Good morning,

Remember back in April when Amazon reportedly said it would start displaying how much tariffs were impacting the prices of items it sold, until the president “talked” Jeff Bezos out of it?

Turns out Amazon raised prices anyway — just without telling the White House or anyone else.

A Wall Street Journal analysis (gift link) found that the online retailer quietly raised prices on 1,200 household essentials, such as deodorant, protein shakes and pet care items.

Which perhaps increases the net worth of this woman’s front porch.

But also provides another opportunity for me to remind you to support local.

This simple path offers a meaningful connection
 

We’ve been envisioning this connection since at least 2018.

UMass students on the Mount Ida Campus now, finally, have direct access to internships and jobs at Wells Ave, the city’s largest business park.

The 350-foot concrete Wells Avenue Path is a new ADA-accessible, fully lit, pedestrian link between Mount Ida and the Wells Avenue Business Park, home to CyberArk, Bright Horizons, Karyopharm, Good Shepherd Community Care and other employers.

Students can also enjoy membership benefits through a partnership between UMass and the West Suburban YMCA’s Wells Ave. branch.

Conversely, the path also offers employees and customers of Wells Avenue businesses access to dining, pickleball courts and other amenities and programs on the Mount Ida Campus.

Wellesley’s hoped-for lab entry sold at a loss

An office complex that Wellesley optimistically hoped would mark the town’s entry into the suburban lab building boom was sold at auction last week at a big loss.

Boston-based developer Beacon Capital Partners acquired the nearly 16-acre lab/office Wellesley Gateway North campus, along Route 9 just off of I-95., in the fall of 2021 and began securing permits from the town the following year.

Last week, it was acquired by Liberty Mutual, the property’s mortgage holder, for $65 million. That’s $21 million less than the value of the mortgage Beacon took three years ago, and barely half the property’s current assessed value of $121 million, reports Catherine Carlock at the Globe.

“Our investment in the property has faced significant headwinds over the last couple of years, primarily due to the pullback in life science and the high-interest rate environment,” a Beacon spokesperson told Carlock in a statement.

Three years ago (approximately when Beacon was asking Wellesley to allow biotech) lab vacancy in Greater Boston was under 2%.

In Q2 of this year, lab vacancies hit just under 26%.

93 Worcester St is about 55 percent occupied. Tenants include Aetna, the American Heart Association and Equitable Advisors.

RTO, seen as disproportionately holding back women

Five years after the pandemic, many workers have headed back to the office.

But studies show that more men are going back than women, reports Te-Ping Chen at the Wall Street Journal (gift link).

Experts say the gap often reflects women’s preferences. But often that decision comes with risks, including fewer promotion opportunities, limited access to hands-on guidance from colleagues and feedback from managers.

“It creates that barrier where they don’t know who you are and why they should try not to lay you off,” one recently laid-off working mom told Chen. “I wasn’t able to show how good I could be at my job.”

Among employed men, 29% reported spending time working from home in 2024, down from 34% the previous year. For women, that figure stayed largely flat at 36%, Chen adds.

Federal Reserve economist Natalia Emanuel, who studies remote work, says some seasoned workers benefit from working remotely, where it may be easier to focus on direct tasks.

Tuesday grab bag

• Two of our chamber communities are among the top 50 wealthiest suburbs in America, according to rankings by GoBanking Rates; Wellesley at No. 10 and Needham at No.42. The wealthiest U.S. suburb is Scarsdale, New York.
• Globe opinion writer Alan Wirzbicki has an interesting take on the Italian flag-painted median controversy in Nonantum, including some tongue-in-cheek possible resolutions.
• Virsa The Punjab, an Indian restaurant with a location in Bedford, is moving into the former La Toscana’s space at 99 Central St. in Wellesley. (Swellesley Report)
• State lawmakers are considering a statewide ban on nicotine sales to anyone born after a certain year, a policy Newton, Needham and 15 other communities across the state have already adopted. (CommonWealth Beacon)
• Fig City News’ Theo Younkin revisits the recent Newton City Council committee meeting when the chamber and business representatives weren’t allowed to talk about the state of the commercial office market.
• And Peter Harrington writes to the Newton Beacon that he doesn’t understand the relationship between housing and the demand for office space, one of the things the councilors never let us explain.
• Wellesley Town Hall head custodian Bill Newton is retiring in July after more than 27 years of service.
• Newton Community Development Foundation is accepting housing applications for the one-, two-, and three-bedroom waiting lists at the Warren House, located at 1600 Washington Street in West Newton.
• Our judges have just completed selecting this year’s Needham Business Awards Winners and it’s an outstanding group. Watch for an announcement soon. Reserve your tickets for the Aug. 6 Needham Night BBQ here.
• And you don’t have to be from Newton to nominate your favorite Newton small business or business owner.

Coffee shop hopes to avoid grease trap’s slippery slope

Wellesley’s grease trap regulations are among the most stringent in the region, often making it prohibitively expensive to convert a retail space into a restaurant.

We know of instances where Wellesley’s rules have deterred restaurants from opening in town, instead choosing communities where the regulations are more business-friendly.  (Grease trap explainer here, spoiler: It’s not pretty.)

But now Linear Retail is in talks with the town on a possible pilot/test at a small storefront it owns at 61A Central Street in the town center, which would bypass some of the costly requirements.

If approved, Blank Street Coffee will be able to open a 22-seat shop in Wellesley Square later this year, with a modest trap system, rather than installing a large, expensive external grease trap, according to the Swellesley Report.

The solution aims to be size-appropriate, considering that all Blank Street will be doing is brewing coffee and other drinks on site, while its pastries/sandwiches are prepared elsewhere.

If the pilot is successful, this test could one day help future restaurants around town.

Newton company creates clean energy career awareness

Finally, Newton-based film production company Another Age has just completed a year-long project with the Mass Clean Energy Center to raise awareness about clean energy careers across the Commonwealth.

Another Age crews traveled from solar fields to research labs, spotlighting real people working in clean energy today.

The effort created a curriculum with 21 career spotlight videos (such as this one about Passive House standards) aimed at students, educators, and job seekers across the state.

And that’s what you need to know for today, unless you need to know why Bill Gates may have invested in Republic Services. 

Be back Friday.

Greg Reibman (he, him)
President & CEO
Charles River Regional Chamber
617.244.1688

Max Woolf contributed to today’s newsletter.

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