On Friday, they will close Soup Dragon on Capel Street, the restaurant they opened in 2000 without business training, without chef qualifications and, by their own admission, "knowing nothing really".
Scroll through social media and it feels like everyone has the next big side hustle figured out. Dropshipping. AI services. Crypto. Faceless YouTube channels. But when real people compare notes after months or years of trying, the tone changes fast. Boring Beats Hype Every Time "I've tried so many side hustles and most were trash," one Redditor wrote in a recent discussion about long-term income ideas. That comment captured the mood of the entire thread.
When Matt Charette arrived at his business, Matt's Barber Shop, just before 10 a.m. Tuesday, he expected an ordinary workday. Instead, he was met with several inches of ice on his storefront steps. "What the hell is that?" he recalled thinking to himself. He could hear the sound of rushing water, and opened the door to a devastating sight. Inside, he found four inches of standing water consuming the mid-century modern furniture, artwork, barber tools, and vinyl records he'd been collecting for years.
TikTok on Wednesday announced the launch of a new "Local Feed" in the U.S. version of the app, which displays content related to travel, news, events, shopping, and dining near the user's current location. The feed's arrival comes shortly after a change in TikTok's terms of service under the new U.S. joint venture, which said that the app would begin to collect precise location information from TikTok users.
A 2025 survey by Nation's Restaurant News and Belle Communications found that about 73% of millennial and Gen Z diners visit restaurants based on social media reviews. Search for "New York City Semma review" to find feedback on one of the city's most acclaimed Indian spots, and you'll see TikTok videos appear in the results before written reviews from The New York Times and The Infatuation. The way we learn about restaurants has changed, and as a result, a notable degree of power has been handed to food lovers on the internet.
Salted caramel isn't going away. Neither is the hot honey trend. Ditto for Dubai chocolate. At least that's our unofficial prediction. We're basing that on the number of candy makers, bakers and national brands dabbling in crunchy pistachio and chocolate these days. And on the number of folks who are already pistachio lovers. And on the mainstream marketing efforts. We've seen the bars sold recently at a farm stand, a gas station counter and a big-box store checkout line.
On Sunday, Zoitas told Fortune, he was at the Knicks game and met some people from the predictions marketplace Kalshi, who offered to pay for an event where shoppers could receive $50 each in free groceries between noon and 3:00 pm. Fortune calculated that, if all 300 or so people in line spent this full allotment, it could cost Kalshi up to $150,000 in groceries.
The building where the retail-rental costume store in San Jose is located has been sold, and owner Kathy Bell has until the end of February to liquidate everything. While the eviction came as a shock, Bell said she's been dealing with personal health issues, making it nearly impossible to relocate the business again. The closure will force her into retirement. "I knew the building was up for sale and we were preparing for it, but we thought it would take a long time," the business' 71-year-old owner told San José Spotlight. "I can't do another move."
For entrepreneurs who are looking to streamline their software costs, Microsoft Office 2024 Home & Business offers a refreshing alternative. Save on genuine Microsoft productivity tools with a one-time purchase instead of recurring fees. At $99.97 (reg. $249.99), this lifetime license delivers Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, and OneNote without the ongoing costs of a Microsoft 365 subscription. Microsoft apps minus the subscription
"I went to Wordstock in 2005 when it was still Wordstock, and I felt like I had walked into the world I should have been in my whole life," Emmerling said, referring to what is now called the Portland Book Festival. It wasn't long after that Emmerling and her husband, John, a blacksmith, were delivering a fireplace he'd crafted. When they drove by a bookstore, Emmerling recalled, "I said, 'You know, when we retire, it would be fun to open a bookstore.'"
Mailchimp is moving beyond just email. The company that put itself on the map with a concept that doing business emails would be so easy a chimp could even do it, is now adding a full slate of tools to empower small businesses, with a campaign featuring that chimp named Freddie. Today (13 May), Mailchimp is launching its all-in-one marketing platform for growing businesses, transforming itself from an email-centric company to one that can be used for all small business marketing needs.
ExploreMedia has been working with businesses and people throughout the River Region since 2006. They work to help businesses reach their targeted audiences and promote their brand through digital media. The anniversary party brought many of their clients out to have food and refreshments, celebrating their partnership. However, it was also to celebrate the official launch of their new business magazine '26 Things in 2026,' which highlights upcoming events and business operations going on in the area throughout the year.
January is typically a slow month for retailers - a time for restocking, chores, and tax prep. This year, small businesses in the Minneapolis area have thrown that out the window. They're offering aid during heightened ICE activity; some will close for Friday's economic blackout. January is typically a quiet month at Mischief Toys in St. Paul, Minnesota. Owner Dan Marshall said he usually spends it cleaning up after Christmas, painting the walls,
For several years, my brother, Mike, and I talked about wanting to go into business together. We considered a few ideas but hadn't settled on one. In February 2022, we rented an Escalade from Turo for a family trip. Almost exactly a year later, we launched our own Turo business, JDM Whipz. By 2024, JDM Whipz was making six figures in profit.
In an era obsessed with social feeds, algorithms, and the next new channel, email marketing is often treated as yesterday's news. Yet every day, hundreds of millions of messages quietly power relationships between businesses and the people they serve. Few leaders have a clearer view of that reality than Frank Vella, CEO of Constant Contact. Vella oversees a platform that sends staggering volumes of email, but his perspective isn't rooted in scale alone.
Acuity is a platform that allows you to sell and manage services like virtual consultations, in-person appointments, or classes-you could use it to manage a yoga studio, salon, personal training practice, or landscaping business. It also helps in taking some of the more annoying responsibilities off the business owner's plate, with automatic appointment updates for the client, and letting clients book, reschedule, or cancel appointments through the platform, rather than, say, by texting the owner a bunch of times.
When Mike Moretti opened "The Art of Picture Framing", a friend of his, who owned a demolition business and just finished a job, approached him and asked if he wanted a pinball machine for his breakroom. "I was like, 'oh man, no, they're really heavy,'" Moretti said. "My crew just needs to focus on getting work done." Moretti would later hire his friend's son, and when his friend, John, passed away a few years later, Moretti was again asked about the pinball machine.
When the Legislature passed its new digital advertising tax ( ESSB 5814), the message was that Google, Meta and Amazon would finally pay their fair share. But as of Oct. 1, these companies are not paying a dime. They simply updated their billing software, added the tax as a separate line item on every invoice and passed the entire cost directly to us - the advertisers.
A Trump administration official credited the president with making small business owners excited to pay their taxes thanks to tax cuts and less regulation. Kelly Loeffler, administrator of the Small Business Administration, told Fox News's Sunday Morning Futures that small business optimism is above its 52-year average. Loeffler said a lot of the optimism is due to the Working Families Tax Cut in Donald Trump's One Big Beautiful Bill.
