Headlines of the Week

Much-anticipated specialty grocery store opens on Western Avenue
Okcbiz.com
Pamela Grady
April 9, 2010

Cheese lovers need not wait any longer. Suzy Thompson and Steve Reynolds opened their new Forward Foods specialty grocery store this afternoon at 5123 N Western Ave.

Taking 3,000 square feet of space, the couple completely renovated and expanded the former CoCo Flow Chocolate Café retail space to open their second shop. They opened their first store at 123 E Main in Norman four years ago. When business began to thrive, they decided it was time to open a second location in the Western Avenue District to cater to their NW Oklahoma City and Nichols Hills customers.

“I credit our architect Brian Fitzsimmons; he really made this space work,” Thompson says. “The floor space is only a little bit bigger than our Norman store, but it’s just so much more carefully used. Hiring Fitzsimmons was very beneficial to us. They were enthusiastic about the project and worked well with our needs and what we needed to have to function properly.”

Thompson says Forward Foods’ second location offers many of the same foods as its Norman shop, including an array of specialty spices, baking ingredients, oils and vinaigrettes, pasta and noodles, Italian sauces, dried beans in bulk, teas, fresh fruits and vegetables, baguettes, honeys, butters and more.

And during its soft opening this afternoon, more than 200 types of cheese will be available for purchase.

“We currently have about 200 varieties of cheese and are about to pick up another 40 at the airport later today,” Thompson says, adding that the cheese types will continuously be rotated in and out. “We’ve had about 500 different cheeses at one time or another.”

Also, the new store will carry a larger variety of cured meats than its Norman site. Roast beef, turkey, chicken and other quality deli meats will be offered. A self-service olive bar has been added where patrons will also find numerous varieties of antipastas.

In the frozen food section, additional food brands have been added, including 15 new pasta items.

“Nuovo specialty pastas are a really good brand. They’re easy dinner-for-two, ready-in-eight minute entrees,” Thompson says. “And we’re also offering Happy Baby. It’s freshly-made and frozen baby food.”
Moving forward, Thompson says the store will feature a lunch menu, possibly in early summer.

“We’re just getting the grocery store up and running and working out all of the kinks as far as that goes, and then we’ll open up the kitchen,” she says.
Store hours are 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. Monday through Saturday, and 1 p.m. to 6 p.m. on Sunday.

Revamping the Renaissance
The Journal Record
by Brian Brus
April 12th, 2010

OKLAHOMA CITY – The Renaissance Hotel will unveil its new catering menu and ballroom decor Tuesday as part of the company’s efforts to boost its client base, Catering Director Trent Alcott said.

“We hope to engender some new business. We hope to excite the clients that we already have, give them something new to choose from,” Alcott said. “We’re very fortunate that a lot of our clients have been with us for years and years, so it’s to give them something new to choose from.
“Our business has been very strong; we’ve been very pleased this year. … We have lost some accounts that did not have it in their budgets to host meetings, but we’ve been fortunate to replace them with new accounts,” he said.

In the meantime, downtown neighbor Skirvin Hilton Hotel’s numbers have been on the rise, Skirvin General Manager John Williams said, due in some part to capturing Renaissance clients.
“When we came to town, we did not put any organization, hotel or country club in the crosshairs,” Williams said. “We didn’t want to come in and steal business; we wanted to earn it.

“But I think that some of the things we have under contract now were previously going to the (Cox) convention center, so by default they were catered by the Renaissance. So, yes, we have taken business from them because those events went to a different venue and they asked us to come along.”

The Renaissance’s “Evolution of Events” Tuesday is a private presentation with a guest list expected to include officials from the City Council, the city convention and visitors bureau, and local businesses. According to early promotional material, the convention center ballroom will be transformed into “an amazing display of lights, entertainment, decor and food with lots of action.”

“We’re mostly rolling out our menu,” Alcott said. “Our chefs have put together a fabulous, new banquet and catering menu that, quite frankly, for Oklahoma City is pretty cutting edge. They’ve incorporated a lot of packaged receptions that we have not had before.”

For example, an a la carte menu will now be offered for banquet events, allowing for up to 2,000 guests at a time to design their meals instead of just one or two pre-selected entrées. The plates themselves are bento-style, dividing the space into clearly defined sections. Early feedback has been strongly positive, Alcott said.

The event will also highlight the catering unit’s decorating services with new lighting systems and settings set to change throughout the night. Alcott said it was “a fairly expensive program,” but would not discuss financial details.

While the Renaissance has been working on its upgrades, in the last year the Skirvin’s catering unit has been developing business at the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum.

“Obviously, you need to learn to crawl before walking and running, which we did,” Williams said. “We established a good reputation within our four walls, and customers started talking to us about helping them in larger venues. It’s our staff, our food and our kitchen; we just take it on the road now, and it’s working very well for us.”

A good example of a big account the Skirvin landed is the Murrah Building bombing memorial annual banquet, which will spotlight former President Bill Clinton this month.

Williams said the economic rebound will probably help all event catering in the metro area because there will be plenty of business to go around.

“Certainly from last April through this January we saw a downturn, but we started to see signs of life in February when it seemed as though there was some pent-up demand that was released,” Williams said.

“You can only not travel for so long; you can only not go out for business or a conference or to see a client, for so long,” he said. “Eventually you’ve got to get out and do it. And that’s what we saw in February, March and April.”

European Wind Show Provides Chance to Grow OK Wind Industry
April 14, 2010
States News Service

The following information was released by the Oklahoma Department of Commerce:
The Oklahoma Department of Commerce and a delegation of state partners will attend the 2010 European Wind Energy Conference (EWEC) April 20-23 in Warsaw, Poland to talk with leading wind companies about opening or expanding operations in Oklahoma.

By attending one of the world’s largest gatherings for the international wind industry, Commerce, the state’s lead economic development agency, and community leaders can market Oklahoma as the place to do business for wind generation, tower and blade production, turbine component manufacturing, repair and maintenance operations, and industry research and development.

"According to the American Wind Energy Association (AWEA), companies around the world are prepared to invest billions in the U.S. wind market as the capital crunch eases and demand surges. That is why we recruit in Europe and participate in international and national tradeshows. We are positioning Oklahoma to become a hub of wind activity, focused on all aspects of the industry – production, manufacturing, research, and training and education,” said Sandy Pratt, Commerce Deputy Director for Business Services. “Continued growth in this renewable energy arena is a top priority of the state’s overall economic development strategy.”

Joining Commerce at the 2010 EWEC are the Greater Oklahoma City Chamber of Commerce, the Tulsa Metro Chamber of Commerce, and OGandE Electric Services.

Pratt said Oklahoma must continue to look for investments from European nations and businesses. The agency has created a targeted strategy to recruit international companies looking to expand, relocate or develop their American presence.

"Oklahoma is very appealing to international investors because of our location in the heart of the wind corridor. To drive investment in Oklahoma, we must aggressively attract renewable energy sector companies that will continue developing the state’s wind energy supply chain," Pratt said.

Oklahoma has 12 completed wind projects with more than 600 turbines that produce approximately 1,130 megawatts of power – all of which are west of I-35. Three current projects are under development to be completed this year. Oklahoma has the potential to generate nearly 10 percent of the nation’s wind-generated electricity by 2030.