Midcoast Entrepreneurs: Bright Ideas, Creativity and Enterprise
From restaurateurs to artists, and everything in between, the Midcoast is beaming with creatives and innovators in all mediums.
Since the inception of PenBayPilot.com, a collective goal of our writers has been to spotlight entrepreneurs and their creativity. Now, we have established a hub for our stories about the Midcoast’s entrepreneurs to permanently reside.
We encourage our readers to support as many local business owners as possible across as many industries as you can. Our neighbors need our support, so please browse through this hub for potential purchases or places to eat.
New Rockland restaurant, Ada’s Kitchen, to offer Italian classics, happy hour
ROCKLAND — Jenn Rockwell, along with her father Rick Rockwell, of Rockland Realty, are on a mission. Their current goal? To bring increased vibrancy and visibility to the north end of Rockland Main Street.
Scheduled to open November 1, Ada's Kitchen is the latest undertaking of the duo, who are also the owners of Main Street Markets, which opened its doors in 2015.
Seated inside the evolving but comfortably elegant space at 449 Main Street, the space that will house the new… Read more
Cold off the press: a new apple press business opens in Knox, Maine
KNOX—On a sunny, October day, it’s the perfect drive from the Midcoast going inland as the trees are beginning to change. Just a couple of miles before the Ridge Top Diner in Knox, Morse Road turns down on a long stretch of farm road toward New Beat Farm, a horse-powered organic vegetable, flower and sheep farm in the heart of Waldo County.
Working out of an 1880s farm house, New Beat Farm’s owners Adrienne Lee and Ken Lanson have converted an unused barn space tacked onto their… Read more
Hot fire, molten glass and lobster claws in West Rockport Foundry
ROCKPORT — On a hot August afternoon, artist Richard Remsen is in his element, standing close to the flames firing his 2,100-F oven. Welders glasses are pulled over his regular glasses, and he’s decked in a Hawaiian shirt with a rip down the center, shorts and sneakers. At the end of a long blow pipe stuck in the oven is first a blob of liquid glass; slowly, though, it takes on the form of a lobster claw, as Remsen carefully tools it toward a piece of glass art.
These lobster claws… Read more
Ferryside Lunch is Rockland’s latest lunch spot
ROCKLAND—The interior of the newly opened Ferryside Lunch in Rockland’s North End (497 Main Street) may small inside, but the homemade paninis and soup are going to be the biggest draw.
Re-opened just last week, Ferryside Lunch originally opened last winter, but had to close through the spring and summer to get renovations done to the 200-square-foot shop. Owner Jessica Arena runs the sandwich and soup shop, alongside with her son, Dylan Whitamore, 16, and her daughter, Adrianna, 14… Read more
Two 19-year-olds run dream business with Smoothie Haven in Rockland
ROCKLAND — Last summer, Keenan Hendricks and Christian Straka were camp counselors and wondered out loud how they could start their own business.
“We’re both physically active and play sports, and were thinking, how we could sell something that was enjoyable and healthy,” said Hendricks.
“We like smoothies, but most places they’re really expensive, so we thought we should make the kind of smoothies we could afford ourselves,” said Straka.
Smoothie Haven launched June… Read more
The Hoot, Northport’s newest breakfast and lunch joint, serves simple, hearty fare
NORTHPORT — Anyone wondering why they no longer see those garish lime green and yellow colors of the old Dos Amigos Mexican Restaurant as they pass Route 1 will be happy to know that the restaurant has been taken over, reinvented and is now open for the season. The Hoot, a breakfast and lunch restaurant, is owned and run by former food truck owner Anna Wagner.
The building is now clad in dark shingles, and adorned by planters of flowers, with an expansive back deck under a canopy of… Read more
Belfast artist on painting: Each brushstroke has a voice
She is an artist, and she likes to work hard. Combine the two characteristics, and there is Jerri Finch, a longtime presence on the Maine art scene, and a bold one. She breaks ground, literally, and on her canvas. These days, her canvases proliferate under the soft allure of oil paints. She has found her groove in her studio, working through the winter, mixing colors, experimenting with light and angles, watching the fall landscape drop into winter, and then push back toward spring.
Two Belfast food trucks trade wheels for bricks and mortar
BELFAST— A trend in Portland, where food truck owners test the waters by going mobile with a small menu and then take it to the next level with restaurant space, has taken hold in Belfast, where two new restaurants are slated to open.
Neighborhood
Four years ago, Seth Whited and Sarah Waldron were co-owners and operators of the Good ‘N’ You food truck in the back parking lot of Rollie’s Bar and Grill. They served up… Read more
Hot Fat in Waldoboro joins growing Midcoast food truck fleet
WALDOBORO — Monhegan resident Matt “Captain Mattie” Thomson has been providing the boat-to-plate experience for the public well before it ever became a trend. For the last 24 years that he’s lived on Monhegan, he has captained at various times both a groundfish boat and a lobster boat. At the end of the fishing trip when everyone else would go home, Thomson would fillet up some haddock or hake he’d just caught and then sell it through a little trailer by his house.
“It was originally… Read more
Camden’s Sea Dog Brewing Co. opens Friday
CAMDEN — In a soft opening event Wednesday night, several dozen people got a chance to check out the renovations the Sea Dog Brewing Co. has made over the spring and summer in anticipation for their grand opening Friday, Aug. 5. The three separate buildings have been built out to resemble a cohesive classic Sea Dog color scheme of exposed beams, wooden booths and tables and splashy wall art. The space now includes two bars, (one downstairs, and one split bar upstairs where the Crow’s Nest of… Read more