Nathan Skid
05/21/12
Construction is set to begin on a rooftop bar called Topless, which will be built on top of The Detroit Pub on the outskirts of Greektown at 1326 Brush St.
And even though its name would suggest it, it is not a topless bar.
The name is a play on the fact that Topless will be an open-air, seasonal bar.
Topless is expected to be open in time for the Detroit Tigers' first home playoff game, if they make it to the playoffs.
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Sherri Welch
05/18/12
Goodwill Industries of Greater Detroit is facing opposition to its first choice of location for an upscale thrift store from yet another local community.
The West Bloomfield Township Zoning Board of Appeals Tuesday night denied Goodwill's request to put a store on Northwestern Highway at Orchard Lake Road in space that Witbeck Home Appliance Mart is vacating.
The decision came after the board tabled a vote on the project at its April 17 meeting to give its members more time to gather information on
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Tom Henderson
05/11/12
Curiouser and curiouser is the ongoing epic tale of the downfall and sale, no sale, maybe sale of the assets of Auburn Hills-based Energy Conversion Devices Inc. (OTC: ENERQ.PK), the long-struggling maker of photovoltaic roofing materials.
Monday afternoon, ECD officials announced that they had canceled Tuesday's auction of its assets — primarily its United Solar Ovonic LLC subsidiary, which makes the flexible roofing materials that have driven company profits, and losses, in recent
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Tom Henderson
05/10/12
Good research news comes out of the University of Michigan in threes this week.
1. It was announced Monday that UM researchers discovered a cell in mice called T2M that appears to play a key role in causing asthma symptoms even in the presence of a steroid intended to make breathing easier.
According to their research, published in the journal Nature Medicine, the T2M cell originates in bone marrow and responds to signals from a molecule called interleukin 25, a
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Bill Shea - Sports Business
05/10/12
The latest fad statistic pushed by the college football-industrial complex is utterly meaningless spring game attendance statistics (link).
Ohio State is trumpeting that 81,112 fans saw the Buckeyes spring game on April 21, tops among BCS teams.
Michigan was 17th with 25,000, and Michigan State was 20th with 21,000, according to a new list
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Tom Henderson
05/03/12
University of Michigan researchers are celebrating the news that their second line of human embryonic stem cells has been placed on the U.S. National Institutes of Health's registry, which makes them available for federally funded research nationwide.
Those opposed to such research are no doubt upset at what they perceive as the lack of sanctity for human life.
The facts behind this second line strike me as making an utterly compelling argument that, in
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Sherri Welch
05/03/12
A small but influential local nonprofit is attracting financial support and attention from several high-profile funders.
The Women's Caring Program recently attracted a $300,000 grant over three years from the DTE Energy Foundation and a $50,000 grant from the Community Foundation for Southeast Michigan.
Local philanthropist Marjorie Fisher, widow of Max Fisher, her son Phillip Fisher and daughter Julie Fisher Cummings also made a $50,000 challenge grant to WCP to help fund operations and spur additional
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Bill Shea - Sports Business
05/02/12
The Detroit Tigers are playing "Dead Moneyball" again.
This time, it's third baseman Brandon Inge that's collecting a paycheck from the Tigers to play for another team.
The Tigers released Inge on April 26 after 12 seasons, the past few being an atrocious nightmare at the plate for him, the team and the fans. He was made expendable by Miguel Cabrera not being a complete disaster when he moved to third base -- Inge's old job -- when Prince
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Nathan Skid
05/02/12
The guys over at B. Nektar Meadery in Ferndale have done it again.
Last year, they came up with Zombie Killer — a mead made from apple cider, wildflower honey and tart cherries, which became an instant hit and the company couldn't keep up with demand.
This year, they have come up with Evil Genius, an India pale ale-style mead with the sharp bitterness of a traditional IPA but drink s a little lighter.
Founders Brad Dahlhofer and Paul Zimmerman
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Dustin Walsh
05/02/12
Crain's has learned that Ford Motor Co. is orchestrating a deal to create one of Southeast Michigan's largest minority-owned suppliers as part of selling its Saline interiors plant.
An unidentified source said Ford required Faurecia North America to create a minority-owned supplier joint venture in exchange for a nearly $1 billion book of business at the Saline plant.
The joint venture, Detroit Manufacturing Systems LLC, was created with Wayne-
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Tom Henderson
05/02/12
That is, as we used to say once upon a time in the news biz, a man-bites-dog story.
One thing we currently say at Crain's is: One doesn't make a trend. At the dailies, these days, to our amusement here, one is sometimes all it takes to make a trend story and a big headline. But here it takes three examples of something, at a minimum, to allow you to pitch a trend story to editors.
So this isn't a trend story, yet. But it does qualify as a dog-biter.
Here's the
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Nathan Skid
05/01/12
John Lambrecht, the owner of Bookies Bar & Grill behind the Fox Theatre and Fountain Bistro in Campus Martius, plans a major food truck rally on Cinco de Mayo in the area directly behind Bookies.
Lambrecht said five food trucks have signed up so far, and the event will include dancing and live music.
The party starts at 2 p.m. and runs through midnight.
Lambrecht was also in charge of coordinating the Opening Day
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Dustin Walsh
05/01/12
Faurecia North America is the minority stakeholder in Rush Group's joint venture, Detroit Manufacturing Systems LLC.
The two were able to strike a deal after the North American arm of the French supplier closed its union negotiations in Saline, an unnamed source says. Faurecia has been negotiating to acquire the former Ford/Visteon plant in Saline from Automotive Components Holdings since August.
This
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Tom Henderson
04/27/12
A fellow Luddite wrote a front-page article for last Sunday's New York Times titled "The Flight from Conversation." It was written by MIT Professor Sherry Turkle, whose recent book will give you a clue to content: Alone Together: Why We Expect More from Technology and Less from Each Other.
The second-to-last paragraph of her piece will give you a clue, too:
"I spend the summers at a cottage on Cape Cod, and for decades I walked the same dunes that Thoreau once walked. Not too
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Bill Shea - Sports Business
04/26/12
In March, the Detroit Lions gave wide receiver Calvin Johnson an eight-year, $132 million deal that made him the highest-paid player in the National Football League.
Yesterday, Johnson was voted by fans to appear on the cover of wildly popular EA Sports video game Madden '13.
That's
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Sherri Welch
04/25/12
A new international film festival in the works for Ann Arbor won't detract from the 50-year Ann Arbor Film Festival.
In fact, it should help create a stronger film culture in the region, said Donald Harrison, executive director of the Ann Arbor Film Festival, in an email sent from England where he today he was presenting the Ann Arbor Film Festival traveling tour at a university just outside of Liverpool.
(Harrison said he anticipates more than 50 stops for the tour internationally over the next 10 months.
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Tom Henderson
04/24/12
Here are three pieces of good news to brighten up a Tuesday:
No. 1: Last Friday, Gary Ran, the CEO of Southfield-based Telemus Capital Partners LLC, a wealth management firm, was named the top financial adviser in Michigan by Barron’s, ranking No. 27 in the U.S.
It was the second straight year in the 27th slot for Ran, who has more than $1.7 billion under management. His typical customer has a net worth of $17 million, and the average account is about $2.8
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Tom Henderson
05/17/12
There's the glass ceiling, which provides a barrier to women reaching the upper echelon of management. And then there's the gold ceiling, which provides a really strong, nearly impenetrable barrier to the very pinnacles of upper management.
According to Equilar, an executive compensation firm based in California, of the top 50 highest-paid CEOs at public U.S. companies in 2011, only one — Meg Whitman, the CEO at Palo Alto, Calif.-based Hewlett-Packard Co. — is a woman.
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Jay Greene
04/25/12
Some 117 scientists and researchers from 11 universities and colleges in Michigan have penned a letter to the state's 17-member congressional delegation urging them to prevent proposed legislation that could reverse tough new regulations on mercury emissions and other air toxins adopted last December by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.
The federal Mercury and Air Toxics Standard will help "protect and clean the air we breathe, assure that local fish are safer to eat, and protect and preserve the wildlife and natural
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Nancy Kaffer
04/20/12
Everyone loves tax time, right? Greatest time of the year?
No, I didn't think so. I don't care for doing my taxes much, either. And don't even get me started on what a giant pain it is if your husband sells exactly one share of stray stock from his employer that he got in 2002 and can't recall the cost basis of.
Still, I do 'em, because I'm a depressingly responsible adult.
So you can imagine my surprise when, chatting with a group of friends and acquaintances a few
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