The North Central Florida Business Report

There’s something to be said about the power of a tall glass of beer. From the first time Luke Kemper took a swig of craft beer, he was hooked on the flavor and the possibilities of brewing his own. So when he wrapped up studying business and environmental science at the University of Colorado in [...]

Chains are adding local stores as part of a national expansion based upon bargain-hunter appeal—and improving their look and merchandise in the process. History is repeating itself, with a mixture of the general store and the “five-and-dime stores” of the past resurging—albeit with some new twists. Dollar stores, carrying a wide variety of discounted items [...]

Two professors who became pioneers in computerized fraud detection now run a diverse, family-focused business. Talk with the men who built one of Gainesville’s most successful businesses, and three words are likely to come up: focus, culture and customer. Info Tech’s emphasis on those three areas has kept it as one of the leaders in [...]

It began with a glass of red wine, and an observation on how well the French aged. Three years later, Reserveage Organics, a Gainesville-based beauty and nutrition supplement company, has grown to a $20 million dollar business. Its chief executive, Naomi Whittel, has seen her products offered in more than 2,500 stores and featured on [...]

Provides innovative solutions that benefit patients while making surgeons’ jobs easier.

You may think of Publix Super Markets as a highly successful grocery store chain, but to people inside the business, it is something else: a personality that carefully grooms itself and constantly works to stay ahead of its rivals.

If you watched the movie The Bucket List, about two terminally ill men living out their wish lists, you might have heard Jack Nicholson rave to Morgan Freeman about Kopi Luwak, the world’s most expensive coffee. Now Coffee Primero, a Gainesville company, is mimicking the exquisite taste of that coffee, without the expense and without the somewhat-unsavory way the original [...]

When it comes to men’s fashion, the less the better. That’s the philosophy of University of Florida graduates Ryan McCabe, Oren Kantor and Adam Fischer, who have created a business selling T-shirts with large arm holes in them, similar to the cut-off shirts some men wear to the gym. Kantor and Fischer came up with [...]

Scott Gill built Atlantis. He made WWI foxholes. He’s worked on dinosaur habitats, too. These are all part of his repertoire at Themeworks, where he and his crew create realistic settings and scenery for clients ranging from museums to theme parks. If you’ve ridden roller coasters at Sea World or Universal Studios, or toured the [...]

John Perkins is developing new types of armor to protect military and police.