Tacoma rescues a business lost in cyberspace. How can your community foster "Economic Gardening"?

Google any combination of the words Tacoma, custom, apparel and embroidery. You won’t find Rainier Designs.

Worse yet, go to http://www.rainierdesigns.com. Most likely you’ll see a big blank spot in the middle of your computer screen. Owner Gordon Alvord wanted you to see a repeating series of photographs showing off his start-up company’s best work.

After nearly 500 days of doing business 24 hours a day in a virtual world, guess how many customers Alvord has gotten through rainierdesigns.com?

That’s right. Zero.

“I had hoped to be more visible,” Alvord said.

DAN VOELPEL; THE NEWS TRIBUNE

Full Story: http://www.thenewstribune.com/business/columnists/voelpel/story/5536396p-4985426c.html

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Economic Gardening in Littleton, CO http://littletongov.org/bia/economicgardening/default.asp

Many thanks to Dan Ripke for passing this along. Russ)