Merchant A-Z

Sales at furniture showrooms sink in Washington state (BizJournals)

The customer had put down a deposit on $25,000 worth of living-room furniture, but on Oct. 5 he nervously walked back into Masins Fine Furnishings & Interior Design showroom in Bellevue.

Antiquing on West 24th Street (AM New York)

Who needs the country? The usual venue for autumn antiquing is some small town up along the Hudson or the Delaware, but if a fine fall Sunday finds you stuck in Manhattan, head over to the West 20s for an afternoon of getting and spending.

The Best of the BeST New Zealand Designs (Scoop.co.nz)

An ingenious “now you see it, now you don’t”cook surface; an office furniture system developed by psychologists as well as designers; a North Shore office building described as New Zealand’s most revolutionary and experimental office block and an irreverent brand for an Auckland law firm were the major winners of this year’s BeST Design Awards –New Zealand designs equivalent of the Oscars.

Local lenders making money, loans the old-fashioned way (Minneapolis-St. Paul Star Tribune)

While big Wall Street "money centers" tumble on bad bets and frozen credit, community banks and their customers are doing fine.

Starbucks vs traditional Vienna coffeehouse: bitter rivals or unlikely allies? (AFP via Yahoo! News)

With a 300-year coffeehouse tradition, Vienna has started attracting US-style chains in the past few years and contrary to all expectations, the two would-be rivals seem to be co-existing just fine.