Manufacturing | Large companies

Finding business angles in the Labor Day story

By Melissa Preddy on Aug 30, 2010 in Beats, Economy, Featured, Manufacturing | Large companies, Story ideas

The national holiday which celebrates the American worker is a natural news peg for business writers, especially with the ailing jobs market a top-of-mind topic amid our stumbling economic recovery.
And as the unofficial end to summer, the first Monday in September is a milestone for the travel industry, for purveyors of back-to-school goods, movie theaters, [...]

Use data to measure your local car economy

By Melissa Preddy on Aug 27, 2010 in Beats, Economy, Featured, Manufacturing | Large companies, Story ideas, Transportation | Airlines | Travel

Automakers will release domestic motor vehicle sales figures for August on Sept. 1, and a year after “Cash for Clunkers” it’s worth taking a look at how car retailers and related businesses are faring in your market.
Edmunds.com has released a detailed forecast and predictably, without the big tax breaks, this August’s sales are suffering by [...]

Workers are being pushed beyond limits – and not just at JetBlue

By Bernie Kohn on Aug 12, 2010 in Basics, Best Practices, Economy, Manufacturing | Large companies, Retail | Lifestyle, Story ideas, TrendingTopic

JetBlue Airways flight attendant Steven Slater’s expletives-not-deleted, beers-in-hand slide into hero worship went viral on the Web this week. Far less noticed, that same morning, was an announcement by the U.S. Labor Department that worker productivity declined in the U.S. during the second quarter for the first time in a year and a half, as [...]

From pool construction to Mad Men: A summertime story-idea sampler

By Melissa Preddy on Jul 26, 2010 in Beats, Manufacturing | Large companies, Small | Private | Non-profit, Story ideas, Technology, TrendingTopic

This is an idea blog, and as you know, story ideas range from full-bodied and meaty to fleeting and fluffy. We try to serve up mostly meat, but some of the other fare is just too tasty to be ignored.
So here’s a round-up of weighty and not-so-weighty summertime ideas, all worth a second look:
Auto dealerships: [...]

High-profile disasters put new focus on workplace dangers

We’re not even halfway through 2010 and already have seen some high-profile workplace disasters, including 29 dead in a West Virginia coal mine and the 11 workers lost two months ago when the BP oil rig collapsed in the Gulf of Mexico.
Those epic tragedies make headlines, unlike the many other workplace injuries and even deaths [...]

Finding local ties to California’s proposed plastic-bag ban

By Melissa Preddy on Jun 07, 2010 in Beats, Featured, Green Economy 2010 blog, Manufacturing | Large companies, Personal finance, Retail | Lifestyle, Small | Private | Non-profit, Story ideas, Technology Back to Green Seminar Blog >>

Paper or ….well, paper. Or cloth. Or straw.
But bye-bye plastic bags, at least in California, under a bill that state’s assembly approved last week. The state Senate is set to take it up, and Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has said he’ll sign it if it passes.
The law would ban supermarkets, drug stores and liquor stores [...]

Create your own list of local economic indicators

By Rosland Gammon on May 21, 2010 in Best Practices, Economy, Featured, Manufacturing | Large companies, Story ideas

Are nail salons less crowded? That could be one indicator to check in gauging your local economy’s recovery. Photo by Flickr.com user ishane.

Maureen Farrell of Forbes gives readers 15 economic indicators to follow instead of the stock market, unemployment and manufacturing data. She writes:
“For enlightenment, we went looking for a slew of offbeat yet telling [...]