MacAllister awarded for service to community
P.E. MacAllister has helped turn Indianapolis into a culturally vibrant city.
Sam Stall
Articles
New rail route connects Hendricks to West Coast: Line should bolster county’s distribution industry
A new rail route launched last month between Los Angeles and CSX’s Avon rail yard could give a further boost to Hendricks County’s booming warehousing-and-distribution industry. The county already hosts some 29 million square feet of warehouse space. However, it lacked a direct connection to the teeming Port of Long Beach in Los Angeles, a major gateway for U.S./ Asian trade. Anyone in the Hendricks County area wishing to send or receive goods from that port by rail had to…
Former rocker rolling along in pizza business: Puccini’s founder has 13 locations and counting
For much of his adult life, Don Main was a rocker rather than a restaurateur. But fate-along with a pressing need to find a more profitable line of work-drove him to seek his fortune in a kitchen rather than onstage. Main, president and co-owner of Puccini’s Smiling Teeth, began his peculiar career change back in 1990, after a decadeand-a-half stint as a professional-but not very well-paid-musician. At age 36, the bassist and lead vocalist for the band The Late Show…
Real estate agents struggling from trickling home sales
The downturn in the housing market isn’t tough just on people trying to sell their homes. It’s also tough on the people
who want to help those people sell their homes–real estate agents. Locally, their ranks have thinned as
more and more leave the field to search for better prospects.
Purdue professor cooks up healthier way to ‘fry’ food: Invention could make microwaves seem like crock pots
A new cooking technology under development at Purdue University could please both dieters looking for lowercalorie meals and food retailers seeking lower costs. It has the potential to produce “fried” foods using vastly less oil, and to cook them at speeds that make microwave ovens seem as slow as crock pots. A Purdue professor is working with Anderson Tool and Engineering Co. in Madison County to create advanced prototypes of the device, called a “radiant fryer.” The first off the…
Creativity pays off for firms: Business owners delay projects, seek alternate funding sources
Large Wall Street firms with a taste for bad debt aren’t the only institutions weathering a financial storm these days. In a classic case of trickle-down bad news, small businesses are suffering as well. But instead of facing a maelstrom, firms seeking expansion funds and entrepreneurs looking for startup cash are enduring a drought. Access to capital has dried up as spooked banks relentlessly tighten their loan requirements. That translates into greater scrutiny of business plans, bigger demands for collateral…
Retailers save on energy costs through innovative lighting, heating and cooling
With energy costs at historic highs, retailers are struggling to find ways to trim the cost of lighting, heating and cooling
their stores and other facilities. The process of wringing out savings can be long, difficult and complex. However, the rewards
are too substantial to ignore.
Hands-on strategy turns Mike’s Carwash into industry model
Mike’s Express Carwash makes money the old-fashioned way. The second-generation family affair, now celebrating its 60th
year, has invested its reserves in steady expansion, becoming a model for the $23.4 billion industry in
the process. And its owners still sweat the small stuff.
Arts fund-raising model not embraced locally
These days, many Indianapolis arts organizations barely know where their next dollar will come from. But an innovative
fund-raising model that’s found success in other cities might provide that sorely needed cash. In Cincinnati,
a venerable not-for-profit called the United Arts Fund, founded in 1927, stages an annual workplace campaign,
then doles out the bountiful proceeds to local arts organizations.
NCAA mum on date to reopen fire-damaged Hall of Champions
Almost a full year after a fire in a single exhibit closed the NCAA Hall of Champions, the wait for the college sports
museum’s reopening is becoming as prolonged and agonizing as sitting through a college football game during
a freezing November rain. The NCAA is apparently in no hurry to relieve the suspense.
Hungry for growth, bagel maker tiptoes into healthy food segment
Since its founding 17 years ago, Indianapolis-based Harlan Bakeries LLC has built its reputation, and its fortune, on making
bagels. Untold millions of bagels. Considering the number of conventional treats Harlan turns out, it might be easy to overlook
its newest project: producing a non-medical “diet cookie” for Boca Raton, Fla.-based Smart For Life Weight Management Centers.
St. Francis thinking green in $42 million renovation: Mooresville hospital features ‘healing’ rooftop gardens
Guests attending the April 19 open house at the newly remodeled St. Francis Hospital-Mooresville will get a sneak peak at the facility’s $42 million makeover. The project increases the size of the campus from 258,000 square feet to almost 400,000 and adds everything from a new, eight-bed intensive care unit to two additional adult inpatient nursing units. But perhaps the most innovative touch-at least from an aesthetic point of view-can be found on the roof. Like a handful of other…
Against odds, AlGalCo pursues ‘Holy Grail’ of power cells
A small West Lafayette technology startup has quietly unveiled a product that might, just might, change the world. At the
TechAdvantage Conference and Expo in Anaheim, Calif., on Feb. 20, Kurt Koehler, CEO, co-founder (and, for the moment, sole
employee) of AlGalCo LLC, showed off a pre-production hydrogen-powered emergency generator.
To weather downturn, housing industry rolls out incentives
For most of this decade, the Indianapolis residential real estate market enjoyed a very good run. But now it’s muddling through
the doldrums just like the rest of the country, and builders are pulling out all the stops to avoid getting stuck with inventory.
Heart or head?: Intellect, emotions play role in most biz-location decisions
Ithe process of f n theory, retail, office or industrial location as should putting be as rational and unemotional reality, emotions together a spreadsheet. But in as hard data. can carry just as much weight “People use very sophisticated uildings processes , but in and evaluations to compare b ,” s as much of an art as a science the end, it’ . Smith, CEO eteran Samuel F said industry v Commercial of Indianapolis-based Resource aspect of it Real Estate…
Counselor ventures out beyond her day job: Business helps student clients find their career path
One could say Barb Skinner works day and night helping confused teen-agers find the right career paths. During business hours, she’s a guidance counselor at Mount Vernon High School in Fortville. But evenings and weekends, she manages her own private career and college guidance firm, Career Planning Resources. CPR, which uses both personality profiling and one-on-one interviews to help high-schoolers pick career paths that mesh with their interests and strengths, came about mostly through Skinner’s own inability to blaze such…
Fringe Festival seeking next level in 3rd year: Growing downtown theater festival hopes to draw cash as well as bigger crowds
Pauline Moffat, executive director of the Indianapolis Theatre Fringe Festival, expects a big turnout for this year’s two-week salute to alternative stage productions. The event takes over the Massachusetts Avenue Arts District Aug. 24 to Sept. 2, offering 228 individual performances staged by 40 theatrical troupes and presented at five different venues, including Theatre on the Square, The Phoenix Theatre and American Cabaret Theatre. Moffat hopes this season will bring a third year of attendance growth and take the event…