Greater Brandon Chamber's Name Meant To Be Inclusive

What’s in a name?

That’s what one reader wanted to know, inquiring as to whether the Greater Brandon Chamber of Commerce was, indeed, considering a name change.

“I heard 2 VP’s talking last week about the Greater Brandon Chamber of Commerce changing their business name to the Eastern Hillsborough County Chamber of Commerce,” reads the comment. “Could this be true?”

Not true, said Tammy Bracewell, chief executive officer and president of the chamber, which this year received its second five-star accreditation from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.

The issue did come up at the chamber’s most recent board retreat, but only “as a topic of general discussion, as in, ‘Is our name adequately reflective of the communities we serve,’ and that’s as far as it went,” Bracewell added. “If I recall correctly, nobody said, ‘No, it’s a horrible idea.’ But likewise nobody said, ‘Let’s do it.’ It’s a good question and maybe we’ll talk about it at a later date.”

Again, what’s in a name?

“People like us, who have been here for a long time, when we hear the word, ‘Brandon,’ we think of an area boarder than just central Brandon,” Bracewell said. “A lot of people newer to Brandon don’t have that history. For them, Valrico is very different from Brandon, which is very different from Lithia, which is very different from Mango, and so on.”

That’s the reason why the Brandon chamber, like many other chambers throughout the nation, incorporate the word “Greater” into their names, she said.

“The word, ‘Greater,’ is supposed to encompass the surrounding areas,” Bracewell said. “Most chambers use the word to be inclusive.”

To wit: the Greater Riverview Chamber of Commerce, the Greater Plant City Chamber of Commerce, the Greater Seffner Area Chamber of Commerce and the Greater Tampa Chamber of Commerce, just to mention a few.

As for the issue brought up at the retreat, Bracewell said she was not surprised the issue came up in passing.

“There’s a lot of discussion about regionalism, but that was the extent of it,” she said. “It was not a discussion at all about involving any other chamber. The scope of the discussion concerned the communities that we serve.”

So, what is the area served by the Greater Brandon Chamber of Commerce?

That area, Bracewell said, includes Brandon, Dover, Limona, Lithia, Mango, Riverview, Seffner, Valrico and parts of east Tampa, Plant City and Sun City.

“Brandon’s not a municipal town, just like Riverview doesn’t have specific boundaries as such, either,” Bracewell said. “We all have ZIP codes.”

And it doesn’t necessarily matter, either, she said, where your business is physically located.

“Your business doesn’t have to be physically located in that town to be in that town’s chamber,” she said. “You join chambers in the towns in which you want to do business.”

Bracewell noted, too, that the Brandon chamber “is very willing to work partnerships with any other chambers in the area.”

A case in point: the annual Trek to Tallahassee that the Brandon chamber sponsors. Other chambers that don’t have such a trip, she added, can offer their members that opportunity through the Brandon trip.

“We’ve very much for partnering for the betterment of our region,” Bracewell said.