By the Bootstraps

My favorite source of Chicago small business news, Crain’s Chicago Business, spoke to three women in Chicago’s business world. These women – Laurel Bellows, Venita Fields and Maria Pinto – spoke with Crain’s about the economy’s effect on entrepreneur’s hoping to get their stores off the group during the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression.

Bellows told said she believed the recession created new opportunities for businesses. Rents are affordable and industries are more willing to negotiate cheaper rates, where they may have been less flexible in the past, said Laurel Bellows, an area lawyer.

Pinto – best known as one of First Lady Michelle Obama’s favorite Chicago designers – stressed networking’s importance during the recession.

“There are business groups and resources out there that you can afford,” Pinto said “Many people who have been extremely successful find great joy out of helping other people.”

The Kansas City, Missouri-based organization the Kauffman Foundation backed their findings. It found the country “might be on the cusp of an entrepreneurship boom, triggered by the recession, an aging population and less job security,” the Crain’s report said.

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Everyblock – one of the best examples of hyperlocal news content online – has been acquired by MSNBC.com. The deal went for “several million dollars,” according to Kara Swisher of the Wall Street Journal, but the true amount remains undisclosed.

The Web site acts as a local news and records aggregator for 15 cities in the country. Created in 2007 by Adrian Holovaty, a Chicago-based programmer/journalist, Everyblock allows users to find out what’s going on in their neighborhood by entering their address, zip code or neighborhood. From the minutiae (apparently there have been 2 bike racks installed in my neighborhood since 2008) to crime reports, Everyblock covers your area in a way local news can’t. read more »

In recent years it seems as though the Second City’s meat and potatoes past has given way to a “foodie” present. Industry professionals and connoisseurs are making room on their dance cards for a number of delicious and innovative restaurants in the city.

Our new found role seems to have trickled down to small businesses: various restaurants and stores offer cooking lessons to customers. For example Andersonville’s The Wooden Spoon sells high quality cookware in the front of the store but in the back you’ll find a full scale kitchen setup, with a half-moon countertop set in front of the stove for easy viewing and demonstration. Students leave each class having made at least three dishes they can replicate at home. During the August 21 “Grill and Sip” class, chefs-in-training will learn how to make mini chicken sliders with Asian slaw and orzo with shrimp and vegetables, just to name a few. Class prices range from $65 – $85.

The Wooden Spoon’s class schedule is online and the Chicago Tribune has compiled a list of over 150 options available throughout the city.

Photo Credit: “Cooking in a Pan”

The Wooden Spoon
5047 N. Clark Avenue
Chicago, IL 60640
(773) 293-3190

The owner of Logan Square’s Mega Mall – which is home to 70 businesses – continues to battle with Chicago officials who want the property. Officials have “already taken steps that would eventually lead to a sale under eminent domain,” Chicagotalks reports.

Closing the shopping center would have both positive and negative effects. According to the report, officials want the site to become a park as part of its initiative to bring open spaces to the West Side neighborhood; the idea of a grocery store has also been thrown around for this “food desert,” an area with limited access to healthy food options. However the 70 business owners at the Mega Mall will lose their businesses – relocation in this economy may be a daunting prospect for some owners.

For more on this story, read the article “Future of Logan Square Mega Mall in Limbo” at local blog Chicagotalks.

Photo credit: “Sterile mall”