Current Issue
July 2009 Issue
Cover Story
Stalking the stimulus
By Jane HobackBillions of dollars in federal stimulus money for a dizzying array of projects must seem like manna from heaven to minority-owned businesses in Colorado laid low by the recession. And for some, that’s virtually what it is.
Companies with all the requirements in place that already do work for the government have a good chance of winning stimulus project contracts. Their businesses are likely to flourish.
From left: Mariano Delle Donne, Ding Hsu, Don Kelin, Lisa Buckley and Richard Valdez. Photography by Rob Hammer
But because of a complicated and time-consuming...
Articles
Best Companies to Work for in Colorado ’09
In a time when workers are taking on extra duties, it’s nice to know we still have companies that keep the office stocked with snacks, or in the case of one of this year’s Best Companies finalists, “Scooby snacks.”
Oh, and thanks for covering employee health-care insurance premiums. That’s coming in handy right now as the nation braces for what could become wholesale changes to our health-care system.
As we face economic challenges, celebrating companies that create great workplaces couldn’t be more important. The Best Company to Work For in Colorado finalists...
Vine Arts & Entertainment: Spirit in small batches
By Eric PetersonIn 2002, brothers Scott and Todd Leopold launched an in-house distillery at their eponymous microbrewery in Ann Arbor, Mich. — making everything from vodka and gin to vermouth and triple sec — because of Wolverine State laws requiring brew pubs to make every alcoholic beverage sold on premise.
Their Leopold Bros. spirits emerged as a focal point of the business, and in 2008, Todd and Scott stopped brewing beer and closed the pub to return home to Colorado and focus strictly on small-batch spirits.
Todd & Scott of Leopold Bros.
An environmental engineer, Scott...
Small biz tech-startup: TopSchool Inc.
By Eric PetersonINITIAL LIGHT BULB:
In 2006, an L.A.-based startup called TopSchool came across the radar of Matthew Schnittman and Justin McMorrow, two longtime employees of Denver-based e-learning provider eCollege, when former chief technical officer Mark Resmer called their attention to the startup.
Justin McMorrow and Matthew Schnittman
After investing in the fledgling provider of “student lifecycle management” software in early 2008, Schnittman and McMorrow joined TopSchool later in the year as its president/chief executive officer and senior vice president of sales and...
Executive edge: Jeff Campos
By Lynn BronikowskiGrowing up in a blue-collar neighborhood on Chicago’s Southside, most kids saw only three options for their future: work for the city, become a cop or firefighter, or end up getting into crime.
“I chose the fourth option,” said Jeff Campos, 52, president and CEO of the Denver Hispanic Chamber of Commerce. “I wound up being a hockey player.”
From pickup games in the neighborhood to playing in high school, Campos would go on to play center for Loyola University.
“Not a lot of people in the neighborhood went to college or even thought about going to college so playing...
Who owns Colorado: Holly after the storm
By David LewisHolly, Colo., seems to be going through a long, uncanny bad spell.
Holly seemingly has always acted as a magnet for trouble, attracting some of the worst kinds of misfortune in the economic, demographic and acts-of-God categories.
Greatness has brushed by Holly, then moved on. In 1541, the explorer Coronado marched over the site of today’s Holly Public Library, according to the Holly Historical Society. In 1806 Zebulon Pike, too, briefly explored what became Holly. Former Gov. Roy Romer, today chairman of the nonprofit Strong American Schools, grew up in the town but...
Rundles wrap-up: A lovely walk
By Jeff RundlesWhen I was a kid, I thought we were rich. We lived in a 2,500-square-foot Cape Cod, four bedrooms, 2½ baths, a full basement and a two-car garage, one of the nicest properties in a very nice neighborhood.
Of course, there were seven of us, and we kids shared bedrooms, but at the time it sure looked like the upper middle class. Many of my schoolmates lived in much more modest homes, where everyone was pretty packed in, but they seemed comfortable and hardly anyone gave it much thought. Oh, there were a few much larger homes, and a few...
Q3 tech report: Dial up savings
{REL[2142][article-author]mBmHIdOBREL}When was the last time anyone in your company took a close look at the phone system, its maintenance costs, and the value proposition of moving some or all of the company’s employees to an Internet Protocol based system?
When was the last time anyone took a serious look at the extensive value and reduced costs of moving from a traditional time division multiplexing voice system to a true multimedia communications platform?
Businesses of all sizes have a propensity to install a telephone system and then ignore it. If the desk phone rings, all is fine. If the voicemail...
Colorado Cool Stuff: BLOSM FLAVORED WHIPPED CREAM
By Eric PetersonInspiration struck Michael Markley in a restaurant several years ago. “I finished half my milkshake, but there was no more whipped cream. I told my wife, ‘Wouldn’t it be cool if we had little tiny cans to spray on the remainder?’” After deciding it was time to shift gears from the mortgage industry in early 2007, Markley decided to give the idea a shot and learned all he could about whipped cream. In August, he moved into a commercial kitchen and “literally built a small dairy plant.”
Blosm is all-natural, meaning it contains no artificial flavors or colors or...
Who owns Colorado: Colorado Sustainable Design Awards celebrate the state’s best architecture
ColoradoBiz wants to celebrate building design by recognizing projects statewide that exemplify social, environmental and economic sustainability.
The magazine is now accepting applications for the Colorado Sustainable Design Awards, a program launched in partnership with the American Institute for Architects (AIA Colorado), the Urban Land Institute (ULI Colorado) and United States Green Building Council, Colorado Chapter (USGBCC).
The awards were developed to highlight sustainable architecture and land use in private and public settings. The competition is open to...
Vine Arts & Entertainment: Butler’s choice
By Mary ButlerPERFORMING ARTS
Cirque du Soleil: Kooza
Cirque du Soleil brings its show to Denver, Aug. 20-Oct. 4, under a special “Grand Chapiteau” big top to be erected next to the Pepsi Center. Kooza tells the story of The Innocent, “a melancholy loner in search of his place in the world,” and combines acrobatic performance and clowning. Tickets are $38.50-$215. (www.cirquedusoliel.com)
Boulder Fringe Festival
This unique 12-day event, Aug. 12-23, offers theatre, dance, circus art, cinema, spoken word, puppetry, workshops and storytelling from 70 artists at 14 venues throughout...
Small biz: Backyard experiment has a business purpose
By Mike TaylorCredit – or blame – for the experiment taking shape behind my house goes to a guy named Manny Howard, a freelance writer who set out to subsist for a month on what he could grow himself in his Brooklyn, N.Y., backyard.
Howard’s attempt was only marginally successful: complicated by a tornado, halted for a few days by a stomach bug and compromised by a non-backyard dinner on his birthday. But his account of it in New York magazine in 2007 was hilarious and inspiring, and when the story found its way to me last year, I suppose the seed was planted.
Sometime in the last...
Colorado Cool Stuff: HIPPIE DAWG DOG TREATS
By Eric Peterson“I’ve always made homemade dog food and treats for my dogs,” Susan Mountjoy says. “I don’t like reading unpronounceable ingredients on the back of a box.” She gave out a batch of her treats as gifts to friends in 2007 and the ecstatic response led her to start baking professionally. “Everybody wanted to buy more.”
She now makes all-natural treats with ingredients like salmon, oat flour, buffalo and sweet potatoes and names like Born to Be Wild Bones and Flower Power Cookies. “I name them after hippie icons,” she says. “Hippie is coming back — I’m coming out of hippie...
Guest column: Are you tapping the Asian market?
By Jie “Jay” ZhengBy 2010, India will surpass Japan in purchasing power, according to a recent Morgan Stanley research report. By 2020, China will surpass the U.S. in purchasing power. And, most startling, by 2041, China will become the world’s largest economy. As astute business people, it’s critical we recognize the importance of the emerging Asian market in the global economy.
How can we effectively tap the Asian market and also develop new U.S. markets? We need culturally sensitive professionals who understand Asian cultures and business operations if American businesses are to be...
State of the state: Fat Tire on a roll in 25 states
By Jay DedrickFat Tire’s tracks are stretching farther beyond Fort Collins than ever.
Earlier this year, New Belgium Brewing began first-time distribution in five states – Georgia, Indiana, Wisconsin, South Dakota and North Carolina — with a sixth, South Carolina, joining the lineup June 1. That makes a total of 25 states where New Belgium offers its brews, including the flagship amber ale Fat Tire.
With half the states in the country accounted for, the country’s third-biggest craft brewer looks to have big plans in store for its small-batch brews. And in the craft-brew world,...
Colorado Cool Stuff: MAMA’S LITTLE YELLA PILS
By Eric PetersonA play on words for something a Southern mother might take at the end of the day to calm her down, Oskar Blues Brewery defied its reputation for big and bold canned micro-beers with its new offering. Marty Jones, the brewery’s “lead singer/idea man,” says Mama’s Little Yella Pils was an opportunity for the brewers to “flex their muscles,” noting, “It’s hard to hide any flaws in a pilsner.”
Recently reviewed by the New York Times as one of the country’s five best pilsners, Mama’s Little Yella Pils is a rarity: It’s brewed from barley, while most American pilsners are...
Sports biz: Track man
By Stewart SchleyRon Schneider keeps a jet-black Porsche and a BMW M5 in a pristine garage behind his company’s Englewood office, but it’s his 1968 Plymouth Roadrunner, bathed in burgundy paint and looking every bit like the muscle car Schneider cruised around in as an Illinois teenager, that tells you what you need to know: He’s a car guy.
Schneider fell in love early. He grew up on a farm that doubled as a hangout for local hot rodders and tore around the tracks 20 years ago on regional Sports Car Club of America circuits until 1987, when he stopped racing cars and started selling...
Top 50 Minority-Owned Companies
A year ago when Ayuda Management Corp. posted the best year-over-year growth of any firm in the ColoradoBiz Top 50 Minority-Owned Companies ranking, Ayuda founder Maria Vogt reacted to her firm’s 970 percent revenue jump by forecasting more growth.
She knew what she was talking about. From 2007 to last year, Vogt’s Broomfield-based construction-management firm increased revenues another 405 percent – improving year-over-year from $2.98 million to $15.1 million – to repeat as the top-growing minority-owned company among the ColoradoBiz Top 50.
Sonya Yungeberg and...
On management: Handicapped parking spaces
By Pat WiesnerI have a confession to make. I’m always the guy giving my opinion and advice like I know it all. And I’m not so sure you should really be paying attention to me. It has been an absolute revelation to see what has been happening to me because I have temporary access to a handicapped parking card for my car.
My self-image is being ruined by my desire to always have a handicapped parking place. Here’s how it came to pass.
I really never thought too much about them. I used to think there were too many because they always seemed empty. They’re not being used, so we don’t...
State of the state: Minority conferences are moving from coasts to Denver
By Patricia KaowthumrongWhen more than 50,000 people attended the Democratic National Convention in Denver last August, the Mile High City was able to showcase its full potential as a conference destination.
The DNC’s success is evident in the number of major conferences that have since chosen to come to Denver. This fall, several minority events have chosen Denver rather than West or East coast locales, including the annual conferences for the U.S. Hispanic Chamber of Commerce and the National Association of Asian American Professionals, which will be held in September and August,...
Cote’s Colorado: Website helps Hispanic entrepreneurs navigate the business world
By Mike CoteBack when Salvador Gomez was the first national director of the U.S. Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, the Denver businessman wanted to create an information database for small businesses that needed entrepreneurial advice, including the basic steps on how to get their companies off the ground.
But back then, the fledgling organization had several locations scattered around the country and didn’t have the World Wide Web to help bind them. Thus the idea fell dormant.
Fast forward to the Internet age. The national business group Gomez co-founded in 1979 is about to hold its...
