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The United Auto Workers has launched a national strike against General Motors Corp., GM spokesman Dan Flores said today. It’s the first nationwide strike during auto contract negotiations since 1976, when Ford Motor Co. plants were shut down. Workers walked off the job and began picketing today outside GM plants after the 11 a.m. UAW […]
Officials for Speedway-based Zipp Speed Weaponry announced Sept. 21 that they have signed a letter of intent to be acquired by Chicago-based SRAM Corp.Both companies design and manufacture high-end bicycle components. Financial terms of the deal, which is expected to close within 60 days, were not disclosed. Zipp will maintain its headquarters on Main Street […]
Genesco Inc. is breaching terms of the deal to sell to locally based Finish Line Inc because Genesco is withholding certain financial information from Finish Line and won’t grant it access to Genesco’s chief financial officer and other financial staff, Finish Line said this morning. The statement was Finish Line’s first official response to last […]
Indianapolis-based Eli Lilly and Co. is suing Sun Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd. of India to stop Sun from selling a generic version of its hyper-disorder drug Strattera. Lilly, which filed the suit in Detroit on Sept. 20, said it would be “irreparably harmed” if the generic wasn’t stopped, according to Bloomberg. Sun’s application to the U.S. […]
Wolf Envelope Co. will invest at least $1.8 million and hire 26 additional workers over four years at its envelope printing operation in Angola, Indiana Economic Development Corp. said today. Wolf, based in Troy, Mich., will add high-speed color jet printers at the northeast-Indiana site. The plant employs 82 who print 1 billion envelopes a […]
When Dane Hudson sold his health benefits consultancy on Aug. 1, he hoped it was only his first of many mergers. Hudson, the founder of Strategic Health Plans Corp. in Carmel, sold his company to Illinois-based Arthur J. Gallagher & Co. for an undisclosed amount. Gallagher, a quiet company that is one of the nation’s largest health benefits firms, wants Hudson to buy up another three or four health benefits brokers in the next five years. Hudson also said he’ll…
Parents sifting through the dizzying array of college-savings plans must feel as though they’re playing their children’s Pin the Tail on the Donkey game: Make a blind stab and hope for the best. But a state tax credit that took effect at the start of the year seemingly is providing enough incentive to steer Hoosiers toward Indiana’s 529 offering despite the hefty fees that accompany it. The bill that created the 20-percent tax credit-equaling $1,000 on contributions up to $5,000-vaults…
LESSONS LEARNED JENNIFER Q SMITH Queen of Fuzz, AvantGarb Have It’s hard to take Jennifer Q Smith too seriously. Oh, she’s the consummate professional, to be sure-responding to an e-mail inquiry about her company with the speed and savvy you’d expect from someone who has run her own business for 20 years. Her marketing materials are slick, her shtick smooth. Her northeast-side work space is clearly well used. But the hot pink fuzz ball that looms in the entryway (dressed…
During 1990s Internet mania, some in philanthropic circles had high hopes for online fund raising. After all, if people were buying books and clothes on the Web, they might just as impulsively click on a not-for-profit’s “donate” button. “They always expected it was really going to take off,” recalled Eugene Tempel, director of the Center on Philanthropy at Indiana University. “But it never did.” That may be changing: A new study by the Indianapolis-based center finds that not-for-profits “may be…
Motherhood is a common path to the home-based child care business, but more childless women looking for self-employment options
also are getting into the field. Nearly 3,000 Indiana child-care providers are licensed to provide services in their homes–including
469 in Marion County.
The business of rating debt securities is dominated by three firms: Moody’s, Standard & Poor’s, and Fitch. Their practices now are under fire with the subprime meltdown. Two weeks ago, we discussed securitization, a process whereby mortgages are pooled together, sliced up into securities, and sold to investors. The job of the rating agencies is to attach a rating to these securities that is based on their analysis of the risk of the underlying mortgages. Many investors, including pension plans,…
Undoubtedly, he was caught up in his “Win-One-For-The-Gipper” moment when New England Patriots quarterback Tom Brady said of Bill Belichick, “We play for probably the best coach in the history of the NFL.” We’ll set aside for a moment whether Belichick can be placed above the likes of Vince Lombardi, George Halas, Tom Landry, Chuck Noll, Joe Gibbs or Don Shula, just to name several. And we’ll forget that Belichick wasn’t so great a coach in Cleveland, where he was…
Greenfield was up to about $150 million in sales by 2000, when the Greenwalt family sold its commercial construction firm. Founder Max Greenwalt then went to work with his sons Jeff and Lynn at the development company. About the same time, Greenwalt Development tweaked its mission to focus on senior-living communities and medical office projects-scaling back the size of the firm in the process. The leaner company now has $15 million in annual revenue and nearly $14 million in projects…
For months, we’ve been reading and hearing news about the so-called subprime mortgage crisis and the resulting “credit crunch.” For thousands of families who have lost their homes to foreclosure, the crisis is clear. For most people, however, the impact isn’t so obvious. Beyond those directly affected by mortgage defaults, who else should be concerned about the aftershocks? Some economic forecasters are warning that the subprime mortgage situation and the ongoing weakness in the housing market could linger long enough…
Economists usually don’t follow marketing slogans, but Wal-Mart’s shift from its “Always Low Prices” slogan to “Save Money, Live Better” caught my eye. The slogan is based on a study by the national consultancy firm Global Insight. During a 2005 conference on Wal-Mart, Global Insight’s economists released a study showing the average American family saved a little more than $2,300 annually by shopping at Wal-Mart. The current marketing campaign uses updated estimates of Wal-Mart’s savings at about $2,500 per year…
It’s called a ghost light. Little more than a light bulb on a pole, it’s there to keep actors from fumbling around in the dark. And, for the superstitious, it’s there to keep the ghosts at bay. The ghost light is an apt opening and closing image for the Indiana Repertory Theatre’s season-opening production of “Our Town,” a play whose ghosts in act three remind us of the things we mortals miss. And a play whose light shines without the…
Sid Eskenazi fell in love with the board game Monopoly as a child. Buying and developing make-believe properties with make-believe money inspired the grade-schooler. And he was good at it. So several years later, Eskenazi began playing what he likes to call “adult Monopoly.” He bought one property at a time with real money.
The recent announcement by the Indianapolis company Gilchrist and Soames that it would recall its privately branded toothpaste because of concerns regarding its diethylene glycol content is a small part of a larger global concern about the quality standards of goods made in China. The same week, Mattel recalled more than 9.5 million U.S. toys over concerns about the use of lead paint. Many Indiana firms rely on a steady stream of qualified products from China, so now seems a…
It probably goes without saying that New Yorkers can be, well, a bit difficult. As a fund-raiser for a NYC-based not-forprofit for many years, I encountered my fair share of these folks, which is one reason why I really looked forward to coming back to my home state of Indiana. Having grown up in Indiana, I knew of the kindness and generosity shown to me by neighbors, teachers-even complete strangers-but I’d never lived and worked here as an adult. More…
Less than two years after New Sunshine LLC was bought by a group led by former Conseco Inc. CEO Stephen Hilbert, its Australian Gold division has acquired its top two competitors, amassing 80 percent of the indoor suntan lotion market.
