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— How many times have you heard it? Someone lamenting, “There’s nothing to do here!” Worse yet, hearing someone tell visitors that. “What is there to do around here?” “Nothing, really. I don’t know.” Enough with that. Let’s give people an easy way to answer, and let’s do it the Idea Friendly way. Make a […]

Without making people mad! One common small town parking complaint is business staff taking up customer parking. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve heard this brought up in discussing downtown businesses. Sometimes business owners or business employees park right in front of their business or along the Main Street. They might park out

When I visited Caldwell, Kansas, the manager of the co-working site said they had filled their private offices, but struggled to attract day users. People who work from home like working from home. They don’t want a full time office, so they said they don’t want to use the coworking space. How can the coworking

By Rob Hatch Thirty-six weeks. Part of my process for planning my business for the New Year is to do a little reality check on exactly how much time I have to work with. What are you talking about, Rob? You have a year. Technically, that’s true. However, on closer inspection, I only have 36

Remember the Retail Apocalypse around 2017? In a media interview this week, I brought up that it was actually Retail’s Big Split, not an apocalypse, and it’s ongoing. The reporter asked me to explain, so here’s my update for today’s retail landscape.   “Everything gigantic in American life is about to get smaller or die.”

Download the PDF report Executive Summary The Survey of Rural Challenges asks rural people to share their ground-level insight into the challenges they face and the assets they can use. This report analyzes over 2200 responses from communities across the US and Canada from 2015 to 2024. The responses show what’s changing and what isn’t

Post extensively on social channels, and pin your hours post to the top of your page Your small business has times when you need to change your hours either for holidays, staff issues or (my favorite) extending into evening hours. How do you retrain your customers so they notice the change? Let’s look at a

We’ve got a sneak peek to share from Marshmallow, a throwback horror film in the vein of Watcher in the Woods. “At a secluded summer camp, Morgan, a shy and introverted 12-year-old, is thrust into a living nightmare when a legendary campfire tale becomes real. As a mysterious figure begins stalking the camp, Morgan and

Marvel made waves yesterday with their five-and-a-half-hour-long announcement video where they very, very slowly revealed the actors involved in 2026’s Avengers: Doomsday. They listed 27 performers, which crazily enough doesn’t compare to the near-40 actors who were announced ahead of Avengers: Infinity War. Still, there are some interesting surprises there with the names. We see

To me! My… folding chairs?! Marvel raised a lot of questions yesterday when they chose to announce the cast of its much-anticipated Avengers: Doomsday via a five and a half hour video posted to social media, in which the camera moves every 12 minutes or so to reveal a new chair with a star’s name