Waterbury businesses roll with flood’s punches

July 11, 2023 | By Hannah Normandeau | Correspondent

Waterbury Sports sits in a stretch of South Main Street where water pooled through much of the day on Tuesday. Photo by Hannah Normandeau

Waterbury’s downtown companies have taken a hit from this week’s flood. But just hours into taking stock of the damage and disruptions, owners and managers are looking ahead and digging in and getting back on their feet. Again. 

Waterbury Economic Development Director Mark Pomilio Jr. said he walked around town on Tuesday to survey activity at local businesses in the immediate aftermath of the flood. Many were closed or on reduced hours due to direct flooding or staff being affected. “It is really difficult to tell to what extent, but I know businesses are suffering during this time,” he said. 

Stowe Street Café was open and offering free coffee and food; K.C.’s Bagel Café opened a bit later than usual; Bridgeside Books closed early and called off special events this week. 

Sandbags cover a basement window at the Craft Beer Cellar on Monday night as floodwaters rise. Photo by Lisa Scagliotti

Many businesses were closed entirely. Waterbury Sports posted on social media that the South Main Street shop will be closed until further notice. “Our basement took water … but we managed to get 99% of our stuff upstairs and it’s dry. But it’s gonna take some time to get all the water out, dried up and put away,” read a post.

Over on Elm Street, water swirled inside the ground-level space of Red Poppy Cakery. The new owners at Craft Beer Cellar down the sidewalk posted photos online of floodwaters several feet up the building. The water came to the bottom sills of the storefront windows, maybe two feet below a sign marking the high water spot at the building during Tropical Storm Irene in 2011.

At Tuesday’s emergency Waterbury Select Board meeting, Pomilio said he will begin collecting information to share with business owners as they respond and recover from this disaster. He will assemble the updates in the business newsletter that’s posted on the Revitalizing Waterbury website and emailed to anyone who signs up for the distribution list. 

Darn Tough Vermont

The scene on Elm Street on Tuesday morning with Prohibition Pig on the left and Craft Beer Cellar on the right. Photo by Hannah Normandeau

Floodwaters didn’t reach Darn Tough Vermont’s relatively new sock-manufacturing plant over in Pilgrim Park. The company expanded to Waterbury in 2021, taking over a building formerly used as a Keurig production facility. During Irene in 2011, the building was part of Green Mountain Coffee Roasters.

Courtney Laggner, brand and community marketing manager for Darn Tough, said there had been no flood damage to the Waterbury facilities, but there was a couple of inches of water in the basement of the Natanna Mill in Northfield. “Our maintenance crew worked diligently to clean all of that out,” Laggner said, but “all of our yarn, all of our machines, everything is okay.”

Darn Tough has about 425 employees combined at its facility in Waterbury and two others in Northfield, where the company started in 1978 as Cabot Hosiery Mills. The Waterbury plant accounts for about 100 employees and a quarter of the company’s sock production.

Laggner said all direct-to-consumer business is done from Waterbury as well. She expected a “fair impact” to order fulfillment, shipping and production over the next week, but said that between current capacity and the operations team’s plan to get back to full production, “we don't think that this will affect us tremendously at all.”

A message on the company’s website Tuesday read, “Severe Flooding In Vermont Impacting Shipping - Our first goal is the safety of our employees and community. We appreciate your patience as we work to fulfill orders.”

Laggner said they made the call early in the storm to send everyone home, and production at all facilities would be closed until at least Saturday night, July 15. Employees will be fully compensated for lost time, Laggner said, and financial help will be made available to displaced and affected employees.

She said that next week, staff would be able to use company volunteer hours to support coworkers in need. 

“We're going to deploy employees to other employees’ houses to help scoop up mud, fix the porch, anything like that.”

The company was also in touch with the towns of Northfield and Waterbury to see what was needed, and was told Barre Auditorium — one of three state shelters at the time — could use the most help. By Tuesday evening, the company had donated dozens of cases of water, diapers, baby food and other items at the top of the request list.

More water woes at Prohibition Pig & Hen of the Wood

Downtown restaurant owner Eric Warnstedt (left) talks with passersby in front of his Prohibition Pig pub and brewery on Tuesday morning, July 11. Floodwaters from Elm Street can be seen along the building’s edge. Photo by Gordon Miller

On Tuesday, Eric Warnstedt, who owns Prohibition Pig restaurant and brewery on Elm Street and Hen of the Wood on South Main Street in Waterbury, Hen of the Wood in Burlington and Doc Ponds in Stowe, was keeping an eye on the water levels at his Waterbury village properties.

Prohibition Pig’s brewery and basement areas were “pretty much full” still on Tuesday, and Warnstedt said it was hard to tell what the total damage would be. 

“After we get the water out of there, everything needs to get ripped out. Who knows at this point,” he said. “Now we’re letting it sink in, connecting with our people, and some of our friends that have more serious challenges than businesses.”

Warnstedt said of his 60 employees, several had more serious losses that they were focusing efforts on first.

Both of Pro Pig’s buildings were hard-hit during Tropical Storm Irene when they were home to different businesses, the Alchemist pub and brewery and One Studio dance studio.

Across the street at Hen of the Wood, Warnstedt said there were a couple of inches of water in the basement, but he expected a relatively quick sanitizing and scrub-down process once the water receded.

“At any other time it would be considered a freakish challenge, but compared to what’s happening across the street it will be an easy day or two or three cleanup,” he said.

Warnstedt opened the original Hen of the Wood in the old grist mill building on Stowe Street in 2005. A Burlington version of the award-winning restaurant opened in 2013, closing briefly in 2019 after fire damaged the restaurant’s ventilation system.

The Waterbury Hen of the Wood moved to 14 South Main St. in Waterbury village just this April. After being open for a single dinner service, the building suffered water damage late that night when the fire-suppression system in the offices above the restaurant malfunctioned and triggered the sprinkler system, pouring water down into the newly renovated dining room and kitchen below.

It was “a little heartbreaking” to see water in the basement this time, Warnstedt said, “but I think we knew if the water came up” at the new location it wouldn’t be totally devastating.

Warnstedt said the Waterbury Hen will be closed for a couple of days, intending to reopen as soon as possible, perhaps with the downstairs bar area closed. A small silver lining — “We can focus on the patio for the summer,” Warnstedt said. The sunny, flower-filled space hadn’t opened yet as everyone seemed to want to hang out downstairs in what Warnstedt thought would be the “winter waiting room.” 

Warnstedt said there had been no damage from the recent storm at Doc Ponds in Stowe and Hen of the Wood in Burlington, and operations would continue as usual there. 

“It’s going to be a group effort,” Warnstedt said. “Baby steps.”