January 20, 2017 at 8:49 p.m.
Award finalists to be announced
Business Roundup
Finalists for the Jay County Community Awards for 2016 will be announced Thursday at the annual membership meeting of the Jay County Chamber of Commerce.
The noon luncheon, free to chamber members, will be served at the Jay Community Center, 115 E. Water St., Portland.
The chamber will also recognize businesses and organizations celebrating anniversary years.
Stressed
Marsh Supermarkets is apparently facing a cash crunch.
The Indianapolis Business Journal reported this week that the company, which has deep roots in east central Indiana, is in a dispute with a landlord over more than $100,000 in unpaid rent and faces mechanics liens totaling $136,500 from a number of outside contractors.
Marsh began with a store in New Pittsburg, just across the Jay-Randolph county line, in 1931 and later had a store in Salem, a village in southeastern Jay County. It has had a store in Portland since the 1940s.
Today it’s owned by the Florida-based private equity firm Sun Capital Partners. It operates 72 Marsh and O’Malia locations in Indiana and Ohio.
That’s down from more than 100 stores in 2006.
Marsh has closed a number of stores in recent years in the face of competition from other chains.
The company this week announced it will close its store near 53rd Street and Keystone Avenue in Indianapolis. That closing is expected Jan. 28.
The IBJ said Sun Capital has tried to sell the chain off and on in recent years, though it is not clear whether it is currently on the market.
Marsh officials declined to comment on its financial situation.
Networking luncheon
Jay County Chamber of Commerce is hosting its monthly networking luncheon at noon Jan. 31 in Jay County Hospital’s conference room.
The cost of the luncheon is $8. Portland mayor Randy Geesaman will deliver his State of the City address.
ATI layoffs
Allegheny Technologies Inc., parent company of Portland Forge, has laid off an undisclosed number of workers at its Albany, Ore., plant, according to the Democrat-Herald in that community.
The company said in a press release that the job reductions were tied to cost-cutting measures that had been announced last summer.
Now hiring
After trimming hundreds of back-office jobs in recent months, Wal-Mart Stores Inc. announced this week that it will create 10,000 new jobs in the U.S. this year.
“Most of the new employees, including hourly workers, department managers and supervisors, will be in 59 new stores announced in October as part of a $6.8 billion capital spending plan for the fiscal year beginning in February,” Reuters reported.
The 59 new stores represents a drop from this year, when the retailing giant opened 130 new stores.
Most of the jobs that have been eliminated in recent months have been in human resources and in departments that do not directly interact with customers.
Adds MBA
Huntington University has added a new graduate degree to its course offerings.
Students in the master’s in business administration program will take 36 credit hours over two years, meeting in a classroom one night per week and working online to complete their coursework.
Huntington University is partnering with Ambassador Enterprises, an equity firm in Fort Wayne, to give students firsthand experience. A select group of students will begin the program in January, with the university planning to open enrollment to other students in August 2017.
April expo
Plans are taking shape for the 2017 Jay County Chamber of Commerce Business Expo and Job Fair, set for 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. April 1 at Jay Community Center.
More than 70 exhibitors are expected for the event.
Registration forms are available from the chamber office at Community Resource Center in Portland.
Big and little
Business Insider reported this week that McDonald’s is offering a couple of tweaks — one big and one small — on its classic BigMac sandwich.
The fast-food company is rolling out the “Mac Jr.” and the “Grand Mac” this week. As the names suggest, one is a downsized version of the classic, while the other is larger.
The Mac Jr. is a single-patty cheeseburger, while the Grand Mac has 61 percent more beef than a regular Big Mac.
Featured
Red Gold is the subject of a feature article in Automation World.
“The amount of tomatoes we could process in the whole year of 1942 we can do in one day now,” Colt Reichert, director of marketing for Red Gold, told the publication.
Red Gold now has 1,800 high-season employees and 13 production lines in three sites, including on in Geneva. Automation World notes that at one point there were 150 canners in Indiana. Now, Red Gold is the only one left.
Serv-Safe class
The Adams County Health Department and Parkview Regional Medical Center will be offering a Serv-Safe class for food handlers Feb. 21 and Feb. 23 in Decatur Room 1 at Adams Memorial Hospital, Decatur.
The cost of the class is $150 per person. The fee for those who only want to take the certification exam on the second day of the class is $50 per person.
See Business page 6
Continued from page 5
For more information, phone (260) 701-2228.
Joins practice
Dr. Amanda Ouzer has joined the office of Merit Dental in Albany.
A graduate of Manhattan College in New York, she received her dental degree at Temple University Kornberg School of Dentistry in Philadelphia. She completed a one-year residency at Interfaith Medical Center in Brooklyn.
She then spent two years treating patients from low income communities at a neighborhood health center.
Merit Dental Albany is open Monday through Friday.
Profits up
First Financial Bancorp reported an 18 percent jump in profits for the fourth quarter and year-end.
The Cincinnati-based parent of a Fort Recovery bank reported annual earnings of $1.43 per share or $88.5 million. That compares with $75.1 million or $1.21 per share in 2015.
For the quarter, earnings were $23.3 million, compared with $19.8 million in the same period a year earlier.
It was the bank’s 105th consecutive profitable quarter.
Coal targeted
An organization called Hoosier Interfaith Power and Light is trying to get church congregations to urge Indiana Michigan Power to retire its Rockport coal-fired power plant.
The organization is also targeting Indianapolis Power and Light’s coal-powered facility in Indy.
A spokesman from the group will be speaking at the Emmaus Road Mennonite Fellowship at the South Adams Senior Center in Berne. For more information, contact Amy Huser at (260) 525-1801.
Meanwhile, I&M is encouraging its customers to buy “blocks” of energy generated by its large-scale solar plants.
A residential customer can subscribe to a 50-kilowatt-hour block for 93 cents a month or 20 blocks for $18.60 a month.
By purchasing the blocks, customers can determine how much of their energy use they want to attribute to solar power. That figure will be shown as an additional line item on utility bills.
I&M operates four solar power plants, three in Indiana and one in Michigan. It also purchases wind energy from Indiana wind farms, operates six hydroelectric generating stations, and operates Cook Nuclear Plant.
The utility says that in all, its power generation is 60 percent emission-free.
The noon luncheon, free to chamber members, will be served at the Jay Community Center, 115 E. Water St., Portland.
The chamber will also recognize businesses and organizations celebrating anniversary years.
Stressed
Marsh Supermarkets is apparently facing a cash crunch.
The Indianapolis Business Journal reported this week that the company, which has deep roots in east central Indiana, is in a dispute with a landlord over more than $100,000 in unpaid rent and faces mechanics liens totaling $136,500 from a number of outside contractors.
Marsh began with a store in New Pittsburg, just across the Jay-Randolph county line, in 1931 and later had a store in Salem, a village in southeastern Jay County. It has had a store in Portland since the 1940s.
Today it’s owned by the Florida-based private equity firm Sun Capital Partners. It operates 72 Marsh and O’Malia locations in Indiana and Ohio.
That’s down from more than 100 stores in 2006.
Marsh has closed a number of stores in recent years in the face of competition from other chains.
The company this week announced it will close its store near 53rd Street and Keystone Avenue in Indianapolis. That closing is expected Jan. 28.
The IBJ said Sun Capital has tried to sell the chain off and on in recent years, though it is not clear whether it is currently on the market.
Marsh officials declined to comment on its financial situation.
Networking luncheon
Jay County Chamber of Commerce is hosting its monthly networking luncheon at noon Jan. 31 in Jay County Hospital’s conference room.
The cost of the luncheon is $8. Portland mayor Randy Geesaman will deliver his State of the City address.
ATI layoffs
Allegheny Technologies Inc., parent company of Portland Forge, has laid off an undisclosed number of workers at its Albany, Ore., plant, according to the Democrat-Herald in that community.
The company said in a press release that the job reductions were tied to cost-cutting measures that had been announced last summer.
Now hiring
After trimming hundreds of back-office jobs in recent months, Wal-Mart Stores Inc. announced this week that it will create 10,000 new jobs in the U.S. this year.
“Most of the new employees, including hourly workers, department managers and supervisors, will be in 59 new stores announced in October as part of a $6.8 billion capital spending plan for the fiscal year beginning in February,” Reuters reported.
The 59 new stores represents a drop from this year, when the retailing giant opened 130 new stores.
Most of the jobs that have been eliminated in recent months have been in human resources and in departments that do not directly interact with customers.
Adds MBA
Huntington University has added a new graduate degree to its course offerings.
Students in the master’s in business administration program will take 36 credit hours over two years, meeting in a classroom one night per week and working online to complete their coursework.
Huntington University is partnering with Ambassador Enterprises, an equity firm in Fort Wayne, to give students firsthand experience. A select group of students will begin the program in January, with the university planning to open enrollment to other students in August 2017.
April expo
Plans are taking shape for the 2017 Jay County Chamber of Commerce Business Expo and Job Fair, set for 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. April 1 at Jay Community Center.
More than 70 exhibitors are expected for the event.
Registration forms are available from the chamber office at Community Resource Center in Portland.
Big and little
Business Insider reported this week that McDonald’s is offering a couple of tweaks — one big and one small — on its classic BigMac sandwich.
The fast-food company is rolling out the “Mac Jr.” and the “Grand Mac” this week. As the names suggest, one is a downsized version of the classic, while the other is larger.
The Mac Jr. is a single-patty cheeseburger, while the Grand Mac has 61 percent more beef than a regular Big Mac.
Featured
Red Gold is the subject of a feature article in Automation World.
“The amount of tomatoes we could process in the whole year of 1942 we can do in one day now,” Colt Reichert, director of marketing for Red Gold, told the publication.
Red Gold now has 1,800 high-season employees and 13 production lines in three sites, including on in Geneva. Automation World notes that at one point there were 150 canners in Indiana. Now, Red Gold is the only one left.
Serv-Safe class
The Adams County Health Department and Parkview Regional Medical Center will be offering a Serv-Safe class for food handlers Feb. 21 and Feb. 23 in Decatur Room 1 at Adams Memorial Hospital, Decatur.
The cost of the class is $150 per person. The fee for those who only want to take the certification exam on the second day of the class is $50 per person.
See Business page 6
Continued from page 5
For more information, phone (260) 701-2228.
Joins practice
Dr. Amanda Ouzer has joined the office of Merit Dental in Albany.
A graduate of Manhattan College in New York, she received her dental degree at Temple University Kornberg School of Dentistry in Philadelphia. She completed a one-year residency at Interfaith Medical Center in Brooklyn.
She then spent two years treating patients from low income communities at a neighborhood health center.
Merit Dental Albany is open Monday through Friday.
Profits up
First Financial Bancorp reported an 18 percent jump in profits for the fourth quarter and year-end.
The Cincinnati-based parent of a Fort Recovery bank reported annual earnings of $1.43 per share or $88.5 million. That compares with $75.1 million or $1.21 per share in 2015.
For the quarter, earnings were $23.3 million, compared with $19.8 million in the same period a year earlier.
It was the bank’s 105th consecutive profitable quarter.
Coal targeted
An organization called Hoosier Interfaith Power and Light is trying to get church congregations to urge Indiana Michigan Power to retire its Rockport coal-fired power plant.
The organization is also targeting Indianapolis Power and Light’s coal-powered facility in Indy.
A spokesman from the group will be speaking at the Emmaus Road Mennonite Fellowship at the South Adams Senior Center in Berne. For more information, contact Amy Huser at (260) 525-1801.
Meanwhile, I&M is encouraging its customers to buy “blocks” of energy generated by its large-scale solar plants.
A residential customer can subscribe to a 50-kilowatt-hour block for 93 cents a month or 20 blocks for $18.60 a month.
By purchasing the blocks, customers can determine how much of their energy use they want to attribute to solar power. That figure will be shown as an additional line item on utility bills.
I&M operates four solar power plants, three in Indiana and one in Michigan. It also purchases wind energy from Indiana wind farms, operates six hydroelectric generating stations, and operates Cook Nuclear Plant.
The utility says that in all, its power generation is 60 percent emission-free.
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