How to make online ads more effective

How to simplify your slate of product names

Dear Karen: Our business has a lot of products with names all over the map. How can we simplify?

June checkup can help ensure your firm is healthy

It's time for a midyear checkup.

Electric-powered radio control planes are taking off

When Greg Stone flies his model airplanes in Irvine at Orange County Great Park — fittingly on the site of the former El Toro Marine...

Advice: How work-at-home parents can keep kids at bay

Dear Karen: My kids are signed up for day camps this summer. How else can I keep them busy while working at home?

Small-business advice: Don't face IRS auditors alone

Dear Karen: You answered a question about getting an IRS notice. What if you're being audited?

Operations menu can help eatery's sales heat up

Kevin Reynolds is hoping for a long, hot summer.

How I Made It: Scott Hauge

The job: Advocating in Sacramento for small companies. Hauge is president of Small Business California, a San Francisco...

More small businesses are offering health benefits to workers

Major insurers around the country are reporting that a growing number of small businesses are signing up to give their workers health...

Coffee-roasting brood keeps L.A. ethnic communities brewing

The coffee beans roasted, ground, packaged and shipped out of the F. Gaviña & Sons Inc. factory in Vernon are as diverse as the...

Flying Pigeon LA peddles bike culture north of downtown

On the third Sunday of each month, a dozen or so people pedal out of Highland Park atop steel-frame bikes straight out of the Chinese...

A friend to L.A.'s best old buildings

The gig: Founder and principal of Levin & Associates Architects, a Los Angeles firm that specializes in historic building...

Find new start-ups through entrepreneurship groups

Dear Karen: My firm helps start-ups with marketing strategies. How can we reach them early on, before our competitors do?

Inviting a Wal-Mart into Florence-Firestone

The little tortilleriatortilleria, hidden away in the Florence-Firestone neighborhood near Watts, could be mistaken for a...

Time bank takes root in Echo Park

ANE CRABTREE, a costume designer and stylist, was on location in Bulgaria when a professional chef e-mailed to say she'd be happy to give...

SBA wish list seeks rules reform

For many small-business owners, it can seem as though federal bureaucrats do little more than churn out reams of mind-numbing regulations...

Think chocolate can't get any better? These Willy Wonkas beg to differ

Meet the new Willy Wonka: Timothy Childs is a former space shuttle technologist who's building a 29,000-square-foot chocolate factory on...

A formula for expanding successfully

Gabrielle DeSantis-Cummings and Monica Hillman are on the hunt for about $250,000 to quickly expand their small company, Gigi Hill, which...

Tote-bag firm Gigi Hill is thinking bigger

It started with a $10 tote.