While browsing in a shop in 2009, 6-year-old Allison Prestwich saw a candle made by the Tyler Candle Co., and she wondered aloud if it was named after her younger brother.

Anna Azevedo enjoyed gardening and doing good for the planet. So it was a natural extension for her to start a business sprouting and potting air-cleansing houseplants in glass containers.

The equation is easy to understand: A weak economy equals challenging business conditions equals reduced corporate support for nonprofits. Understandable, yes, but terribly unfortunate — and, I’m convinced, not particularly good business.

The enterprising minds behind the Sacramento Arts and Business Council and The Urban Hive believe growing artistic businesses in the Capital Region is key to economic success. So, to plant and nurture such endeavors, the organizations last month launched Flywheel Creative Economy Incubator.

Kim Parker, 46, is the executive vice president of the California Employers Association. A nonprofit, the CEA provides human resource solutions for small to medium-sized businesses throughout the state. Parker is also president of the national Employers Association of America. 

Fluff the pillows and stock the fridge because, chances are, your adult kids are coming home. Nearly one-third of Americans age 25 to 34 have lived with their parents in recent years, according to a 2011 study by Pew Research Center. But before you start blaming a generation of millennials — known for their unearned trophies and sense of entitlement — remember it’s the generations past who wrought an economy with tuition hikes and growing unemployment.

Gov. Jerry Brown’s tax measure would raise sales taxes by one-quarter of a percent for four years and increase taxes on incomes of $250,000 or higher by 1 to 3 percentage points for seven years.

Product and company branding is more complex than a logo, a slogan and a catchy marketing campaign. Branding is the way consumers talk about your product or service, how they remember you and how they expect you to behave.

At a conference in China in November 2010, Harris Lewin and Richard Michelmore approached Jian Wang, the president of global genetics company BGI, with an informal question: Could they interest the world’s largest genomics research institute in building a lab at UC Davis?

On a morning in April, eight representatives of local banks and credit unions walked into the Sacramento Metro Chamber headquarters to discuss the region’s lousy credit situation.

Developers looking to build in the Capital Region are finding cash in emerging green-financing products.

Like so many recent law school graduates, Seth Benkle searched vainly for a job after graduating from the University of the Pacific McGeorge School of Law in Sacramento in 2010, increasingly stressed about his $160,000 in student loans, interest accruing.

John O’Malley is the recruiting partner at Sacramento’s largest law firm, Downey Brand, which was founded nearly a century ago and employs more than 120 lawyers in five regional offices, 103 of them in Sacramento.

Immediately south and southeast of Elk Grove are thousands of acres of mostly undeveloped farmland that officials think the city will someday need. The plan is to add nearly 8,000 acres — about 29 percent of Elk Grove’s current size — to its fold. But critics say Elk Grove has plenty of unused land within its borders, and California is losing farmland fast.

Life often has been unkind to economic development directors since California put its redevelopment agencies out of business last year. Randy Starbuck tells it first hand.