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Last Friday night, my friend Cheri and I decided to go out to dinner and a movie. The film we chose wasn’t playing near our downtown home. So we had to get in the car and drive 14 miles northwest to Traders Point. As we sat outside at Abuelo’s eating and talking, we watched hundreds of cars, trucks and SUVs pass by on 86th Street. This led to a conversation about the environment and the need for mass transit in…
SMALL BUSINESS PROFILE A-1 VACUUM CLEANERS AND JANITORIAL SUPPLIES Vacuum dealer on his own Franchise dissolution gave owner freedom and more responsibility For his entire adult life, Tony Stahl has been helping other people clean up their messes. From the time he graduated from John Marshall High School, Stahl has had A-1 Vacuum Cleaners as part of his work life, first as an employee and, most recently, as an owner. In fact, Stahl’s work with vacuums and customers was so…
According to the mainstream media, no sooner is your precious data placed on a hard drive than it’s promptly vacuumed off through a hacker’s hole and inserted into some miscreant’s illicit schemes for world domination. I admit I’ve advocated for computer security for years, but that was because most companies’ idea of security is to hide the backup CDs in the coffee creamer box. I never meant to contribute to the panic that seems to have gripped the American population…
What a mess. A new regulatory filing shows that Marsh Supermarkets Inc.’s efforts to sell itself unfolded in the most awkward of fashions-with rejected suitors invited back into the fray, and with potential buyers throwing out wildly different per-share values for the company, from $7.50 to $20. At one point early this year, a special board committee of independent directors sent Dallas-based Cardinal Paragon Inc. packing, calling its “preliminary indication of interest” of $11 a share to $13 a share…
Forget-Me-Not in Greenwood will soon be forgotten. The store, which sold scrapbook albums and supplies, closed last month. It was the latest of at least seven scrapbook stores to close in the past few months in central Indiana. Business analysts are calling the rash of out-of-business signs a cautionary tale for proprietors who invest in “silo businesses” that base their bottom line on a trend or product that may soon be out of style. “A lot of the mom-and-pop [scrapbook]…
We’re a start-Q: up and constantly need answers to basic legal questions about business structures, the hiring process, contracts, wages, safety, trademarks and more, but can’t afford expensive lawyers. What are some options? Legal issues often present a dilem-A:ma for cost-conscious small businesses, especially startups. You want the best information but paying legal professionals for every little thing gets expensive. The range of legal issues facing entrepreneurs is immense, from naming a business and obtaining licenses to complying with tax…
And more are coming. Indianapolis is leading the charge toward high-definition radio, thanks to the strong presence of national players such as Emmis Communications Corp. and Clear Channel Communications, which operate a total of seven stations here. But the technological revolution reaches far beyond our airwaves. Industry experts call HD the most radical change in the radio landscape in 50 years, despite the fact that few listeners have the special radio receiver necessary to tune in the new channels. “We’re…
It’s been a bumpy ride for Michael Crawford this year. Scratch that-it’s been like driving into a concrete wall at 190 miles per hour. Repeatedly. The rookie race team owner put his financial livelihood on the line this year to buy two cars and run them in the Indy Pro Series, the open-wheel racing equivalent of AAA baseball, one step below the major leagues. IBJ is following Crawford’s progress in hopes of shedding light on the challenges startups face when…
Every business, large or small, should establish a relationship with an attorney. I always recommend that such a “partnership” be put in place before legal services are needed. Why do you really need an attorney? In a perfect world, you wouldn’t. Entrepreneurs can go to the Indiana Secretary of State’s Web site and find all of the forms necessary to form a business structure. They can review the laws that pertain to their businesses by surfing the Internet. They can…
Forrest Gump owned a shrimp boat. Tim and Julie Connor have a shrimp farm instead. The couple, who live on 22 acres near Monrovia, are in their third season raising prawn, or large shrimp, from a pond on their property. The $4,000 they earned last year from selling 350 pounds of the crustaceans to the public is hardly enough to cause Tim, 47, to retire from the job he’s held at Allison Transmission for 28 years. But if the sideline…
As an economic forecaster, I am almost always optimistic. But that’s not a personality trait. It’s the nature of the business. The economy around us is doing amazingly well. We’ve had much longer economic expansions, steady job and income growth, and less frequent recessions for more than two decades now. So when you deliver an optimistic forecast these days, you stand a pretty good chance of being right. But if there’s one area where my optimism vanishes, it is this-how…
Two bridges at opposite ends of the state are of concern to neighboring citizens and all Hoosiers. Both are historic steel-truss bridges. One spans the Wabash River connecting New Harmony (Posey County) with White County, Ill. The second spans the Gibson rail yard in Hammond (Lake County) and carries the traffic of busy Indianapolis Boulevard. Both bridges are in poor condition. The Indiana Department of Transportation has recommendations for both bridges. Local officials are opposed to the INDOT plans. Whose…
In early May, I wrote this about home-builder stocks: “They failed to break out of their August highs, however, and they have been struggling ever since. This is a textbook example of when the best risk/reward ratio presents itself for shorting.” Using the home-builder exchange-traded fund XHB and selling it short yielded a one-month gain of 18.3 percent. Not bad! If home-building stocks are crushed, what does that say about the real estate market in general? Here are a few…
Economic development leaders and corporate executives thought Roger Brummett was spinning his wheels when he launched a classic car show in Indianapolis four years ago. But Brummett and partner Tim Durham find themselves at the wheel of such a fastgrowing enterprise that they hope to expand it into a multiday event, with an auction and classic-car race, that they believe would draw 100,000 attendees. The pair also plans to replicate the show in other markets, starting in Naples, Fla., in…
City Market officials are trying to pull together an ambitious plan to transform the century-old downtown lunch spot into a virtual paradise for foodies, complete with an Ivy Tech culinary school campus. But they still have a couple of big hurdles to clear before giving the green light to the nearly $20 million project. Plans include razing the east wing and replacing it with a five-story, $18 million building that could house Ivy Tech State College’s culinary programs. A separate…
Now, he’s an owner himself. This month, he teamed with two prominent executives to buy Dalevillebased Sherry Laboratories, a 180-employee company that does product testing for firms in such fields as aerospace and automotive. “I’ve been interested in Sherry for about 10 years,” LaMothe said. “I had approached them two or three different times … . I was intrigued with the company because I believed it was needed and necessary and adds value to society.” LaMothe will serve as chairman…
You don’t always see it or hear it, but it’s there. The quiet panic that sets in after a theater company or a newspaper or any organization realizes it must begin appealing to a new breed of consumer if it wants to survive. Young consumers of news want it in bite-size portions delivered to their desktops. Young church-goers want dynamic worship services and activities to match, not tradition-bound church groups that require elections, officers, meetings and minutes. And young patrons…
Ruth Purcell Jones knows the statistics well. Nearly 1.8 million board seats at not-forprofit organizations turn over every year, presenting a challenge for charities already trying to fill the 1.2 million positions open at any given time. And anecdotal evidence backs up the national research. “If there’s one thing I hear over and over, it’s, ‘We can’t find board members,'” said Jones, president of Indianapolis-based governance consultant Trustee Leadership Development. “It’s really a ‘Who do you know?’ kind of thing….
Being self-employed -a term I prefer to “being a guy who sits around the house in sloppy clothes, unshaven, making fun of things”-I worry that I might have trouble adjusting, were I to go back to an office job. Would I fit in? Would I be able to get along with people? And most important, would I be able to come up with convincing excuses when I am scamming a day off by calling in sick on a lovely day…
When Walker Information Inc.’s lease was up on its Keystone-area offices, it looked citywide for new space. In February, the company signed a lease for space in a building along the North Meridian Street corridor because it got a good deal from Lauth Property Group Inc., according to Walker’s broker, Samuel F. Smith, of Resource Commercial Real Estate. Several area developers are betting that others will follow Indianapolis-based Walker’s lead, lured by the prestige of a North Meridian Street address….
