Becky’s email newsletter

onday I led a session on filling empty buildings in your downtown. One of the thorny issues that came up was buildings used to store junk. I think every town has a few of these. They’re doubly annoying because not only are they hogging a building that some active business could locate in, they are…

When Deb Brown and I spoke at the RuralX Summit, one of the ideas we mentioned was the tiny business village, where businesses pop up inside of storage sheds in Tionesta, Pennsylvania.  Dylan Fulton and Camden Breitling, high school students from Miller, South Dakota, heard that idea and ran with it. Together with some supportive…

Rural OmniLocal. It’s the new rural retail buzzword. I know because I made it up. I didn’t make up the trend; I just decided we needed a name for it.   In the world of big retail companies, “omni channel” means using as many different channels as they can to try to reach their customers…

When I asked for your questions and challenges, Mike said “Getting people to live here or come here for the jobs we have open NOW!”  Mike’s not the only one with workforce challenges. It was one of the top answers in our Survey of Rural Challenges, and is mentioned often as a rural economic development…

You’re important to me because you read these ideas, and you make your community better. That’s why I pack so much value into what I write for you each week. But this isn’t the only place I share my ideas, so I wanted to make sure you don’t miss out on any of the good…

Every year, we get inundated with hundreds of trends articles: business trends, tech trends, marketing trends. Not one of them focuses on rural business. Unless, of course, you count mine. Because all the trends I focus on are rural trends.  This year, I’m watching several larger society trends that are squarely in our favor. Big…

When Deb Brown and I did our Q&A show, we noticed that many of you face related questions, ones that other towns are also dealing with.  Gaylin asked us to address this issue:How to bring together a diverse community with poverty and discrimination issues. If you’re thinking you’ll skip this question because your town isn’t…

When Deb Brown and I did our preview of 2017, we noticed a pattern in the questions that you sent in. Many of you face related questions, ones that other towns are also dealing with. So I wanted to share one of those answers this week.  Jonya from Minnesota asked: What are some good first steps…

Last week we talked about the behavior changes that Idea Friendly promotes: from Formal to Informal, from Control to Chaos, from a Few to a Crowd, from Deciding to Testing, from Isolated to Connected, from Big to Small, from Failure is Bad to Failure is Good. This week, three examples crossed my path that I’d…

Remember last week I said there is an old, hard way of organizing ourselves and a new, easier way? The change won’t happen when you adopt new tools. The change will happen when you adopt new behaviors.  What are those new behaviors? I just started working on this list, and I’m dying to share it with…

The old way of getting things done in small towns was committees, meetings and plans in binders. That’s the hard way. But you and I know that doesn’t cut it anymore. We know what the new way looks like because we use it everyday. We already use tools like text messages, email and social networks…

Jobs used to be the big end goal for all economic development. When anyone discussed the economic future of your town, they talked about creating jobs, good jobs, especially recruiting outside companies to come in and create good jobs here.  Well, jobs just aren’t what they used to be.  More and more people are working…