Tell friends that you and your spouse are planning to start a business together, and they might set the red flags flying.  But despite potential pitfalls, it’s estimated that about 1.4 million U.S. businesses are jointly owned and operated by married couples, who have to make all that togetherness work. “People have made comments: ‘This is amaz ...

When Taner Basaga opened Basaga International at the Port of Wilmington last year, it was the second time he would turn things around at the riverfront wood chip facility.     The first time was in 2011 when he restarted operations at the facility “from scratch” while working for a Turkish-based company, Yildiz Entegre. “It was abandoned, ...

Boombalatti’s Homemade Ice Cream became a local favorite when it first opened in The Forum on Military Cutoff Road in 1999. When Wes and Kristen Bechtel decided to take the reins in 2015, they kept the name but decided to make it more of an experience. “We saw immediate growth right off the bat,” Wes Bechtel said. “We honed in on our customer ser ...

Motorized pulley manufacturer, Rulmeca Corp., has expanded its production line thanks to a yearlong expansion effort.  This fall, the firm’s electric autoclave manufacturer, Bondtech, commissioned a new machine and trained production staff on how to use it to bring a new capability in-house. The new equipment enables Rulmeca to offer more motorized pulley opt ...

While economic factors such as inflation and interest rate changes are expected to impact several sectors in the Wilmington area this year, some signs and local professionals in those industries show optimism about the possibility of continued growth.  The real estate market in New Hanover, Brunswick and Pender counties this year won’t look like the start o ...

GE Hitachi Nuclear Energy has submitted a design application for its BWRX-300 small modular reactor (SMR) to the U.K. Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy. The company, headquartered in Wilmington, has been working toward the goal of deploying its BWRX-300 design, which is based on its legacy boiling water reactor models. As GE Hitachi’s first S ...

After two years of life-uprooting curveballs thrown by a global pandemic, the end of 2022 was marked by COVID-19’s near-absence of a presence in daily life.    However, the pandemic’s impacts still reverberate, certainly so in the pressures exerted upon the health care system, which was critically strained this summer.   This year’s rea ...

Many influential local organizations saw leadership changes this year, from newcomers to familiar faces taking over the helm. In July, Aswani Volety started his role as the seventh chancellor of the University of North Carolina Wilmington. Volety previously worked at UNCW, where he served as the dean of the College of Arts and Sciences. Most recently, he served as th ...

Plenty of job openings and fewer applicants this year meant employees held the upper hand while employers offered higher wages, hefty sign-on bonuses and other perks to attract and retain workers. At Novant Health New Hanover Regional Medical Center, hospital officials continued to navigate the nationwide nursing shortage. Burnout from the pandemic prompted nurses to qu ...

A Wilmington brewery with a social impact mission and backing from a large national beer company ceased its operations this year. TRU Colors CEO George Taylor announced the company’s end in September, just a few months after its taproom had opened on Greenfield Street. The company had also been distributing its first beer, TRU Light, at grocery stores and bar ...