#Buy a company Minneapolis

[petersonacquisitionsminneapolis]

Selling Your Business in Minneapolis: Steps to Ensure a Top-Dollar Sale

Selling your business in Minneapolis requires strategic planning and a deep understanding of the local market to secure a top-dollar sale. Start by conducting a professional business valuation to set a realistic and competitive asking price. Prepare your financials, organize detailed records, and address any inconsistencies to present a solid financial picture. Enhance your business’s appeal by optimizing operations, strengthening your management team, and boosting your online and physical presence. Timing is crucial—monitor market trends and economic conditions to sell when your industry is performing well. Partnering with a local business broker can help target the right buyers and maintain confidentiality. During negotiations, focus on your business’s unique strengths and growth potential to justify your price. Be transparent and responsive during due diligence, ensuring a smooth transition. With proper planning and expert guidance, you can attract serious buyers and achieve a successful and profitable exit in the Minneapolis market.

OUR ONLINE BLOGS :

[reasonsforhope]

Article Link

"Minnetonka first started selling its “Thunderbird” moccasins in 1965. Now, for the first time, they’ve been redesigned by a Native American designer.

It’s one step in the company’s larger work to deal with its history of cultural appropriation. The Minneapolis-based company launched in the 1940s as a small business making souvenirs for roadside gift shops in the region—including Native American-inspired moccasins, though the business wasn’t started or run by Native Americans. The moccasins soon became its biggest seller.

[Photo: Minnetonka]

Adrienne Benjamin, an Anishanaabe artist and community activist who became the company’s “reconciliation advisor,” was initially reluctant when a tribal elder approached her about meeting with the company. Other activists had dismissed the idea that the company would do the work to truly transform. But Benjamin agreed to the meeting, and the conversation convinced her to move forward.

“I sensed a genuine commitment to positive change,” she says. “They had really done their homework as far as understanding and acknowledging the wrong and the appropriation. I think they knew for a long time that things needed to get better, and they just weren’t sure what a first step was.”

Pictured: Lucie Skjefte and son Animikii [Photo: Minnetonka]

In 2020, Minnetonka publicly apologized “for having benefited from selling Native-inspired designs without directly honoring Native culture or communities.” It also said that it was actively recruiting Native Americans to work at the company, reexamining its branding, looking for Native-owned businesses to partner with, continuing to support Native American nonprofits, and that it planned to collaborate with Native American artists and designers.

Benjamin partnered with the company on the first collaboration, a collection of hand-beaded hats, and then recruited the Minneapolis-based designer Lucie Skjefte, a citizen of the Red Lake Nation, who designed the beadwork for another moccasin style and a pair of slippers for the brand. Skjefte says that she felt comfortable working with the company knowing that it had already done work with Benjamin on reconciliation. And she wasn’t a stranger to the brand. “Our grandmothers and our mothers would always look for moccasins in a clutch kind of situation where they didn’t have a pair ready and available to make on their own—then they would buy Minnetonka mocs and walk into a traditional pow wow and wear them,” she says. Her mother, she says, who passed away in 2019, would have been “immensely proud” that Skjefte’s design work was part of the moccasins—and on the new version of the Thunderbird moccasin, one of the company’s top-selling styles.

[Photo: Minnetonka]

“I started thinking about all of those stories, and what resonated with me visually,” Skjefte says. The redesign, she says, is much more detailed and authentic than the previous version. “Through the redesign and beading process, we are actively reclaiming and reconnecting our Animikii or Thunderbird motif with its Indigenous roots,” she says. Skjefte will earn royalties for the design, and Minnetonka will also separately donate a portion of the sale of each shoe to Mni Sota Fund, a nonprofit that helps Native Americans in Minnesota get training and capital for home ownership and entrepreneurship.

Some companies go a step farther—Manitobah Mukluks, based in Canada, has an Indigenous founder and more than half Indigenous staff. (While Minnetonka is actively recruiting more Native American workers, the company says that employees self-report race and it can’t share any data about its current number of Indigenous employees.) Beyond its own line of products, Manitobah also has an online Indigenous Market that features artists who earn 100% of the profit for their work.

White Bear Moccasins, a Native-owned-and-made brand in Montana, makes moccasins from bison hide. Each custom pair can take six to eight hours to make; the shoes cost hundreds of dollars, though they can also be repaired and last as long as a lifetime, says owner Shauna White Bear. In interviews, White Bear has said that she wants “to take our craft back,” from companies like Minnetonka. But she also told Fast Company that she doesn’t think that Minnetonka, as a family-owned business, should have to lose its livelihood now and stop making moccasins.

The situation is arguably different for other fashion brands that might use a Native American symbol—or rip off a Native American design completely—on a single product that could easily be taken off the market. Benjamin says that she has also worked with other companies that have discontinued products.

She sees five steps in the process of reconciliation. First, the person or company who did wrong has to acknowledge the wrong. Then they need to publicly apologize, begin to change behavior, start to rebuild trust, and then, eventually, the wronged party might take the step of forgiveness. Right now, she says, Minnetonka is in the third phase of behavior change. The brand plans to continue to collaborate with Native American designers.

The company can be an example to others on how to listen and build true relationships, Benjamin says. “I think that’s the only way that these relationships are going to get any better—people have to sit down and talk about it,” she says. “People have to be real. People have to apologize. They have to want to reconcile with people.”

The leadership at Minnetonka can also be allies in pushing other companies to do better. “My voice is important at the table as an Indigenous woman,” Benjamin says. “Lucie’s voice is important. But at tables where there’s a majority of people that aren’t Indigenous, sometimes those allies’ voices are more powerful in those spaces, because that means that they’ve signed on to what we’re saying. The power has signed on to moving forward and we agree with ‘Yes, this was wrong.’ That’s the stuff that’s going to change [things] right there.”"

-via FastCompany, February 7, 2024

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Stellantis wants to make scabbing woke

I'm coming to Minneapolis! Oct 15: Presenting The Internet Con at Moon Palace Books. Oct 16: Keynoting the 26th ACM Conference On Computer-Supported Cooperative Work and Social Computing.

I know, I know, it's weird when the worst people you know are right, even when they're right for the wrong reasons: like, the "Intelligence Community" is genuinely terrible, pharma companies are murderous crooks, and Big Tech really does have a dangerous grip on public debate. The swivel-eyed loons have a point, is what I'm saying:

https://locusmag.com/2023/05/commentary-cory-doctorow-the-swivel-eyed-loons-have-a-point/

When conspiratorialists and reactionaries holler about how the FBI are dirty-tricking creeps who are framing Trump, it's tempting to say, "well, if Trumpists hate the FBI, then I will love the FBI. Who cares about COINTELPRO and what they did to Martin Luther King?"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FBI%E2%80%93King_suicide_letter

It's a process called "schizmogenesis": forming new group identity beliefs based on saying the opposite of what your enemies say, and as tempting as that is, it's extraordinarily foolish and dangerous:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/12/18/schizmogenesis/

It means that canny reactionaries like Steve Bannon can trick you into taking any position merely by taking the opposite one. Bannon's followers are even more easily led, so it's easy for him to convince them that we have always been at war with Oceania. The right has created an entire mirror world of "I know you are but what am I?" politics.

Anti-vax co-opts "bodily autonomy." Climate denial becomes environmentalism ("wind turbines kill birds"). Transphobia becomes feminism ("keep women-only spaces for real women"). Support for strongmen becomes anti-imperialism ("don't feed the war machine in Ukraine"). These are the doppelgangers Naomi Klein warns us against:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/09/05/not-that-naomi/#if-the-naomi-be-klein-youre-doing-just-fine

The far right has even managed to co-opt anti-corporate rhetoric. Culture warriors rail against "woke capitalism," insisting that when big businesses take socially progressive positions, it's just empty "virtue signalling." And you know what? They've got a point. Partially.

As with all mirror-world politics, the anti-woke-capitalism shuck is designed to convince low-information right-wing pismires into buying "anti-woke pillows" and demanding the right to pay junk fees to "own the libs":

https://pluralistic.net/2023/08/04/owning-the-libs/#swiper-no-swiping

But woke capitalism is bullshit. Corporations – profit-maximizing immortal transhuman colony organisms that view workers and customers as inconvenient gut-flora – do not care about social justice. They don't care about anything, except for minimizing compensation for workers while maximizing the risk those workers bear; and locking in and gouging customers for products that are as low-quality as can be profitably sold.

Take DEI, a favored target of the right. It's undoubtably true that diversity, inclusion and equity initiatives have made some inroads on correcting bias in hiring decisions, with the result that companies get better employees who would have been excluded without this explicit corrective.

However, corporations don't value DEI because they abhor their history of hiring bias. Instead, DEI is how corporate management demonstrates to workers that their grievances are best addressed by trusting corporate leadership to correct their error of their ways – and not by forming a union.

Before the passage of the National Labor Relations Act in 1935, corporations would create fake "Company Unions" whose leadership were beholden to the company executives. These were decoy unions: they looked and sounded like unions, but when they negotiated with management, they were actually working for the bosses, not the workers.

This is more mirror-world tactics. They're the labor equivalent of the "crisis pregnancy centers" that masquerade as abortion clinics in order to fool pregnant people and trap them with endless delays until it's too late to terminate their pregnancies. Company unions get workers to trust in negotiators who are secretly working for the bosses, who emerge from the bargaining table with one-sided, abusive contracts and insist that this is the best deal workers can hope for.

Company unions were outlawed 90 years ago, and for decades, labor had a seat at the table, with wages tracking productivity gains and workers getting protection for discrimination, unsafe labor conditions, and wage-theft. Then came the neoliberal turn, and 40 years of wage stagnation, increased inequality, and corporate rule.

Anything that can't go on forever will eventually stop. Finally, finally, we have reached a turning point in labor, with public approval for unions at levels not seen since the Carter administration and thousands of strikes and protests breaking out across the country:

https://striketracker.ilr.cornell.edu/

It's not just the Writers Guild and SAG-AFTRA, either. For the first time in history, the UAW is striking against all the major automakers, and they are winning:

https://arstechnica.com/cars/2023/10/striking-uaw-workers-win-key-battery-plant-concession-from-general-motors/

The automakers are getting desperate. Stellantis – Chrysler's latest alias, reflecting the company's absorbtion into corporate-human-centipede of global carmakers – has mobilized its DEI programs, trying to get marginalized people to believe that scabbing is a liberatory activity:

https://theintercept.com/2023/10/10/uaw-auto-strike-stellantis/

Stellantis calls each of its DEI silos a "Business Resource Group" (BRG): there's a "Working Parents Network," an "African Ancestry Network," "Asians Connected Together," a "DiverseAbilities Network," a "Gay & Lesbian Alliance" and more:

https://blog.stellantisnorthamerica.com/2021/07/20/business-resource-groups-drive-inclusion-and-diversity/

The corporate managers who lead these BRGs have established a scab rotation for each subgroup, calling on members to cross a UAW picket-line at a Michigan Parts Distribution Center run by Stellantis subsidiary Mopar:

Each BRG will pick a specific day of the week/weekend to volunteer as a team. Help continue to be the RESOURCE the BUSINESS can count on! Stellantis needs your help in running the Parts Distribution Centers (PDC) to ensure a steady supply of parts to our customers while negotiations continue. Working Parents Network has identified Friday, October 13 as WPN’s BRG Day at the PDCs!"

Now, these BRGs weren't invented by marginalized workers facing discrimination in the workplace. They come from literal union-busting playbooks produced by giant "union avoidance" firms that charge bosses millions for advice on skirting – or breaking – the law to keep workplace democracy at bay. All the biggest anti-union consultancies love BRGs, from Littler Mendelson to Jackson Lewis. IRI Strategies touts BRGs as a way to "union-proof" a business by absorbing workers' grievances in a decoy committee that will let them feel listened to.

BRGs, in other words, are the Crisis Pregnancy Centers of workplace discrimination. They're a Big Store Con, a company union dressed up as corporate social responsibility.

Now, let's not pretend that unions have a sterling record on race and gender issues. Giant labor organizations like the AFL had to be dragged into racial integration, and trade unions have sometimes been on the wrong side of anti-immigration panics:

https://www.archives.gov/publications/prologue/1997/summer/american-labor-movement.html

But unions have also been the most reliable way for people of color and women to win better workplace treatment. The struggle for racial and gender justice was fought through labor organizing. Remember that MLK's "I've Been To the Mountaintop" speech was given in support of striking sanitation workers in Memphis:

https://www.afscme.org/about/history/mlk/mountaintop

Black organizers have always been militant labor organizers. Labor Day commemorates the victory of the long, hard-fought Pullman strike, where Black workers brought one of the most powerful companies in America to its knees:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pullman_Strike

And women have always fought for gender justice through the labor movement: the New York shirtwaist strike is the Ur-example, when women-led unions fought thugs and scabs on icy New York streets:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_shirtwaist_strike_of_1909

It's no surprise that labor activism, anti-racism and feminism go together. Since the earliest days, the labor justice struggle was also a social justice struggle. To learn more check out Kim Kelly's Fight Like Hell: The Untold History of American Labor:

https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/Fight-Like-Hell/Kim-Kelly/9781982171063

The most exploited, underpaid, and abused workers in America are also the most marginalized (duh).

From nurses:

https://www.reuters.com/business/healthcare-pharmaceuticals/kaiser-healthcare-union-says-week-long-strike-possible-early-next-month-2023-10-09/

To teachers:

https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2023-04-18/l-a-teachers-win-21-wage-increase-in-new-lausd-contract

To Amazon warehouse workers:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amazon_Labor_Union

To publishing assistants:

https://apnews.com/article/harpercollins-union-strike-ends-0a94238718879066d9b21af6266be526

To baristas:

https://www.cnn.com/2023/09/29/business/starbucks-union-wages/index.html

To fast-food workers:

https://www.ufcw.org/about/

The vanguard of today's labor surge is Black, brown, female and queer. Without a union, workers who face discrimination are on their own, hoping that their bosses will voluntarily do something about it. Black workers in Tesla's rabidly anti-union shops face vicious racism, from slurs to threats to violence. Without a union, they have to rely on the shifting whims of an Apartheid emerald mine space-Karen for relief, or hope for help from the NLRB or a class-action lawyer:

https://apnews.com/article/tesla-racism-black-lawsuit-class-action-21c88bddf60eca702560be58429495de

The far right isn't wrong when they holler that woke capitalism is bullshit. As with so many of their mirror-world causes, they've got a point, but only a limited one. The problem with woke capitalism is that it's no substitute for a union. The problem with relying on Business Resource Groups to fight racism, sexism, homophobia and transphobia is that these struggles are all class struggles, and a BRG is never going to fight against the company that created it.

To understand how bankrupt woke capitalism is, conside this: Stellantis is calling on its "Working Parents Network" to scab this Friday. Stellantis is also being sanctioned by the Department Of Labor for discriminating against nursing mothers – the same "working parents" that the BRG is meant to protect:

https://www.clickondetroit.com/news/local/2023/02/08/investigation-finds-stellantis-violated-rights-of-nursing-mothers-at-sterling-heights-plant/

Woke capitalism is just another kind of "predatory inclusion," like Intuit's campaign defending its "Free File" tax-prep scam, where they're claiming that ending this ripoff is racist because it denies Black families the right to be tricked into paying for something they are entitled to get for free:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/09/27/predatory-inclusion/#equal-opportunity-scammers

When I learned about Intuit's wokewashing, I thought I'd found woke capitalism's rock bottom, but I was wrong. Stellantis's call for woke scabbing is a new low.

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/10/11/equal-opportunity-class-war/#inclusive-scabbing

My next novel is The Lost Cause, a hopeful novel of the climate emergency. Amazon won't sell the audiobook, so I made my own and I'm pre-selling it on Kickstarter!

[hclib]

Minneapolis School Supply Company Catalog, 1927

With fall just around the corner, many parents and teachers are busy buying school supplies. If you were a teacher in 1927, this Minneapolis School Supply Company catalog from our Trade Catalog Collection could have come in handy. The catalog lists everything from desks and blackboards to paste and pencils. Some of the items -- like Ticonderoga pencils and Crayola crayons -- might still be on school shopping lists this year.

[follow-up-news]

Target will no longer accept personal checks from shoppers as of July 15, another sign of how a once ubiquitous payment method is going the way of outmoded objects like floppy disks and the Rolodex. The Minneapolis-based discounter confirmed the move in a statement to The Associated Press on Tuesday, citing “extremely low volumes” of customers who still write checks. Target said it remained committed to creating an easy and convenient checkout experience with credit and debit cards, “buy now, pay later” services and the Target Circle membership program, which applies deals automatically at checkout. “We have taken several measures to notify guests in advance” about the no-checks policy, the company said. Target’s decision leaves Walmart, Macy’s and Kohl’s among the retailers that still accept personal checks at their stores. Whole Foods Market and the Aldi supermarket chain previously stopped taking checks from customers. Shoppers have pulled out checkbooks increasingly less often since the mid-1990s. Cash-dispensing ATMs, debit cards, online banking and mobile payment systems like Venmo and Apple Pay mean many young adults may never have written a check.

[lilnasxvevo]

If you live in the Midwest US, you might live near a grocery store that stocks Baba’s hummus!

A lot of grocery stores only stock Sabra hummus which is a real pain in the ass for those of us who love hummus but don’t like supporting businesses that provide financial support to the Israeli army.

Baba’s is a great alternative because it’s a company run by two Palestinian-American siblings and it is REALLY TASTY, it’s just imho really good hummus (and really good pita bites and really good…everything else).

If you DON’T live near a store that stocks Baba’s, you can buy their pita puffs straight from their website, and honestly their pita puffs are DELICIOUS so I do recommend it.

If you live in the Twin Cities area, you can also hit up their restaurant location in the Whittier neighborhood of Minneapolis! I’ve only eaten there once, with my sister and her partner, but all three of us agreed that the food was so mind-blowing that we can’t wait to go back.

[stevebattle]

DC-2 (Drink Caddy 2) by Gene Beley (1982), Android Amusement Corp, Irwindale CA. The DC-2 achieved TV fame, appearing in an episode of "CHiPs" called "Day of the Robot" in January 1983.

“The next model, DC-2, one of which was bought by the actor James Caan and some other friends as a present for Mr. Hefner, has a sleek fiberglass body, a color television in its chest, a videotape recorder in its midriff, a color camera in its head, a black plastic drink tray in its chest and other features. Though Mr. Beley believes that technology that could adapt DC-2 to a true robotic form is not far off, he is convinced that the home robot industry will begin with robots that have more entertainment value than practical use. ''It's nice to say you're going to make a home robot that's going to do all kinds of wonderful things,'' he commented, ''but if you ask someone if they'll spend $20,000 for it and they say: 'Are you crazy. I can buy a vacuum cleaner for $200,' it doesn't make sense.'' " – DOMESTICATING THE ROBOT FOR TOMORROW’S HOMES, Peter Applebone, The New York Times, March 4, 1982.

“Dayton’s Department Store, Minneapolis, Minnesota, utilizes a DC-2 robot on a regular basis for promotions. The 4’2” tall robot [middle photo] features a baked-on enamel grey paint job over a sleek fiberglass body with green, flashing L.E.D.s. Electronics include a 9” color TV in the chest, JVC video camera in the turning head, and a VCR.” – ANDROID AMUSEMENT CORP.

“BEVERLY HILLS, Calif. – DC-2, the first robot ever arrested here, was released yesterday after two youngsters apologised in writing for creating a fuss with the 4-foot tall machine. … DC-2 took a remote-controlled walk along a block of North Beverly Drive in this wealthy Los Angeles suburb, passing out business cards bearing the name of Beley’s company, which manufactured it. Police responding to a call of a robot walking the street couldn’t find its human controller and ended up pulling DC-2’s batteries and carting it off – via a tow truck – to the pokey. “The kids had it without permission and were just screwing around.” said Lt. Russell Olson. “There will be no criminal filing.” When police neared the mechanical object, it was heard to say, “Help me! They’re trying to take me apart” ” – Robot back at home after arrest, jail stay, Associated Press.

[aquagrunt]

life update

so my husband walked out of his job last Wednesday bc they were absolutely fucking awful & an incident occurred that was so beyond mishandled and insane that he no longer felt safe working there.

we have been planning on moving to the Minneapolis/st Paul area sometime in the near future. This has been our plan for the last two years.

he had an interview with a company in the twin cities that we are waiting on hearing back from, but he felt that the interview went well. It would be the exact same job he was doing at his old job. problem is that they want him to start in like. a month.

Now MY job as some of you know is bridal store manager. the bridal store that I work for is a failing business (and has been as long as I’ve been there [10 years]) and I am the ONLY employee and work directly with my boss/the store owner. small business you know. so as you can imagine… immensely improper relationship (she thinks of me like a daughter she never had). at one point many years ago I was planning on buying the store; as I explained earlier this business is NOT profitable and any bank would laugh at anyone trying to take a loan out to buy this business. so I told her that I was not buying the business anymore like. 5/6 years ago? and told her when we made our minds up to move to the twin cities two years ago. originally gave her a timeline for the move at anywhere from 2-4 years.

well, of course she did nothing to plan for me leaving. and now that I very much could be leaving in a couple months is all like “WELL I just don’t know how you expect us to sell everything off ((for the purpose of closing the business)) by then” and is giving me intense guilt trips about this. and wants to hire someone (? literally who is going to work somewhere that’s actively trying to close ?) and all this and expects me to stay on through busy season (which will end after October) because we have weddings with tuxes on the books. and it’s just all so much!!!

AND on top of that, I have to try to find a job when I haven’t been doing that in 10 years, we have to try to find a place there that will be affordable and close enough to our jobs, AND we own our house here so we have to sell it, AND we have to move four hours away and have a shitload of junk that we have to figure out what to do with. we’re planning on renting for a year before we buy a house there just so we really know if we like it there & also so it’s not so hard to go to showings and stuff for houses (like it would be from 250 miles away)

I have lived in the town I live in my whole life. my entire family is within 15 minutes of us (minus a few). it’s not as hard for my husband who has moved away from his family before.

It’s all so sudden and so stressful and I don’t think he really understands just how scary and hard this is for me. I do want to move. But I thought I had at least until next year. My grandma is 90 years old and I don’t want to be that far away from her. my grandpa went so suddenly and I don’t know if I could live with myself if the same thing happened to my grandma and I didn’t get to say goodbye.

also unrelated but I got a bad manicure today.

[haggishlyhagging]

Jul - Dec 2023 Reading List:

Bernard, Jessie. The Future of Marriage. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1982.

Budapest, Zsuzsanna Emese. The Holy Book of Women’s Mysteries. San Francisco: Weiser, 2007.

Cady Stanton, Elizabeth, “The Destructive Male.” 1868. http://edchange.org/multicultural/speeches/stanton_destructive_male.html

Chollet, Mona. In Defense of Witches: The Legacy of the Witch Hunts and Why Women are Still on Trial. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 2022.

Christ, Carol P. Rebirth of the Goddess: Finding Meaning in Feminist Spirituality. Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley, 1997.

Cloninger, Sally J. “A Rhetorical Analysis of Feminist Agitation.” The University of Michigan Papers in Women’s Studies 1, no. 1 (February 1974): 44-50. https://quod.lib.umich.edu/m/mfs/acp0359.0001.001/46:4

Daly, Mary. Beyond God the Father: Toward a Philosophy of Women’s Liberation. Boston: Beacon Press, 1973.

Dworkin, Andrea. Right-Wing Women. New York: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1983.

Echols, Alice. Daring to Be Bad: Radical Feminism in America: 1967-75. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1989.

Eisler, Riane. The Chalice and the Blade: Our History, Our Future. New York: HarperCollins, 1987.

Faludi, Susan. Backlash: the Undeclared War Against American Women. New York : Crown Publishers, Inc., 1991.

Frymer-Kensky, Tikva. In the Wake of the Goddesses: Women, Culture, and the Biblical Transformation of Pagan Myth. New York: The Free Press, 1992.

Griffin, Susan. Pornography and Silence: Culture’s Revenge Against Nature. New York: Harper & Row, 1981.

Harding, M. Esther. Woman’s Mysteries: Ancient and Modern. Boston: Shambhala, 1990.

Janega, Eleanor. The Once and Future Sex: Going Medieval on Women’s Roles in Society. New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 2023.

Johnson, Sonia. From Housewife to Heretic. Garden City, N.Y: Doubleday, 1981.

Jones, Ann. Women Who Kill. New York: Holt, Rinehart, and Winston, 1980.

Jones, Beverly and Judith Brown. “Toward a Female Liberation Movement.” Jul 1968. https://www.redstockings.org/index.php/main/classics-of-1968

Judd, Elizabeth. “Women Before the Conquest: A Study of Women in Anglo-Saxon England.” The University of Michigan Papers in Women’s Studies 1, no. 1 (February 1974): 127–49. https://quod.lib.umich.edu/m/mfs/acp0359.0001.001/129:8

Koedt, Anne. “The Myth of the Vaginal Orgasm.” 1970. https://www.cwluherstory.org/classic-feminist-writings-articles/myth-of-the-vaginal-orgasm#

New York Radical Women, Notes From the First Year (June 1968). https://www.redstockings.org/index.php/main/classics-of-1968

Raworth, Kate. Doughnut Economics: Seven Ways to Think Like a 21st Century Economist. White River Junction: Chelsea Green Publishing, 2017.

Reed, Evelyn. “The Myth of Women’s Inferiority.” The Myth of Women’s Inferiority by Evelyn Reed 1954. Accessed July 9, 2023. https://www.marxists.org/archive/reed-evelyn/1954/myth-inferiority.htm.

Spender, Dale. There’s Always Been a Women’s Movement This Century. London: Pandora Press, 1983.

Starhawk. The Spiral Dance: A Rebirth of the Ancient Religion of the Great Goddess. San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 1999.

Women’s Majority Union, Lilith (Dec 1968). https://www.redstockings.org/index.php/main/classics-of-1968

Zeisler, Andi. We Were Feminists Once: From Riot Grrrl to CoverGirl®, the Buying and Selling of a Political Movement. New York: BBS PublicAffairs, 2016.

[petersonacquisitionsminneapolis]

What to Expect When Working with a Minneapolis Business Broker

Engaging a business broker in Minneapolis can significantly streamline the process of buying or selling a business. These professionals bring valuable expertise and a network of connections to the table, making complex transactions more manageable. If you're considering working with a business broker, here's what you can expect throughout the process.

1. Initial Consultation and Assessment

The journey with a business broker typically begins with an initial consultation. During this meeting, the broker will gather detailed information about your business, including financial records, operational details, and your goals for the transaction. For sellers, this assessment helps determine the business's market value and identify areas that could enhance its appeal. For buyers, the broker will understand your criteria and preferences to find suitable opportunities.

2. Business Valuation and Pricing Strategy

One of the broker's key roles is to provide an accurate valuation of your business. This involves analyzing financial statements, assessing market conditions, and comparing similar businesses to determine a fair price. For sellers, the broker will use this valuation to develop a pricing strategy that reflects the business's worth while attracting serious buyers. For buyers, the broker will help evaluate the fairness of the asking price based on the valuation.

3. Marketing and Outreach

For sellers, business brokers are responsible for marketing your business effectively. They create comprehensive marketing materials, including detailed business listings and presentations that highlight the strengths and potential of your business. Brokers utilize various channels, including online platforms, industry networks, and direct outreach, to attract qualified buyers. Their goal is to generate interest and competitive offers, ensuring a successful sale.

4. Screening and Qualifying Buyers

Business brokers play a crucial role in screening and qualifying potential buyers. They use their networks and expertise to identify serious and financially capable buyers. By pre-qualifying buyers, brokers ensure that only serious parties with the necessary resources and intent are engaged. This process helps avoid time-wasting and ensures that negotiations are conducted with genuine prospects.

5. Negotiation and Deal Structuring

Negotiation is a critical component of any business transaction. Business brokers act as intermediaries, managing negotiations between buyers and sellers to reach mutually beneficial terms. They use their negotiation skills to address concerns, resolve conflicts, and structure deals that meet the needs of both parties. Brokers aim to achieve the best possible outcome while maintaining a positive and professional relationship with all involved.

6. Confidentiality and Discretion

Maintaining confidentiality is essential during the sale process to prevent disruptions and protect business operations. Business brokers ensure that sensitive information is handled discreetly and that the sale remains confidential until a deal is finalized. They manage all communications and documentation with care, safeguarding your business’s reputation and minimizing the risk of leaks that could impact employees or customers.

7. Managing Due Diligence

Due diligence involves a thorough review of financial records, legal documents, and operational details. Business brokers coordinate this process, working with accountants, attorneys, and other professionals to ensure that all aspects of the transaction are thoroughly examined. They help identify and address any issues that may arise during due diligence, ensuring that the transaction proceeds smoothly.

8. Closing the Transaction

The final stages of the transaction involve completing paperwork, finalizing legal agreements, and ensuring all regulatory requirements are met. Business brokers manage these aspects, coordinating with legal and financial advisors to ensure a seamless closing process. They handle the administrative details, allowing you to focus on your core business activities and prepare for the transition.

9. Post-Transaction Support

After the transaction is complete, business brokers often provide support to help you transition smoothly. For sellers, this may involve assisting with post-sale arrangements or addressing any lingering issues. For buyers, brokers may help with integration and provide guidance on managing the newly acquired business.

Conclusion

Working with a business broker in Minneapolis offers a structured and professional approach to buying or selling a business. From initial consultation and valuation to marketing, negotiation, and closing, brokers play a pivotal role in managing the complexities of the transaction. By leveraging their expertise, networks, and resources, you can navigate the process with confidence and achieve a successful outcome.

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Unity's feudal gambit as class struggle between rentiers and capitalists

Today (Oct 16) I'm in Minneapolis, keynoting the 26th ACM Conference On Computer-Supported Cooperative Work and Social Computing. Thursday (Oct 19), I'm in Charleston, WV to give the 41st annual McCreight Lecture in the Humanities. And on Friday (Oct 20), I'm at Charleston's Taylor Books from 12h-14h.

The outcome of this struggle is what determines whether the digital society is capitalist or feudalistic. Think of the recent grab by games toolsmith Unity, who have long extracted rents from the capitalists who used their tools to make games. Unity is “software as a service,” which means that you have to buy again it every month, for so long as your capitalist enterprise is in business.

The capitalists who rent Unity’s tools had resigned themselves to this, but then Unity went one step further, and demanded a royalty (a word with decidedly feudal origins!) every time a game made with Unity’s tools was distributed. The outcry was ferocious, and Unity eventually backed down, but even as they did, company executives insisted that they would continue to pursue a “sustainable system” for “shared success.”

“Shared success” is a pure expression of feudalism. Unity was not proposing a joint venture, where they would supply the capital to produce games and share the risk of that capital being competed away by a better games-maker.

Instead, Unity wants a rentier’s bargain: if the capitalist it rents do does well, so does Unity. But if the capitalist does badly — if a games-maker loses out to a competitor who is also a tenant of Unity’s IP — then unity also does well. Heads capitalists lose, tails the rentier wins.

When Unity speaks of this system being “sustainable,” they mean that they will seek to maximize the total amount of profits made by capitalists who rent its tools. Because the higher the total profits are, the more rent it can extract.

Profits are highest where competition is lowest. It’s in Unity’s interest for a single company — or a cartel of companies — to control entire genres or modes of games, and to be protected from innovators who might enter the market with better offers. Unity wants to pick some winners and bind them to its fields.

-A Major Defeat For Technofeudalism: We euthanized some rentiers.

My next novel is The Lost Cause, a hopeful novel of the climate emergency. Amazon won't sell the audiobook, so I made my own and I'm pre-selling it on Kickstarter!

[hclib]

Save Cedar Lake Park!

In the spring of 1989, Glacier Park Company was selling a large plot of land – 48 acres on the north shore of Cedar Lake. A group of concerned neighbors founded Save Cedar Lake Park (SCLP) with a mission to “Establish a nature park on the north and northeast shores of Cedar Lake and along the railroad right-of-way from Cedar Lake to Highway 100.” This unique urban nature preserve would link together the Chain of Lakes, Mississippi River, and western Minneapolis suburbs with a pedestrian and bicycle corridor and would complete a grand vision for the city parks.

In January 1990, the Metropolitan Council of Minneapolis unanimously approved a recommendation to add the Cedar Lake Park initiative to the Park and Recreation Board’s existing capital improvement plan. By summertime, discussions were already in motion with the Nature Conservancy, State officials, and Glacier Park Co. to accomplish early acquisition.

Market value for the land was $1.7 million. The Metropolitan Council Open Space Commission approved $1.2 million in funds if SCLP could raise the remaining, which came to roughly $560,000. For the next two years, Save Cedar Lake Park organized a massive fund-raising push involving public education initiatives, newsletters, and a benefit concert, picking up a Committee on Urban Environment (CUE) Award along the way. The Minneapolis Chapter of the Audubon Society even pledged their entire Sanctuary Fund ($15,000) to SCLP, hoping to sway legislators. The “birders” felt this was the closest they could get to having a bird sanctuary.

30 years ago, in November 1992, SCLP presented the city with $473,000 citizen-collected dollars, the largest amount of public money raised to buy a piece of land in the state of Minnesota. And on November 25th, 1992, the Minneapolis Park and Recreation Board, adding their $1.2 million contribution, purchased the land from Glacier Park Co., securing the future of Cedar Lake Park.

In 1995, construction of Phase One of the Cedar Lake Regional Trail was completed and the corridor has continued to grow and change in the years since--with prairie, a cedar grove, and maple and basswood forest. Most recently, construction of the Southwest Light Rail Project has further changed the area.

The Cedar Lake Park Association Records are currently being reorganized and processed by Michael V., one of our archival processing assistants hired as part of a $50,000 Legacy grant received by Special Collections this year. The grant supports processing many of our Minneapolis neighborhood association archival collections.

[squatever]

Minneapolis Economic Boom: A Look at the Growth of Local Businesses in the City

Minneapolis, the largest city in the state of Minnesota, is experiencing an economic boom. This can be seen in the growth of local businesses throughout the city. In recent years, Minneapolis has become a hub for innovation and entrepreneurship, with new startups and established companies alike thriving in the city's dynamic economy.

One of the key drivers of Minneapolis' economic growth has been the city's thriving tech sector. The city is home to a number of major tech companies, including Target and Best Buy, as well as a growing number of startups in the areas of software development, data analytics, and artificial intelligence. These companies are attracting top talent from around the country, and are helping to fuel the city's economic expansion.

Another factor contributing to Minneapolis' economic boom is the city's strong and diverse economy. The city is home to a number of major industries, including healthcare, finance, and manufacturing. This diversity helps to insulate the city from economic downturns in any one sector, and helps to ensure that there are always opportunities for businesses to grow and thrive.

In addition to the city's strong economy, Minneapolis is also known for its vibrant and supportive business community. The city is home to a number of business organizations and networking groups, which provide support and resources to local entrepreneurs. The city also has a number of incubators and accelerators, which provide early-stage startups with the resources and support they need to get their businesses off the ground.

Furthermore, Minneapolis is a city with a strong culture of innovation, which has helped to attract and retain top talent. The city's universities and research institutions are major drivers of innovation, and are helping to foster the development of new technologies and business models. The city also has a number of co-working spaces and incubators, which provide entrepreneurs with the resources and support they need to build their businesses.

Overall, Minneapolis is a city that is experiencing an economic boom, with local businesses throughout the city growing and thriving. The city's strong and diverse economy, supportive business community, and culture of innovation are major drivers of this growth, and are helping to ensure that Minneapolis remains a leading player in the national and global economy.

In conclusion, Minneapolis is a city on the rise, with a strong and diverse economy, a supportive business community, and a culture of innovation that is helping to attract and retain top talent. These factors are contributing to the growth of local businesses throughout the city, and are helping to ensure that Minneapolis remains a leading player in the national and global economy. With the recent economic boom, Minneapolis is becoming a hub for innovation and entrepreneurship, and it's a great place to establish your business.

[notallbloodmages]

I Wanna Take a Class

So I've wanted to do some sort of accounting shit forever and...I finally am well enough that it wouldn't be hell to get through. I want to start out with something small that I already have experience in - tax filing! The course I've found goes through both individual and small business taxes, and includes physical textbooks in the tuition.

Ideally I'd like to volunteer my time to help others. I don't want to run a tax business or anything. Basically....I love filling out forms and looking at numbers, I love helping people, and I hate the USA system of scaring the public into paying big companies to file info that the gov't already has. Plus it would be relevant to my own existing small business as a bonus!

With all the stray cats we've helped survive the winter (if you're in MN and want a cat...), I'm pretty broke. So please take a look at some of my artwork that I have for sale! I also do custom work with no minimum quantity requirement, and I'm really flexible on pricing. I'll do trades, too, which wouldn't fulfill my tuition cost raising, but just in general it's a thing I accept.

If you don't need any embroidery or sewing done, I would also gratefully accept donations at my Ko-Fi OR you can buy a gift card on my site to use in the future.

Reblogs appreciated but I won't guilt trip anyone into them!

In addition for anyone trying to offer advice: -No, I can't get a loan. My bank knows I don't have much income right now so they won't give me a personal one. And it's not a college degree-related loan so they won't give me an education loan either. -My credit card isn't maxxed but I only have about a third of what I need for the course. -The course is less than $1k in case anyone wants to know. -Yes, I did look up reviews and how local colleges feel about the course in case I want to get a degree some day. That is why I chose the one that I have.

[beardedmrbean]

An activist group and researchers tried to increase pressure on agribusiness giant Cargill on Wednesday to do more to fight deforestation and human rights abuse, releasing a report that accuses the company of not following through on commitments to help end such practices.

The report argues that the family-owned company has been misled by its managers and now should take the lead in ensuring it carries out its promises to fight forced child labor in the cocoa industry and protect forests and other natural resources. As one of the world's largest privately held companies and by far the largest grain distributor, Cargill is in a unique position to force positive changes, especially in ending deforestation, the groups said in the report.

"The destruction of the natural world is driven by agribusiness and agribusiness is driven by Cargill," said Todd Paglia, executive director of the environmental group Stand.Earth, at a news conference in Wayzata, Minnesota, a Minneapolis suburb where Cargill is based.

Besides the news conference, Stand.Earth highlighted the report by buying full page advertisements in The New York Times and Minneapolis Star Tribune newspapers. Later Wednesday, the group planned to deliver documents backing its report to the Wayzata headquarters of the families that own a majority of Cargill and ask that they be given to 20 leading members of the families.

Cargill did not immediately respond to a request to comment about the report.

According to its 2022 annual report, Cargill recorded $165 billion in revenue for the fiscal year ending May 31, 2022. The company says it has 155,000 employees and operates in 70 countries, with sales in 125 countries.

The report states that 193,000 square miles (499,868 square kilometers) of forest were destroyed through human activity from 2015 to 2020, primarily because of expansion of agriculture in South America, Central America and parts of Africa. Although Cargill has promised to end deforestation practices for products in its supply chain, the report argues the company has invested in ports and other infrastructure in South America that will lead to the removal of forests for land to grow soybeans.

The report, compiled with help from the Brazilian journalism organization Repórter Brasil and the nonprofit group AidEnvironment, also accuses Cargill of not following through on its commitments, first in 2001 and then in 2010, to end or at least reduce forced child labor in the cocoa industry. Cargill is one of the world's largest cocoa suppliers.

The report cited a U.S. Department of Labor-funded study that found the number of children harvesting cocoa in the Ivory Coast and Ghana and the prevalence of hazardous child labor in those countries had both increased.

“It's one thing not to meet an ambitious target,” said Mathew Jacobson, director of Stand.Earth. “It's another to have the problems you claim to be addressing get worse.”

Jacobson said he is hopeful the families that own most of Cargill will push for change if it realizes company executives are not making meaningful changes.

“We are not asking for anything the company has not already promised,” the report says in its conclusion. “We seek implementation, not new commitments.”

[mariacallous]

In February, attackers from the Russia-based BlackCat ransomware group hit a physician practice in Lackawanna County, Pennsylvania, that's part of the Lehigh Valley Health Network (LVHN). At the time, LVHN said that the attack “involved” a patient photo system related to radiation oncology treatment. The health care group said that BlackCat had issued a ransom demand, “but LVHN refused to pay this criminal enterprise.” 

After a couple of weeks, BlackCat threatened to publish data stolen from the system. “Our blog is followed by a lot of world media, the case will be widely publicized and will cause significant damage to your business,” BlackCat wrote on their dark-web extortion site. “Your time is running out. We are ready to unleash our full power on you!” The attackers then released three screenshots of cancer patients receiving radiation treatment and seven documents that included patient information.

The medical photos are graphic and intimate, depicting patients' naked breasts in various angles and positions. And while hospitals and health care facilities have long been a favorite target of ransomware gangs, researchers say the situation at LVHN may indicate a shift in attackers' desperation and willingness to go to ruthless extremes as ransomware targets increasingly refuse to pay.

 “As fewer victims pay the ransom, ransomware actors are getting more aggressive in their extortion techniques,” says Allan Liska, an analyst for the security firm Recorded Future who specializes in ransomware. “I think we’ll see more of that. It follows closely patterns in kidnapping cases, where when victims’ families refused to pay, the kidnappers might send an ear or other body part of the victim.”

Researchers say that another example of these brutal escalations came on Tuesday when the emerging ransomware gang Medusa published sample data stolen from Minneapolis Public Schools in a February attack that came with a $1 million ransom demand. The leaked screenshots include scans of handwritten notes that describe allegations of a sexual assault and the names of a male student and two female students involved in the incident.

“Please note, MPS has not paid a ransom,” the Minnesota school district said in a statement at the beginning of March. The school district enrolls more than 36,000 students, but the data apparently contains records related to students, staff, and parents dating back to 1995. Last week, Medusa posted a 50-minute-long video in which attackers appeared to scroll through and review all the data they stole from the school, an unusual technique for advertising exactly what information they currently hold. Medusa offers three buttons on its dark-web site, one for anyone to pay $1 million to buy the stolen MPS data, one for the school district itself to pay the ransom and have the stolen data deleted, and one to pay $50,000 to extend the ransom deadline by one day.

“What’s notable here, I think, is that in the past the gangs have always had to strike a balance between pressuring their victims into paying and not doing such heinous, terrible, evil things that victims don’t want to deal with them,” says Brett Callow, a threat analyst at the antivirus company Emsisoft. “But because targets are not paying as often, the gangs are now pushing harder. It's bad PR to have a ransomware attack, but not as terrible as it once was—and it's really bad PR to be seen paying an organization that does terrible, heinous things.”

The public pressure is certainly mounting. In response to the leaked patient photos this week, for example, LVHN said in a statement, “This unconscionable criminal act takes advantage of patients receiving cancer treatment, and LVHN condemns this despicable behavior.”

The FBI Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3) said in its annual Internet Crime Report this week that it received 2,385 reports about ransomware attacks in 2022, totaling $34.3 million in losses. The numbers were down from 3,729 ransomware complaints and $49 million in total losses in 2021. “It has been challenging for the FBI to ascertain the true number of ransomware victims as many infections go unreported to law enforcement,” the report notes.

But the report specifically calls out evolving and more aggressive extortion behavior. “In 2022, the IC3 has seen an increase in an additional extortion tactic used to facilitate ransomware,” the FBI wrote. “The threat actors pressure victims to pay by threatening to publish the stolen data if they do not pay the ransom.”

In some ways, the change is a positive sign that efforts to combat ransomware are working. If enough organizations have the resources and tools to resist paying ransoms, attackers eventually may not be able to generate the revenue they want and, ideally, would abandon ransomware entirely. But that makes this shift toward more aggressive tactics a precarious moment. 

“We really haven’t seen things like this before. Groups have done unpleasant things, but it was adults that were targeted, it wasn’t sick cancer patients or school kids,” Emsisoft's Callow says. “I hope that these tactics will bite them in the butt and that companies will say no, we cannot be seen funding an organization that does these heinous things. That’s my hope anyway. Whether they will react that way remains to be seen.”