Roscoe Village has a lot to offer shoppers this holiday season
Rachel Bechtol, social media coordinator at the Coshocton Visitors Bureau, shows some locally made craft items for sale in their shop. (Marianne Austin)
People are looking for a small safe place to visit and Coshocton fits the bill, said Mindy Brems, director of the Coshocton County Visitors Bureau located in Roscoe Village.
“We’re seeing where people come from and we’re excited,” she said. “It’s fun to collect information and to engage them in conversation. We have seen many different demographics. Some people from Mahoning County were tracking their genealogy and looking for a grave in Chili. We were able to direct them to the library. They came back to tell us about it and that’s exciting.”
In addition to be a source for information, the visitors bureau shop also offers guests the chance to purchase Annin flags and handmade items from 19 more local vendors.
“We have all local products,” Brems said. “We know the people personally. If anybody wants anything custom we can get that for them. Books, clothes, jewelry, local honey, leathercraft, a lot of these folks have been selling for quite a while. The Mautz family has been here from the beginning.”
Rick and Jane Mautz from Pine Gap Woodworks have been there for two years. They design unique wooden inlay products using domestic and exotic wood from Central and South America and Africa using a process known as Intarsia. Their collection includes Ohio State products, Christmas ornaments – Santas, Angels, Ohio State Cardinals. They have male and female cardinals sitting in dogwood blooms that make very unique gifts. Also, logos and mascots for Bowling Green, Miami, Cincinnati, Kent State, Muskingum, Otterbein – even a Musky Husky. If you have a request, they will come up with something to satisfy whatever the customers are looking for.
“We can work from photographs. We made a Beagle puppy that came out well,” Rick said. “If a customer has an idea for something custom made we can do it. We had an order for a 1966 Cessna Airplane and a 10×12 wood-inlay of a 1927 Ford Pick-up a customer ordered for their nephew. ”
Rick added that they use no stain on their products.
“It is all just the natural wood,” he said.
The visitors bureau has a great mix as far as vendors including Author-J B Schmidt, Handcrafted by Pam, Hickish Homes, Millcreek Homestead, Peaceable Kingdom, Primitive By Design, Rusty Plow Press, Schumaker Farms, Strawberry Hill Farms, Tana’s Tasty Treats, Winding Creek Farm, Mix and Match Candles, and Schoolhouse Primitives. It is great place to buy gifts for Christmas, gift baskets, museum memberships or gift certificates.
They also provide destination information in the county showing places for people to go using maps and guides available at the shop.
“It is really exciting to provide people with lots of information to showcase all the talent in our community,” Brems said. “We’ve had people here from 23 states and 57 Ohio counties. We can track where people come from and how they found out about us. We can tell them about local resources and sometimes they come back and tell us about it. They may need information about places to stay while they are here. We like to promote overnight stays and we’re able to give them a visitor’s guide for accommodations and things to do while they are here. More than 4,000 people visited our county in 2020. There is so much in the county to do.”
“We have great shopping and recreational maps, five scenic water trails in the county, great camping, it’s great for hunters in the fall,” Brems said. “We’ve been the top deer harvest for 10 years – more than any other county in the state. We can show them places to stay and some bring their families.”
Maps and guides include The Three Rivers Wine and Beer Trail providing a map for six wineries and a brewery on a scenic drive through the Appalachian foothills of Coshocton County and they can get a free t-shirt.
If you are a biker the Three Rivers Ride to find your adventure map is for a 105 mile trip through scenic Appalachia – all paved roads – also available at the visitors bureau.
The Coshocton Crow Geotrail provides visitors with a passport to record their journey and guide them to 13 geocaches hidden across Coshocton County and collect a commemorative coin at the end from the visitors bureau.
Jingle and Mingle on Saturday, Nov. 14 will kick off the holiday shopping season in the village with holiday sales, discounts, demonstrations, workshops, and gift certificates for some pretty unique gift ideas.
Category: Business
