Category: Q&A

Owner of Macdaddy Guitars

Christian Macdonald, owner of Macdaddy Guitars in Weare, thinks of guitars as “beautiful three-dimensional sculptures.” His guitars can be found on his MacDaddy Guitars Facebook page as well as at select local dealers.

Explain your job and what it entails.

My job now is building guitars full-time, basically working in my home shop. I build acoustic-electric hollow-body designed guitars that I’ve designed. I use all solid woods, mostly from the area, locally sourced if I can.

How long have you had this job?

Well, that’s a long story but officially I started in 2003, working part-time at my business-slash-hobby at the time, and then it wasn’t until 2019 that I decided to leave the office world behind and just jump into this full-time.

What led you to this career field and your current job?

I’ve always, since I was a young kid, dabbled with my brother’s guitar and banjo … I built my first guitar back in 1981 I think it was. A solid body, kind of like a Fender Strat kit, and I really loved it…. I wanted to get more adventurous and build a hollow-body guitar … Just sort of evolved from there and I just fell in love with the whole process, the making of them, and it kind of became an obsession.

What kind of education or training did you need?

I went to college and got a B.A. in communications and one in fine arts. I was trained as a two-dimensional artist, a painter … I had to really be self-taught, the guitar-making part of it. I never had formal training as a guitar-maker.

What is your typical at-work uniform or attire?

It depends on what time of year it is, but right now it’s a T-shirt and shorts. I like my Crocs with socks. I also wear my Macdaddy work apron to keep stuff off of my clothes and there’s a lot of things like earmuffs and dust masks and goggles on top of what I wear.

What is the most challenging thing about your work, and how do you deal with it?

I think for me the most challenging thing is to be a self-motivator and -promoter. I mean the most challenging aspect of making a product and selling it is the marketing.

What do you wish other people knew about your job?

I wish they knew how much work is actually entailed. It’s such a multi-step job … From cutting raw wood to putting all the pieces together and then doing all the finishing and the setting up.

What was your first job?

My first job was at a little Italian restaurant in Connecticut…. I was a dishwasher and a food prepper and I made $1.25 an hour.

What is the best piece of work-related advice you’ve ever received?

I was at a conference for business and a person, I don’t think this is an actual quote, but I wrote it down, [said,] ‘When you find that passion that drives you, work it for all it’s worth knowing what you don’t want to do.’

—Zachary Lewis

Five favorites
Favorite book: Night Fall by Nelson DeMille
Favorite movie: Definitely Jaws
Favorite music: Lately I really love Amos Lee.
Favorite food: All things cheesy. Cheese of any kind.
Favorite thing about NH: I guess, metaphorically speaking, I can breathe easier here in New Hampshire, it just always feels like home.

Featured photo: Christian Macdonald. Courtesy photo.

Plymouth State grad and his big idea

Kyle Dimick is an entrepreneur and Inventor as well as the founder and CEO of New Hampshire-based company Life-Able. He graduated from Plymouth State University in 2024 with a bachelor’s degree in business administration and management. Kyle discovered a gap in the market for adaptive nail care solutions following a ski injury which resulted in a traumatic brain injury requiring extensive physical therapy. The Trim-Able, which is Bluetooth-enabled, makes nail care more accessible for individuals with limited mobility. Interested investors can connect through his LinkedIn profile, where updates can be found as well.

Did you always want to be an inventor?

I’ve always been very interested in inventing…. Growing up I would always go up to my grandparents’ house up north, and my grandfather was a mechanic at the mills so he would teach me how to do wiring and how to mess around with mechanical stuff. I would go up there and help him with restoring cars and working on random projects, and that’s where I learned how to do a lot of this stuff. …When it came to actually seeing this as a viable career option, I didn’t really see that until the fingernail trimmer.

How did the Trim-Able come about?

This particular idea came from when I was ski jumping, I was on the high school ski jumping team, and the last day I was on it I went off and wrecked pretty good. That messed up my shoulder, a bunch of stuff in my arm, also got a good concussion and some other stuff out of it. Because of that I ended up going to physical therapy. While at physical therapy there were people coming in just to get their nails trimmed, and when I hurt my arm I was like, ‘OK, how would I cut my nails?’ So I just made this little thing for myself…. Then other people came in looking for help with their nails. so I just kept making more and handing them out.

How was the process of turning the Trim-Able into a product to sell?

It really stayed as the wooden version, up until I got to PSU in 2021. I was just walking around and I heard about the Makerspace … I got a hold of Bret Kulakovich, who was the director of the Makerspace…. He actually taught me how to use a lot of the machines and taught me a lot about fabrication. That’s where I got the electronic prototype from and then I entered that into Panther Pitch, which is a Shark Tank-style competition at PSU, and ended up getting first overall and a people’s choice award, which gave me a good amount of money, which I was able to put into the preliminary patent. I continued working with Bret with some of their equipment down there and building newer and newer models and then I submitted my newest model into the Paul J. Holloway Competition a couple months ago and ended up getting second overall. I was the only PSU student to ever enter the competition and was the only solo team in the top three so that gave me $10,000, which I used for a non-preliminary patent….

What are the next steps?

I have a preliminary patent or patent-pending status, I’m protected on that, but still need to wait for the paperwork to get processed for it to be official. I’ve been talking to a good amount of possible investors and I’ve been working on registering an LLC and getting trademark protections because I want to trademark the name and trademark the company name. … Then, a little further on, I’m trying to figure out manufacturing and scaling. I was able to work with a couple of people to figure out a marketing plan and some business strategies….

What’s the No. 1 thing that has surprised you about this journey?

The amount of support from the business community. So many people have reached out and offered advice without expecting anything in return. …. It’s really shown me how connected the whole business community around here is.

Are you still able to ski?

I’m fine. I ski a lot. … I still alpine ski and Nordic ski quite often…. I’ve been skiing since I was 4 so it’s just like second nature at this point.

Is there anything else you’d like to mention or say I haven’t asked you about?

If anyone is interested in the Makerspace at PSU, they have a ton of cool resources and I think it’s a great opportunity for people to be able to invent up here. …

—Zachary Lewis

Featured image: Kyle Dimick. Courtesy photo.

Owner of Granite State Stomp

Cathy Garland runs Granite State Stomp (granitestatestomp.com), where she teaches line dancing and works private events and corporate events, and even choreographs line dances for other instructors to use. One of her dances, titled Texas Hold Em’ EZ, has been nominated for the Best Beginner Dance of 2024 by the International Line Dance Association.

Explain your job and what it entails.

I teach line dancing for a living, full-time. I’m either teaching or entertaining at different clubs. I also have a lot of private events … and then I’m also doing tutorials and choreography online as well.

How long have you had this job?

Like most people because of Covid I completely pivoted from what I was doing for over 40 years. I’ve been in the fitness industry my whole life and was at the Bond Wellness Center in Peterborough and when that closed permanently I kind of looked at my husband and said, ‘I need to reinvent myself now.’ So I took a chance on this line dancing thing and went all out…. That happened in May of 2023 because the Center didn’t officially close until then.

What kind of education or training did you need?

For me, believe it or not, I went to college for computer science… When you’re in the fitness industry and you’re dealing with wellness coaching or personal training or especially when you’re dealing with a high-risk population, you really do have to have a ton of training, a ton of exercise science training and background and most of them [certifications] come through nationally recognized organizations. For line dancing … you don’t need to be certified in anything, which probably made it easier for me because I have that fitness background … I do have certifications and all that training.

What is your typical at-work uniform or attire?

My typical attire is country. I’m usually in boots. I’m usually in some kind of Western hat and I’d say most of the time like denim shorts and a T-shirt, tank top…. Always kind of making it fun for everybody.

What is the most challenging thing about your work, and how do you deal with it?

New to me is the world of social media. … if one of my videos gets outside of the group of line dancing, I think the most difficult thing is how negative people can be on social media.

What do you wish other people knew about your job?

I don’t think people realize what goes on behind the scenes and how much you really have to practice and work to be able to go out there and queue a group for two hours … I think people just think we can just show up and put the music on and go.

What was your first job?

I was a fitness instructor at a place called — I don’t even know if they called us fitness instructors back then — but it was called Gloria Stevens…. We’ve come a long way from that but I did enjoy working with those women ….

—Zachary Lewis

Five favorites
Favorite book: This is weird but my favorite book is The Long Walk by Stephen King.
Favorite movie: Dirty Dancing. I could watch it over and over again.
Favorite music: Country. I would say mostly modern country.
Favorite food: Pizza.
Favorite thing about NH: The peacefulness.

Featured photo: Cathy Garland. Courtesy photo.

New website from the NH Dept. of Revenue Administration

Ora LeMere, Assistant Commissioner of the New Hampshire Department of Revenue Administration (NHDRA), spoke about the Department’s new website, unveiled this summer, that is designed to be easier to use, will be more responsive to Granite State taxpayers, and will optimize access to its Granite Tax Connect portal, which enables taxpayers, tax professionals and other NHDRA customers to manage their accounts, according to a press release. Visit revenue.nh.gov.

Can you give a brief overview of what the NHDRA is and does?

The Department of Revenue Administration is the taxing agency for our great state of New Hampshire and we are responsible for administering the tax laws that drive the revenue…. Generally speaking, we have divisions that make up the DRA. We have the admin unit, that would be myself, the assistant commissioner, and the commissioner, Lindsey Stepp, at the head of that. We have an Audit Division, a Collections Division, Municipal Property Division and lastly a Taxpayer Services Division, each having different functions to make sure that we fairly and efficiently administer those tax laws to our constituents.

With no sales tax or income tax in the state, what taxes do people in New Hampshire need to pay?

The most focused, if you will, are business taxes, which include the Business Enterprise Tax as well as Business Profits Tax. We have the Meals and Rooms Tax, we have the property taxes and we have the Interest and Dividends Tax, which I’m sure you’ve heard is phasing out. I think those are the majority of our taxes. We do have transparency on our website that gives information into each of our individual taxes, that also includes Tobacco, Communication Services, some smaller taxes….

What do these taxes fund in New Hampshire?

The taxes generally bring in around $2.9 billion in revenue each year and that is divided up and it is appropriated to different agencies to fund many different things. Funding can include the Department of Safety. Road Toll [Bureau] has a tax that they also administer. There are a few other taxes that we don’t administer but it all, for the most part, goes into funds … so we can fund the main functions of our state…. We fund 80 percent of the General Fund.

What types of feedback led to the website updates?

We have had overwhelmingly positive feedback since we went live. The DRA put in enormous effort to get this off of the ground in-house. We did not contract with an outside vendor. We chose to use the expertise in-house to get it off the ground. We were super proud of it. There is a webmaster link at the bottom that we all monitor constantly and the feedback that we’re getting is exceptional.

Would you like to expand on the updates you all are most proud of?

We had a taxpayers’ services section added right to the home page … It explains what a tax notice is or who to contact. It links to other agencies in the state that may be helpful or a taxpayer may need to visit in doing business in this state. The taxpayer assistance site has information about what forms to use, the laws and rules, tax fraud, it’s probably one of the most utilized pages on our site. We also made sure that our smaller businesses, mostly restaurants and hotels or short-term rental types of taxpayers, had their own page as our Meals and Rooms Operators. This page has a plethora of information and has links that help an operator know what they need to do, how to get to our portal to file or to apply for a license. … we try to make it customer-centric, taxpayer centric, and give them areas in which to visit where they wouldn’t need to click all around the site to find certain information that was pertinent.

Why is it important to have a tax website focused toward the needs of taxpayers?

I mean, plainly stated, taxes can be confusing. It’s really important that not only we administer those tax laws fairly and efficiently but we do so in a friendly and supportive manner…. the support that we try to provide for our constituents is ready and available at all times.

—Zachary Lewis

Featured image: Courtesy photo.