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Among those who stake their livelihood on tourism there is a sense that Brown County is at a crossroads. That dilemma is evident
in decisions about whether to refurbish aging hotel rooms, update restaurant decor or close shop for the off-season.
Noble Roman’s Inc. has taken over the operation of six franchised restaurants in Indianapolis in a bid to prove its concept
can be executed profitably. The move–which comes amid a chorus of discontent from franchisees and as the company explores
the possibility of selling itself–could help the 1,000-restaurant chain avoid the embarrassment of store failures in its
own back yard.
The 2008 legislative session is history, and makes history with a property tax reform package that goes a long way toward Gov. Mitch Daniels’ goal of enacting one that is fair, final and farreaching. Give him the lion’s share of the credit for establishing the philosophical and practical framework. Majority House Democrats didn’t propose their own property tax plan, but they largely embraced the governor’s plan and successfully played a few new strategic riffs that Republicans found didn’t disrupt the…
For most of Indianapolis-based WellPoint Inc.’s six years as a public company, it’s been a Wall Street darling. Even with the company’s stock down by nearly half since January, it still boasts sterling long-term performance. Since their October 2001 debut, the shares have appreciated 120 percent, obliterating the 18-percent advance of the S&P 500. But that’s yesterday’s news. Management has been on the hot seat since March 10, when the company announced it was slashing its earnings forecast because medical…
The local office of Cleveland-based KeyBank has hired a banking veteran to lead a revamped mortgage department that will boast a larger sales force. And locally based mortgage firm Signature Group recently completed construction of its new headquarters and added three brokers. In this climate of ballooning foreclosures and rising interest rates, one might wonder whether executives of the aforementioned institutions are reading the wrong spreadsheets. To the contrary, despite the gloomy picture monthly housing statistics paint, they are among…
Property tax reform is now Indiana law. Hoosier homeowners are thrilled. But many corporate leaders grumble the historic deal was brokered on the backs of business. Topping their concerns is the new 3-percent property tax cap for commercial and industrial properties, which they fear will slow business expansions and discourage companies from moving headquarters to the state.
Anthem Insurance Co. added nearly 75,000 commercial customers last year, pushing its total up more than 4 percent. Anthem,
a subsidiary of Indianapolis-based WellPoint Inc., now claims a whopping 1.8 million commercial customers in the state. The
trouble is, Anthem’s dominance limits price competition, according to benefits brokers, making it hard for local HMOs such
as M-Plan or even some national players to compete.
SMALL BUSINESS PROFILE MATRIX LABEL SYSTEMS INC. Label maker manufacturing growth – again Fourth expansion project set to open this summer Within a month, Plainfield-based Matrix Label Systems Inc. will break ground on a fourth addition to its central Indiana facility, adding nearly 17,000 square feet of warehouse space and potentially more workers. That’s just the latest growth spurt at the 23-year-old company that started out of a garage and now has 50 employees and $15 million in annual revenue….
I try to avoid leading this column with commentary on productions that have come and gone. While I steadfastly believe it’s valuable to keep such productions in the mix, I appreciate that many of you aren’t as interested in what happened as you are in what’s still happening. Still, I think there’s use in talking about some weekend-onlys and onenighters. If I share, for instance, that Indianapolis Opera’s production of “Tosca” (March 14, 16) offered a compelling, entertaining, and often…
JP Morgan’s unprecedented, purchase of Bear Stearns for $236 million raises more questions than it answers. In a stunning series of events, Bear Stearns went from trading for $65 a share on Wednesday, March 12, to an announcement the following Monday that, with the assistance of the Federal Reserve, it was being sold to JP Morgan for $2 a share. The collapse of Bear Stearns began the prior week with investors who had entered into securities transactions with the firm…
Matt Ewer and his wife, Elizabeth Blessing, launched Farm Fresh Delivery LLC in July. With nearly 500 subscribers already,
the organically- and locally-grown-groceries delivery business is blooming in a segment where many large, mass-market retailers
failed during the dotcom bust.
It took decades of turning a blind eye to get here: Indianapolis has draped itself in utility poles. Walk, ride, jog or drive to any major street in Indianapolis, with the exceptions of a few designated boulevards, streets and avenues. Take a mental picture of where you are. Now, with Photoshop in your mind, remove the web of utility poles and wires from that picture and quickly open your eyes. We’re visually strangled by them. Few streets are exempt from…
When American Express and Diner’s Club introduced the first credit cards in the 1950s, few people could have anticipated their presentday popularity. And even fewer could have anticipated the creative ways identity thieves would find to conduct credit card scams. They install cameras in and around ATM machines, engage in sophisticated online phishing schemes, and hack into large databases to obtain Social Security numbers, credit card numbers and drivers licenses. Through the Internet, thieves buy and sell those numbers as…
ITT Educational Services Inc. and other for-profit schools are facing a maelstrom of financial threats that analysts say could
hurt student recruiting and profit margins–and already has driven stock prices down sharply. ITT shares are off 61 percent
since hitting an all-time high of $131.82 in November.
“At $2.94 per share, the price of Finish Line stock has almost fully discounted the downside risk.” Whew! The above quote in my column of Dec. 3, 2007, had me choking on my own ink. I was addressing Finish Line’s ill-fated quest to purchase the outstanding stock of much larger Genesco Inc. for $54.50 a share. The thought of trying to digest the $1.5 billion purchase price is reminiscent of Charlie Chaplin’s lunching on his own boots. I predicted that…
The local president of Milwaukee-based M&I Bank, Reagan Rick, got the shocking news while waiting for a plane at Boston Logan International Airport. It came in a text message from Robert Warrington, the former CEO of First Indiana Bank, the Indianapolis bank M&I acquired last year for $529 million. Warrington told him 85-year-old New York-based investment bank Bear Stearns Cos. had been sold to JP Morgan Chase Co.-with backing from the Federal Reserve-for a mere $2 per share. “The degree…
Many consumer bankruptcies typically can be traced to a divorce, job loss or medical issue. Now another perpetrator-subprime mortgages-is entering the fray. The fallout from the housing crisis, coupled with a weakening economy, is contributing to a rise in bankruptcy filings nationwide. They spiked more than 30 percent in January compared with the same time last year, according to the Virginia-based American Bankruptcy Institute. With more than 1 million subprime mortgages due to reset this year, ABI Executive Director Samuel…
And in less than five months-if, as we used to say in Center Grove, the Good Lord’s willing and the cricks don’t rise-it no longer will be just that mammoth structure rising between West and Missouri streets. It will be ours, and in that personal pronoun, I mean, sincerely, that Lucas Oil Stadium will belong to all of us, not just residents of Indianapolis and the contiguous counties who have pitched in on the funding, but to all Hoosiers who…
It took a year and a half. But Indianapolis-based Taliera Holdings LLC finally acquired its first beverage brand. Taliera, led by Indianapolis entrepreneur J. Smoke Wallin, acquired Texasbased Red Eye Brands this month. The company makes Red Eye Bloody Mary mix, as well as salsas and sauces. Terms of the deal were not disclosed. But Wallin said Red Eye holds less than 5 percent of the Bloody Mary mix market. He hopes to take the company to 10 percent three…
Standard & Poor’s plans to rate the corporate credit and debt of Hillenbrand Industries Inc. at a BBB- rating instead of its current A- after the Batesville company spins off its Batesville Casket Co. business on March 24. Hillenbrand, which focuses on hospital beds and other health care equipment, is receiving the downgrade because the […]
