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Consumer Stories

Financial planner has a passion for competitive barbecue

When Kurt Mueller isn’t crunching numbers for clients at Apollon Wealth Management, you can probably find him flipping ribs on a smoker. “I know a lot about a little, including financial planning and barbecue,” he said. You don’t usually hear barbecue and talk of money in one sentence unless you own a restaurant that serves the South’s revered food of choice. “I fell in love with grilling as a kid when my dad taught me to grill on an old-school Weber, the kind found in just about everybody’s backyard. Then

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Mitzi Oxford December 21, 2022 No Comments
Closings

Stay. Social, Tap + Table closing for good

“It’s time,” said Renee Hajek yesterday in advance of a social media post, announcing the permanent closing of her restaurant and bar, Stay. Social, Tap + Table, in Evans across from the Lady A. The stress of fighting for her liquor license for about three months took its toll. At issue was whether Hajek obtained more than 50 percent of her sales from food, the requirement after she received a grant and loan money from Columbia County to open Stay. It started with a 4-1 vote by the County Commission

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Neil Gordon December 21, 2022 No Comments
B2B Stories

Copper recycler doubles size of Augusta plant, creates more jobs

A new company in the Augusta area is already expanding its facilities before it has finished construction. Aurubis AG, a European copper recycler, has been working on a new facility in Augusta Corporate Park since June, as reported in ABD here. But on Tuesday, the company announced it will invest more money to double the size. Aurubis announced its plans to invest an additional 250 million Euros ($265.8 million U.S.) into the company, which will double its production from 90,000 tons of recycling to 180,000 tons and will hire 75

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Gary Kauffman December 20, 2022 No Comments
Consumer Stories

More than a Quarter of SC’s “lost” workforce choosing not to work, survey finds

One of the big business questions for 2022 has been, Where are all the workers? A survey conducted by South Carolina has found some answers. The state currently has a record 3.3 percent unemployment rate and has about 100,000 unfilled jobs in a wide variety of sectors and positions. To get a better grasp on why those jobs are unfilled, the South Carolina Department of Employment and Workforce conducted a survey of people (more than 150,000) who were employed in 2019 and filed for unemployment in 2020, but failed to

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Gary Kauffman December 20, 2022 No Comments
Consumer Stories

Local business professionals host community lunch, coat drive this week

Many in the CSRA have always had plenty of food and warm winter coats, but this week, two local business professionals are helping those in our community who haven’t been so fortunate. Local Certified Public Accountant, Josue Garcia, and certified financial planner, Kurt Mueller with Atomic City Smokers, a competition barbecue team that also provides catering services, will host a free lunch for the community on Friday from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. at Garcia’s office located at 705 Edgefield Road in North Augusta. All it takes to enjoy the

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Josh Heath December 20, 2022 No Comments
B2B Stories

Expanding networks – the gift that keeps on giving

By the time you read this, there will be only four more shopping days until Christmas, only six days left in Hanukkah, and 10 days until the last day, the giving day, of Kwanzaa. Some of you may be considering giving a gift to someone in your business circle. However, there are often concerns about the appropriateness of giving a material gift to your boss, subordinate, colleague, or people you work with in other companies such as vendors/suppliers or distributors. In this season of giving and gratitude, why not give

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Dr. Richard Franza December 20, 2022 No Comments
B2B Stories

Simon Says: Future trends: Transportation, healthcare support jobs to grow in next decade

In my annual economic forecast presentation a couple of weeks ago, I looked forward to 2023, which I covered in this column last week. I also took a longer timeline through 2031 to see what our economy would look like using Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) occupational projections. There are 22 major occupational groups tracked by the BLS and the charts below show the changes in the top 12 major groups that account for 85 percent of jobs locally. There are several things of interest. First, the top 12 major

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Dr. Simon Medcalfe, AU Economics Professor December 20, 2022 No Comments
Consumer Stories

Local businesses sponsor families at Christmas airport event

On Saturday, Santa Claus came a little earlier than usual for many local children from underprivileged families, thanks to help from the CSRA business community. The Augusta Regional Airport and Richmond County Marshal’s Office hosted the fifth annual Santa’s Fly-In to provide toys for 136 kids from 40 families. “We partner with Augusta Partnership for Children, Inc. and work with local businesses and individuals,” said the airport’s Assistant Director of Marketing and Public Relations, Lauren Smith. “This is our biggest year yet, and we hope to continue growing.” Business sponsors

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Story and photos by Josh Heath December 19, 2022 No Comments
B2B Stories

Holidays bring out online scammers, teens increasingly vulnerable

CSRA residents, like millions of Americans, enjoy the ease of online shopping. But that trend also brings out criminals trying to capitalize on that appeal by running scams and, surprisingly, the fastest growing victim group is teenagers. The South Carolina Law Enforcement Department (SLED) said the end of the year is especially rife with scams and fraud. According to Social Catfish, in the past five years, the number of teenage victims of scams has increased by 1,125 percent and in 2021 resulted in a loss of $101.4 million. Those over

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Gary Kauffman December 19, 2022 No Comments
Digital Marketing

Free Access: The New Year: Time to tidy up your online presence

First off, Merry Christmas CSRA! 2022 is just about to end, and it is time to make sure your online presence is ready for 2023. How do you do that, you ask? We have got you covered! Go to https://grouprb.com/get-your-free-online-audit-report/ and run a free assessment of your online presence. You will get a report back that gives you a feel for how your business is performing in seven categories: listings, reviews, social media, website usability, e-commerce, online advertising, and SEO (search engine optimization). Below is a sample summary. Each of

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Richard Brashear December 19, 2022 No Comments
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