Fairfield County Business Journal 021020

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PRINT JOURNALISM: BECAUSE IT STILL MATTERS. FEBRUARY 10, 2020 VOL. 56, No. 6

westfaironline.com

The coronavirus outbreak has sickened thousands in China.

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WELLNESS THERAPY

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EXECUTIVES OUSTED

THE WRIGHT STUFF

AtmosAir Solutions VP: Coronavirus ‘hysteria is at such a fever pitch’ BY PHIL HALL phall@westfairinc.com

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fter news reports of a new strain of coronavirus began to filter out in December from Wuhan, the capital city of China’s Hubei province, AtmosAir Solutions has been receiving higher-than-normal sales inquiries.

DANBURY MOTHER-SON DUO UP THE LUXURY-GIFTING ANTE WITH BLKBOX BY KEVIN ZIMMERMAN

The company’s Fairfield headquarters has been fielding telephone calls and emails from airport authorities and commercial property managers around the country to learn more about its air purification technology, while its office in Shanghai has been flooded with requests for immediate product deliveries. “The dealers are saying to our Shanghai division,

‘Tell the U.S. to send everything,’ ” said Tony Abate, the company’s vice president and chief technological officer. “They want to get every piece of equipment we have because the hysteria is at such a fever pitch.” AtmosAir’s bipolar ionization technology has its roots in conversations from the early 1900s between Swiss mathematician Conrad Habicht and a drinking buddy who worked in a patent office named Albert Einstein. “Einstein had a sister that succumbed to tuberculosis,” Abate noted. “There was no cure in the early 1900s, so the recommendation was to have her go » ATMOSAIR

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kzimmerman@westfairinc.com

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walk along a Martha’s Vineyard beach has doubtless resulted in any number of ideas. But while presumably few of those have had to do with starting a business, it turned out to be the ideal place to brainstorm a luxury-gifting service. The Vineyard was the site of a family vacation for Eric and Karen Wright and their son, Justin. Karen had spent much of her career in the education field, including serving as director of development at Western Connecticut State University in Danbury and

New York University. She also ran gift service Fancy Baskets for 16 years. Justin had focused on sales and business development primarily in the food and beverage sector. “I have a hanging on my refrigerator that says, ‘Build your own dream, or someone else will hire you to build theirs,’ ” Karen recalled. “What Justin and I decided was to do both, together.” The result is BlkBox, curated gift presentations designed to, in her words, tell a story, connect people and build relationships. “Anybody can go to a store, pick up a few things and put them in a gift box,” Karen, co-founder and » BLKBOX

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