This is the second of several reports from the Making Place Matter in Northwest Oklahoma Rural Community Economic Development Summit held in Alva on June 3, 2010. A session on community building covered a wide range of topics, from the Main Street approach, to supporting local businesses, rural tourism, rural grocery stores, the participation of young people,…
Encouraging and supporting entrepreneurs is a hot topic in economic development, and I’d like to start a series on it here at Small Biz Survival. Most of you are involved either in a small business, or in economic development in one form or another, so I’d like to start with you. Do you have an opinion…
This is the first of several reports from the Making Place Matter in Northwest Oklahoma Rural Community Economic Development Summit held in Alva on June 3, 2010. Deidre Myers from the Oklahoma Department of Commerce presented statistics and analysis about Northwest Oklahoma’s population changes. Most Northwest Oklahoma counties have lost 50% or more of their population…
In July 2009, I attended the High Plains Resource Conservation and Development Board meeting in Taloga, Oklahoma. While I was officially there to present their new website, I couldn’t help learning and taking notes. Dr. Larry Sanders from Oklahoma State University spoke about wide ranging rural business issues, including marketing, entrepreneurship, retaining youth, and tourism….
[This arrived by email from the National Rural Assembly. I didn’t think I could improve on it, so I asked for permission to reprint it here, which they have kindly granted. I added photos from the White House blog. -Becky] From the National Rural Assembly, www.ruralassembly.org President Barack Obama tours MogoOrganic in Mt. Pleasant, Ia.,…
Here’s an entrepreneurial idea for any small town. Build “a community of small businesses” like 1440 Main Street in Ferdinand, Indiana. via @ahoffman50 on Twitter. Each business can support the others in promotions, in sharing customers, in splitting expenses. Each entrepreneur can benefit from brainstorming and networking with the others. Everyone can learn something from…
Shop local is a popular topic here, but this week I’ve watched a new trend pop up: bank local.Move Your Money is encouraging people to shift their money to locally owned banks. The site includes bank rankings by Institutional Risk Analytics. All of my local banks scored B+ or higher. The project was dreamed up…
Many small towns have un-used space in their downtown. A local resident in Buffalo, Oklahoma, has used some of that space to create short-term lodging for hunters. Julia Hinther runs a salon and gift shop. The space upstairs used to be an apartment for her sons. When one of her sons tried his luck with…
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