In A Nutshell

Best Colorado Deals needs your support

            The Best Colorado Deals newsletter project has made it into the semifinals of the James L. and John S. Knight Foundation’s News Challenge, a grant program to support “innovative ideas that develop platforms, tools and services to inform and transform community news, conversations and information distribution and visualization.” Our proposal -- along with proposals from 221 other semi-finalists – can be seen on the foundation’s website. You can boost our chance of success and learn a lot about our plans if you read it – and, better yet, leave some positive feedback. To help, enter http://apply.newschallenge.org in your browser. When the page opens, click on "Read and Comment" and register to make comments. Enter “Best Colorado Deals” in the search box, and have at it. Knight will announce its choices for the 50 finalists on Feb. 15 – so hurry! And thanks!

January 9th 2010

By William Porter

The Mile High City is something of a mecca for the region's antiques enthusiasts, with scores of stores offering blasts from the past.

This is in spite of the fact that a big chunk of the city's population arrived here from somewhere else. You would think many of these transplants would have jettisoned the old horsehair sofa or cherrywood highboy back home before loading the moving van, but no: Those treasures survive and wind up in local shops.

Wed, Jan 13th, 2010

By: Lamar Clarkson

Over the past decade, as the public has increasingly embraced the idea that food is best grown locally and sustainably, we’ve made the opposite assumption about our cultural institutions. Witness the “Bilbao effect,” recently declared all but dead in the New York Times. Smitten with the success of the Guggenheim’s outpost in Bilbao, Spain, we’ve come to believe that any city dissatisfied with its growth and tourist traffic need only follow a simple formula: Commission a big-name architect to design a bigger, flashier museum building, then wait for the tourists and tax dollars to come pouring in. And so we set to work turning culture into a cash crop, sowing boldface names and marble bricks like soybeans and corn.

Since this summer, I have been covering the ever growing movement of local governments adopting (or at the least formally encouraging) an internal purchasing preference to that which is local. This includes proclamations supporting local vendors as well as point systems that favor awarding contracts to local bidders. Now, I just got wind of an executive order issued by Colorado Governor Bill Ritter directing state agencies to adhere to the Buy American Provisions of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.

Though this isn't the typical hyper-localized "buy local" proclamation you're used to seeing, it is very important to consider the relative perspective of government-sized purchasing initiatives. This legislation isn't necessarily going to fuel a small town's economy or support a community that's easily tangible to the individual, but it certainly is focused on keeping money within the United States, which will affect us all in the long run.

Locally-owned independent businesses outperform average retailer sales during 2009 holidays. Those with active Buy Local campaigns fared best.

One of our newest MHBA members, Closely, Inc has issued a survey asking local business owners about their usage and understanding of various social media tools.

Closely, Inc. is a new Denver start-up, from the founders of other Denver companies including MapQuest, Newsgator, Jabber and Local Matters. The company is focused on building new social media applications that empower small businesses to more "closely connect" with their customers, followers, and fans. Our mission is to make the new world of social and real-time media more useful and powerful as a local direct marketing tool.