Bizbox Twitter:

    A Tale of Community Banking

    By Marc Tracy

    MSNBC runs a fantastic little story on the small businesses of Westwood, N.J. and how they have come to rely on the local, publicly owned community bank to get them through the months and years. (The community bank in question, it should be noted, was wise enough to stay away from the junk real estate loans that have helped cause the failure of 100 banks in 2009.) It's especially fascinating to hear all this stuff from the businesses' perspectives, straight from their owners' mouths. When times are tough, the consensus advice--and we ourselves have given it--is: first, slash payroll. But small business owners don't particularly want to lay anyone off, since their employees are, in the words of the restaurant owner interviewed, "family". Fortunately, it seems these owners' relationship to their employees is similar to the community banks' relationship to these businesses.

    Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

    Comments (0)

    November 4, 2009 1:03 PM

    Post a comment

    (Comments that include profanity, personal attacks or other inappropriate comments or material will be removed from the site. Additionally, entries that are unsigned or contain "signatures" by someone other than the actual author will be removed.)

    (If you haven't left a comment here before, you may need to be approved by the site owner before your comment will appear. Until then, it won't appear on the entry. Thanks for waiting.)

    The Purpose Linked Organization

    by Alaina Love

    On Tuesday, July 14 earn how to harness your employees' passions so that they further your own.

    401(k) 401(k)s academics acquisition Advertising alternative energy American Express Americas Competitiveness Forum Android angel investing Anonymous Banker! Apple ARC Are You An Entrepreneur? athletes audits auto bailout Baby Boomers bailout Baked & Wired Balance Banana Republic Banking Bankruptcy Banks Barack Obama bartering Bear Stearns Ben's Chili Bowl benefits Bill Cosby Bill Gates Biz Box Panel BizBooks BizBox BizEquity BJs black entrepreneurs Branding Brett Favre broadband business blogging Business Growth business incubators Business Planning Business Week Buzz Capital carbon card-check Carl Icahn Carl's Jr. cash flow CDFI Census chamber of commerce China Chrome Chuck Schumer CIT classification Clients Cloud Computing cNet coffee Collection Columbia University community banks Community Express Competition consumer spending convertible notes corporate structure Costs coupons creative capitalism credit Credit credit cards credit score credit union cupcakes currency Customer Service Day in the Life Debt Debt Repayment Detroit Digg disaster Disaster Loans discounting Dodgeball Dun and Bradstreet Dunder-Mifflin Dunkin' Donuts e-commerce eBay eco-preneurship EEOC Elvis Email email Employee Free Choice Act Employees employer mandate Energy costs Entrepreneur.com Entrepreneurship estate tax Evan Bayh Facebook family business Fannie Mae Farhad Manjoo FDIC Federal Reserve Financing Firefox Flex-time Flexibility Forbes fraud Fred's Freddie Mac Gap gelato George W. Bush Gizmodo Global Gmail goodwill Google Google Analytics Google Sites Government great rearranging green Green Bay Packers Greg Verdino Grom H1N1 Happy New Year hats Health Care Highland Capital Hiring homestead exemption Housing bill HR ICBA identity theft iFund immigration incorporating Innovation innovation policy interchange fees Internet Internet Explorer Introduction inventory optimization investment strategy iPhone iPod IRS iTunes Ivan Misner Jaiku Jerry Seinfeld Jill Lublin jobs John McCain Johnny Money joseph michelli JotSpot Karen G. Mills Kiva Late Payments leadership Legislation Lloyd Chapman Loan Repayment Loopt luxury M&M's M&M's Premium Magic Johnson Main Street Alliance Mamma Mia Management Market Value Marketing Mars Mastercard McDonald's Meetings Mentoring Mentorship meta Microsoft military Mission Statement Mojave Mojave Experiment Money Mortgage Motivation Mozilla MySpace NASE National Women's Business Administration net neutrality Networking new lending program New Orleans NFIB NFL office OfficeMax Old Navy Olympia Snowe Olympics open source optimism index Organization P2P lending Packetel paperless partnership Payment payroll payroll tax peer-to-peer lending Persuasion Planning Podcaster Politics PR Pricing procurement Productivity property tax Raising Capital Rate of Return Real Estate recession marketing referrals Republic Windows retail retirement retirement plan blog retirement plans retiring Risk ritz carlton Roadmap to 2020 Roth IRA Sales Sales advice Sandy K. Baruah SBIR SEAS security self-employment self-employment assistance self-employment tax self-promotion Selling Seth Godin Silicon Valley Slate Small Biz Advice Small Business Administration Small Business Legislation Small Business Salon social networking solar panels Southwest Staples Starbucks Start-up Start-ups states stimulus Structure Success Super Bowl swine flu T-Mobile T-MobileDream TALF Tax Reform Taxes TechCrunch Technology TechRepublic telecommuting the bailout The Big Money the economy The Economy The Entrepreneur's Lament The Great Rearranging the states TIN Twitter unemployment United Parcel Service UPS vacationing venture capital Visa Vista Vista Small Business Assurance Wal-Mart Web 2.0 Windows women entrepreneurs Work/Life Balance Yahoo Yahoo! young entrepreneurs Zune