Going “Midcentury modern”
March 21, 2008
How would you like to spend your weekdays scouting for vintage furniture? Rob Degenhard and Nini Sarmiento, owners of the Home Anthology store, do.
The couple’s Catonsville furniture store is open only on weekends, allowing them to spend the week hunting for vintage pieces - the habit that got them into the business. Their store is featured in today’s issue of The Daily Record supplement Distinctive Properties.
Now, Rob and Nini are two businesspeople filling a growing demand for “midcentury modern” furniture and accessories - vintage pieces made between 1945 and 1970. The functional, sleek pieces are in demand now as people aim to simplify their lives, and the prices are beginning to reflect that, with high-end pieces demanding tens of thousands of dollars.
Midcentury modern’s “appeal isn’t limited to the young and hip,” Mary Medland reports. Home Anthology has clients “ranging from newlyweds to those who are in their 70s.”
Browse through the inventory of Home Anthology, as seen through the eyes of Photographer Rich Dennison. (View larger here).
JACKIE SAUTER, Web Editor
To bundle, or not to bundle
March 13, 2008
While the practice of “bundling” services is commonplace in many industries, such as food service (think McDonald’s Happy Meal) or the new car industry, where various options are thrown together for one price instead of sold separately, I never thought that the plastic surgery business was an industry where I would find services bundled.
I was wrong.
A news release issued by Dr. Eric Chang, owner of Columbia Aesthetic Plastic Surgery LLC, in Columbia, though touts a bundling of surgical services “popularly known” as a “Mommy Makeover.” The service is aimed at mothers looking to restore to “restore a woman’s pre-pregnancy body.”
“Mommy Makeovers are tailored to the individual needs of each patient, but usually combine tummy tuck with a breast enhancement surgery like breast lift, breast enlargement, or breast reduction to recontour women’s bodies that have begun to stretch and sag after pregnancy,” Chang said in the release.
According to Chang, the procedures are making up an increasing share of his practice.
Do you think this is a valid response to an underserved market?
Should he bundle a selection of services for male clients as well? Why not have men tag along and go for something like a “pre-wedding makeover?”
Or, why not target both and make a “parent makeover” bundle?
BEN MOOK, Assistant Business Editor
Sphere: Related ContentMd. pizza supplier donates to week-long food drive
March 4, 2008
Maybe I’ve just been hungry at work, but I feel that pizza’s been in the news a lot lately.
Yesterday, I ran an Uncover story about the rising cost of wheat used to make pizza crusts, which is leading some pizza makers to offer alternative menu choices and consider raising prices. The cost of cheese has also grown.
But that didn’t stop Joe Corbi’s from donating 10,000 pizza kits this week to the Harvest for the Hungry spring food drive. The drive runs through Saturday.
From the press release:
While our country continues to enjoy high economic prosperity, there are still 31 million Americans who are at risk of hunger or malnutrition. To date, Harvest for the Hungry campaigns have collected food and funds worth more than $30,000,000.
“We are thrilled about our ongoing partnership with Joe Corbi’s,” comments Deborah Flateman, CEO of the Maryland Food Bank. “They are one of the organizations that continue to give to the Maryland Food Bank. In these times of financial uncertainty, we must remember that we are all fragile.”
Joe Corbi’s was founded in Columbia, Md., 25 years ago, and has become a popular source of fundraising for PTAs, little league teams and clubs. According to the company Web site, Joe Corbi got his start at the Baltimore Pizza Crust Company, which produced and distributed pizza crusts throughout Maryland.
To participate in this week’s Harvest food drive, leave a bag of non-perishable food by your mailbox and local Boy Scouts, Girl Scouts or Postal Service carriers will pick it up.
JACKIE SAUTER, Web Editor
Sphere: Related ContentSuburban students offered reward to “snitch” on food fight
January 10, 2008
To snitch, or not to snitch: that’s the $30 question, if you’re a student at Wilde Lake High School in Columbia.
The principal offered a $30 reward for the names of the students who started a food fight in December, creating a mess of complaints.
The AP reports, “While the controversy lacks the grit surrounding the “Stop Snitching” street video produced in nearby Baltimore, which warned against cooperating with police in drug investigations, the principal’s offer prompted a discussion over the propriety of such offers.”
Howard County does not have a policy on the issue, but cash rewards have been offered in the past for information on vandals, graffiti incidents and theft.
Baltimore County schools allow cash rewards, if the school superintendent and county police agree. Baltimore city, Anne Arundel and Carroll counties don’t offer them.
JACKIE SAUTER, Multimedia Editor
Sphere: Related ContentThieves get copper-happy in HoCo
December 19, 2007
When I visited Chicago last month, my colleague and I noticed reports of theft of stainless-steel appliances from residential construction sites. My colleague shared that in his hometown of New Orleans, residents often complain of copper pipe thefts from home sites under construction.
Turns out the theft of this valuable metal doesn’t always happen so far from home.
Patuxent Square, a new commercial/residential development in North Laurel, Md., is hiring a night watchman after $10,000 of copper pipe fittings were ripped off at its construction site, the HoCo Times reported last week.
And the Patuxent Square development is just one of many. According to the story, the Howard County Police say copper thefts from county construction sites tripled in October (14 reports) and November (13 reports). At scrap dealers, copper yields about $3.20 per pound.
JACKIE SAUTER, Multimedia Editor
Sphere: Related ContentHoCo chooses civility
September 25, 2007
I was on Route 175 in Columbia last week when I saw an odd bumper sticker on the car in front of me: “Choose Civility in Howard County.”
At first, I thought it was imploring Columbians to be more racially tolerant.
Since the (albeit small) sample of Howard County residents I asked didn’t know, I turned to the local blogosphere.
Sure enough, Hometown Columbia was able to point me in the right direction: Choose Civility is an initiative led by the HoCo Library that “intends to enhance respect, empathy, consideration and tolerance in Howard County.”
Their strategy for doing so? Recommended reading (“Choosing Civility” by P.M. Forni of the Johns Hopkins Civility Project), a Facebook group and car magnets.
At least they’re aiming near and far.
Anyone out there involved in this initiative care to comment? Are people in Hoco becoming more civil, or are those involved already the pillars of civility?
I, for one, will honk for joy if area drivers truly mend their ways.
-JACKIE SAUTER, Multimedia Editor
Sphere: Related ContentWhere everyone (at the designer-discount store) knows your name
September 19, 2007
A Filene’s Basement opened Wednesday morning in Columbia.
In yet another area where many of the residents seemingly can afford to pay full-price, the new designer-discount store will offer Ralph Lauren sweater sets and the like for just $29.99.
| View Larger Map |
Although it’s been six years since I lived in Howard County, when I visit now, it looks like a rival sibling of a Montgomery County town.
You know what I mean — how you can’t walk 25 yards without passing a Panera Bread or seeing a little kid decked out in Crocs.
It used to be a refuge, with less traffic, less development, less pressure, less people.
Anyone love the new Columbia?
-JACKIE SAUTER, Multimedia Editor
Sphere: Related ContentUncontrollable growth?
September 13, 2007
The immigrant population in the Baltimore area grew by almost 40 percent between 2000 and 2006, the Baltimore Sun and the Census Bureau reported Wednesday.
In those same six years, the immigrant population in Howard County alone increased by a whopping 59 percent.
With all the talk of development due to BRAC, has the state been preparing for the infastructure changes that this increase in population demands?
Is the state of Maryland really prepared to handle this massive influx of new residents?
-JACKIE SAUTER, Multimedia Editor
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