When StateImpact reporter Molly Messick traded in her old Toyota last fall, it had racked up more than 260,000 miles.
Until recently, my car was a 1994 Toyota Camry that my parents purchased second-hand when I was in high school. By the time I was finished with it, its odometer had passed the 260,000 mile mark. It had been broken into in D.C. and held its own on rutted out back roads all over Wyoming. I probably would have kept driving it, had it not been for a couple of expensive repairs on the horizon.
All of that is to say that when I read this recent New York Times article that declares 200,000 miles the new 100,000, it touched a chord. “[T]oday, as more owners drive their vehicles farther,” the article says, “some are learning that the imagined limits of vehicular endurance may not be real limits at all.” Continue Reading →
Greber has directed COBE, part-time, since December 2009. He told the Idaho Business Review he’s leaving the University to  do area consulting work.
“‘I wasn’t doing it for the money,” he said March 21. “It was starting to become work instead of fun.’
Greber’s last day at the center is March 30. He and a work-study student were the sole employees of the center, which is part of Boise State’s College of Business.
It could be hard to find another director of Greber’s caliber who is as inexpensive. Greber said he made about $600 a week for Boise State, with no benefits.” – Idaho Business Review
Greber told IBR.com he’ll continue to teach two classes at Boise State.
The direct selling industry isn’t just for Mary Kay or Tupperware consumers anymore. It seems the younger demographic is getting on board. The entertainment blog WetPaint and parenting blog Babble have recently posted that two women from the MTV reality show Teen Momare selling Scentsy products.
Scentsy is the Meridian, Idaho-based wickless-candle and personal care products company. Continue Reading →
To see Planet Money's full post, click on the image above.
The good folks at NPR’s Planet Money created this neat visualization of how the jobs we work have shifted over time. The clearest change is in manufacturing jobs. In 1972, they accounted for nearly 24 percent of jobs in the U.S. Now, just 9 percent of workers are employed in that sector. The proportion of jobs in service industries, meanwhile, has grown substantially.
Government jobs hold the top spot, employing more than 16 percent of U.S. workers.
We’ve spent a good deal of time documenting just what people here in Idaho do for work. For example, this county-level map shows whether the private or public sector is responsible for a greater share of jobs.
This story shows Idaho’s top 30 employers, and the extent to which they’ve expanded or cut back since 2005. As it explains, government jobs are at the top of the heap in Idaho, too. “If taken as one entity,” the post says, “the state would finish well ahead of other employers in [Idaho], with about 24,400 employees at the start of this calendar year, according the state controller’s office.”
A passenger checked in at the Boise Airport early this week.
For the last week, StateImpact Idaho has been reporting on recent cuts to flights in and out of Boise. The guiding question: will airlines’ cutbacks affect Idaho’s prospects for an economic turnaround?
Airlines are, of course, responding to broader economic conditions when they determine to stop offering a flight between, say, Boise and Los Angeles. They’re considering the cost of fuel and the demand for service. The chart below gives a sense of just how that demand for flights in and out of Boise has changed over the last decade. Not surprisingly, many routes saw a substantial increase in ridership between 2000 and 2007.
It’s the declines since that time that are particularly telling. Continue Reading →
Amy Robinson is the Chief Marketing Officer at DSA.
One of Idaho’s fast growing companies is Scentsy. They sell wickless candles and personal care products. It’s a direct sales company, meaning independent consultants sell products largely through home parties (think The Pampered Chef).
The Direct Selling Association is a trade group for some of the country’s most well known direct sales companies like Avon, Herbalife and The Pampered Chef. DSA has about 200 members, including four companies based in Idaho (Kyani, Melaleuca, 21Ten and Scentsy). According to DSA, direct sales in the U.S. totaled more than $28.5 billion in 2010.
Amy Robinson is the Chief Marketing Officer at the Direct Selling Association. StateImpact Idaho recently spoke with her about the industry.
Q: How have direct-selling companies grown in the United States? Continue Reading →
The price of oil is the key factor in that projection of lost profits. Oil is now trading at about $107 a barrel. If the price were to spike to $150 a barrel, the AP writes, “the industry’s diminished profit forecast for 2012 could turn to losses of more than $5 billion.” Continue Reading →
On a Monday morning, the Southwest ticket counter at Boise Airport was mostly vacant. The airline recently suspended service from Boise to Seattle, Salt Lake and Reno.
Boise resident C.K. Haun has this routine down. He may live in Idaho, but he’s a senior engineer at Apple. Long before the sun is up, he arrives at the Boise Airport, to catch his regular flight to San Jose. “I can do this by autopilot now,” he says. “Most of the TSA people know me, and we smile and say hi. Every Monday morning, week in week out!”
The State Integrity Investigation gives Idaho a D-.
The latest government transparency report gives Idaho a near failing grade, ranking the Gem State among the ten worst states for transparency in the country.
The State Integrity Investigation gives Idaho an overall grade of D-. The report looks at 14 categories, six of which the state failed. The worst grades went to categories like legislative accountability, executive accountability and ethics enforcement.
You can click through the different categories to get more information on the methodology used for grading. Continue Reading →
Bill Connors believes the local business community can be an asset in retaining -- and even attracting -- important flights.
StateImpact is considering the potential economic effects of the shrinking number of flights in and out of Boise. As we mentioned in a post yesterday, there will be 20 percent fewer seats leaving Boise this summer than last. The Boise Metro Chamber of Commerce is targeting the issue through a new travel committee. Early this week, I spoke to Bill Connors, the chamber’s president and CEO.
Q: How much of an issue is air service and flight availability when you’re looking at business recruitment and retention?
A: It’s an issue, and it’s particularly an issue for Boise because we’re one of the remotest metro regions in the nation. Continue Reading →
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