January 22, 2013

  • Newsmaker: 616 Development makes lasting mark on downtown

    Editor’s note: The Business Journal is recognizing 10 nominees for its 2012 Newsmaker of the Year Award, based on their long-term economic impact on the region. One nominee will be featured each day on grbj.com — leading up to the Jan. 21 announcement of the 2012 Grand Rapids Business Journal Newsmaker of the Year. In […]

  • Newsmaker: Downtown Market initiates ripple effect

    Editor’s note: The Business Journal is recognizing 10 nominees for its 2012 Newsmaker of the Year Award, based on their long-term economic impact on the region. One nominee will be featured each day on grbj.com — leading up to the Jan. 21 announcement of the 2012 Grand Rapids Business Journal Newsmaker of the Year. Though […]

  • Newsmaker: Start Garden feeds startup culture

    Editor’s note: The Business Journal is recognizing 10 nominees for its 2012 Newsmaker of the Year Award, based on their long-term economic impact on the region. One nominee will be featured each day on grbj.com — leading up to the Jan. 21 announcement of the 2012 Grand Rapids Business Journal Newsmaker of the Year. It’s […]

  • Newsmaker: LINC connects neighborhoods to change

    Editor’s note: The Business Journal is recognizing 10 nominees for its 2012 Newsmaker of the Year Award, based on their long-term economic impact on the region. One nominee will be featured each day on grbj.com — leading up to the Jan. 21 announcement of the 2012 Grand Rapids Business Journal Newsmaker of the Year. LINC […]

  • Newsmaker: ArtPrize paints picture of spending downtown

    Editor’s note: The Business Journal is recognizing 10 nominees for its 2012 Newsmaker of the Year Award, based on their long-term economic impact on the region. One nominee will be featured each day on grbj.com — leading up to the Jan. 21 announcement of the 2012 Grand Rapids Business Journal Newsmaker of the Year. ArtPrize’s […]

  • Newsmaker: West Michigan Sports Commission scores $26M for region

    Editor’s note: The Business Journal is recognizing 10 nominees for its 2012 Newsmaker of the Year Award, based on their long-term economic impact on the region. One nominee will be featured each day on grbj.com — leading up to the Jan. 21 announcement of the 2012 Grand Rapids Business Journal Newsmaker of the Year. With […]

  • Newsmaker: Beer City, U.S.A. spills over

    Editor’s note: The Business Journal is recognizing 10 nominees for its 2012 Newsmaker of the Year Award, based on their long-term economic impact on the region. One nominee will be featured each day on grbj.com — leading up to the Jan. 21 announcement of the 2012 Grand Rapids Business Journal Newsmaker of the Year. Although […]

  • Newsmaker: Kent County Land Bank Authority sells foreclosed properties

    Editor’s note: The Business Journal is recognizing 10 nominees for its 2012 Newsmaker of the Year Award, based on their long-term economic impact on the region. One nominee will be featured each day on grbj.com — leading up to the Jan. 21 announcement of the 2012 Grand Rapids Business Journal Newsmaker of the Year. To […]

  • Newsmaker: Auto suppliers drive manufacturing reversal

    Editor’s note: The Business Journal is recognizing 10 nominees for its 2012 Newsmaker of the Year Award, based on their long-term economic impact on the region. One nominee will be featured each day on grbj.com — leading up to the Jan. 21 announcement of the 2012 Grand Rapids Business Journal Newsmaker of the Year. The […]

  • Newsmaker: Argonne lab taps Johnson Controls for battery development

     Editor’s note: The Business Journal is recognizing 10 nominees for its 2012 Newsmaker of the Year Award, based on their long-term economic impact on the region. One nominee will be featured each day on grbj.com — leading up to the Jan. 21 announcement of the 2012 Grand Rapids Business Journal Newsmaker of the Year.  West […]

  • Change Ups: Harney tapped for political leadership program

    Patricia Harney, Hospice of Michigan’s legislative affairs manager, has been selected for the Michigan Political Leadership program. Sponsored by Michigan State University and administered by its Institute for Public Policy and Social Research, the 10-month weekend program recruits, trains and inspires future public policy leaders. Harney will be one of 24 individuals from around the […]

  • Public Record

    Selected mortgages filed with Kent County Register of Deeds VAUGHN, Gregory R. et al, First Place Bank, Whistle Ridge No. 3, Lot 111, $256,000 PORTER, Cari L. et al, JP Morgan Chase Bank, Condo-West Village Site, $360,000 COLLINS, Peter A. et al, Founders Bank & Trust, Ada Twp., 25-7-10, $257,600 NIEDERER ENTERPRISES LLC, Huntington National […]

  • Are you making sales — or measuring sales activity?

    The amount of time that management spends measuring sales activity and salespeople (or, even dumber, the ROI of some investment they made in CRM) is generally wasted effort. The same amount of time could be invested in making millions of dollars worth of sales if the salesperson was just pointed in the right direction and […]

  • Street Talk: Is Michigan a hotbed for medical devices?

    For years now, part of the mantra associated with the medical industry in the Grand Rapids region has been the goal of turning West Michigan into an important region in the U.S. for medical device manufacturing. Medical devices are seen as a hopeful diversification of the Wolverine State’s manufacturing sector. So, have we achieved that […]

  • Local group beats lame duck deadline

    During the waning moments of the state Legislature’s lame duck session, House Speaker Jase Bolger told a contingent of local government officials and business representatives they had an hour to find 56 votes to ratify a version of the Personal Property Tax phaseout legislation that contained an acceptable revenue reimbursement plan. If they had failed, […]

  • County to review its economic development policy

    Kent County commissioners will decide Thursday whether to allow the recently created North Quarter Corridor Improvement Authority to capture a portion of the county’s property-tax revenue. “I know everybody’s budget is strained. The capture could be zero. If the property tax is going to go up, it will go up slowly,” said Thomas Cronkright, chairman […]

  • Council settling budget disagreements with MDOT

    Members of the Grand Valley Metro Council agreed recently to pay an invoice from the Michigan Department of Transportation in an attempt to put a three-year-old accounting dispute behind them. The $365,000 payment arose from a charge made by MDOT’s auditing commission in 2010. The Office of Transportation Commission Audit reviewed the council’s budgets from […]

  • Privacy policies now standard in app development

    With app downloads now reaching well into the billions — Apple and Google now average 1 billion downloads per month — concern over privacy rights has prompted a move toward the inclusion of privacy policies in app development. In 2011, California Attorney General Kamala Harris brokered an agreement with Apple, Google, Microsoft, Amazon, Hewlett-Packard, Research […]

  • Concentrate on per-capita income, not business climate

    As we have written frequently, being highly ranked in business climate rankings seems increasingly to be the goal/measuring stick of economic policy makers and too many pundits. Wouldn’t you rather have a good economy? The problem is that Michiganders can’t pay their bills or save for their kids’ education or their retirement with business climate […]

  • Does your company have what it takes to be a Best and Brightest?

    The National Association for Business Resources is accepting nominations for its Best & Brightest Companies to Work For program through Feb. 1. Think your company has what it takes to earn a spot on that list? Businesses might be interested in the asociation’s recent study on the shared components Best and Brightest companies have in […]

  • Selling your business ‘someday’? Five things to consider now

    There are a myriad of external factors that can influence the best time to sell your business:  taxes, interest rates and market demand, to name a few. While you can't control these issues, you can insure your business is ready when the right timing hits. 1. First and most important — start putting your house […]

  • Inside Track: For this ‘ordinary’ runner, the adventure continues

    Don Kern has run marathons on all seven continents — not just once but four times each, and he is on his way to making that five. As if that is not impressive enough, in 2011, Kern achieved the Guinness World Record for completing a marathon on each continent in the shortest time: 25 days, […]

  • Grooters gets back into the game

    After achieving iconic status in the industrial real estate market by building roughly 20 million square feet of manufacturing and warehouse space in the metro area, Robert Grooters is at it again. His highly regarded firm, Robert Grooters Development Co., has plans to build another 1.7 million square feet of industrial space this year, with […]

  • Understanding the role of cultural resources in development projects

    As Michigan moves to expand its commercial and industrial base, in particular in the natural resources and energy sectors, companies are moving to more remote and previously undeveloped areas. In the process, they are often running into a new, and sometimes unfamiliar, set of concerns — cultural resources. Generally speaking, cultural resources refer to anything […]

  • Rootscore report reveals top phone service companies

    Verizon is the best overall mobile carrier in the Grand Rapids region, according to an independent mobile measurement company. After conducting 15,038 data, call and text tests throughout West Michigan from Nov. 7-11, the Rootscore report identified Verizon as having the best overall score in terms of quality service. Rootscore judged local mobile carriers based […]

  • A design room with a Vue

    A creative downtown business is creatively restructuring. The business is also in the process of moving due to the almost instant success since it opened a little more than a year ago. Shannon Gales is planning to transfer her firm, Vue Design, from MoDiv, a new business incubator at 40 Monroe Center, to a larger […]

  • Iserv continuing a newly established tradition

    The Iserv Co. is getting ready to serve the city yet another time, and, like before, in both a real and virtual manner. Iserv, a leading independent Midwest Internet service provider, is finalizing its plans to offer free wireless service to those who visit Rosa Parks Circle through contracts the company is entering into with […]

  • Collectively, Newsmakers’ impact is impressive

    (As seen on WZZM TV 13) The annual compilation of the top economic stories of the previous year has provided the region with a concise picture of activity impacting the local economy with the greatest effect. The 10 Newsmakers acted throughout the year to bring announcements making individual headline news, but it is in bringing […]

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