Global marketplace opportunities that exist within our local economy will be topic at the 15th annual meeting of the Economic Development Collaborative-Ventura County. Read more: http://www.vcstar.com/news/2012/jan/13/global-opportunities/#ixzz1jf1ie7ip - vcstar.com ...[MORE]

by  Staff

Source:  The Ventura County Star

Oxnard wireless communications provider CalAmp Corp. announced Thursday it will provide its Viper radios to Mexico and its 31 states and federal district. Read more: http://www.vcstar.com/news/2012/jan/05/calamp-corp-in-oxnard-to-distribute-radios-and/#ixzz1jNIhT9Wr - vcstar.com ...[MORE]

by  From staff reports

Source:  The Ventura County Star

There is a sense of timelessness at the Scissors and Comb barbershop in Oxnard, where customers fill chairs from the 1930s, '40s and '50s as an old-fashioned barber pole swirls in the corner and photos of Ronald Reagan and Plaza Park in 1908 line the walls. Read more: http://www.vcstar.com/news/2011/dec/28/scissors-and-comb-uses-team-approach-to-build-of/#ixzz1hxyAps5w - vcstar.com ...[MORE]

by  Anne Kallas

Source:  The Ventura County Star

Opening a store during an economic downturn might seem risky, but Edna Esfeld of Camarillo believes the time is right. Esfeld has opened Office Center Furniture and Supplies at 321 South C St., Suite 100, in downtown Oxnard after years of running her office supply business from her home. Read more: http://www.vcstar.com/news/2011/dec/22/office-center-furniture-and-supplies-opens-in/#ixzz1hlVksKO6 - vcstar.com ...[MORE]

by  Anne Kallas

Source:  The Ventura County Star

A Massachusetts woman has accepted the job of executive director for the Oxnard Harbor District after the slot was vacated in October, the district's president said Thursday. Read more: http://www.vcstar.com/news/2011/dec/22/oxnard-harbor-district-hires-new-executive/#ixzz1hlVIF66i - vcstar.com ...[MORE]

by  John Scheibe

Source:  The Ventura County Star

The garden was dedicated Thursday, with local dignitaries, hospital staff members, foundation board members and members of the Hiji family, the primary donors, in attendance. Read more: http://www.vcstar.com/news/2011/dec/08/st-johns-regional-medical-center-dedicates-a/#ixzz1g5Kz0VhW - vcstar.com ...[MORE]

by  Mark Storer

Source:  The Ventura County Star

Pacific Shore Stones of Oxnard will host a grand opening from noon to 5 p.m. Friday at 3130 Paseo Mercado. The exotic-stone distributor invites representatives of local communities and industry professionals to the opening of its fifth California-based location and its 11th distribution center in the nation. Read more: http://www.vcstar.com/news/2011/nov/30/business-brief/#ixzz1fnjfJNjU - vcstar.com ...[MORE]

 

Source:  The Ventura County Star

Ventura County's unemployment rate returned to single digits in October with 2,800 farm jobs added, the state Employment Development Department reported Friday. Read more: http://www.vcstar.com/news/2011/nov/18/ventura-county-unemployment-dips-below-10/#ixzz1eNgASXs8 - vcstar.com

by  Stephanie Hoops

Source:  The Ventura County Star

County Commerce Bank reported record earnings for the third quarter 2011. Total assets were $182.9 million, an 8.6 percent increase from third quarter, 2010. Total deposits were $160.5 million, an 8.1 percent increase from the third quarter of 2010. Read more: http://www.vcstar.com/news/2011/nov/19/ventura-county-local-business-briefs/#ixzz1eNfVnO18 - vcstar.com ...[MORE]

by  Staff Reports

Source:  The Ventura County Star

The county's newest Lowe's will be in the Carriage Square shopping center at the northwest corner of Oxnard Boulevard and Gonzales Road. What was a rundown shopping center — with a shuttered movie theater and grocery store — was largely vacant for several years. Read more: http://www.vcstar.com/news/2011/oct/31/lowes-in-oxnard-to-open-before-christmas/#ixzz1dzmfeobf - vcstar.com ...[MORE]

by  Stephanie Hoops

Source:  The Ventura County Star

The Juice It Up smoothie and juice bar chain plans to open up to five stores in Ventura County in the next 18 months, with three possible locations in Ventura, including downtown. Read more: http://www.vcstar.com/news/2011/oct/25/smoothie-juice-bar-chain-plans-to-expand-in/#ixzz1d9HcsN6c - vcstar.com ...[MORE]

by  Amy Bentley

Source:  The Ventura County Star

OXNARD — Mission Produce Inc. has signed an agreement to acquire a 50 percent interest in Cabilfrut S.A. of Santiago Chile. Mission Produce, based in Oxnard, has avocado packing, processing, and distribution operations in the United States, Mexico and Canada. Read more: http://www.vcstar.com/news/2011/oct/25/local-business-briefs/#ixzz1cOUeTlbx - vcstar.com ...[MORE]

 

Source:  The Ventura County Star

Sam Sadove said it was one too many snowstorms and car accidents that drove him to start looking for a new place to settle after having been a partner in three marinas in the Hamptons on Long Island, N.Y. Sadove has acquired a master lease for a Ventura Harbor property, which includes the former Anchors Way boatyard, a small marina, the building that housed the former Scotch & Sirloin restaurant, a dry-storage area, offices, the Ventura Sportfishing building and surrounding grounds. Read more: http://www.vcstar.com/news/2011/oct/05/sadoves-has-big-plans-for-ventura-harbor-marina/#ixzz1a2K0cPj9 - vcstar.com ...[MORE]

by  Anne Kallas

Source:  The Ventura County Star

One of Ventura County's largest and oldest farming companies will move soon into a new $10 million-plus building that will more than double its ability to cool, process and pack its huge array of vegetable crops. Read more: http://www.vcstar.com/news/2011/oct/01/deardorff-family-farms-preps-to-move-in-to-10/#ixzz1ZqqfXBln - vcstar.com

by  Jim McLain

Source:  The Ventura County Star

International music, worldwide dance traditions and thousands of people joined to celebrate Oxnard's 16th annual Multicultural Festival Saturday in downtown's Plaza Park. Read more: http://www.vcstar.com/news/2011/oct/01/oxnard-festival-celebrates-cultures/#ixzz1Zqq0GSWz - vcstar.com ...[MORE]

by  Donna Griffin

Source:  The Ventura County Star

When it comes to jobs in Ventura County, the highest-paying work is in categories such as legal, management and engineering, but many county jobs are concentrated in careers that pay less than $20 an hour. The latest occupational employment and wages data released by the Bureau of Labor Statistics shows areas of opportunity for the county, which had a 10.3 percent unemployment rate in June, but also challenges for those seeking jobs. Read more: http://www.vcstar.com/news/2011/aug/18/occupation-and-wage-data-shows-opportunities-for/#ixzz1YWvAq7JU - vcstar.com ...[MORE]

by  Allison Bruce

Source:  Ventura County Star

With its gleaming parking lot under the store, shaded cart and human escalator, and wraparound windows in a cafe area that leads to a patio, Oxnard's new 149,000-square-foot Target store impressed customers on its first day of business Wednesday. Read more: http://www.vcstar.com/news/2011/jul/20/residents-welcome-new-target-store-at-oxnards/#ixzz1YWtHRffU - vcstar.com ...[MORE]

by  Anne Kallas

Source:  Ventura County Star

David Zasloff never set out to design footwear. But when he started discussing making better shoes for beach soccer, his internal engineer got hooked. What happened was Sockwa, an Oxnard-based company that builds sock-like shoes that can be worn at the beach and on the street. Zasloff has started and run a business before, so he brought that experience to the company. Read more: http://www.vcstar.com/news/2011/aug/06/oxnard-company-changing-shoes-from-the-soles-up/#ixzz1YWsCNDqq - vcstar.com ...[MORE]

by  Allison Bruce

Source:  Ventura County Star

With impassioned support from several business owners and a Cliff Notes summary of its accomplishments, backers of the semi-public Economic Development Corporation of Oxnard pushed back against recent criticism of the organization. A week ago critics hammered EDCO, with one person saying the organization acted like a "shadow government," and others questioning its use of public money to help businesses navigate leases, relocation issues and permits. But this week, supporters said the critics were wrong and shortsighted. EDCO Executive Director Steve Kinney argued the organization bent over backward to be transparent. "I don't know how we could be more transparent," Kinney said Tuesday night at a City Council meeting. He said the 17-year-old organization abides by the Brown Act, the state's open meeting law; complies with public records requests, and makes available its check registry every month. The group was also criticized for recently deciding to change its by-laws to accommodate board members who wanted to continue to participate in the organization but didn't want to be forced to disclose their clients. The reporting of financial interests is a requirement for public entities, to avoid potential conflicts of interest. The EDCO board decided to create an advisory committee. Those on the committee wouldn't have voting power or be able to deliberate on the organizations business, but would still have an opportunity to participate, Kinney said. They wouldn't have to report financial interests. The criticism appears to have stemmed from erroneous information, Kinney said. Some of it was triggered by an overture made to activists who have been working for decades to protect the ravaged wetlands at Ormond Beach in south Oxnard. A consultant who portrayed himself as working with EDCO suggested activists consider letting some of the property they wanted restored to be used as a cold storage facility. The Star originally reported the consultant was a representative of EDCO. Kinney said that was not true. The consultant didn't work for EDCO nor did EDCO have a position on the idea. Shirley Godwin and her husband, Larry, who had talked to the consultant, said the confusion was over the use of the word "for" instead of the word "with," saying the consultant had told her he had been talking with EDCO. Beyond that issue, supporters of the group said that it has played a hugely important role in attracting and retaining businesses in Oxnard. David Feigin, owner of the historic Woolworth Building downtown, said he wouldn't have been able to succeed as a commercial property owner in Oxnard without EDCO's help. "I do not have the skills and knowledge to navigate the necessary steps to get approvals and permits," Feigin said. "EDCO has those skills. Steve (Kinney) and Elizabeth (Callaghan, EDCO vice president), I just want to go over and hug them." Magda Weydt, owner of the cafe Fresh and Fabulous in downtown Oxnard, said she owed a lot of her four years in business in Oxnard to help from EDCO. Another supporter of the organization, real estate broker Rick Ross, gave a long list of businesses that moved to commercial spaces in the city and brought jobs because of EDCO. One of those companies, Harbor Freight, the city's third largest employer, is now considering a move. But EDCO is working to try and modernize the facility to entice them to stay, according to Ross.

by  Scott Hadly

Source:  Ventura County Star

The Kitchen's 'grastropub' fare is fine for downtown Oxnard. Cathie Moreno and Lydia Galbraith opened the Oxnard restaurant The Kitchen in October, four years after a chance meeting at a home tour led to a friendship based on a shared love of good food, local wines and craft beers. But what’s really surprising, the women say, is that they didn’t meet several years sooner. Both grew up in Oxnard, helping out at their respective family-owned businesses at Channel Islands Harbor. They both also graduated from Villanova Preparatory School in Ojai, albeit four years apart. “Our paths crossed, but it was never the right timing, I guess,” Galbraith said. Still, the timing for The Kitchen, a “gastropub” that serves sliders, fried green beans and ginger-shoyu-glazed salmon with pint glasses of Shock Top and snifters of Firestone Walker Double Jack, could be just about right for taking advantage of Oxnard’s burgeoning restaurant scene, they said. Located in a series of rooms that link the 500 blocks of South A and B streets, the combination bakery (red velvet cupcakes are a specialty), cafe and beer-and-wine bar is one of more than a dozen eateries already signed on to participate in the inaugural Oxnard International Restaurant Week from Jan. 21. Further, it will be ideally located should plans for a proposed international food marketplace on B Street ever come to fruition, said Moreno. “All we have to do is wait 15 years,” she added with a laugh. In the meantime, she and Galbraith are presenting multicourse wine dinners in the dining room, booking special events in the attached banquet hall and planning the first in a series of on-site brewing classes for Saturday. They hope to eventually introduce a line of made-in-Oxnard strawberry jams and other gourmet food items that tourists can purchase as culinary souvenirs after going whale watching and wine tasting in the region. “You could say that entrepreneurship runs in our genes,” Moreno said. Moreno’s mother, Gerry Moreno, operated the deli and cafe La Dolce Vita in Hollywood Beach for more than 30 years. Her sister, Michelle Kelley, moved a second La Dolce Vita location from Port Hueneme to a renovated farmhouse in Oxnard’s Heritage Square in 2005. Gerry now makes occasional appearances at both daughters’ restaurants, helping out when an extra pair of hands is needed. Galbraith’s family, meanwhile, ran a sport-fishing business that now is associated with Island Packers. But that doesn’t mean she didn’t also come from a food-service background. “I definitely put in my time as a galley girl,” Galbraith said. After attending college in San Francisco, Galbraith earned her graduate degree in the combined subjects of philosophy and theology at Oxford University. She remained in England for seven years, some of them spent teaching. While there, she became enamoured with gastropubs, the mash-up term for pubs where the menu is several gastronomical notches above the usual steak-and-kidney pie. “Think of them as pubs distinct from the ‘bar scene,’” she said. Neighbors become friends When she returned to Ventura County in 2003, Galbraith bought a home in the Henry T. Oxnard Historic District, one street over from where Moreno already was living. The year that Moreno was chairwoman of the Autumn Home Tour, an event organized as a fundraiser for local beautification projects, also was the year Galbraith agreed to put her house on the tour. The women met and clicked. They found the site that would become The Kitchen by accident, while on a wine tour that included a stop at the A Street space previously home to the organic Mexican restaurant Barroco’s. It immediately reminded Galbraith of the gastropubs she’d seen in Europe. Moreno, meanwhile, was taken by the enormous kitchen: After studying international relations at CSU Chico State, she started a catering business called Cat in the Kitchen and was looking for a larger space. Traveling through Germany and sampling craft beers with boyfriend Scott Milles, an avid home brewer, primed her for Galbraith’s idea of opening a gastropub, Moreno said. Former seat of power The location had been a popular hangout for Oxnard’s movers and shakers in the 1980s, when the raised dining area at the center of the 7,000-square-foot building was known as the Board Room, said Moreno. She and Galbraith recarpeted that room in a mock-tiger design and used books from their personal collections to fill the shelves on the wood-paneled walls. The dark paneling extends into the bar area, giving that space an Old World feel. They both liked the idea of creating a place where women could feel comfortable stopping in for a beer or glass of wine by themselves or with friends, Galbraith said. Another plus: The Kitchen is close enough for their neighbors to walk over and visit several times a week. “We’d hoped to create a cozy place that people would come to see as their home away from home,” Moreno said, “and that is totally happening.” Read more: http://www.vcstar.com/news/2011/jan/01/situated-for-success/#ixzz1ACMTuJmP - vcstar.com

by  Lisa McKinnon

Source:  Ventura County Star

The medical device industry is one of growth and innovation, and a new Oxnard company is playing a key design and manufacturing role behind the scenes. Although IntriMed Technologies launched only this year and is still getting equipment installed in its prototyping and manufacturing rooms, the company has the benefit of experts and manufacturing space at its sister company, IntriPlex Technologies in Santa Barbara. IntriMed is creating large amounts of tiny components — a key for data storage and increasingly important for medical devices that need to function inside the body. IntriMed leaders talk about the components in terms of “smaller than a red pepper flake” and “the width of four human hairs.” “There’s a general feeling in the country that we don’t make things anymore,” marketing director Gretchen Garnett said as she stood in the high-ceiling space where the company will have three manufacturing lines. “We don’t just make things,” added President Larry Czapla, “we make cool things.” IntriPlex started in 1987 in the data storage industry. The companies are structured as separate entities but have the same CEO and board. The decision was made at the end of last year to open IntriMed, which moved into a 19,800-square-foot Oxnard office and industrial building in May and plans to be manufacturing there by the end of this year, Czapla said. IntriMed focuses on the precision, cleanliness and high-volume manufacturing necessary in both data storage and medical devices, he said. Because it tries to get in on the ground floor to work with companies at the design stage, much of IntriMed’s work is shrouded by nondisclosure agreements. But company leaders are excited about the work and what it could mean for medicine in areas such as minimally invasive surgery, orthopedics and ophthalmology. IntriMed uses specialized equipment to test prototypes to discover flaws early in the process, designing with high-volume manufacturing in mind and seeking the latest materials and processes to offer clients not only what they want but also what they didn’t know they could have, Garnett said. The company runs quality analysis similar to what is found in the aerospace industry to improve reliability, because whether a screw goes into a satellite or a hip joint, manufacturers want to make sure all the variables in play don’t cause a component to fail. IntriMed works with both small companies that need to test an idea to see if it can be manufactured, and major manufacturers that outsource to get better components faster and at less cost. The Oxnard location puts the company in close proximity to clients in the Southern California medical device hub. IntriMed is a member of the Southern California Biomedical Council, an industry association called SoCalBio. SoCalBio’s map of firms in Santa Barbara and Ventura counties shows about 60 medical device companies. Although dated, 2004 data from the association show 28,304 workers and 864 establishments in the medical device and equipment industry in the Los Angeles Metro Area, which includes Ventura County. The area ranked first in medical device and equipment employment among large metro regions. Big industry statewide A 2010 report based on the 2007 Economic Census showed California had nearly 84,000 people employed in the “medical technology industry,” with $26.3 billion in annual sales. IntriMed has worked with the Economic Development Corp. of Oxnard and the Economic Development Collaborative — Ventura County. “We’re delighted to have them here in Oxnard,” said Steven Kinney, EDCO president. He said the company hits the “sweet spot” of desirable corporate residents, bringing higher-wage jobs into the community. Oxnard has several other medical device companies. “The more we can add to that cluster of like companies here in the city, it increases our chances of attracting even more of them in the future,” he said. The move into Oxnard is a strong endorsement of Ventura County’s broad distribution of labor skills for the company’s high-end technical and production staffing, said Bruce Stenslie, EDC-VC president. The county has a good high-tech labor force to draw upon, Czapla agreed. Fast growth foreseen IntriMed has about 15 employees and could grow to 45 to 60 employees in coming years, Czapla said. Those jobs include engineering, technicians, quality and compliance, and toolmakers. There is potential for growth with the clients the company now has. That’s because the early work with clients involves design and testing to get to a viable component. The growth comes once manufacturing begins. That could lead to a yearly doubling in size of the company in its early years, Czapla said. An eventual goal is to have regional innovation centers near clients in other parts of the country. Medical component manufacturers are no longer the simple machine shops of the past, Czapla said. “We’ve evolved and are evolving past that strategic model,” he said. On the Net: http://www.intrimed.com

by  Allison Bruce

Source:  Ventura County Star