (05:28):
It's called Ping Ping Pi, NJ. And apparently there's one
of these coffee shops in a parking lot up there
in Lowell.

Speaker 1 (05:36):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (05:37):
Yeah, they're CEO Rob Whitten. He's going to join us
to talk a little bit about Ping and what that
might mean for the future of coffee shops.

Speaker 2 (05:46):
Okay, without further ado, we talked a little bit about it.
Let's bring in the senior reporter for the Boston Business Journal,
Greg Ryan. He's a regular visitor here to the program.
His story this week is it's got a number of
headlines on the BBJ site, but this is the one
we're going to start with. It sort of the umbrella story.
It's called full Pipeline. These thirteen projects would unlock twelve

(06:10):
thousand homes in Boston. Well, Greg, welcome to the program. Well,
this is certainly a topic that we've all been talking about.
Tell us what you found.

Speaker 6 (06:18):
So you hear this number thrown out that there are
thirty thousand, over thirty thousand housing units in Boston that
are approved to be built but have not yet been built.
So I thought it'd be interesting to look at, you know,
where are these units? And what I found was just
thirteen projects, thirteen larger projects make up forty percent of
those unbuilt units. So, Mayor wu is one of our
top priorities is to get housing productions started in the city.

(06:41):
You know, get some of these rents down by adding
new housing stock. So if the city can just you know,
get some a few of these projects started, it could
really make a dent in the housing production numbers.

Speaker 3 (06:53):
Okay, so you make it sound easy if they can
just get them started. What's the problem here, Why aren't
they getting started?

Speaker 6 (06:59):
Yes, it is definitely not easy. So the biggest thing
here is the expense. So you know, it's hard for
these developers to find financing. You know, interest rates are
still high, even with the feds recent move. Construction costs
are so high, so they are are having a difficult
time getting these projects to pencil to the point where
they can get lenders and investors to come in. The

(07:21):
city is trying has launched a few initiatives to try
to get to make that a bit easier. The mayor
this month announced a one hundred million dollars Accelerator Fund
with in which the city will actually provide financing to projects,
including market rate projects, to help them get started. I
also reported the other week about an effort to have

(07:41):
some flexibility around the affordable housing mandates for market rate
projects to help developers get these projects a pencil and
get shovels in the ground.

Speaker 2 (07:51):
Talking with Greg Ryan, Senior report of the Boston Business Journal,
you know, one of the story one of the places
I think you're talking about is this for Liberty Square
right out the Financial District there, and I guess Charlestown's
Greg mccarthy' right as proposed turning the mostly vacant seventh
story office building into forty two apartments. That's where I

(08:12):
used to work for the Liberty Square group.

Speaker 6 (08:13):
So is that right?

Speaker 2 (08:15):
Yeah, that particular building, But is that one of your
thirteen stops?

Speaker 6 (08:19):
So that's that's on a smaller scale, so that's not
one of the thirty, but that is what that is,
one of the thirteen office to residential projects. So that's
a big That's another big piece of this puzzle is
taking this empty office space, converting it to housing and
you know, adding to the house of the city's housing
stock that way. So yeah, that came that application came

(08:40):
in in the past few days. There was also another
one in the North End on North Washington Street to
turn an office into fifty seven apartments, so that that's
another avenue of the city is pursuing to get more housing.

Speaker 3 (08:53):
So what is the city saying, Greg, when it comes
to housing? About how many units? I know that we
have this many proposed, but how many does the city
really need to start to alleviate the issues?

Speaker 6 (09:05):
Yeah, I think it is. It's easily on the order
of tens of thousands of additional units, I know statewide.
You know, the goal is to add as many as
two hundred thousand units over the next decade or so
in order to address our house and crest and so
Boston is going to have you know, Boston is one
of the leaders in producing new housing, of course, but

(09:25):
it's going to have to take a big chunk of that.
So yeah, you know, thirty fists.

Speaker 2 (09:30):
It might might just be the start, right, Greg. You
make a reference in your article there to Boston Mayor
Woo and this one hundred million dollar accelerator fund to
kickstart this housing. Tell us about that fund and who's
using it.

Speaker 6 (09:47):
Yeah, So the mayor just announced this that her recent
chamber address, and as I understand that, details are still
being worked out. But yeah, the idea is to provide
low cost financing, you know, so so lower rates. What
have you to developers to help them get started? That
The first project they've selected is a public private partnership

(10:08):
between a developer and the Boston Housing Authority UH for
a project in Charlestown, So that will be I think
an initial focus of the fund are these public housing
and these public private partnerships. But the mayor has said
that she also wants to use some of the money
for you know, market rate projects private development. So I

(10:29):
understand that the city is now talking with developers who
are interested in getting some of that money.

Speaker 3 (10:33):
And Greg, did you have an opportunity to speak to
any developers? I mean, you know, I know that there
are proposals out there, but are these guys really on
board and are they going to start to try to
make some moves?

Speaker 6 (10:43):
So yeah, I have I spoken. I spoke to a
number of developers about this. As I understand it, projects
out in some of the outer neighborhoods like Allston, maybe
some projects in South Boston those are closer to becoming reality.
Those are you know, the costs aren't is us as
a steel tower going up downtown or in the back bay.

(11:03):
So those projects are closer to getting financing, and so
I think those will be the first ones to move.
And on this list of thirteen we have, there are
several in the neighborhoods like Austin are.

Speaker 2 (11:15):
He's at Greg Ryan, Senior reporter at the Boston Business Journal,
and thanks so much for taking time join us on
this Sunday morning. Up next, we're going to be talking
with the CEO of iPoint Pharmaceuticals. What did he do well?
He made a decision to stay right here in Massachusetts.
You're listening to the New England Business Report.

Speaker 1 (11:35):
You are listening to the New England Business Report on
the Voice of Boston w RKO six't eighty Joe and
Kim will be right back.

Speaker 3 (11:45):
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Five.

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Hi everybody, I'm Kim Carrigan and.

Speaker 2 (13:47):
I'm Joe Shortsley. If you want to be part of
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That's Any Business Radio all one word at gmail dot
com and we'll get your business on the show too.

Speaker 3 (14:14):
Welcome back everyone to the New England Business Report. Great
to have you along on this Sunday morning. Joe, there
is an incredible story that is great news for the
state of Massachusetts that was written about this last week
in the Boston Business Journal, and we decided we had
to get a little more information.

Speaker 2 (14:30):
About it very often, right Kim, this is it, you know,
and we'll all look.

Speaker 3 (14:35):
At for those good positive stories. I Point Pharmaceutical. They
were searching for a place to open a big manufacturing plant.
They searched up and down the East Coast, and ultimately
they've made the decision they're going to stay right here
in Massachusetts. Joining us to talk a little bit more
about that is iPoint CEO. This is doctor j Duker

(14:57):
and doctor It's great to have you with us. Congratulations
on what those of us in Massachusetts seem to think
is a pretty good idea.

Speaker 8 (15:04):
Oh, we certainly agree, Kim and Joe, and thanks for
having me on.

Speaker 3 (15:08):
Absolutely So tell us about first off, just tell us
about EyePoint and the background on the company itself.

Speaker 8 (15:15):
Sure I Point is a biotechnology company that's based in Watertown, Massachusetts,
and our expertise is drug delivery to the back of
the eye. As some of your listeners may be aware,
there's some serious diseases of the retina, such as we
age related macular degeneration and diabetic macular redeema, which will
require treatments with injections into the eye in the doctor's office.

(15:39):
While these injections work well, they don't work long and
we're developing one that we hope will solve the same problems,
but with a much longer interval. Instead of just one
getting an injection every month or two, we hope to
enable patients to go six months or longer between injections
that product is called Derivu and it's currently three trials

(16:01):
for wet H related maculate degeneration.

Speaker 2 (16:03):
Well, you were looking to build a manufacturing facility around
You were looking up and down the East Coast, based
here in Watertown, of course, and ultimately made the decision
to build this manufacturing facility in north Bridge, Massachusetts. Tell
us about that decision. How you got there.

Speaker 8 (16:20):
Well, first of all, we needed to set down our
specifications for the facility. It's over forty thousand square foot
commercial facility that was built from the ground up to
our specifications, and I think that was important to us
that it'd be a greenfield build as opposed to taking
over a previous space. We needed great partners and we

(16:42):
were looking for incentives from the state. We were also
looking for course, a strong labor pool and an overall
business friendly environment. And as we looked up and down
the East Coast to literally seventy different potential locations, we
came back to Massachusetts and we came back to Northbridge.
It was not only competitive in all of these areas,

(17:04):
but it was superior by almost every metric that we
looked at compared to other locations in Northbridge, in particular,
provided support and incentives to make it a real win
win situation. The jobs created in our new facility will
be primarily manufacturing, supply chain quality, and engineering, and we're
actively recruiting for those jobs. Massachusetts State gave us a

(17:28):
nice tax incentive that will help continue our growth. And
I would actually encourage other biotech companies, not just the
many Massachusetts biotech based ones, but even outside our state
to consider the conclusion we came to, which is Northbridge
is a great, great location and a great partner if

(17:48):
you want to expand.

Speaker 3 (17:49):
Doctor j. Duger is our guest today. He's the CEO
of Hpoint Pharmaceuticals and they are building a manufacturing plant
here in Massachusetts. You talked about all the different criteria
that you guys are looking for, and one of them
certainly was tax breaks and incentives. Can you give us.
You know, we're a business show here, sir, so give
us a sense of some of the numbers and how

(18:12):
it compared here in Massachusetts versus maybe in you know,
one of the other states up and down the coast.

Speaker 8 (18:18):
Well. Sure, the tax incentives were proximately two point five
million dollars in both state and local incentives and they're
spread over the duration of the lease. Interestingly, there's some states,
in particular North Carolina. I think everybody knows the you know,
the research triangle there has a great reputation for being
business friendly, but the costs of building in the distance

(18:41):
from Massachusetts and actually the tax incentives in North Carolina
could not be matched by what we found the Massachusetts.

Speaker 2 (18:49):
You know, Jay Doker, I'm curious as to how you
got on the state's desk. In other words, at some
point you're making this decision, You're you're doing this search
quite extensive, I might add, but you're on the state's desk.
Somehow how did that happen? And how did they reach out?
And you know, how did you pull this all together?

Speaker 8 (19:07):
Yeah, and so we had some very good advisors that
were helping us both from the real estate perspective and
getting through the business aspects. And so the advisors really
were able to guide us through that process. And so
we actually were proactive to reach out to the state

(19:27):
to say, here's what we're considering, here are the jobs
that we'll create, here's the commitment we're going to make
to the community. And then there is an application process
that one goes through both at the locals and state
level to get those.

Speaker 3 (19:41):
Incentives, and Jay talk to us about the workforce because
you said that's an important part of this and how
many people will be employed there at that manufacturing plan.

Speaker 8 (19:49):
So we just had the ribbon cutting yesterday. So the
building is now up and running. We now have nine
full time employees working there that have been recruited to
work there. We expect to expand by another twenty in
the next year and ultimately have probably between forty or
up to fifty employees working there full time. Should we

(20:11):
get approval for our drug to review and should it
match the commercial success that our projections show that it
very well might.

Speaker 2 (20:21):
You mentioned two and a half million dollars in tax incentives.
What does iPoint Pharmaceuticals have to do over the next
several years to realize that number.

Speaker 8 (20:30):
Well, tax incentives are just that right now, like most biotechs,
we have no particular revenue. We are spending heavily in
research and development in the clinical parts of our program.
But should we become efty approved in the next few years,
then obviously we would expect that which to turn around

(20:52):
as we commercialize. And again over the two point five
million is tax incentives over the lifetime of police over
the next you know, ten to fifteen years, we would
be able to offset some of the tax that we
might be liable for using these incentives.

Speaker 3 (21:08):
Okay, I have to go back to the workforce for
just a moment. You know, one of the big fears
in the state has been that it's expensive to live
here and housing is an issue. Do you guys have
any concerns related to the workforce and being able to
find those individuals here in Massachusetts.

Speaker 8 (21:26):
Yeah, those are real concerns, and if I knew how
to solve them, I'd probably be sitting in a politician's seat,
not the seat I'm in. So they're concerns. On the
other hand, some of the jobs that we have are
jobs in engineering, for example, and we have, as you know,
some of the top engineering schools in the world here

(21:50):
between it WPI Olan. You know, we've got toughs. We've
got engineers recruited from all those colleges. In many times,
the graduates are moved devated to State of Massachusetts because
they really like the environment and it guests to use
the sports reference, they'd be willing to take the home
team discount when it comes to housing, Northbridge again is

(22:12):
in a relatively remote area compared to you know, obviously Boston,
Cambridge even Watertown, and therefore for the workforce, you know,
should they decide to relocate into that area that I
think it's again a lifestyle type decision where they perhaps
live ay have worked, be close and live a more

(22:33):
Liverpool lifestyle there So, all in all, the Blackstone Valley
has been a great location. And I have to add
the Blackstone Valley Vootech School is literally right down the
street from our location and we expect to be recruiting
and training graduates from there to help us with our manufacturing.

Speaker 3 (22:49):
Jay Duker, listen, thanks so much for being a part
of the show this morning. We very much appreciate it
and continued success for the iPoint Pharmaceuticals still coming your way.
We've got some headlines you may have This is the
New England Business Report.

Speaker 1 (23:05):
Kim and Joe will explore more business news that impacts
our New England economy when they return.

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Speaker 3 (25:58):
Welcome back everybody to the New England Business Report on
this for Sunday of November. I hope everybody has fallen
back and you've changed your clocks this morning. All right,
looking ahead. By the way, Scott Kershner from the Boston
Globe's going to join us talk about all of our
favorite things that are still made right here in Massachusetts.
I think you're going to be surprised by some of

(26:18):
the items that he has found. In the meantime, we
like to take a look at some of the headlines
that maybe you might have missed. And Joe obviously, well
maybe I shouldn't say obviously, there is an election this Tuesday.

Speaker 2 (26:30):
I could do it that. Kelly a television commercials.

Speaker 1 (26:36):
I think.

Speaker 2 (26:37):
I mean, it's like if we could just stop one thing,
just stop one thing.

Speaker 3 (26:43):
That race. I don't know how much they've spent there,
I don't know, but it is astronomical. And if you
think about you're watching, it doesn't matter. And Kelly aod
if you think about this she has actually had those
TV ads running since Midsummer. So it's just I've fallen
into that trap. I've fallen into that trap. Please make

(27:05):
it go away. There was a piece in the Boston
Business Journal this week that I just thought was fascinating
though looking at the election through an employer's eyes. Political
tension can spill into the workplace, and it was a
recent survey from a resume builder. It founded seven in
ten managers anticipate escalated workplace tension after this election on Tuesday,

(27:30):
which I guess is not surprising. In fact, nearly three
in ten managers said the upcoming election has already caused
problems in their workplace. A lot of them are already
saying and sending out emails apparently saying there will be
no political discussion in the workplace after Tuesday. I mean,

(27:52):
I can't imagine anything worse than going into work and
then suddenly, you know, it all breaks out. But boy,
I think we can all anticipate there could be some
discussions after Tuesday. I'll just be discussing how happy I
am to see the ads go away.

Speaker 2 (28:06):
And you know, can we often hear so much about,
you know, well, companies that aren't making things in Massachusetts anymore,
or or they're made somewhere also on the planet, whether
it's you know, Taiwan or Mexico or whatever the piece
may be. Well, you know, interesting article really caught my attention,
tickled my fancy, so to speak. Was written by Scott

(28:27):
Kerzner in the Boston Globe. He covers the innovation economy
for the Globe, and when you and I did the
Bloomberg Program for all those years, Scott was a regular visitor.
So we dialed him up. He had an article in
the Globe just recently and the headline Junior Mint's golf
balls and leather jackets twenty things still made in Massachusetts

(28:48):
and Scott joins us. Now, Scott, thanks for joining us
at New England Business Report.

Speaker 9 (28:53):
Thanks for having me on.

Speaker 2 (28:55):
Yeah, all right, So tell us how this all came about,
this story terms of still made in Massachusetts.

Speaker 9 (29:03):
Well, you know, I it kind of started earlier this summer.
I had written a piece about Boston boat work. Someone
had told me, oh, I went to visit a boat company,
a boat manufacturing company in Charlestown. And so for a
while I had been painting them and saying, hey, I'd
love to come see what you guys are doing. I
wrote a piece in the summertime when the weather was

(29:23):
beautiful and everybody wanted to be out on the water
about the last company that was still making boats in
the city of Boston. And one of the boats that
they make is the launches, the really sort of sleek
looking launches that take people from downtown Boston up to
the Encore Casino in Effett. And you know that kind

(29:46):
of that article really struck a chord where people, Globe
readers really seem interested in how how can you continue
making physical products, not just software, not just you know,
biotech drugs or financial services. How can you do physical
things in Massachusetts? And then when I was I think
I was on vacation in August, this guy, Mike Vandersleasen

(30:06):
emailed me and he said, I have a leather jacket
company in Fall River and we're marking our fiftieth anniversary.
And so that was another thing to kind of pique
my interest and let me put together the list.

Speaker 3 (30:18):
You know, first off, I think this was such a
fun assignment. It had to have been because you had
this opportunity to explore all these really cool local businesses.
But before we get into what some of them are, Scott,
you know, how did you determine that these people can
still make these products in Massachusetts? I mean, you know,
you said a lot of people were wondering, how did
you determine that?

Speaker 9 (30:38):
Well, determine it in terms like determining it was I
had I had some criteria for like what I was
looking for, and I was generally looking for stuff that
like a normal person might buy as opposed to like
a knee implant right right, or something that like it
might still be made here, but you know, you know,
you wouldn't buy a shop and at lows are shopping

(31:00):
at Target. So I was really looking for stuff that
kind of consumers can purchase. And then surprisingly, I mean,
there are still some consumer brands here and Bows would
be a really good example where Bows or you know, Converse.
Maybe this shoe company would be a good example where
the company is still headquartered here. But once you start
poking at where do they make stuff, it's not you know,

(31:21):
their products are made largely in Asia, but they're designed here.
So I was really looking for, you know, for the
production facility being in Massachusetts.

Speaker 2 (31:30):
All right, Well, let let's hear as Scott challenges that.
Let's Harra Scott Kersner globalrrespondent tellis what's made here in Massachusetts.

Speaker 9 (31:37):
Well. In addition to vans and leather jackets which we mentioned,
there's these sort of cool looking Aviator sunglasses that are
made by Randolph Engineering, which has been around since nineteen
seventy three. A lot of their customers are you know,
our Department of Defense in different uh, you know, branches
of the military, and they're still making sunglasses in the

(32:01):
Boston area.

Speaker 2 (32:03):
Doesn't Joe Biden wear them?

Speaker 1 (32:05):
Isn't that?

Speaker 2 (32:06):
Yes?

Speaker 9 (32:07):
You know, both Jovian wars, and I think he gifted
a pair to Vladimir Putin in.

Speaker 4 (32:11):
Better times.

Speaker 9 (32:13):
When you know, we were still still had a relationship
with Russia. Golf balls both Titleist golf balls, and I
didn't mention the article, but Callaway also has a golf
ball plant down in the New Bedford Fall River area.
I did go to visit this company, Zilgion Symbols. So

(32:36):
a lot of drummers play Zilgion symbols and that's a
company that still makes all of their symbols in Norwell, Massachusetts.

Speaker 2 (32:43):
The company is how old is that company?

Speaker 9 (32:46):
It's probably one of the oldest companies in the world.
They just celebrated their four hundredth birthday. So it was
founded in Turkey and then one of the family members
moved to the South Shore at some point in the
twentieth century and set up shop.

Speaker 2 (33:00):
And and Ringo Star, Ringo Star plays their symbols.

Speaker 9 (33:05):
They have an amazing you know, their headquarters is like
a museum of drumming, you know where it's got drum
set from like Jeane Kruba and Ringos Star and all
these cool people that have played uilds and symbols over
the years. They also owned a drumstick company, but the
drumsticks are not made in Massachusetts. They're made in Maine,
so they didn't they didn't make the cut for this article.

Speaker 3 (33:29):
My most fascinating part of all of this was the
Junior Mints. I had no idea they were made here.

Speaker 9 (33:34):
Yeah, yeah, I was just gonna say. With Halloween right
behind us, Senior Min's are one of my favorite candies.
At the same factory in Cambridge, which I think is
the last candy factory that's still operating in Cambridge. They
also make sugar babies, those little caramel kind of you
know raisinet looking things. They make sugar daddies and maybe

(33:57):
a few other things, but it's a very candy manufacturer,
is very secretive. They don't give tours of the.

Speaker 10 (34:02):
Factory like Willie Watka.

Speaker 2 (34:05):
Love those. Talking with Scott Kerzner, Globe correspondent covers the
innovation economy, talking about his story about twenty things still
made here in Massachusetts. Obviously, I have a long list
of questions, but I guess kind of go I turn
it back on you. What surprised you on this list
of twenty?

Speaker 8 (34:20):
I mean, I guess that there's still a decent number
of apparel companies. You know, we always talk about shoes
and shirts and pants, you know, moving to the South
or moving to Mexico, you know, but that you can
still find dress shoes being made by Alden Shoes in Middleborough.
New Balance is still making some of it sneakers. I

(34:41):
don't think the majority of their sneakers in Massachusetts. And
you know, I definitely heard about some other niche you know,
shirt companies, pants companies that have still figured out that
you know, for their brand at least people will pay
a premium for that, you know that made in the USA.

Speaker 3 (35:01):
So Scott, I've got a question for you. I live
in swam Scott, so very close to Lynn. Now, the
big debate has always been whether marshmallow fluff was started
in Linn or in Summerville. Now I know they make
it in Lynn. Now did you get to the bottom
of that?

Speaker 9 (35:19):
Oh my gosh. I didn't investigate that question. But the
biggest thing that people mentioned. They were like, Scott, You're
an idiot. How could you leave this off the article
is I did mention marshmallow fluff still put into those
little white plastic the blue and white plastic containers in Lynn.
But they were like, how could you not mention Teddy

(35:41):
Bear peanut butter.

Speaker 8 (35:42):
Which I think is made in em Bread.

Speaker 9 (35:44):
They're like, oh, that's the hometown Massachusetts peanut butter, and
I definitely have eaten it, and I didn't think to
mention it as the perfect companion but fluff.

Speaker 2 (35:55):
And these are the people I've been contacting you after
the article came out. Correct.

Speaker 9 (35:59):
Yeah, and it got a lot of good ones that
I just didn't know about. You know, it's hard to
you know, I asked a bunch of the manufacturing agencies
in Massachusetts, you know that promote manufacturing, So I did
you know. I did a lot of research trying to
turn up interesting stuff. And the one thing in addition
to Teddy Peanut butter that that Globe readers mentioned most

(36:19):
frequently was Chelsea Clocks. I guess Chelsea Clocks has been
around forever in the city of Chelsea, and they make
ships clocks and beautiful mantle piece clocks, and I just
had not heard of them before before writing it. And
then also, you know, the record players are now having

(36:41):
a resurgence, right record players and final records, And there's
a company in Wuburn called U Turn Audio that is
making these like high end record players that people really,
people really love. So I've heard a lot about U
Turn Audio.

Speaker 2 (36:57):
All right, well we need a part two there, Scott.
Volume two covers the innovation economy. Great conversation with you
on this Sunday morning on the New England Business Report.

Speaker 3 (37:07):
Well, Joe, the twenty four to twenty five Celtics season
is off to a pretty darn good start. Have you
been keeping an eye.

Speaker 4 (37:13):
On our Celtics?

Speaker 5 (37:14):
So I have.

Speaker 2 (37:15):
I had that one loss, you know, but it was
an overtime, so I'm going to give him that one
very good.

Speaker 3 (37:22):
Yeah, absolutely, our NBA champs. Of course, it was shortly
after they won the championship last year that we'd learned
that the majority owner, Wick Grouseback, is selling and so
a lot of people have wondered what this will mean
for the value of this team. So joining us now
is the director of Sports management over at Suffolk University.

(37:43):
He's our friend, Skip Perm. It's great to have his Skip.
You're always the guy we turned to when we need
some dollar signs and some figures when it comes to
our sports teams. So let's talk a little bit about
what the Celtics. You know, you know it was Wick
and his group that want the Celtics back twenty years ago.
I guess it was talk to us what they bought

(38:05):
it for then, and what you anticipated me sell for.

Speaker 6 (38:08):
Yeah, they bought it in two thousand and two, so
it's you know, twenty two years ago at this point
for the small seven three hundred and sixty million dollars,
which is you know, a pittance for what it's worth now.
I mean, it looks obviously like an incredibly good investment
back in two thousand and two, and.

Speaker 3 (38:27):
What is it worth?

Speaker 6 (38:28):
Yeah, oh it is, Well, it's worth right now, quote
UNA Forbes six billion dollars. It's number four in the NBA,
behind I think the Knicks, the Lakers, and the Golden
State Warriors.

Speaker 2 (38:39):
Give us a big picture here on this proposed sale, well,
I mean it is.

Speaker 6 (38:44):
It is really surprising. And you said Wick as the
majority owner. You know, I think people just did assume that.
But as the news coverage as is been folded here,
it really appears that his dad was the primary investor
and Wick has a relatively small percentage on his own.
But it does look like you know, with with lots

(39:04):
of estates and families that you know, there is I
don't know if it's a disconnect or not. I'm not
obviously in the inside, but the father, Irving is it
is sort of dictating the sale and now it's up
for sale whether Wick wants to sell it or not.
But that's that's where they are.

Speaker 2 (39:23):
Mm hmm.

Speaker 3 (39:25):
You know, Joe and I were talking about this earlier
in the show, but there's all kinds of talk that
this team that's worth six billion dollars is barely breaking
even after winning the championship last year. Wow do these
numbers all shake?

Speaker 6 (39:42):
Well, there's been a relatively new collective of bargaining agreement
between the owners and the players, and there are some
real there are real, some not restrictions on what you
can play payers players per se, but the more you
play pay them, the higher you go above the salary cap.

(40:02):
And the sources I have is the cap this year
is one hundred and forty million dollars. The Celtics payroll
this year is at one hundred and ninety nine million,
So that's fifty nine million dollars spread above the cap.
They're being taxed on that, and that gets added to
the payroll. Now that's going to accelerate next year, where

(40:23):
their payroll is going to be two hundred and twenty
six million, and by reports they're going to actually pay
more than double that in tax for being a sort
of two time tax offender cap offender. And so you're
talking about a five hundred million dollar payroll, which would
be the first five hundred million dollar pay roll in
the NBA history that the new owners and theory will

(40:46):
have to swallow when they purchased the team. That's just
an enormous amount of spending on employees.

Speaker 2 (40:52):
I talk about skiperm He is, of course with the
sports management program over there at the Suffolk University Sawyer
School of Business. Right, So take us through who the
potential buyers are here? Who wants to spend the five
six billion dollars to buy the Celtics.

Speaker 6 (41:07):
Yeah, that's that's a great question, and it's sort of
this is not necessarily an NBA thing, but a sports
thing in general, and that the valuations of these clubs
have become so enormous that the prospective buyers, as you
can imagine if you're talking about a six billion dollar purchase,
there aren't many of those individuals walking around the streets

(41:29):
who can just drop six billion dollars. So a lot
of these our groups, you know, consortiums that are put together.
But Steve Paluca, who's in the partnership group now, is
one of those that's rumorged quite frequently, and I think
a lot of Celtics fans would love to see him
because he's part of that same ownership group. There's another
limited partner that has been the name has dropped over

(41:51):
the last few weeks, a guy named Robert Hale who
has owned teams in the past. He's owned the the
Boston Cannons and Major League Lacrosse and he's been a
big benefactor in Quincy and in other places. He's part
of that ownership group and is on the for billionaire lift.
And then I thought these names had never come out.
But there are other locals who might be interesting. Jim

(42:14):
Davis of New Balanced, John Fisherpsky of Suffolk, and even
Jim Cook. I don't think any of those are interested,
but those are people who might be able to afford it,
or you can at least put up some of the money.

Speaker 5 (42:25):
You know.

Speaker 3 (42:26):
I think I read something somewhere Skip But there could
be some impact on the sale price because Wick has
some certain guidelines that he wants. He wants to stay
in control of the team for a certain amount of time,
he wants to be directly involved. How might that differ
from sales of other sports teams, and how could that

(42:48):
impact possibly the price.

Speaker 6 (42:52):
Well, it doesn't make it clean.

Speaker 9 (42:53):
And if you're going to spend six billion dollars on something,
and look, I don't I don't think the Celtics are
going to get.

Speaker 6 (42:59):
Six billion dollars. They don't own their own building, so
they're limited in their revenue streams the Bruins own, or
the Jacob's family owns owns the garden. So if you're
going to spend five billion dollars on an asset, I
think you're going to expect to have complete control. And
there isn't going to be a tiered structure to this.

(43:21):
So I think that sloads the process. If that's what.

Speaker 10 (43:24):
Wick really would like to do.

Speaker 6 (43:26):
And prefer to do. I think the buyer really dictates
the terms. Right, if the if the if his Wick's
father is really certain on selling and he's got a
good price, is the fact that Wick wants to stay
in charge going to hold up that sale. I'm sure
it can delay it, and I think it would, But
you know, money talks, and if you've got an offer

(43:47):
that you want to take, whether Wicks in charge or not,
I think that's going to rule the day.

Speaker 2 (43:53):
Despite what we're hearing about all the cost right and
and and the luxury tax, and the five to six
billion dollars and the fact that they didn't make any
money supposedly running through that championship run most recently, there's
no shortage of billionaires that want to do this right.
I mean, I mean, I doesn't anybody is scared away?

Speaker 6 (44:12):
Well, but I guess I would counter that I think
there are a shortage of billionaires who do want to
do it, and really a lot of the money coming
into sports, and there are NBA guidelines that would prohibit this.
But we're talking about sovereign wealth funds who own organizations
like Man City, which now is you know, I don't
know how many championships they've won in the last year

(44:33):
in the Premier League, but they bought that club, put
a ton of money into it and now it's the
premier team and almost Man United. It's brother in the
City is secondary, but that's where the real money is.
And then you're talking about private equity groups, and the
NBA is taking private equity money now, but not to

(44:54):
the point where those entities can be majority owners. So
I think it's a small n niverse of people Joe
that really could, in fact, you know, buy this and
Sticky buy it outright. It's definitely I think going to
be a group for sure.

Speaker 3 (45:09):
All Right, skip, great information. Like always, thank you so much.
We'll look forward to chatting with you again sometime real soon.
In the meantime, it's back to the future. For your
next cup of coffee. We'll have details of a new
shop that just might knock your socks off.

Speaker 1 (45:26):
You are listening to the New England Business Report on
the Voice of Boston w RKO sixt eighty Joe and
Kim will be right back.

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Speaker 2 (48:49):
And welcome back to the New England Business Report on
this h Sunday morning in November. Okay, so I'm looking
at the Boston Globe story written by Aaron Pressman jumped
out at me headline, This Lowell startup is getting buzz
for quicker coffee service. Ping's mostly automated trailer offers a

(49:11):
variety of bruis via a mobile app. Okay, now you
have my full blown attention. Let's bring in the top
executive there, Rob Witten. He is a robotics expert. And Rob,
let me share this first line of Aaron Pressman's story
in the Globe. It says, after careers at tech companies
including Amazon, I Robot and Shark Ninja, a pair of

(49:34):
first time entrepreneurs are trying to solve one of life's
small but annoying problems, the long wait at the drive
through coffee line. Okay, Rob, that puts you on deck.
Tell us what is this?

Speaker 10 (49:46):
Hi, Joe and Kim, thanks for having me on. Yeah,
so this is an automated drive through experience. So we
don't think you should have to wait in a long
line to get your drive through order. And this way
you can order ahead of time. Just drive up the kiosk,
grab your order and go.

Speaker 3 (50:02):
Okay, so let's walk through this. You get on your
app and you order your latte. And my understanding is
that the app and the robotics there at ping recognize
where you are because for me, it's important that it
be hot.

Speaker 10 (50:18):
Oh yes, I think it's very important to keep all
the orders very fresh. You don't want your your ice
cubes melted. You don't want your coffee lukewarms. So the
way it works is you order on the app and
there's a one click order button. So once you set
up your regular it's just a click away and you
can order it whenever you like, and words the great Secura,

(50:40):
it's whenever wherever. So you could order it first thing
in the morning, go run your errands, and then when
you get within three hundred meters of the kiosk, we
see that you're coming, or the kiosks that you're coming,
and that's when your order gets prepared.

Speaker 2 (50:53):
That's insane, It sounds obvious, but explain to us nonetheless.
So how this makes it quicker?

Speaker 6 (50:58):
Oh?

Speaker 9 (50:59):
Sure?

Speaker 10 (50:59):
So the great thing about this is everybody is ordering
on the app, so you're not waiting for somebody else
to order ahead of you in the line for that
order to get made, and then they take off before
you can pick up your order. Everybody is ordering on
the app, so all of their drinks are being made
just in time. So as you drive up, we have

(51:19):
some sensors on the site that recognize that you're the
next person in the windows. Your order should come out
just as you're arriving.

Speaker 3 (51:26):
So is there a human inside the facility or is
all of this done by robots?

Speaker 10 (51:33):
Right now, we're inside the trailer sort of in the
Willy Wonka mode, if you will, because this is our
first pilot, so we built this ourselves, We bootstrapped it,
and right now we're raising money prefeats for the next round,
and that next round is to really complete all of
the automation inside so we can be pretty much hands free.

Speaker 2 (51:54):
Talking with Rob Witten, robotics expert and the one of
the executives behind paying Now. It's low located at the
intersection of Root three and Root four and Lowell. Okay,
so tell us about that physical site. How is business going.

Speaker 10 (52:07):
You know, it's been going great that the customers here
have been amazing, really supportive because this is a very
new thing. So we're working through all of the little
kinks and trying to figure out exactly how we get
the best customer experience. There's a nice, you know, a
bit of traffic going through here, and it's underutilized parking
lot right now, so we're able to you know, kind

(52:28):
of liven that up a little bit and put it
to good use.

Speaker 3 (52:32):
So do you anticipate that that will be the model
for future locations in parking lots like that? And and
talk to us about what you hope this all ultimately
turns into.

Speaker 10 (52:43):
Yeah, so we really hope to use you know, parking
lots like this, or or maybe the extra space at
the mall, those sort of things. We're talking to you know,
developers and property owners for a number of sites so
that not only can they generate a little bit of
revenue for their extra park but also we can help
increase the foot traffic inside of their stores.

Speaker 2 (53:03):
All right now, I read in the article in the
Globe that ultimately down the road, you see this as
a franchise opportunity. So explain that part.

Speaker 10 (53:12):
Yes, I think one of the nice things about our
system is that it's not super expensive to build a site.
We believe we can establish a site for under two
hundred K, which is it makes the ownership of a
franchise much more achievable for somebody that's more like us,
not super rich. To begin with, you'd have to be
pretty well off to own most franchises or at least

(53:35):
a location for one of those franchises. And in this way,
somebody like us that maybe isn't quite that quite that wealthy,
but can pull together the capital for a couple of
hundred K, would be able to buy one of these
pods and place it in the site and make sure
it's in good working order.

Speaker 3 (53:52):
So Rob Witten is our guest and he is the
CEO and one of the founders of this new futuristic
coffee shop that's up been loll it's called paying So
talk to me about this this technology. I mean, it's
a little it's a little freaky because the fact of
the matter is you you know where I am, and

(54:13):
you now you know my coffee and then you know
what I've arrived.

Speaker 6 (54:17):
Well, I think you know.

Speaker 10 (54:18):
Privacy is you know, one of our number one concerns,
you know, to make sure that we're you know, keeping
customer information private so we'll never share or sell the information,
and we only use that to figure out when you're
getting close to one of our pods, Like we can't
look up your number and track where you are or
anything like that. It only activates when you have an

(54:40):
active order and you get within three hundred meters of
the pod, and it just notifies us that you're close
and we should start making your order. And then of
course on site, it's very short range sensors that work
through your Bluetooth and that's how we figure out that,
say you're you're the next person in the window.

Speaker 2 (54:56):
You know, if Starbucks is vulnerable in any area would
probably be cost so talk to us about what PING
is doing.

Speaker 10 (55:05):
So the nice thing about Ping is we're allowed to
send a little bit more on the ingredients that go
into your cup because we have labor. You know, we
have to obviously maintain these and restock them, but it's
there's a less of a dependency on direct labor to
make each and every order. And we also have a
very small footprint. If you look at a Starbucks, they're

(55:27):
often a large building and a very prominent area, and
it has bathrooms and all these things that need to
be kept up so that all translates into costs that
goes into your cups. Right, so we're able to offer
a lot more in terms of ingredients for what we
believe is a very fair price.

Speaker 2 (55:45):
Well, what does a large dark ROAs cost me? Because
that's what I buy at Starbucks? What does it cost
me at Ping?

Speaker 10 (55:51):
It's about three dollars? And we use the same size
for our hot coffees, all one size. And then saying
with are ice cooppies as well?

Speaker 1 (56:02):
All right?

Speaker 6 (56:02):
Rob?

Speaker 3 (56:03):
The all important question now though? Is the coffee good?

Speaker 8 (56:08):
Yes?

Speaker 10 (56:09):
Well, you know, I think it's really important that you
know the coffee the gourmet and so we're actually using
a pre crew from a local startup and well as
well up in Gloucester, and this is a really gourmet
cup of coffee. I mean they started with George Howlbeans
to make sure that they were really elevating that experience.

(56:30):
And you know, being able to have a very quick
pre crew that scoremet really helped unlock some of our automations.

Speaker 2 (56:39):
And once you're at this spot and Lowell as you are,
can you move? I mean, can can you go?

Speaker 9 (56:44):
Say?

Speaker 2 (56:44):
Well, the spot isn't working, We're going to go down
the road.

Speaker 10 (56:47):
We certainly. Could you know it's in a trailer format now.
Eventually we expect to be in a shipping container. But
I think we'll have both formats in the future because
often we'll be in a parking lot pretty static for
a long period. But we've also gotten a lot of
requests for events and so we'd like to be able
to move one of these Ping clouds into an event
location and be able to supply black beverages for everybody

(57:10):
at the event.

Speaker 2 (57:10):
Well, good luck with it, and thank you Rob Whitten
of Ping for joining us this Sunday morning on the
New England Business Report.

Speaker 3 (57:18):
All right, well Joe, that's going to do it for
this edition of the New England Business Report. So glad
everybody could be with us today. Be sure you join
us next Sunday at eight am when one of our
guests will be Dan Canary. He is the CEO of
Harpoon Brewery. Great guy and we're going to talk to
him a little bit about some of those holiday brews
that they are going to be putting on the shelves

(57:39):
here pretty quick, which is always.

Speaker 2 (57:40):
Sunday morning on the New England Business Support.

Speaker 3 (57:43):
Listen, listen, they drink beer everywhere so this is not
a bad thing. In the meantime, have a great week everybody,
and join us again next Sunday morning, eight am on
WRKO six eighty am, the Voice of Boston.