I am going to chat with Angelo Pizzo, author of the best sports film of all time. Pizzo is the writer and coproducer of feature films “Hoosiers” and “Rudy.” He and I will debut “Mickey’s Corner,” a project patterned after TV’s Bravo Network program “Inside the Actor’s Studio.” The conversation will happen Jan. 16 at 7 p.m. at the Jewish Community Center, 6701 Hoover Road. Why don’t you drop in? Pizzo grew up in Bloomington and stayed home for his…
As legislators prepare to overhaul the state’s property-tax system, Marion County’s future hangs in the balance. Indianapolis
residents–particularly in the city’s older, urban core–already pay far higher taxes than their suburban counterparts. And
arguably get less bang for their buck. Changes on the table could make Marion County an even tougher sell.
Stitches & Scones Entrepreneur sews together her enterprises Yarn-store owner finds ways to keep doing what she loves Mollianne Cameron took a page from the book of successful businesses with her current business, Stitches & Scones, and two planned ones: Crafty Capers and The Amish & Antique Quilt Store. Each retail venture marries business to Cameron’s passion for knitting, crocheting and hand stitchery. The lesson: Do what you love and the money will follow. Growing her own customers was another…
With steep declines in new-home construction and existing home sales, market conditions in the Indianapolis-based North American
residential business of Carrier Corp. “are clearly challenging,” according to George David, CEO of Carrier’s parent, United
Technologies.
In the last year, Hetrick Communications has hired 10 employees, added a major new client, and changed its focus. What was once primarily a public relations firm is now also an advertising agency targeting health care and life sciences. On the heels of the changes, Hetrick actually wants fewer clients. “We want fewer, bigger clients,” said Amy Ahlersmeyer, the firm’s president and chief operating officer. “We want our growth to come absolutely in the health care and life sciences sector.”…
I’ll admit it: Until recently, I thought “My Space” was simply where I stored “my stuff.” My bad, it turns out. Just ask that young staffer down the hall: The new place to see and be seen is MySpace, Facebook or one of the other online social communities. This summer, MySpace announced it had more than 70 million unique users in the United States-meaning nearly one in four Americans used the site, for a total of nearly 50 billion page…
A sign on the basement wall reads “Construction Zone.” Nearby on the router table, window frames are taking shape along with decorative pieces that will adorn the façade of a World War IIera brownstone. Behind a red plywood wall a few floors up, hammers knock and saws shrill as workers erect a 13,500-square-foot homage to three children who changed the world. It’s just another day at the office for the production crew at The Children’s Museum of Indianapolis. For months,…
The son and grandson of hotel managers, Maarten van Wijk became general manager of the historic-but-ailing 2,000-member Columbia
Club in May. His first priority is to polish the venerable private club’s tarnished quality standards to a lustrous sheen.
Here’s one way to send your company’s revenue through the roof: Push your product into 70 countries around the world. That’s easier said than done, of course. But it’s exactly the path Polymer Technology Systems Inc. took to help quadruple sales of its cholesterol-checking device in the last three years. How Indianapolis-based PTS pulled off the feat shows how even small companies in Middle America can become global enterprises in today’s economy. In fact, the possibility of worldwide expansion is…
Driving around the Holy Cross area just east of Lockerbie, the CEO of Wright Development LLC points out several properties her company has bought and refurbished-starting with 1209 and 1210 E. Vermont St.-as well as the many rehabs in the works. “Our goal is to re-create neighborhoods and make them viable, thriving, desirable places to live,” she said. “That’s usually left to the city, the not-for-profits and the [community development corporations]. We feel like there’s been a component missing.” The…
Every few years about this time, I offer free job-seeking advice for collegians. Judging from the resumes deluging my company, it’s time to hum this tune again. The first line of the first song in the musical comedy “How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying” is “How to apply for a job.” That’s also the name of a course I’ve long proposed to colleges and universities. While more colleges are doing that, there’s a frequent flaw: waiting until the…
Starting salaries for young lawyers at the city’s largest law firms could be on the cusp of hitting six figures. First-year associates at several top-tier Indianapolis practices currently earn $90,000 a year. But a wage war playing out among firms on both coasts, and in Chicago, might prompt those here to raise the ante as well. “It’s just a matter of who blinks first,” said Mike McConnell, a former legal consultant who chairs the state’s Education Employment Relations Board. “It…
The state’s best-known car wash company has found a new formula for success it hopes will rival its popular multiwash books: monthly passes that practically guarantee a permanent shine. Indianapolis-based Mike’s Express Carwash already has enrolled more than 3,000 customers in a monthly membership program, launched in September, that allows unlimited washes in exchange for a monthly fee. Express wash passes are $39.99 per month, and “Works” passes are $69.99. “It’s truly for the person who always wants a clean…
Indiana University leaders believe their researchers can spawn 100 new companies, pump $2.4 billion into the state's economy, help create 14,000 jobs, and generate a $2.25 return for every dollar spends if the General Assembly will invest in their bold life sciences strategy.
The lesson Amy Kurzekwa taught the folks at the downtown Gregory & Appel Insurance agency reaches far beyond what they learned about premiums and deductibles. Since 1992, she has taken the bus to her job there as a clerical assistant, performing such tasks as sorting and delivering the office mail and filling the copy machines. While most anyone can do that, Kurzekwa, 37, is irreplaceable to her co-workers. Her role in opening their eyes to the fact that people with…
A physician-billing service recently gave WellPoint Inc. a virtual spanking over its sometimesstrained relationship with doctors. M a s s a c h u s e t t s – b a s e d Athenahealth Inc. rated the Indianapolis insurer last out of seven national payers in its so-called “pain in the butt” index posted online late last month. The unusual index aims to tell doctors how easy-or difficult-it is to work with each insurer by using data the…
No habla inglesImmigrants who want to advance find many programs to help them learn English Osvaldo Escobedo was hungry to learn English. It was bad enough when he couldn’t advance at the Nissan Motor Co. plant in Aguascalientes, in central Mexico, because he couldn’t converse in the business language of English. Later, when he came to the United States, he couldn’t eat much more than what he could pronounce. “When I go to restaurant, I ask [for] ‘coffee and doughnuts….
If David B. Girton isn’t already regarded as an innovator in the local investment brokerage community, he should be now. The 45-year-old Indianapolis native is in the process of launching Liger Securities Corp., the only locally owned black investment firm in the city. But 10 years ago, he accomplished a similar first, when he opened the local office of Cleveland-based SBK-Brooks Investment Corp., then the only black-operated brokerage here. Make no mistake, though, Girton’s credentials far outweigh his designation as…
CoLucid Pharmaceuticals Inc., a drug development company Eli Lilly and Co. spun out last year, has attracted Jim White as its first CEO. White was a longtime Lilly executive before spending the past five years in Boston helping grow Hypnion Inc., another pharmaceutical startup that so far has attracted $80 million from venture capitalists. “We have a lot of great talent in the state that leaves because we haven’t had the kind of jobs to retain those folks,” White said….
When a truck carrying a load of frozen chicken crashed on Interstate 74 near Batesville last month-mixing the meat with less-than-appetizing ingredients like diesel fuel and coolant-Duke’s Earth Services was high on the invite list for the impromptu barbecue. The Mooresville-based environmental services company specializes in such unpleasant jobs: cleaning hazardous materials spills, removing underground storage tanks, and checking construction sites for contaminated soil. And business is good. Duke’s posted revenue of $3.5 million in 2005, and leaders expect to…
