The cover of the Feb. 21, 2011, edition of the Northern Nevada Business Weekly.
NNBW File
EDITOR’S NOTE: Each week in 2021, we will feature snippets of stories that published a decade ago to provide readers a 10-year perspective of business news in the region. This week’s stories first published in the Feb. 21, 2011, edition of the NNBW.
Impact of athletics: $18.5 million
University of Nevada, Reno athletic programs generated an economic impact of $18.5 million during 2009-2010, finds a newly commissioned analysis.
To put that number into perspective, the five companies that moved to the Reno area in the past eight months with the assistance of the Economic Development Authority of Western Nevada — three manufacturers, a logistics company and a financial firm — generated first-year economic impact of $18.9 million.
Visitors who come to town for athletic events generated about $4.5 million in economic impact during the year that was studied — nearly a quarter of the total impact, reports Brian Bonnenfant of the Center for Regional Studies at the University of Nevada, Reno.
— Page 1, by John Seelmeyer
Walmart appears to be looking once again for Reno-area locations to develop Walmart Neighborhood Market stores, which are similar to traditional grocery stores. The company apparently is looking to develop four or five of the smaller stores, said Roxanne Stevenson, a veteran broker of retail space at Colliers International.
Walmart, which keeps its real estate plans close to the vest, isn’t saying anything. But Douglas Baker, whose Scottsdale-based B.D. Baker Co. handles Walmart site acquisitions in Nevada and Arizona, said the company has opened 11 Neighborhood Market locations in Las Vegas.
“With five Supercenters open in the Reno area and one under construction in Stead, it is only logical in time that we backfill with the Neighborhood Market format,” Baker said.
— Page 1, by John Seelmeyer
A Reno animation company is looking to raise capital to take its business up a couple of notches, money that will allow it take on a feature film and a television series.
Antipode Entertainment Inc., owned by the husband-and-wife team of Dayan and AnnaSheila Paul, has been focused for eight years on meat-and-potatoes animation projects.
The firm and its contractors have developed animation for gaming-equipment manufacturers. They’ve developed programming for digital signs and pre-show advertising in movie theaters. Dayan Paul even created an animated e-card distributed by HDgreetings.
But the company’s owners set their sights higher. They’re looking to raise about $360,000 to move forward with “Da Vinci Jr.,” an animated television program to teach drawing and other creative skills to children.
— Page 5, by John Seelmeyer
