Washington loses up to $375 million annually – equal to about 5 percent of tax collections – to as many at 164,000 unregistered businesses operating in the state, according to a new study issued by the Washington State Department of Revenue.

The department recovers about $25 million annually from unregistered businesses through its tax discovery efforts, but the findings will help it bring more businesses into compliance through a combination of education and enforcement, Director Cindi Holmstrom said Thursday. “Legitimate businesses have told us time and again that nobody should enjoy a competitive advantage simply by evading taxes.”

The analysis found that an estimated 99,000 businesses conducting business in Washington were registered with the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) but not the state, costing the state an estimated $225 million in annual tax revenue, equal to 3 percent of taxes collected from registered businesses. An additional $150 million may be lost to another 65,000 businesses that are not registered with either the IRS or the state.

By comparison, the state has 760,000 registered businesses, though only about 460,000 those have to file and pay taxes after small business credits are considered.

The study confirms that out-of-state businesses operating in Washington comprise the bulk of the tax losses, with an estimated $155 million of the $225 million in unpaid tax. These businesses comprise about 25,000 of the 99,000 businesses registered with the IRS but not the state. Many may not realize that their activity requires them to register to do business in Washington. Most of the Department’s current tax discovery efforts are targeted at identifying these businesses and getting them registered and paying taxes.

Washington-based sole proprietors comprise the largest number of unregistered businesses, at 45,000 of the 99,000. Professional and management services constituted the largest dollar loss at $19.6 million of the $52 million in unpaid taxes.

Are you ready for those power outages, fires, earthquakes and major technological breakdowns? If not, you may want to attend tomorrow’s annual business fair sponsored by the University Place / Fircrest division of the Tacoma Pierce County Chamber.

It’s free, and runs from 11 a.m. until 3 p.m. at the Pierce County Environmental Services Building, 9850 64th St. W. in University Place. (That's at the southern end of Grandview Drive, out by the new golf course.)

Free of charge and open to the public, the business-to-business fair will feature an emergency preparedness seminar, plus information about the retention of documents. There will also be booths sponsored by a variety of businesses promoting their goods and services.

Those lattes at Starbucks will soon come with less fat.

Starbucks Corp. said today it will replace whole milk with 2 percent as the default milk for its drinks by the end of the year.

Here's what that means to you: A 16-ounce “grande” latte made with reduced fat milk has 190 calories, compared with 260 calories in one made with whole milk.

But if you love extra fat with your espresso, don't worry. Customers can still request their drinks with whole milk, the company said.

Starbucks said it made the switch based on increased requests from consumers for low-fat milk in stores, as well as increasing purchases of lower fat milk in U.S. consumers’ homes.

The coffeeshop company tested the 2 percent espresso drinks in Jacksonville, Fla.; Orange County, Calif.; the state of Oregon; and London, Ontario, in Canada and said the results were “overwhelmingly positive.”

Grab your sunscreen. Alaska Airlines wants to take you to the Aloha state.

The airline announced today it will offer year-round daily flights beginning Oct. 12 between Sea-Tac and Honolulu, and nonstop between Sea-Tac and Lihue on the island of Kauai starting Oct. 28. The flights are available for purchase now at alaskaair.com.

"Our customers will now be able to enjoy Alaska's special brand of service when visiting the Aloha state," said Gregg Saretsky, Alaska Airlines' executive vice president of flight and marketing. "Hawaii is the largest market out of Seattle and Anchorage that we didn't already serve. These long-awaited routes, including the first nonstop service between Seattle and Kauai, expand the leisure travel options we can offer our customers and Mileage Plan members."

To inaugurate the new service, Alaska Airlines is offering introductory one-way fares of $109 for Sea-Tac-Honolulu flights and $149 for Sea-Tac-Lihue flights. Customers must purchase their tickets by June 2, 2007, and travel by Dec. 13, 2007, from Sea-Tac. Additional restrictions and blackout dates apply.

Sea-Tac-Honolulu flights will depart at 8:40 a.m. Pacific time and arrive at 11:55 a.m. Hawaii time. Return flights will depart at 1:25 p.m. Hawaii time and arrive at 10:10 p.m. Pacific time.

Sea-Tac-Lihue flights will depart at 4:20 p.m. Pacific time and arrive at 7:45 p.m. Hawaii time. Return flights will depart at 9:15 p.m. Hawaii time and arrive at 5:55 a.m. Pacific time.

Warehouse retailer Costco Wholesale Corp. said Thursday its fiscal third-quarter profit declined 4.9 percent due to a charge, but sales advanced at a double-digit pace, The Associated Press reports.

Income for the quarter ended May 13 slid to $224 million from $235.6 million. Per-share earnings were flat at 49 cents.

The latest quarter includes a $30.3 million charge to reflect the reduced gross margin on estimated future returns recorded in the increased sales return reserve. Excluding the item, earnings per share were 56 cents, in line with the average analyst estimate, according to a Thomson Financial survey.

Sales rose 10 percent to $14.34 billion from $13.01 billion but were shy of the consensus estimate of $14.68 billion.

This just in:

IKEA announced today that its Portland store will open on July 25. If you are familiar with Portland, the new store is out near the airport, off of Interstate 205.

IKEA Portland will present 50 different room settings, three complete model homes, a supervised children’s play area, and a 250-seat restaurant serving Swedish specialties such as meatballs with lingonberries or salmon plates, as well as American dishes, according to a news release from the company.

The store will also include approximately 1,200 parking spaces, 75 bicycle racks (very Portland), as well as a light-rail station in front of the store, providing convenient access for coworkers as well as for customers.

The store will employ 400 people. It's the second store in the Northwest and the 31st store in the country.

At yesterday's Port of Tacoma commission meeting, port staff announced they'd finally reached an agreement with Arkema to buy the chemical company's property on Taylor Way.

The news was overshadowed by the eminent domain action, so I thought I'd provide a few more details here.

The port has been trying to obtain the 67 acres owned by Arkema for the past few years. Saying that the negotiations were taking too long, the port filed a condemnation action against the company last December.

The property – at 2901 Taylor Way – once housed a caustic soda and liquid chlorine plant. The business opened in 1929 and operated under the name Pennwalt for much of its life.

The property hasn't been used for years.

=> Read more!

As George Harrison sang: “Let me tell you how it will be, there's one for you, nineteen for me.”
And now it’s your turn to be The Taxman.

The Internal Revenue Service is looking for Revenue Officer candidates for positions in Bellevue, Kennewick, Olympia, Seattle, Tacoma, Vancouver and Yakima. Applicants must apply by June 21.

An applicant must be a U.S.citizen and have a bachelor’s degree, with superior academic achievement, or equivalent work experience. Revenue officers are trained in both tax law and collection techniques necessary for the collection of delinquent taxes and delinquent tax returns. Duties include conducting research, interviews, investigations and analysis of financial information for assigned cases, often at the taxpayer’s home or business.

For details, visit www.jobs.irs.gov/home.html. Application information is available at www.usajobs.opm.gov.

Attention music lovers: iTunes Store now sells thousands of songs without copy protection.

That means you can listen to them on any device that plays digital music.

The service – called iTunes Plus – features tracks that are free of digital rights management, or DRM, technology. The copy-protection software limits where songs or movies can be played and distributed.

The unrestricted content means some songs purchased from iTunes will work for the first time directly on portable players other than Apple’s iPod, including Microsoft Corp.’s Zune.

The inaugural batch of iTunes Plus songs includes music from Coldplay, The Rolling Stones, Norah Jones, Frank Sinatra, Pink Floyd and more than a dozen of Paul McCartney’s classic albums.

ChangMook Sohn, executive director of the State Economic and Revenue Forecast Council, today sent his latest economic forecast – for June – to the Governor’s Council of Economic Advisors. The advisors will meet Friday in Olympia to review the forecast.
Among the highlights:

• Nationwide, what little GDP growth there was in the first quarter (1.3 percent) was more than accounted for by consumer spending which rose at a rate of 3.8 percent.

• Housing starts continued to plunge in the first quarter, falling at a 19.9 percent rate to 1.474 million units. The mortgage rate declined to 6.22 percent in the first quarter from 6.25 percent in the fourth quarter.

• The national forecast shows an even more severe downturn than assumed in the March forecast, but the Washington forecast continues to expect a slowing, but no significant decline. "We believe the underlying trend is close to 50,000 units with higher multi-family activity offsetting much of the decline in the single-family market."

• The Washington aerospace employment forecast is virtually unchanged since March. As of April, the aerospace sector has added 16,600 jobs since the trough in May 2004. The forecast expects another 3,400 new aerospace jobs by mid-2008 when employment is expected to level off at 80,900. This is still 32,200 (28.5 percent) lower than the previous peak in June 1998.

• Excluding software jobs, which tend to skew general results, real personal income will increase 0.9 percent in the second quarter and 4.7 percent in 2007 as a whole. The figure will increase 4.6 percent in 2008. The average annual wage for Washington workers will increase 4.4 percent in 2007 and 3.9 percent in 2008.

To see a copy of the full forecast, visit www.erfc.wa.gov.

There’s a puppy on the East Coast, or maybe in Canada. The owner is a missionary, and about to leave home to do God’s work in Africa. You, a dog lover, can have the puppy for free.

That’s what the online ad says. That’s what you read when you go to the Web site. That’s what you hear when you call the number.

Yes, the puppy is free – but there will be a $400 shipping fee. Please wire the money immediately.

Guess what! There is no puppy. You’re out the $400. So goes one of the latest scams reported by the Better Business Bureau.

Marcella Kallmann, regional BBB public relations and communications manager, said today that this particular scheme “seems to be more prevalent. People get so emotionally involved. They’ve found a dog, and they’ll go to all ends, even if it means paying a little extra. We’re dubbing these the Nigerian Puppy Scams.”

The scammers, she says “are pulling at peoples’ heartstrings from all different directions.”

So beware. If you’re looking for a purebred dog, check the American Kennel Club at www.akc.org. If you’re looking for a new pet, try the Humane Society. If you’re thinking about sending $400 to a stranger, go first to the BBB at www.bbb.org.

Looking for an inexpensive plane ticket? Expedia will add low-cast airline JetBlue Airways Corp.

JetBlue will list flights on Expedia and unit Hotwire for five years, the companies said Thursday according to Bloomberg News.

JetBlue in August began selling flights to offline travel agencies through Sabre Holdings Corp. and is on a testing basis with Sabre’s Travelocity.com, the No. 2 U.S. online travel agency, JetBlue spokesman Bryan Baldwin said.

JetBlue, which trails Southwest Airlines Co. among U.S. low-cost carriers, is trying to boost sales after two straight years of losses and winter operating problems that caused the airline to cancel almost 1,700 flights, stranding more than 130,000 passengers.

St. Joseph Medical Center in Tacoma, St. Clare Hospital in Lakewood and St. Francis Hospital in Federal Way this month received the 2007 Partners for Change Award for waste-reduction, mercury-elimination and recycling programs.

The awards were presented by Hospitals for a Healthy Environment. The three Franciscan Health System hospitals were among 128 hospitals, health systems and health care organizations in the United States honored by H2E.

In 2006, St. Joseph, St. Clare and St. Francis recycled, reused or donated 138,000 pounds of materials that otherwise would likely have ended up in landfills. “We always strive to be good stewards of our limited resources,” said Rozi Arends, Franciscan’s manager of value analysis.

It may be too soon to call this a trend, but the numbers look right. And what with gasoline prices traditionally bound upwards on the edge of a holiday weekend, today it’s different.

The price of gasoline is going down.

A gallon of regular gas in Tacoma fell again Friday – to $3.415, down from $3.429 on Thursday. In Bellingham, home of the state’s most highly priced gas, the price fell from $3.541 to $3.539, according to AAA. Spokane is maintaining its reputation for selling Washington’s cheapest gas, at $3.302 a gallon, down from $3.308.

A month ago, Tacoma gas was just over $3.19, and a year ago it was a hair above $3.17 – but down a penny in one day is cause for a small celebration.

Go ahead, smile.

Now get back to work. And have a pleasant holiday.

Hundreds of business and community leaders gathered at the Greater Tacoma Convention & Trade Center last night to honor four people for their work in community and business.

The room was crowded. The food was good - including the famous cheesebread. And everybody had read The News Tribune's series profiling the winners: Ray Tennison of Simpson Investment Group, Joe Stortini of Joeseppi's Italian Ristorante and George Weyerhaeuser of the company that bears his family's name. (Note to YMCA CEO Bob Ecklund and his fans: Bob's profile will run in Sunday's paper. Columnist Dan Voelpel will tell the story of how he raised money for the new Gig Harbor center.)

Keynote speaker Steve Rogel, CEO of Weyerhaeuser Co., told the story of an early Tacoma blessed with a deep water port and abundant natural resources. He talked of the boom and bust of the city. And he gave credit to business leaders who stepped up starting in the 1980s to start revitalization in the downtown core.

Weyerhaeuser has donated $11 million in Pierce County since 1998.

George Weyerhaeuser made a rare public appearance since retiring from the company about a decade ago and accepted his lifetime achievement award:

"We did a lot of good things. I don't know anyone who did more than (Columbia Bank founder) Bill Philip. I love this area. I think we have all the advantages of location and beauty."

Weyerhaeuser splits his time between Palm Springs and Lakewood.

Amazon.com today announced it is seeking enthusiastic, energetic young Muggles under the age of 18 to be filmed sharing their excitement for the epic series and championing their favorite Harry Potter character.

Between five and 15 entrants will be selected as “Amazon Kid Correspondents,” and will serve as Amazon.com’s Harry Potter aficionados in media interviews and on the Amazon.com Web site leading up to the much-anticipated July 21 release of “Harry Potter and Deathly Hallows.”

Selected video submissions will be shown on the Amazon.com Web site for customers to enjoy. The deadline for submissions is 11:59 p.m. June 1; or when 1,000 eligible entries have been received, whichever comes first.

For information on the Harry Potter Kid Correspondent Quest and for Quest rules, visit www.amazon.com/kidcorrespondent.

Alaska Air Group stock hit a more than 2-year closing low today at $27.52 on news that the SeaTac-based airline holding company expects the second quarter to be less profitable than the same quarter last year.

The stock closed at $27.52 a share, the lowest closing price since May 6, 2005, when the stock closed at $27.13 a share.

The stock has dropped steeply since Alaska announced in April that its first quarter results were less than analysts had predicted. As recently as March 21, Alaska stock closed at more than $40.00 a share.

The lastest dip was propelled by an Alaska Securities and Exchange Commission filing in which the airline group said that while its costs per mile, per seat are expected to drop to 7.5 cents in the second quarter, the amount it receives from fares and other sources per mile is expected to drop 2.8 percent and its percentage of seats filled will decline by 1.8 percentage points.

Meanwhile the airline said it had found buyers for 20 of its Boeing MD80s, which it is retiring in favor of new Boeing 737-800s. The airline will lease back 16 of those planes until their replacement planes arrive.

In another more pleasant bit of aerospace industry financial news, The Boeing Co. closed at a new all-time high, $97.42 a share. Boeing executives told analysts Wednesday that the company expects rising earnings over the next two years generated by a record order backlog.

Air France and AirTran waded in with more Boeing orders today.

Air France ordered 18 more 777 widebodies to replace its remaining fleet of Boeing 747s. The 777 order was part of $7 billion order from Boeing and Airbus.

From Airbus, Air France ordered 30 more A320 family single-aisle aircraft. The French carrier also exercised options for two more A380 super jumbos. The additional two were part of the compensation Airbus provided Air France for its late delivery of the first 10 A380s Air France has already put on order.

Meanwhile, Orlando's AirTran Airways placed orders for 15 Boeing 737-700 aircraft. Those planes are due for delivery in 2010 and 2011. The airline currently has a fleet of 132 planes, 45 Boeing 737-700s, and 87 Boeing 717-200 aircraft. The company is attempting to take over Midwest Airlines, which has a fleet of 717s.

Spam still fills our electronic inboxes, but it doesn’t bother us as much. Newcomers to the Internet are bothered less than veteran users.
We’ve learned how to filter spam, and we’re not reading it.

The Pew Internet & American Life Project today released the results of its latest study into the unsolicited mail that sometimes clogs our computers.
Among the findings:

• 37 percent of Internet users said the volume spam in personal e-mail accounts has increased, up from 24 percent three years ago. For those with e-mail accounts at work, 29 percent say the volume has increased, versus 18 percent three years ago.
• In June 2003, 25 percent of users said spam was a big problem. Now, only 18 percent say that.
• Those who are not bothered “at all” has risen from 16 percent to 28 percent.
• 52 percent of e-mail users report having lately received pornographic spam, down from 71 percent three years ago.
• Internet users under age 50 are more likely than their elders to say that spam is annoying. Two thirds of college graduates are annoyed, compared with 45 percent of those with less education.
• 16 percent of Internet users with less then six years online say spam ins a big problem; 41 percent say it’s not a problem at all. For those who have been online more than six years, 19 percent say it’s a big problem and only 21 percent aren’t bothered.
• 68 percent of those who use e-mail say they almost never unintentionally open a message without realizing it was spam.
• 71 percent use filters offered by employers or e-mail providers, and 44 percent have taken steps to make it more difficult for others to fund their e-mail addresses.
• 51 percent say they check their spam folders “at least once in a while” and 46 percent say the almost never or never check the folder.
• 36 percent of users say they have received “phishing” requests for financial information.

(The report was embargoed for electronic release today and for use in newspapers on Thursday. For a copy of the full report, visit www.pewinternet.org.)

LAS VEGAS – The doors will open next March on a 10-screen digital movie theater at Gig Harbor's Uptown Center. The man behind the movies, Galaxy Theaters Chairman Frank Rimkus, says the stars have aligned now to make downtown Tacoma viable for a multiscreen theater.

As part of the right development project, Rimkus said he would consider adding Galaxy to the mix. He spent part of this week here at the International Council of Shopping Centers annual conference scouting location opportunities for his relatively small chain of 10 locations in Washington, Nevada, California and Texas. Galaxy owns the Galaxy 6 in Tacoma on South 23rd Street near Allenmore Golf Course. Rimkus has found a formula to that location work after two other theater chains tried and bombed.

While here in Vegas, I went to Galaxy's 1-year-old multiplex at the Cannery Hotel & Casino. If I had taken these photographs a few minutes earlier, I would have caught CEO Rimkus pushing a dust broom in the crowded lobby where a flood of families were en route to see "Shrek 3."

"We're like a big family," Rimkus said. "Everyone pitches in."

True enough. Theater Manager A.J. Witherspoon had the wipes and glass cleaner out buffing the entry doors.

In this puffed up city where glitz rules, you have to do something special to impress the locals. Witherspoon and crew must have the right formula. In the Las Vegas Review-Journal 2007 Best of Vegas listing, the paper picked this theater as the best of the bunch.

Maybe because Galaxy puts REAL butter on its popcorn.

"I'm very proud of that award," Rimkus said, "because it reflects on the quality of the staff we have."

Gig Harbor will get the benefit of it when Witherspoon transfers there to open the new theater next year.

Michael Spitzauer, CEO of Green Power, popped up in Atlanta earlier this month at the Waste Expo.

According to e-mails I received from people who met Spitzauer there, he may be looking for more investors for this trash-to-diesel business.

Spitzauer had repeatedly said he had the $82 million he needs to build the Fife plant – which he has yet to break ground on.

I wonder why he's in Atlanta...

To refresh your memory, Spitzauer is the person who proposed a multi-million garbage-to-diesel plant to be built on property inside the Puyallup Tribe of Indians reservation.

He was also convicted of fraud in Austria. He spent time in prison there.

I reported a story last winter about the many questions surrounding Green Power and the man who heads it including not paying employees, being investigated by the state's Department of Financial Institutions, disputes with the inventor over rights to the technology, etc.

About a month ago the Environmental Protection Agency fined Green Power for violating environmental regulations.

Spitzauer remains involved in numerous court cases as his previous creditors from former business ventures try to catch up to him, according to court documents.

His proposed plant here was supposed to open last fall. He has yet to start construction and most likely will never get the permits to do so, according to officials with the Puyallup Tribe.

Now he's in Atlanta pitching a new version of the waste-to-diesel technology, according sources who saw him there. And people are e-mailing me from Georgia wondering if they should invest.

Spitzauer asked me once if "Big Oil" was feeding me tips about him. For the record I've had no contact with "Big Oil."

But I have had lots of contact with "Big Court Documents" and people who've done business with Spitzauer in the past.

Sometimes doing business is about more than revenue, profit and earnings. So says Forbes in a recent story that runs down the highlights of a study ranking 600 companies on categories such as innovation, citizenship and leadership.

Microsoft hit the top for innovation. But it was IKEA, the giant, ready-to-assemble land of colorful, modernesque furniture, that pulled in a top five ranking in five of the seven categories.

The study shows that IKEA is No. 1 in governance and leadership, which spokeswoman Mona Liss explained stems from the company's equality in the workplace in lieu of a true hierarchy or caste, according to Forbes.

"We really don't have titles at IKEA," she said.

For the uber rich, not even a 747 is out of reach as a conspicuous symbol of their wealth.

Both Boeing and Airbus are increasingly relying on the shieks, moguls and corporate barons of the world to supplement the orders they get from airlines to fill their airliner production lines.

And with parts of the world awash in cash (now you know where the profits from that $50 fill-up are going) business is better than ever.

Just today Boeing announced it had sold yet another 737-sized corporate jet to a Ocean Sky, a London-based corporate aircraft charter firm. That follows the company's announcement earlier this week that it has sold six Boeing Business Jets to undisclosed buyers and two 787 Dreamliner jets to individual customers including Hong Kong real estate tycoon Joseph Lau. List price for a 787? $153 million with a fancy interior extra.

Airbus countered that its Airbus Corporate jet family has won 14 firm orders since the year's start. In addition, Airbus sold three of its A340 four-engine jets to corporate customers. In passenger configurations, the A340 seats up to 350 passengers.

Boeing also revealed a mockup interior for the latest version of the double-deck 747, the 747-8 Intercontinental. Those interiors featured a two-story dining room as part of the nearly 5,000 square feet of interior space on the new jet. An undisclosed individual bought the first passenger version of the new jet.

J.D. Power and Associates' annual North American Airport Satisfaction Study is out again, and the results are not encouraging for Sea-Tac Airport.

The study rates Sea-Tac 16th of 25 mid-sized U.S. airports in overall passenger satisfaction. The survey gave Sea-Tac a numeric rating of 680 out of 1,000 possible points. The winner in the medium-sized category, Kansas City International Airport, won 721 points. At the bottom in that category was Calgary with 656 points. The average for that segment was 688 points.

Sea-Tac was rated lowest by the travelers in its terminal facilities. The travelers surveyed gave Sea-Tac an average of two stars out of five stars for those facilities.

That below-average terminal facilities rating comes, somewhat ironically, after Sea-Tac spent more than $1 billion in rebuilding its A concourse, extending the ticketing lobby to a new arrival hall on the airport's south end and creating a showpiece central marketplace surrounded by restaurants and shops and with a vast window wall overlooking the runways. The airport has remodeled and upgraded most of its restrooms, replaced its underground shuttle trains and upgraded its security checkpoints.

In all other categories evaluated by travelers, accessibility, check-in, security check, food & beverage, retail services, baggage claim and immigration, customs control, Sea-Tac won "about average" ratings.

=> Read more!

Wal-Mart Stores Inc. has decided to cut a second line of women’s apparel by the end of this year as it struggles with growing inventory despite a drive to offer more fashion for price-conscious shoppers, according to an Associated Press story at MSNBC.

The world’s largest retailer said Monday it will reduce the number of U.S. stores selling a fashion line by designer Mark Eisen, which it unveiled last year as part of a drive to match successful low-price designer labels at rivals like Target Corp.

But a Wal-Mart spokeswoman said the reduction will not be as large as the retailer’s rollback of its urban-style Metro 7 line for women, which the company said was pushed too fast into too many stores.

“This is not of the same magnitude,” spokeswoman Linda Blakley said. “It is not at all uncommon for adjustments to be made as you roll out a new line.”

The line getting downsized goes by the name George ME. A quick look at the retailer’s Web site turned up sateen capris, a cord blazer, a paisley chiffon dress and a cotton-silk camp shirt by George ME. All were priced between $16.82 and $27.82.

The price drop isn't exactly enough to get you thinking about buying a new 14 mpg Mercedes G55, but the price of gasoline both in the state and in the Puget Sound area fell overnight.

"Fell" might be too strong a word for what AAA Washington figures show. The statewide average for regular dropped from $3.445 on Monday to $3.443 today. In the Seattle-Bellevue-Everett area, the price eased downward by .2 of a cent to $3.461.

In Tacoma, the regular average changed from $3.448 to $3.445 a gallon. That's a grand savings of six cents on a $68.90 fill-up.

The significant news, however, is that after nearly three months of a steeply upward climb in Washington the prices may have plateaued or even turned downward.

The drop follows a trend seen in California where gas prices have been inching downward since May 9. At $3.45 a gallon, the California price is down four cents a gallon in the last two weeks.

While West Coast prices are softening, the national average is still climbing though its got a long way to go catch up with the West Coast. The national average price of regular Tuesday was $3.209 a gallon, up 1.3 cents from Monday.

Illinois now has the priciest gas in the U.S. at $3.481 a gallon. The lowest? You'd never guess. New Jersey with the only sub $3.00 price, $2.947 among the 50 states.

The Tacoma-Pierce County Chamber 2007 New Tacoma awards were announced last week.

They winners were:

• Ghilarducci Award (recognizing successful new development, renovation, or beautification): Prium Companies

• Popham Award (recognizing the individual that has done the most to build community): Lisa Fruichiante, Grand Cinema promoter, underground artist, and community builder

• Union Station Award (recognizing leading companies or individuals that have built or sustained momentum for revitalization): Jim Merritt, architecture company Merritt Arch

• Schoenfeld Award (recognizing exemplary performance--and pizzaz!--as a retailer): Leroy Jewelers & The Art Stop

The following nominees were also recognized:
Alexa Folsom Hill (SOTA)
Bill Evans, Tacoma City Council
Chuckals Office Supply
Dame Lola
Derek Young
Felix Flannigan, Martin Luther King Housing Development Authority
Kevin Freitas
Jeff Rounce, The Business Examiner
Matador Restaurant
Paddy Coyne's Irish Pub

The final assembly line for Boeing's new 787 Dreamliner is unlike any in aviation.

When it's finally up and running at full speed, the job of taking the parts of the 787 brought from plants all over the world and making a finished plane will take three days. That's about a quarter of what it takes Boeing to build a plane now.

That speed is a product of Boeing's decision to have much of the large construction and small detail work on large subassemblies done at subcontractors' plants. When the system is working well, those large subassemblies, big sections of the fuselage, the tail, the nose and the wings will come prestuffed with all the wiring, plumbing, ducting, motors and sensors needed for the complete plane.

Workers at Everett will simply join those half dozen big pieces together, connect the wiring and plumbing, hang the engines on the wings, and install the interior. Three days=one finished 787.

Boeing showed reporters Monday how it has modified an assembly hall at Everett to accommodate the new assembly method.

The company, for instance, has eliminated overhead cranes that are used in other assembly halls to move major plane parts. Instead, partially built 787s will be secured in specially built cradles that move on rails in the floor. A towering, bridge-like device, nicknamed the Mother of All Tools, will move the pieces of the plane's tail into position to join with the fuselage.

Once the planes' landing gear is installed, it will support itself as it rolls down the assembly line.

Smaller parts necessary for final assembly and not installed at the factories of Boeing's partner contractors, will be assembled into "kits" by a company called New Breed for delivery to the assembly line for installation. A kit could include major parts plus all of the fasteners and even the tools needed to install it.

Here's an additional photo taken this week on the assembly line:

Gov. Christine Gregoire took time out of her busy day Monday to give the engineers, executives and workers at Boeing a well-deserved attaboy for reaching the critical milestone of beginning assembly of the new 787 jetliner.

But for all the governor's virtues, she's obviously no aviation aficiando. You could see the silent cringes on the faces of the assembled engineers at an event Monday at Boeing's Everett plant when she referred to the part of the 787 Dreamliner built at Boeing's Frederickson plant as "the wing," and when she said the 787 was an ecological wonder because it would use less "gas."

The part that the folks in Frederickson build is the vertical tail. The 787 wings are made in Japan. The 787, like all jetliners, doesn't use "gas" but jet fuel that's similar to kerosene.

But the Boeing brass obviously appreciated the governor's interest and accolades, so a minor mistake in aviation jargon was not a big deal.

Fast-food chain Wendy’s plans to add breakfast to 30 percent of its restaurants by the end of the year, according to trade magazine Marketing Daily. Key to the strategy is serving a Folgers Gourmet line of coffee.

“We've engaged in consumer testing and it scores extremely well. It's a high-quality, premium coffee that will compete favorably with any other coffee in the marketplace," said spokesman Bob Bertini.

Perhaps the company was emboldened by a recent Consumer
Reports coffee tasting that ranked McDonald’s brew ahead of Starbucks'.

No info on which Wendy's will get the new breakfast program, but Marketing Daily reports that all the restaurants will eventually be serving the Folgers Gourmet – with or without eggs and hashbrowns.

LAS VEGAS – I had a close shave here Monday and lived to tell you about it.

During the International Council of Shopping Centers conference, V's Barbershop, a young franchise based in the Greater Phoenix area, had two chairs open for anyone who needed their neck hair shaved. And boy, I had a scruffy neck.

So Mario Herrera, director of barbers, applied the warm creme and scraped my neck with a straight razor.

Meanwhile, Jim Valenzuela, founder and president of V's Barbershop, said the company would sell franchises in the Puget Sound region if anyone stepped forward to meet the requirements. The franchise fee costs $25,000. The royalty fee equals 5 percent of gross sales. The advertising fee equals 3 percent. The total build-out of a shop requires an investment estimated between $194,000 to $386,000, according to company materials.

At a separate booth at the conference, real estate specialists for IN-N-OUT Burger solicited potential new locations for its juicy Double Doubles and other burgers. (One outlet sits just across Interstate 15 from the convention center here.)

Alas, the company, founded in 1948, would not bring one to the Puget Sound region even if we begged and claimed the IN-N-OUT cheeseburger tastes better than Frisko Freeze's burgers. A company representative says you'll have to visit Nevada, California or Arizona to get your fix for the foreseeable future.

Call it a decrease in benefits rather than a rate increase. Either way, Puget Sound Energy electricity customers will see their bills increase by an average of $10.28 per month thanks to a decision announced this morning by the Bonneville Power Administration.

In a letter to seven Northwest utilities, BPA said it would not be sending checks amounting to some $25 million related to "residential exchange program benefits." Those benefits had been passed on as credits to utility customers.

The announcement by BPA came after a decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.

BPA spokesman Mike Hansen told The News Tribune today that the payments would be held in a reserve account "until we work through this issue."

Steve Reynolds, Puget Sound Energy chairman, president and CEO, lamented the announcement and said it was "a simple question of fairness."

Mark Gendron, BPA vice president of requirements marketing, said in the letter to utilities that the agency is "exploring all potential viable avenues for rehearing, including by the full court if possible."

The marathon of photo opportunities and events leading up to the July 8, 2007 (7/8/07) rollout of the first Boeing 787 Dreamliner grows larger today with Boeing holding an open house at its new 787 assembly line in Everett.

The open house follows a string of well-photographed late night arrivals of the key substructures of the new plane aboard Boeing swollen 747, the Dreamlifter.

Gov. Christine Gregoire and a clutch of Boeing executives will lead the cheers this afternoon displaying for the first time what Boeing's four years of research and design and the state's billions in tax cuts have wrought.

Give credit to Boeing's PR team for creating the buzz surrounding the plane, the best-selling jetliner in history judged by its pre-flight sales. But the press and the public has an almost insatiable appetite for a new aircraft, especially one bearing so much promise:

* The world's first mostly-composite jetliner.
* The world's most efficient airliner with costs 20 percent below state-of-the-art commercial jets.
* A game-changing jetliner that promises to connect dozens of cities worldwide non-stop instead of through big hub cities.
* A plane with bigger windows, better entertainment systems, lower cabin altitudes and fewer emissions and noise than its predecessors.

The open house will be followed shortly by the Paris Air Show, always an Easter Parade for the aerospace companies. Expect more big orders to surface at that show for both the 787 and its Airbus rival, the A350XWB.

Let's hope all this bravado is followed by real performance. It would be an embarrassing moment for Boeing if 7/8/07 came and the plane that rolled out was held together with duct tape.

LAS VEGAS – What happens in Vegas – at least for this one week a year – doesn't stay in Vegas. Instead, it floods back to Dubai; Lebanon, Tenn., and, perhaps, University Place, Wash., in new shopping centers big and small.

"We are here to do business and make money…the ultimate element is to make money," said Michael Greeby, vice president of The Greeby Companies, a development management consultant from Chicago.

He ain't kidding. The first wave of an eventual 45,000 retailers, commercial real estate brokers, property developers, city governments and financiers arrived today to start making the contacts and writing the contracts.

During this annual conference of the International Council of Shopping Centers, approximately 25 percent – one in four – of the retail real estate industry' shopping center leases are signed or conceived during this convention.

That explains why South Puget Sound brokers from First Western Properties, GVA Kidder Matthews, CB Richard Ellis, Neil Walter Co., Colliers International, Cushman & Wakefield – and probably more I'm missing – hit town Saturday.

A contingent from University Place, including the mayor, council members, staff and a team from the city's new private development team, hope to ink some deals to secure retailers, a hotelier and restaurants for their town center project.

The convention center here, just off The Strip and adjacent to the Hilton Hotel, has dedicated 2 million square feet of space on multiple levels of four buildings for corporations in the development game to showcase their projects from around the globe – 55 countries on five continents, if you want to get specific.

If you can't put 2 million square feet into a mental picture, imagine the equivalent of more than 33 Greater Tacoma Convention & Trade Centers.

Here's a breakdown of the attendees here by category:
Shopping Center Owners/Developers 42 percent
Retailers 32 percent
Financial and investment Institutions 10 percent
Economic Development Agencies and Municipalities 6 percent
Architects/Design/Construction 5 percent
Suppliers 3 percent.

Journalists fall in the "Other" category at 1 percent.

I hope you can see why Las Vegas matters.

Despite its great success around the world, until today Boeing had yet to win an order for its 787 Dreamliner from a Mideast airline.

That order drought ended with an order for two 787s today from Royal Jordanian Airlines. Royal Jordanian said it will likely order two more 787s before the year is out and lease eight of the Dreamliners from an aircraft leasing firm.

The 787 has been rumored to be on the short list of such major Mideast airlines as Emirates, but those airlines have been playing Airbus and Boeing off each other and haven't yet given the 787 a firm nod.

Royal Jordanian will accept delivery of its first 787 in 2010, a date which indicates that either the first 787 will be among those ordered by a leasing company or that the airline has persuaded Boeing to squeeze out one more 787 from its supposedly sold-out order book.

LAS VEGAS – When Blimpie, the submarine sandwich franchise, opens a new shop at East 224th Street and Meridian Avenue in Graham, I can say I witnessed the genesis of the idea.

The International Council of Shopping Centers annual conference starts in Sin City Sunday. But the dealmakers didn't wait that long to start talking. They didn't even wait until they arrived here where an expected 44,000 developers, commercial real estate brokers, retailers and restaurateurs meet in the city's largest conference of the year.

At 6:45 this morning at SeaTac Airport's gate D11, I waited for an Alaska Airlines flight. I bumped into there Jeff Lyon, president and CEO of the real estate brokerage GVA Kidder Matthews, and Bob Levin, manager of the City of Tacoma's Private Capital Division.

As we chatted about each of our conference plans, a large man sitting in the waiting area stood up. "Excuse me," he said, "but I couldn't help overhearing."

The large man was David Hepner, the Pacific Northwest area developer for Blimpie. He was on his way to the Las Vegas conference to talk with brokers about his company's big push to site multiple Blimpie franchises from Olympia to the Canadian border.

Lyon immediately suggested some retail pads under development at one of the main intersections in Graham and told Hepner he'd provide his contact information to one of the GVA Kidder Matthews brokers.

The dealmaking here will include relatively modest matches between strip malls and franchises such as Blimpie. But it also will involve megadeals between companies such as Simon, owners of the Tacoma Mall, and some of the world's largest retailers.

Women entrepreneurs, who will represent half of all new small businesses in the U.S. by 2009, say technology is a key factor in the success of their business.

In a nationwide survey commissioned by FileMaker, Inc., and conducted by Greenfield Online, 83 percent of women-owned businesses with fewer than 100 employees reported that technology is key to the success of their business.

Among the findings:
• 39.3 percent said “the business takes more of my time than I expected.”
• 43 percent said they have “made less money than I thought I would.”
• 35.8 percent said their business “requires more capital” than expected.
• 35 percent said that running their own business “is more stressful than I expected.”
• 61 percent said the primary reason they started their own business was “independence/to be my own boss.”
• 13 percent said they started their own business because they “needed more convenient hours because of my family.”
• 8 percent said that “making more money” was the primary reason for starting their own business.
• 51 percent of the businesses use database software to organize and manage important business information.
• 68 percent percent of women business owners listed websites as one of their top two leading sources of information about new technologies; 55 percent said publications; 15 percent cited a technology consultant.
• 77 percent say “most business software is easy enough for small businesses to use.”

Tacoma-based Rainier Pacific Financial Group, parent of Rainier Pacific Bank, reported today that its board of directors has declared a quarterly cash dividend of $0.065 per share of common stock.

The dividend will be paid on June 11 to shareholders of record as of the close of business on May 28. This is the company's fourteenth consecutive quarterly cash dividend.

Rainier Pacific stock, trading as RPFG, closed at $20.41 in Friday trading, down 27 cents. The stock is up 2.92 percent so far this year.

I just pulled this LA Times story off the news wire. The upcoming contract negotiations between the PMA and Longshore Union are coastwide and therefore affect the PMA and Longshore members right here in Tacoma.

Read on:

The dockworkers’ union and shipping lines said Thursday that they have agreed to early labor contract talks in hopes of reaching an early settlement and avoiding the rancor that had shut down West Coast ports for 11 days in 2002.

The joint statement by the Pacific Maritime Association, which represents 74 cargo carriers, terminal operators and stevedore companies that operate on the West Coast, and the International Longshore and Warehouse Union, which represents maritime laborers at 29 seaports, was a change in tone from 2002. The current labor contract expires in 2008.

“The PMA and its member companies are committed to good faith negotiations with the ILWU that will result in a win-win contract for management, for workers and for the U.S. economy,” said Jim McKenna, maritime association president.

Robert McEllrath, president of the dockworkers’ union, said that his organization “likewise is committed to good faith negotiations and is hopeful that the parties can reach a conclusion to negotiations without transportation disruptions from either side.”

=> Read more!

Forget the bad name that passports have received thanks to new requirements at the Canadian border. This is different - and it could spell discounts and prizes along with a healthy downtown business climate.

The Tacoma-Pierce County Chamber's “Downtown Tacoma 2007” project group – which includes the Chamber, the Business Improvement Area, Pierce Transit, Downtown Merchants Group and Tacoma Farmers Market – today inaugurated its “Go Local” passport program, designed to draw shoppers to the greater downtown Tacoma area.

It works like this: You get a passport at the Chamber or at any one of the participating businesses downtown. (The businesses include, for example, Watermark Gifts, University Bookstore, Buzzard CDs, Vin Grotto, Greenspace Tropical Plants along with dozens more.) The passport is actually a map encircled by coupons good for discounts and freebies.

When you visit a merchant, you get your “Go Local” passport stamped. On Thursdays, a downtown “prize patrol” will be on the lookout for shoppers wearing an emblem available on the passport. Again: more prizes.

And there will be a grand prize awarded in October.

Alaska Airlines was among a handful of U.S. airlines that saw it's workforce grow in the last year, a new federal Department of Transportation report says.

The SeaTac-based airline's workforce increased by 3.7 percent between March 2006 and March 2007. The airline employed 9,500 full-time equivalent persons in March.

Other airlines enlarging their workforcss were Continental, America West and JetBlue.

Alaska's employment has yet to reach the peak it hit in 2004. Since then, the airline has outsourced some maintenance and baggage handling jobs and offered voluntary retirement deals to executives and other workers alike.

Southwest Airlines has hired Kent's Naverus to develop a high-technology navigation system that promises to save the airline time, money and fuel and improve safety.

The Required Navigation Program (RNP) uses satellite global positioning systems coupled to the aircraft's controls to follow flight paths that more precisely dodge obstacles, avoid noise-sensitive areas and save fuel by allowing aircraft to follow a sloping descent path instead of one with multiple steps.

Southwest, working with Naverus, will develop specificslly defined RNP approaches to all the 63 airports it serves as well as RNP ascent paths for those same airports. The airline will implement those RNP programs throughout its fleet.

Naverus was founded four years ago by pilots and executives who had helped Alaska Airlines develop the nation's first RNP procedures for the terrain and weather-restricted airports it serves in Southeast Alaska.

RealNetworks Inc., owner of the Rhapsody online music service, acquired a unit of Sony Corp. for $9 million to gain technology for delivering music, videos and games to mobile devices in Europe, Bloomberg News reported.

The company cut its earnings forecasts for this quarter and the full year because of the purchase, while raising its sales prediction. Salzburg, Austria-based Sony NetServices provides services to mobile-phone carriers in eight European countries, Seattle-based RealNetworks said in a statement today.

The purchase is part of a strategy by RealNetworks Chief Executive Officer Robert Glaser to bolster revenue by expanding outside of the U.S. The company bought South Korea’s WiderThan Co. last year to add software for selling music and ring tones.

Second-quarter results will range from a loss of 2 cents a share to breakeven, RealNetworks said today. The company had predicted earlier this month that net income would be as much as 1 cent a share. Full-year net income will be 21 cents to 24 cents, down from a May 2 forecast of 24 cents to 27 cents.

It's time again for Cheryl the Pig Lady and the Bee Lady from Lakebay.

The Tacoma Farmers Market opens its 17th season in downtown Tacoma on Thursday with 88 vendors offering products and produce ranging from lettuce and lotions to honey and jewelry, from candles and clothing to freshly shucked oysters and newly picked flowers.

Eight food-court vendors will sell prepared items ranging from soup and burritos to pad thai and homemade donuts.

The event – free to the public – runs along Broadway between South 9th Street and South 11th Street. Stalls open at 9 a.m. and close at 2 p.m.

The Broadway Market will continue each Thursday for 23 weeks, closing October 18. For more information visit www.tacomafarmersmarket.com.

The last major piece of Boeing's first 787 Dreamliner arrived in Everett today aboard one of Boeing's enlarged 747 Dreamlifter aircraft.

The assembly arrived from South Carolina at almost 2 a.m. at Paine Field. The assembly was the middle of the fuselage barrel for the new jetliner. Part of the composite tube was made in Japan, another part in Italy and a third in South Carolina and then married together in a new plant in Charleston.

The fuselage section will be joined with the forward fuselage produced in Kansas, the rear fuselage, wings and wing box and tail assembly in Boeing's final assembly plant in Everett. Rollout date: 7/8/07.

The big piece of the fuselage arrived just a day after the wings arrived in Everett from Japan.

Now that most of the big pieces are in Everett, Boeing expects to begin putting them all together for the first time next week. When the assembly line gets up to speed the final assembly time from start to finish is expected to be as little as three days. That's because most of the modular pieces will come "stuffed" with wiring and piping, electric motors and ductwork that are installed on the final assembly line on other airliners. Boeing's job is just hooking all those wires and ducts together and joining the big pieces.

Here's a picture of the unloading process. Boeing, which seemingly hasn't lost an opportunity to beat the drums for the 787, dropped the ball on this section of the fuselage. It came wrapped in black plastic for its middle-of-the-night unloading. A more visible orange might have been more photogenic.

Enumclaw Regional Hospital has officially become a part of the Franciscan Health System, making it the fourth hospital in the Tacoma-based organization.

Terms and conditions of the affiliation were unanimously approved by ERH directors in February and endorsed by the Enumclaw Regional Hospital Association in March. The Washington State Office of the Attorney General completed its review of the agreement in late April, clearing the way for this week's announcement that the deal was complete.

Enumclaw Regional Hospital joins St. Joseph Medical Center in Tacoma, St. Clare Hospital in Lakewood and St. Francis Hospital in Federal Way. St. Anthony Hospital in Gig Harbor will open in 2009.

The Enumclaw facility has served Enumclaw, Buckley, Black Diamond, Carbonado, South Prairie, Orting and nearby communities since 1949. Licensed for 38 beds, it is designated as a Critical Access Hospital in a federal program for small hospitals in rural areas. The hospital is a non-profit organization and will retain its name as a member of the Franciscan Health System.

Franciscan will build a 90,000-square-foot replacement hospital in Enumclaw that will nearly double the size of the existing hospital. The $40 million facility will be constructed within four years.

Online retailer Amazon.com today said it plans to launch a digital music store later this year featuring songs without copy protection restrictions.

The store will feature millions of songs from 12,000 labels able to be played on a range of devices including iPods, Microsoft’s Zune players and personal computers, according to the Associated Press. Files will be offered in the standard MP3 format.

EMI Music is the latest to license its music catalog to the store.
Amazon did not say how much songs would cost or the terms on which it would offer music — per song, per album, by subscription or some combination of those plans. It also did not specify a date for the launch of the store.

Former Sea-Tac Airport Director Gina Marie Lindsey, the incoming director of Los Angeles International Airport, had not even been confirmed in her new job by the Los Angeles City Council, when a judge dropped a big challenge in her lap.

A judge for the federal Department of Transportation late Tuesday ruled illegal the LAX Airports commission's imposition of sharply higher fees for airlines using some of the airport's terminals.

Those airlines, prominently among them SeaTac-based Alaska Airlines, had challenged the new fees before the DOT. The new fees were costing the airlines, including Southwest, US Airways, Frontier, Air Tran Airways and Midwest Airlines, millions of dollars in extra costs for use of terminals 1 and 3 at LAX. Some of those airlines had raised ticket prices to LAX by as much as $10 to help pay those costs.

The airlines argued that the fee increases were discriminatory because the airport commission did not impose them equally on all LAX airline tenants. Airlines with long-term leases didn't see increases.

=> Read more!

A maritime air inventory released last month detailed the pollution coming from ships, trucks and trains doing business in our region's ports.

Today the maritime industry meets in Seattle for the Faster Freight, Cleaner Air conference to discuss strategies for reducing the pollution.

The seminar will "address the growing demands for rail and trucking associated with port growth by focusing on the regional infrastructure needs."

"The one-day summit will also highlight the innovative programs, policies and technologies now being implemented in region and provide a venue for ports in the Pacific Northwest to interact with technology providers, elected officials, environmental organizations and the community to develop together plans to improve efficiency and reduce the air quality impacts of the goods movement industry," according to the conference organizers.

I'll report back this afternoon.

Northwest companies generally scored well in the customer satisfaction in a survey released today by the University of Michigan.

The survey rates customer satisfaction with goods and services in a cross section of American companies.

Companies are scored on a 100-point index with 100 being a perfect score. The university rates only 200 companies, so not every major company is rated.

Among the Northwest companies scoring well was Starbucks, tied for first place in the limited service restaurant category with Wendy's with a 78 score. McDonald's was rated last with a score of 64.

Bellevue-based T-Mobile USA was rated second among the wireless telephone services category with a score of 70. In first place was Verizon Wireless. Sprint Nextel earned the bottom rating of 61.

Qwest Communications, the Northwest's dominant fixed line telephone company, moved up sharply to a 72 rating from its 69 last year. Qwest's rating hit bottom in 2002 with a 56 score. Qwest was tied for first with Verizon among fixed line telephone companies.

Microsoft was the only Northwest company rated in the index that fell below the industry norm. Microsoft dropped to a 70 rating from a 73 last year. The industry average in software is 73.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported Tuesday that consumer prices in the Tacoma-Bremerton-Seattle area increased 1.9 percent for the two months ending April. Regional Commissioner Richard J. Holden said the increase was mainly due to higher prices for transportation, and to a lesser extent, higher prices for housing. From April 2006 to April 2007, overall prices rose 4.0 percent.

The housing index increased 1.1 percent for the two months, and compared to a year ago, was 5.2 percent higher. Shelter, the primary component of housing, moved up 1.2 percent over the past two months.

Lodging away from home, an unpublished category, contributed strongly to the shelter index increase. Prices for household furnishings and operations moved up 0.5 percent for the two-month period, and were 4.9 percent higher over the year.

The food and beverages index rose 0.2 percent from February to April and was 4.1 percent higher over the year. Grocery prices rose 0.7 percent. Food away from home declined 0.5 percent from February to April, but increased 4.0 percent for the latest 12-month period.

Apparel prices rose 9.8 percent from February to April, and increased 7.5 percent from April 2006 to April 2007.

The Port of Tacoma says its needs more than 30 pieces of privately-owned property on the east side of the Blair Waterway to develop marine cargo terminals.

And – if necessary – the port will use its power of eminent domain to force the sale of the land, said Bob Emerson, the port's senior director of real estate and industrial development.

The landowners affected by the port's expansion – 22 in total – received letters this week notifying them of the situation and of a Port of Tacoma commission meeting.

At that meeting, the commissioners will vote whether to authorize the port's use of eminent domain to acquire the properties, if negotiations between the port and the individual landowners fall through.

The properties affected total 130 acres.

The port may not physically need the land for two or three years, but Emerson said the port wants to be certain that the land will be available for development.

Many of the businesses will need to relocate, though a few should be able to reconfigure their operations on their current site, Emerson said.

Read more in Wednesday's News Tribune.

The April unemployment rate in Washington has fallen to a level unseen since modern records were first tallied. At 4.4 percent, the unemployment rate bettered the record for March – 4.6 percent – and led Employment Security Department Chief Economist Evelina Tainer to say Tuesday’s numbers represented “a pretty good report.”

April was the third consecutive month to show a decline in the unemployment rate.
Since April 2006, payroll employment in the state has increased 2.3 percent.

Tuesday’s numbers reflect good news from a few months ago, she said. “While we did see a downward trend in the unemployment rate, it didn’t decline very much.”
Especially in King County, she said, “I think it’s important to keep in mind that we didn’t have a recovery until May or last year. While the rest of the state didn’t have the declines that the Puget Sound area had during the recession, some of the area continued to grow. What we’re seeing now – it’s shifted to recovering in the non-Puget Sound area to more Seattle. Tacoma is feeling some of that as well.”

Regional Labor Economist Paul Turek, who tracks employment in Pierce County, said the local rate in April – 4.7 percent – was down from 4.6 percent in March and well below the 5.3 percent marked during 2006.
“It’s a good economy,” Turek said.

Amazon.com today announced a new feature called "Subscribe & Save" offering customers automatic delivery of grocery products with discounts of 15% and free shipping.

Customers choose when they would like shipments delivered (in one-month, two-month, three-month, and six-month intervals) and get a guaranteed discount and free shipping for the length of the subscription.

The service comes with automatic e-mail reminders allowing customers to make changes as needed or cancel.

Plus, customers are charged only when each order is shipped. The program requires no minimum purchase amount and no time commitment for ultimate flexibility.

In Sunday's column, I told you about an upcoming City of Tacoma Planning Commission hearing regarding proposed new rules governing planned residential developments. But I made an error. I gave you the wrong date for the hearing.

The Planning Commission meets tomorrow (Wednesday) at 4 p.m. in the City Council Chambers at the Tacoma Municipal Building, 747 Market St.

Among the key issues under review is how much of a residential development should get preserved as open space. In addition, the Planning Commission is likely to recommend to the City Council a more specific definition of what counts as open space. Since the 1965 rules went into effect, open space has been so liberally construed that private yards, private roads and storm water detention ponds can count as open space.

Microsoft Corp., whose Windows operating system runs about 95 percent of the world’s personal computers, sold 40 million copies of its new Windows Vista as of last week, Chairman Bill Gates said.

The rate of adoption has been twice as fast as that of the previous Windows XP version, Gates said in a speech at a Microsoft conference in Los Angeles today.

Vista went on sale broadly on Jan. 30.

Vista is Microsoft’s first new PC operating system in five years and the company is counting on it to fuel revenue growth, Bloomberg News reported. The world’s largest software maker said last month that Vista sales during the March quarter were higher than it expected, contributing to a 32 percent increase in revenue.

The first set of composite wings for Boeing's 787 Dreamliner arrived in Everett this morning aboard an enlarged 747 freighter Boeing has dubbed the Dreamlifter.

The wings are significant in that they're the first wings for a Boeing airliner that Boeing itself has not built. The wings were made by Mitsubishi Heavy Industries in Japan.

The wings are also an aviation achievement because of their composite construction. Prior to the 787, all jetliner wings were made of metal.

Boeing and Airbus have built airliner tails from composite (the 777's composite tail is built at Boeing Frederickson plant) but nothing as big as the wing.

Composites promise to make wings lighter, less labor intensive to build and more corrosion resistant.

Boeing workers in Everett, will attach various control surfaces to the wings and then mate them to the center wing box and the fuselage which are coming from other major manufacturers around the world.

So far, Dreamlifters have delivered the 787's nose section, the wings, and the aft fuselage. The vertical tail fin was trucked to Everett from Frederickson. Other fuselage sections, the wing center box and the horizontal tail have yet to be delivered.

Once all the major pieces have arrived, Boeing machinists will begin connecting the pieces. The object: roll out a substanially complete Dreamliner on July 8 (7/8/07). First flight is set for late August.

The proposed South Sound Logistics Center – a joint project between the ports of Tacoma and Olympia – isn't sitting well with the center's Thurston County neighbors.

This from The Olympian today:

TENINO — A truck and rail cargo facility proposed for 745 acres near Maytown drew overwhelming opposition from neighbors during a meeting at Tenino High School on Monday night.

South county residents raised a host of environmental, economic and traffic concerns about the joint idea of the ports of Tacoma and Olympia.

Many in the crowd of about 125 urged the ports to perform more environmental study of the impacts from the project, proposed on the site of a former munitions plant about 2.5 miles east of Interstate 5 near Maytown.

Olympia’s three port commissioners tried to assure the residents the project was an idea under study at least until the end of the year. It would take three to five years to build, they said.

“This is not any done deal,” commissioner Bob Van Schoorl said. “This is when the public process begins.”

Many residents were wary and believed the ports would build the South Sound Logistics Center without organized opposition.

Here's the rest of the story.

Anyone who finds previewing just one cable channel at a time boring will like Comcast's new offering.

The company announced today that it will introduce a new interactive on-screen program guide with video-based navigation for customers in the Puget Sound area.

Yes, but what exactly is it? The new 'Comcast Central' navigation feature lets viewers simultaneously preview as many as six different television programs in real time. With a click of the remote, viewers can then go directly to the program they want, whether it's on live TV or ON DEMAND.

Initially, the programs will be chosen by Comcast and grouped by themes, spokesman Walter Neary said today. One example could be a children's programming option that would preview Disney, PBS Sprout and Nickelodeon at the same time.

The new guide is scheduled to launch in Spokane beginning June 5, and Comcast expects all customers in Pierce County to have the new service by July, Neary said.

The new interactive program guide is replacing the existing guide available to Puget Sound and Spokane area Comcast Digital Cable customers. This guide also will support future cross-platform features that integrate Comcast's Digital Cable, High-Speed Internet and Digital Voice services.

The price in Tacoma of a gallon of regular gas rose more than a penny to a new record today, averaging $3.459. The price Sunday was $3.447 – anda refreshing $3.093 just one month ago.

Following a statewide trend, Spokane drivers saw the state’s lowest price Monday, at $3.278, while Bellingham drivers found the highest, at $3.561.

Boeing rival Airbus won an order for 10 new A330 twin-engine aircraft today from Malaysian carrier AirAsia. The airline also acquired an option for five more of the mid-sized, long range aircraft.

The planes will be delivered beginning in the fall of next year. The airline said it also was discussing buying a further 10 A330s from the European manufacturer.

Just as the encouraging news for Airbus emerged from AirAsia surfaced, other less upbeat news leaked out from another Asian Airbus customer, Thai Airways.

The Bangkok Post reported the airline is canceling orders for eight A330s. Thai Airways is still on Airbus' order list for eight A380 superjumbo jets.

Boeing's not exactly sure which flight was the record one, but based on it's calculations, one of the Boeing's 777s completed their one millionth long distance flight sometime last Friday.

Those flights are technically called "extended operations" or "ETOPS" flights. Those flights, typically over oceans, fly hundreds of miles from the nearest alternate airport where a plane could land in case of in-flight mechanical problems.

ETOPS flighs have been a benefit both for Boeing and it's airline customers. Under ETOPS, twin-engine aircraft such as the 777 can fly as far from a suitable alternate airport as 5 hours and 30 minutes flying time on one engine.

That allows airlines to route their planes the most direct routes possible to distant destinations.

ETOPS rules have allowed efficient twin-engine aircraft such as Boeing's 767 and 777 and Airbus' A330 to replace three and four-engine aircraft such as the Boeing 747, McDonnell Douglas DC10 and MD11 and Airbus A340 from international routess. Twin engine planes require less maintenance and are more fuel efficient.

The advent of ultra-reliable jet engines and the development of redundant safety and backup systems allowed the aircraft manufacturers and airlines to successfully seek ever-more-remote long distance flights from regulators.

I now pronounce you: expensive.

Discover Card today released findings from its first Wedding Shopping Survey examining spending habits of groomsmen, bridesmaids and wedding guests.
Among the findings:

• Groomsmen spend an average of $1,009 on wedding expenses -including pre-wedding festivities- while bridesmaids spend an average of $963.
• Groomsmen spend on average three times as much on the bachelor party, $289 per person, as bridesmaids do on average for the bachelorette party, at $100.
• Bridesmaids incur an average expense of $163 per person hosting the bridal shower.
• Bridesmaids spend an average $197 more for a dress, shoes and jewelry than groomsmen spend for a tuxedo or suit, at $132.
• Bridesmaids spend nearly three times more on average on hair, nails and make-up, at $74, than do groomsmen, at $27.
• It costs about twice as much to participate in a wedding as a groomsman ($1,009) or bridesmaid ($963) than it is to attend as a male ($416) or female ($393) guest.
• The top-three gifts that guests prefer to give are money (39 percent), gift cards (23 percent) and home goods such as bedding, towels and kitchen accessories (15 percent).
• The top-three gifts newlyweds would like to receive are the same: money (50 percent), gift cards (23 percent) and home goods (11 percent).
• Wedding guests say it is reasonable to spend $154 on a best friend, $129 on a family member and $71 on an acquaintance.

Citing a high demand for loans, Northwest Commercial Bank in Lakewood is issuing and offering an additional $4 million in stock.

“We’ve had more than two consecutive years pf solid growth and profits each month,” Kurt Graff, NCB president and CEO, said today. “The addition of more than $4 million in capital will allow us to increase our lending limits and better serve our business and individual customers.”

Deposits at NCB stood at $52.5 million at the end of April, and assets are at nearly $60 million. Loans have topped $49 million.

The price of the shares have been set at $21, with a minimum purchase of 1,000 shares required for new buyers. There will be an individual purchase ceiling of 20,000 shares. A prospectus is available through the bank.

The University of Washington Business School today published its inagural Washington Minority Small Business Survey – chronicling the characteristics, growth prospects and challenges of minority-owned busiensses in the state. Focusing on companies owned by African Americans, Asian/Pacific Islanders and Latinos/Hispanics, the survey found there are 561,300 small businesses in Washington – of which Asians own 5.7 percent; Hispanics own 2 percent; and Blacks own 1.4 percent. Among minority-owned businesses, 71.5 percent are owned by men and 28.5 percent by women.

Among trends identified by the survey, researchers found:
• 48 percent of the firms recently made capital investments.
• Nearly 50 percent have recently purchased new technology.
• More than 43 percent funded worker training in the last quarter of 2006.
• Between 20 percent and 30 percent were hiring new employees in the fist quarter of 2007.

Challenges outlined in Friday’s report included:
• 14 percent to 17 percent of the firms report they cannot get required financing.
• State businesses said competition with bigger companies is their greatest concern, whereas taxes present the greatest concern nationally.
• Among 40 percent of minority business owners who felt the business climate would be OK to poor this year, 50 percent identified sales prospects as the greatest worry.

For a full look at the survey, visit http://bschool.washington.edu/bedc/msbs-may07.pdf.

It took consumers longer than expected to latch on to online grocery shopping. But more of them seem to be buying milk and tomatoes through store Web sites.

The once-maligned online grocery business is helping supermarkets stave off competition, boost margins and gain customer loyalty, thestreet.com reports today.

Much has changed since dot-com excess poster child Webvan went out of business in 2001. Large chains such as Safeway and Albertson's have online service available in various markets – and surprisingly, these businesses actually add to the bottom line.

Rich Tarrant, CEO of MyWebGrocer, which builds infrastructure for online grocers, says that data from shoppers using loyalty cards show that online customers spend 21% more with the supermarket because they're using the online services for their big weekly purchases but still going to the store to replenish items such as milk and eggs. The convenience factor of the online business builds loyalty to that particular store, Tarrant says.

A delegation of more than 50 government and business leaders from China are making Washington their first stop today. The group is here looking for investment opportunities.

They meet this afternoon with Puget Sound business leaders, including representatives from the port of Tacoma and Seattle and the state's Community, Trade and Economic Development department.

The seminar-style event will run from 3 p.m. to 5 p.m. at the Sheraton on Sixth Avenue in Seattle.

Senior Airbus executives are warning that aircraft deliveries could be delayed if wildcat strikes at some of its plants don't end soon.

The company has been able to maintain its planned production rate until now, but the strikes could begin to take their toll soon because the production lines could be running out of critical assemblies.

European aerospace workers have been holding work stoppages to protest Airbus' planned layoffs of some 10,000 workers in a plan to stem the company's losses from the Airbus A380 production foul-ups.

The big pieces of Boeing's first 787 Dreamliner are beginning to arrive at the company's Everett assembly plant.

Today a modified 747 Dreamlifter will deliver two rear sections and the forward nose section of the composite plane to Everett from South Carolina and Kansas.

Those three pieces are the latest parts of the first plane to arrive in Everett. When the Dreamliner production line is running at full pace, the company's assembly teams are supposed to be able to pop the pieces, gathered from Japan, Italy, South Carolina, Kansas and Frederickson and other places around the globe in just three days. But since this is the first time they've put all these parts together it's likely to take a little longer.

The first 787 is scheduled to debut on July 8 (7/8/07) and make its first flight late in August with delivery of the first aircraft in the spring of 2008.

Much is riding on the timely assembly of the plane after Airbus' embarrassing debacle with the failure to deliver its A380 superjumbo jetliner on time.

Between April 11 and today, the state general fund collected $94.3 million – or 8.3 percent – more than was forecast. This brings the cumulative increase for the past two months, since the March forecast, to $141.1 million, or up 7 percent.

Once again Revenue Act collections (sales, use, business and occupation and public utility taxes) and real estate excise tax payments accounted for most of the positive variance for the month, said Chang Mook Sohn, director of the Washington Economic and Revenue Forecast Council.

In a regular letter to the council issued this afternoon, Sohn explained that the variance “reflects stronger than expected economic activity and consumer and business spending.”

However, he wrote, a large real estate excise tax variance – $58.7 million – was due to three unusually large and unexpected payments, not an improving housing sector. Excluding these transactions, receipts would still be substantially higher than expected for the month, at $37.3 million, or 3.3 percent, as well as cumulatively, up by $68.1 million or 3.1 percent) for the two months.

Is your iPod lacking? Have no fear.

Amazon.com today launched its Amazon Podcasts network, an original podcast series offering customers four unique channels of free content: Amazon BookClips, Music You Should Hear, Significant Seven and Amazon Wire, all available at www.amazon.com/podcast.

The company expects to offer additional channels in the next few months. Each podcast is available via streaming and download from Amazon.com, and through RSS and iTunes. Amazon Wire is also available on TiVo.

Chilly and wet weather, higher gasoline prices, and an earlier Easter holiday in April caused many retailers to report disappointing sales for April, BusinessWeek.com reported this morning.

But one of the winners was Costco Wholesale (COST), which said same-store sales (at stores open for at least one year) rose 7%, beating the 6.3% estimate from analysts. The big-box retailer said total sales for April rose 12% from a year ago to $4.94 billion.

Joseph Agnese, an analyst at Standard & Poor's Equity Research, said in a research note that he continues to expect Costco to benefit from an acceleration in square footage growth, leading to increased sales leverage. Agnese reiterated his buy recommendation on Costco shares and kept his fiscal year 2007 (ending August) earnings per share estimate of $2.57. However, he lifted S&P's 12-month target price on the stock by $1 to $61, based on updated forward p-e and relative valuation analyses.

Costco shares were trading slightly lower, to $54.81, on the Nasdaq May 10. They are not far from a 52-week high of $58.70 hit on Feb. 7, 2007.

Analysts had expected sales for retailers to be weak last month, but some were more disappointing than others. Many merchants blamed the weather and the shift of more sales in March because of the earlier Easter holiday.

The International Council of Shopping Centers (ICSC) survey of 51 retailers said chain-store sales dropped a record 2.3% in April from a year ago. The decline marks the largest since the trade group started keeping records in the 1970s. The results came in much weaker than already-depressed forecasts, as the sharp reversal in the weather from the balmy March to poor weather in April, the pull-ahead of Easter sales into March, and higher gas prices all conspired against sales in the month.

Paul Turek, regional labor economist for Washington's Employment Security Division, sent us his most recent post on gas prices after seeing our story in today's paper.

Here's what he said:

The notion that this might be some type of organized conspiracy can be put to rest through the courtesy of an economic explanation. There are three major forces behind the recent rise in gasoline prices:

1. The rebound in crude oil prices

2. Strong demand for gasoline in the U.S. coupled with weaker imports of gasoline

3. Weaker refinery capacity and activity

Get the details.

=> Read more!

The Franciscan Health System of Tacoma has received the 2007 Washington State Quality Award for performance excellence.

Gov. Christine Gregoire presented the honor on Wednesday during a ceremony at the Greater Tacoma Convention and Trade Center. Other recipients were the University of Washington Medical Center in Seattle, Qualis Health of Seattle and the Richland School District.

“This award acknowledges the dedication and commitment to excellence that are shown every day by the nearly 6,000 employees at the Franciscan Health System,” said Franciscan Chief Financial Officer Mike Fitzgerald.

Using criteria established by the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award program, the Washington State Quality Award (WSQA) program honors organizations with proven and sustainable accomplishments in business performance and overall excellence.

“The process has been a very interesting and rewarding experience for us, from completing our application to hosting site visits by the professional and inquisitive analysts,” said Laure Nichols, senior vice president for Strategic Planning and Business Development for Franciscan.

WSQA is a non-profit organization, authorized by the Washington State Legislature, to promote the success of Washington public and private sector organizations.

The Franciscan Health System includes St. Joseph Medical Center of Tacoma, St. Clare Hospital in Lakewood, St. Francis Hospital in Federal Way, Franciscan Hospice House in University Place, and a network of primary-care and specialty-care clinics and physicians. Franciscan will open St. Anthony Hospital in Gig Harbor in early 2009. Also, Enumclaw Regional Hospital is in the process of affiliating with the Franciscan organization.

The hotel occupancy rate in Tacoma rose 10.7 percent in March, an increase second only to Spokane, which saw an increase of 12.2 percent. Statewide, the rate rose 5.9 percent.

Fully 77.9 percent of rooms were occupied in Tacoma in March, reported Bellevue hospitality consultant Wolfgang Rood this week. Statewide, 72.1 percent of rooms were taken.

Occupancy rates and average room prices were up in all regions of the state, Rood said.

The average daily room rate in Tacoma, $75.34, increased 4.7 percent over the past 12 months. The statewide rate, $116.42, was up 6.5 percent.

Downtown Seattle hotels charged the highest average rate, at $155.29, and the Tri-Cities asked the state's lowest, at $74.71.

Statewide occupancy rates in March fell in both Oregon (0.8 percent) and Idaho (3.5 percent), Rood said.

Gina Marie Lindsey, former aviation director at Sea-Tac Airport, was named executive director of Los Angeles' airports agency today.

Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa announced the appointment at a press conference this afternoon. If she passes muster with the Los Angeles City Council, she will assume command of the LAX and three other airports in Van Nuys, Ontario and Palmdale.

"In searching for a new executive director, we knew we needed someone with experience, with an ability to build bridges and with a vision for moving the area's airports forward," Villaraigosa said. "And we found the perfect candidate in Gina Marie Lindsey."

She will inherit an airport engaged in a court battle with some of its airline tenants over rent raises and paralyzed in planning how to create more capacity at one of the nation's largest airports.

Before Lindsey served more than a decade at Sea-Tac, she was director of the Anchorage International Airport. At Sea-Tac, she guided a controversial $4.1 billion project to remodel and add on to terminals and to construct a third runway. At Anchorage, she turned the airport into a major international cargo hub.

In recent years she served as executive of McBee Strategic Consulting in Washington, D.C.

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security is designating the Port of Tacoma as a test center for technologies that detect radiation from containers that loaded directly from ships to rail cars.

The DHS plans to officially announce the designation Friday at the Port of Tacoma.

Port security legislation passed by Congress last year requires that the nation's 22 largest ports install radiation monitors. All containers passing through the ports must be scanned for radiation by the end of this year.

Ports have figured out how to do this for containers loaded onto trucks. In fact terminals at the Port of Tacoma began installing Radiation Portal Monitors – drive-thru radiation scanners – in 2006.

Here what that looks like:

The monitors detect high levels of radiation, something that prompts the U.S. Customs & Border Patrol to do additional inspections.

But how to scan containers traveling via rail – which at the Port of Tacoma is the vast majority of international cargo. The test center designation will allow Tacoma to figure that out.

The port had a wee hint they'd be selected for the job last October after Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-WA) tailored the amendment that establishes the rail test center so that the Port of Tacoma was the best option for it.

With Mother's Day approaching, CareerBuilder.com (an employment Web site owned in part by The News Tribune parent McClatchy) has conducted a survey of moms who are employed full-time and who have children under 18 living at home.
Among the findings:
• 25 percent say they are dissatisfied with their work/life balance.
• 44 percent say they would take a pay cut if they could spend more time with their children.
• Of moms who are not the sole financial provider, 49 percent say they would leave their job if their spouse or significant other earned enough to provide a comfortable living.
• 23 percent say say they have missed three or more significant events in their child's life during the past year.
• 31 percent say they bring work home at least once a week.
• 28 percent say their job is "negatively impacting" the relationship they have with their children.

The Port of Tacoma will receive $11.7 million in federal funding for port security, Sen. Patty Murray's office announced today.

The money is part of $18 million in grants coming to the state's ports. The funds will go towards projects including chemical detectors, cameras, security gates, access controls, and training and exercises, according Murray's office.

Mike Wasem, Port of Tacoma spokeman, said the port has received almost $19 million – including the most recent grant – for port security projects from federal sources since 2002.

A thousand free airline tickets from Vancouver to Hong Kong were snapped up early Wednesday after they became available on Oasis Hong Kong Airlines' Web site at midnight.

But bargain tickets remained available for the new low-cost carrier's new six-times weekly flight between Vancouver and the Chinese city.

Coach tickets were priced as low as $299 Canadian one way (that's about $256 U.S.). Roundtrip tickets including taxes were available for about $673 U.S. on Oasis in coach. The carrier was also offering a two-for-one deal in business class.

That compares with normal Hong Kong roundtrip fares of about $1,400 on Cathay Pacific or Canadian. Service starts June 28 on the route. Oasis says its coach seats are as comfortable as those on legacy carriers.

Nintendo of America apparently has dropped plans for a 550,000-square-foot expansion at its U.S. headquarters in this Seattle suburb, and a local official says 80 jobs are being moved to New York or San Francisco, the Associated Press reported today.

James L. Roberts, the municipality’s deputy planning director, said he was told by a Nintendo real estate executive, Bruce Meyer, that Redmond will remain the company’s headquarters but that planning, marketing and advertising operations will be moved to New York or San Francisco.

Meyer did not return calls for comment and other officials at the U.S. arm of the Japanese electronic game manufacturer would not comment, The Seattle Times and the Seattle Post-Intelligencer reported Wednesday.

Other Nintendo of America operations in Redmond, where the company moved in 1982, include writing, translating, game testing, customer service and administration. A production plant is located in North Bend, 20 miles to the southeast.

Sears and Kmart are debuting new marketing pushes. Playing off its “blue light special” history, Kmart is calling its promotion “Mr. Blue Light,” which will take consumers on a tour of Kmarts and “shine” on specials, according to trade magazine Brandweek.

Sears will unveil TV ads pointing to the retailer’s days as a specialty mail-order catalog. Under the theme, “Sears. Where it begins,” the retailer will promote itself as a one-stop store, highlighting such products as baby clothes, washers and dryers, lawn mowers and widescreen TVs, Brandweek reported. The new tagline: “Sears ignites true possibilities for life at home.”

In a transaction that may foreshadow Airbus' strategy of winning back market share from Boeing, India's Flyington Fliers has ordered six Airbus A330 freighters instead of the four Boeing 777-200F freighters it previously had ordered.

The A330F is not quite as large and capable as the 777-200F, but the Indian freight carrier reportedly got six A330Fs for the same price Boeing wanted for four 777s.

While that strategy may even out the order book inequalities, will it, in the end, make Airbus a healthier manufacturer?

If you lose or make only a small amount on each aircraft, especially when you're facing a multi-billion dollar deficit from the A380's problems, will you survive?

Certainly it's important to show that you're still in the game, and stealing an order from Boeing says that. And if you get an infant carrier such as Flyington started with your planes instead of your rival's, you should be able to count on follow-up orders that you can price more profitably. The trick is staying in business until that happens, but with Airbus' government guarantees, that's not the issue it would be for Boeing.

Business Week has named four Washington companies, Microsoft, Boeing, Starbucks and Amazon, to its list of the 25 most innovative companies in the world.

That puts Washington in second place nationwide trailing only California among the 50 states. California has seven companies, Intel, eBay, Cisco, Walt Disney, Google, Genentech and Apple, on the list.

The list is a result of a poll of 2,500 executives worldwide by Boston Consulting Group.

Microsoft was the highest ranked Washington company at fifth mostly on the strength of its huge research and development spending. Boeing was a newcomer to the top 25 propelled upward from 70th last year by its composite-bodied new 787 airliner.

Yes, Boeing is headquartered in Chicago. But its Commercial Airplane Group, which developed the 787, makes its home in the Puget Sound area.

No other states were even close. Minnesota came in third with two companies, 3M and Target. Seven of the companies, Sony, Toyota, Honda, Nokia, BMW, Virgin Group and Samsung are based overseas.

Only five other states are represented on the list: New York (IBM), General Electric (Connecticut), Wal-Mart (Arkansas), Texas (Dell) and Ohio (Proctor & Gamble).

The Economic Development Board for Tacoma-Pierce County, World Trade Center Tacoma and State Department of Community Trade and Economic Development will co-sponsor a seminar for companies considering entering the export market.

Called "Exporting in the Flat World," the seminar is slated for September 5-7 at the Port of Tacoma business Center in Fife. Matters up for discussion will include the improvement of importing and exporting skills and the development of an international business plan and marketing strategy.

The course will be taught by James Foley, Director of the International Trade and NAFTA Opportunity Centers at Bradley University. Foley currently serves as Director of the NASBITE Trade Credential. He received his MBA from the London Business School at the University of London.

Cost is $325 for non-members and $275 for members of WTCTA.

For more information or to register, visit www.wtcta.org.

There's still time to get your reservations in for the LeMay Museum Grand Tour - a drive-you-own-vehicle tour of Europe slated for May, 2008. The cost is $27,500, which includes a $10,000 contribution to the museum.

Stops on the schedule include Paris, Milan, Florence and Rome, with visits to the Ferrari factory and the flagship store of Nicola Bulgari, a member of he LeMay board. Visit www.lemaymuseum.org for further information.

Bulgari will also be one of the hosts next month as General Motors sponsors a reception – June 1 at the GM Heritage Center in Sterling Heights, Mich. – aimed at Motor City movers and shakers.

"It’s to introduce people in Detroit to the project, to get people excited. We have several board members from Detroit," said Valerie O'Shea, executive assistant to LeMay president and CEO David Madiera.

Wal-Mart Stores Inc. has made the switch to healthier trans-fat-free oil for frying foods at its in-store delis, according to Reuters. For all you fried food fanatics, that includes chicken, corn dogs and country steak.

Wal-Mart's announcement follows similar moves by restaurant companies, including Wendy's International Inc., Yum Brands Inc.'s KFC and Taco Bell chains and Starbucks Corp., which said yesterday it would nix trans fats from its food and drinks.

The Wal-Mart oil switch affects more than 2,400 deli locations at Wal-Mart's Supercenter and Neighborhood Markets in the United States, according to Reuters.

The Tacoma Goodwill honored local businesses and inspiring individuals today at its annual awards breakfast. The winners are:

•Brown & Haley, Business Partner of the Year. The Tacoma candy company selected Goodwill's Commercial Services department to handle its high-quality packaging.

•Galaxy Theaters of Tacoma, Small Employer of the Year. Galaxy has hired more than 20 disabled and disadvantaged workers from Tacoma Goodwill in the past two years.

•Foster Farms, Large Employer of the Year. The Kelso-based company has used workers from Goodwill's Vocations Unlimited program. The partnership provides Foster Farms with employees and allows Goodwill to train workers for future jobs.

=> Read more!

Harry Potter fans must be eager for the last book.

Amazon.com today announced that more than 1 million copies of "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows" have been pre-ordered worldwide for the seventh and final book in the epic series. And there's still two-and-a-half months left before its release.

The company also announced today it has further reduced the price of the hardcover edition of the book in the U.S. from $18.89 to $17.99, bringing the customer discount to 49 percent.

All customers who have already pre-ordered the book will be charged this lower price.

=> Read more!

Amazon sold more than 23,000 different styles of watches during the period, the Seattle-based company said today in a statement.

Amazon said last month that first-quarter profit doubled, exceeding analysts’ estimates. Sales of DVD players and general merchandise including apparel, watches and shoes rose 48 percent, almost twice the pace of media products such as books and CDs.

Shares of Amazon fell $2.41, or 3.8 percent, to $60.82 in Nasdaq Stock Market composite trading today. The stock has surged 54 percent this year.

Starbucks Corp. announced today that it will cut artificial trans fats out of food and drinks in its stores in the continental United States, Alaska and Canada by the end of the year.

The coffee retailer isn’t about to quit selling its ice cream-laden Frappuccinos or baked sweets, but said it will only use ingredients with naturally occurring fats, like butter, whole milk, eggs and whipped cream, the Associated Press reported.

“No longer using artificial trans fats in products sold in our stores allows us to take out ingredients like partially hydrogenated oils that have no health benefit, while retaining high quality and great tasting natural ingredients,” Denny Marie Post, senior vice president of Starbucks’ global food and beverage unit, said in a statement.

The Fred Meyer on South 19th Street added a new Starbucks shop today. The store is still in training mode – a tall latte came without any espresso. But the new space include lots of room to sit and sip.

The coffee seller is in many grocery stores in the area allowing shoppers to get caffeinated while buying food for their families.

Fred Meyer is in the middle of a long remodel that will bring an up-to-date store plan that already is in some of the newer stores including the Fred Meyer on Bridgeport Way.

With the new coffee stop in Fred Meyer, I now pass five Starbucks stores on my commute to work. Add in the other brands such as Forza and I pass eight coffee shops in the 8.5 miles I drive. By the way, I pass only two McDonald's.

It’s been a month since the Eagles Hall at South 13th and Fawcett St. collapsed into a heap of dusty bricks. Demolition at the site is now complete, and the rubble has been removed. What comes next? We’ve called the owner, a downtown commercial real estate broker, but haven’t heard back. We’ll keep you posted.

Here's a look at what's left:

=> Read more!

KFC Corp. is testing milkshakes, grilled chicken and longer hours to boost sales and appeal to women, according to a story from the The Courier-Journal in Louisville, Ken., where the fast-food chain’s parent company is based.

In a conference call, the company described the milkshakes as part of an effort to create “destination” drinks and desserts at other restaurants part of parent company Yum, which include Pizza Hut and A&W All American Food. Yum is also “aggressively developing” a line of Mexican-themed drinks at Taco Bell, the paper reported.

But it’s the grilled chicken the company hopes will win over women and health-conscious eaters.

More from the story:

KFC already offers a line of roast chicken, and the company frequently plays with new and existing menu items. It launched cold chicken in 1997, four years after spending $100 million on a line of roasted chicken called Colonel's Rotisserie Gold. The rotisserie line is no longer offered. A menu line called Skinfree Chicken also flopped.

The KFC shakes, called Avalanche, cost $1.99 and come in two flavors: Old Fashioned Vanilla and Chocolate Dream.

Never mind the Dow and the S&P 500, our own Russell indexes are soaring.

For the second day in a row, both the large-cap Russell 1000 Index and the broad-market Russell 3000 Index reached record highs at close.

The large-cap Russell 1000 index reached a new high of 820.89, which was a 1.86 point increase from its previous record close on Thursday. Overall, the index is up 6.97 percent year-to-date and 2.94 percent during the past seven years.

The broad market Russell 3000 Index closed at 875.77 today, after reaching an all-time intraday high of 877.91. The index is up 6.85 percent year-to-date and 3.37 percent over the past seven years.

Dennis Jensen, senior research analyst at Russell noted that the recent record levels for the Russell 3000 looks quite different from its previous high points seven years ago in March of 2000. “The P/E ratio of 30.7 back in 2000 definitely didn’t look as favorable as the current ratio of 17.8,” he said. “This time the record valuation is accompanied by an attractive P/E.”.

With four months behind us, it looks like 2007 is going to be strong for small business. So says the latest survey from SurePayroll, a nationwide payroll outsourcing firm.

April was the fifth consecutive month for hiring growth at small businesses, the data say, and year-to-date hiring has increased 1.5 percent. That's on track for a 4.6% gain for the year – quite good considering that 2006 saw a 0.2% decline.

Otherwise, SurePayroll reports that the average small business salary nationwide stands at $31,892, the highest since the firm began tracking the figure. April's increase of 0.3% was the twentieth consecutive increase in salary growth.

And the West continues to lead the country in both hiring and salary growth.

We're awaiting state data, and will post it as soon as it comes in.

Is there no end to this? Probably not.

The average price of gasoline in Tacoma hit another record on Friday, up more than two cents to $3.378 for a gallon of regular. On Thursday, the record was $3.353. And who can forget those salad days of early April, when the price hit $3.006?

Count yourself lucky that you aren’t buying gas in Bellingham, where Friday’s price hit a statewide high of $3.438, according to AAA. And then there’s Spokane, which hit $3.180 – also a record, but still the state’s lowest price.

Ominously, the nationwide average price climbed above $3 for the first time on Friday, up to $3.012 from $2.991. And except for the seafood, this is probably a good time not to be in San Francisco, where a gallon broke the $3.60 ceiling, settling at $3.602 for those drivers filling up for the weekend.

Shares of Yahoo! Inc., owner of the second most-used Internet search engine, jumped the most in 4 1/2 years after the New York Post said Microsoft Corp. wants to buy the company.

Yahoo shares surged $4.48 to $32.66 at 12:37 p.m. in Nasdaq Stock Market trading, Bloomberg News reported.

Microsoft asked to start talks about a takeover and is working with Goldman Sachs Group Inc. on a possible deal, the newspaper said, citing unidentified bankers. An agreement would triple its share of the U.S. search market to 38.4 percent, rivaling Google Inc.’s 48.3 percent, according to ComScore Inc.

Weyerhaeuser Co. said this morning it rebounded to a profit in the first quarter after combining its fine paper business with Montreal-based paper maker Domtar Inc, the Associated Press reported.

For the 13 weeks ended April 1, Weyerhaeuser said it earned $755 million, or $3.22 per share, compared with a loss of $576 million, or $2.34 per share, during the comparable period last year.

Weyerhaeuser also said it was considering whether to sell its containerboard, packaging and recycling business.

The company said its board of directors had authorized a broad strategic review of that division, and that alternatives included continuing to run that part of the business, selling it off or a combination.

If the company decides to sell its containerboard business and experiences success similar to the Domtar deal, Weyerhaeuser could pass significant gains on to shareholders, said Steven Chercover, an analyst with D.A. Davidson & Co.

As recently as 2004, Boeing commercial airplane orders for the whole year totaled just 272 aircraft.

Now, just four months into 2007, Boeing reports orders of 315 aircraft. The company added 51 new aircraft orders this past week through Thursday. All were for 737s, two Boeing Business Jets (corporate versions of the 737) and 49 737 airliners.

The airlines, leasing companies or individuals who ordered those planes weren't identified. Boeing identifed Panama's Copa Airlines as the carrier that earlier had ordered four 737s.

Airbus hasn't announced orders for April yet, but through the end of March, the European manufacturer had 2007 orders for 134 planes.

Here's the rundown through May 1 of Boeing orders by aircraft type:

737 - 106
747 - 5
767 - 36
777 - 49
787 - 119

Costco is voluntarily recalling its Kirkland Signature Lamb and Rice canned dog food because it could be contaminated with melamine, a chemical that could be harmful to animals if eaten.

The company sent letters last week to customers who purchased the dog food. The cans that are subject to the recall have a code on them that reads “Best if used by Aug 21 08” through “Best if used by Apr 15 09.”

The letter urges customers to stop using the food and notes that customers may get a full refund if they purchased any of the dog food within those codes.

Not everything we know about a subject always fits in the paper. That's true of the former Elks Temple about which we wrote in Thursday's News Tribune.

So here's more for those of you have a hunger for more details:

This photo shows the fourth floor grand ballroom's northwest corner. A memorial to World War II Elks members on the right is defaced with graffiti. The door leads to a stairwell to a mezzanine that overlooked the ballroom. The mezzanine, thoroughly soaked from repeated rains, is equipped with a single row of theater seats where perhaps five rows once sat on risers.

This picture shows the second floor auditorium with its salmon-colored paint flaking off. The graffiti artists have added a new scenic backdrop behind the proscenium on the stage.

The former kitchen area on the Broadway level of former Elks Temple is an appliance graveyard. One row of old freezers and refrigerators is covered with spray painted slogans including one that beckons, "Come on in." I suspect the parking regulations on the sign are not being enforced at the Elks.

An additional note: Expect the jungle on the lot north the Elks to be cleared in the next few weeks. The building's managers expect that tangle of vines and small trees is a hiding place for drug paraphernalia.

Sea-Tac Airport's owner, the Port of Seattle, and the state Department of Transportation are working on a land swap that could ultimately lead to better airport access for South Sound residents.

Under that proposed land swap, the airport would give the DOT part of the land it needs to extend the Washington 509 freeway from its present end southwest of the airport to Interstate 5 between South 211th and South 216th streets.

In return, the DOT would give the airport land it needs to expand airport-area warehouses and support facilities. The land swap, the airport says, will cut about $25 million from the road's ultimate cost.

The land the port is trading is south of its existing runways. The port acquired that land years ago as part of its noise mitigation program.

Washington 509 is the Puget Sound area's least used and perhaps least known freeway. It connects with I-5 now via South 188th Street at the airport's south end. The freeway skirts the airport's west side as it heads northward toward Seattle. The road descends into the Duwamish River Valley before it ends at the First Avenue South drawbridge across the river. Northbound motorists can connect there with First Avenue South or with Marginal Way, which ties in with the Alaskan Way Viaduct.

The funding for the 509 extension is part of a package of projects set for the ballot next fall. The port will build a spur off the extended 509 as a new south approach to Sea-Tac.

Alaska Airlines saw its passenger traffic grow two percent in April, but the percentage of seats filled fell because its capacity grew more quickly than its traffic, the airline said today.

Average occupancy of its planes dropped from 78.6 percent in April 2006 to 76.9 percent in April this year.

At Alaska's regional sister carrier, Horizon Air, traffic grew by 2.8 percent, but capacity rose by 8.3 percent. Occupancy was thus down from 75.2 percent to 71.4 percent compared in April over the same month last year.

April's numbers follow a trend that began early this year. Alaska recently announced a new airfare sale. Object: fill more seats.

Costco Wholesale Corp., the warehouse club known for bargains on designer and luxury goods along with basic meals like rotisserie chicken, will start selling a line of Martha Stewart-brand food, Bloomberg News reported.

The company will introduce fresh, frozen and refrigerated foods, probably sometime next year, Susan Lyne, Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia Inc.’s chief executive officer, said during the company’s earnings call today. The goods will have both Costco’s Kirkland Signature and a Martha Stewart label.

Costco customers are “going to respond to a higher-end, well-made product,” Patricia Edwards, a Seattle-based money manager at Wentworth, Hauser & Violich, said. Costco does a “phenomenal” business in fresh foods, Edwards said. The firm holds $9.6 billion in assets including Costco shares.

Chile's LAN Airlines joined the parade to add blended winglets to its Boeing 767 fleet today.

Seattle-based Aviation Partners Boeing announced that Santiago's LAN had ordered eight blended winglet systems for its 767-300F freighters and seven winglet systems for its 767-300ER passenger jets.

LAN joins American Airlines in becoming a launch customer for the 11-foot high vertical additions to its 767 wingtips.

The blended winglets are designed to cut fuel consumption five percent, increase range by about 415 miles, improve takeoff performance and bolster payload by some 12,000 pounds.

LAN will install the winglets at its maintenance base in Santiago.

LAN is a strong customer of the 767 having been one of the latest airlines to order the airplane though it will soon be replaced by Boeing's 787 Dreamliner in the mid-sized, twin-aisle aircraft category.

Blended winglets have become almost a standard option on Boeing 737s leaving Boeing's Renton assembly line because of their fuel-saving ability. In addition many airlines such as Southwest and Alaska are adding winglets to their existing fleet of 737s. Aviation Partners also offers winglets as a retrofit to existing Boeing 757s.

Panama's Copa Airlines has ordered four more Boeing 737-800 aircraft, Boeing said today.

That brings Copa's 737 orders to 34. The carrier already has 24 of the aircraft in service. Ten more, including today's four, are on order from Boeing.

Boeing said the ordes are already reflected in it's order table. Previously they had been listed as from an unidentified customer.

The large-cap Russell 1000 Index closed at 815.68 today, a quarter of a point higher than its previous all-time close on April 25.

Russell Indexes are leaders in institutional usage and now account for more than half - an industry leading 52% share - of the benchmarks in funds used by corporate pension plans and other institutional investment organizations.

More than $3.8 trillion in assets are benchmarked to Russell indexes.

Safeco Corp., a home and car insurer based in Seattle, raised its quarterly dividend by a third to 40 cents a share, Bloomberg News reported.

The increase applies to shareholders of record as of July 6, and will be payable July 23, Safeco said in a statement. The action brings the annual dividend rate to $1.60 a share.

Safeco last raised its dividend to 30 cents on May 3, 2006. It has more than doubled its annual dividend rate in the past four years, the company said.

As goes the Dow, so goes gas.

While the nation’s most-watched average of stock market prices soared to a new record this morning, so did the price of gasoline in the South Sound. A gallon of regular cost $3.332 in Tacoma on Tuesday, and by Wednesday morning it rose to $3.345.

Bellingham retained its place as the place for the state’s dearest gas, at $3.411 per gallon (also a record high on Wednesday), while Spokane closed relatively lowest at $3.154.

The Dow climbed above a record 13,240, while the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index beat a six-year high. In the "Huh?" department, crude oil fell below $64 a barrel in New York after an Energy Department report showed that refiners increased fuel output last week, and oil futures dipped 1.1 percent to $63.67. Futures are down 15 percent from a year ago.

I was perusing the Inside the Editorial Page blog this morning when I came a post by editorial writer Patrick O'Callahan. He's discovered an possible twist in the Puyallup Tribe/SSA Marine deal announced Monday.

Read on:

Legally, the Puyallup Tribe's plan to let SSA Marine build a shipping terminal on 128 acres it owns on the Tideflats is uncontroversial.

But Ladenburg raises a question about SSA's plan to add 52 acres it owns – which are adjacent to the Puyallups' property – to the deal.

Not that he's opposed to the transfer. But SSA's 52 acres would be put into tribal trust status, exempting them from Tacoma taxes. Talking to me via a bad cell-phone connection Tuesday, Ladenburg said the 1988 tribal land claims settlement, which he helped negotiate, bans any "fraudulent transfer to avoid city taxes."

He emphasized that he's not calling SSA's plan fraudulent – just that it could take 52 acres of extremely valuable real estate off the city's tax rolls. "The City of Tacoma must sit down and talk to SSA," he said.

We'll keep you posted.

Airliner acquisition contracts often contain specific performance guarantees, manufacturer promises meet certain fuel economy, range and weight guarantees for their products.

But an agreement signed last week between Virgin Atlantic Airways and The Boeing Co. added a further performance stipulation: That Virgin Atlantic CEO Sir Richard Branson and Boeing Chairman James McNerney would shed some weight.

According to London's Daily Mail, the agreement regarding testing biofuel in a Virgin 747, stipulates in the fine print that each CEO must lose at least one stone (14 pounds) over the next four years to reduce carbon dioxide emissions on the delivery flight.

According to Virgin Atlantic's spokesman, staff members inserted the provision in the contract to see if their bosses would read the contract before signing.

"Clearly, neither of them reads contract properly before they sign them," said spokesman Paul Charles. "They had no idea they had until their signatures were down on the dotted line. They thought it was very funny."

The ever vigilant British press said Branson could stand to lose the poundage. Boeing isn't saying how much McNerney weighs though he appears already to be height and weight proportional.

Andy Turner has resigned as dean of Pacific Lutheran University’s School of Business. The sudden decision came Thursday, after the board of directors of Turner’s private equity firm unanimously requested that he focus solely on his growing responsibilities there.

Turner was named dean in November 2006, after six months as acting dean. He intended to serve as dean while continuing to work as a partner in Northern Lights Ventures.

Turner felt an obligation to the investors and chose to pursue the firm’s goal of transforming the money management business, the school said in a press release.

University Provost Patricia O’Connell Killen said Turner’s departure
will not delay implementing the vision of the School of Business to
become the best small-college business school on the West Coast.

Killen will move immediately to put interim leadership in place, the school said.

Shares of Safeco Corp. dropped the most in two months after first-quarter underwriting profit from auto insurance declined 68 percent.

The stock fell $1.81, or 2.7 percent, to $64.93 in New York Stock Exchange composite trading, Bloomberg News reported today.

The number of customers with Safeco auto policies declined 3.5 percent in the first quarter to 1.74 million, and underwriting profit in that segment fell to $17.2 million, the Seattle-based company said in a statement today. The number of accidents per insured car rose from a year earlier.

“Personal auto remains the area of weakness,” said Matthew Heimermann, an analyst with J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. in New York.
The accident rate had a “low single-digit percentage increase,” due to severe winter weather, said Executive Vice President Michael

Lacey-based Venture Financial Group, parent of Venture Bank, on Tuesday announced that first-quarter income – $3.2 million – increased by 39.1 percent over income in the first quarter of 2006. The $3.2 million was the highest first-quarter income the bank has reported.

At the end of the first quarter, Venture had assets of $1.062 billion, an all-time high and an increase of 8.6 percent over the same period in 2006.

“The first quarter 2007 is a milestone for Venture Financial Group,” said Ken Parsons, Venture’s chairman and CEO.

“Commercial loans have seen good growth. Construction and land development have been strong for us. We’re getting more customers,” said James Arneson, Venture president.

Alaska Airlines pilots were picketing today near the airline's SeaTac headquarters.

The informational picketing was just the opening ritual in what could be a difficult year of negotiations for a new contract for the 1,500 pilots.

Those pilots took an average 26 percent pay cut two years ago when an arbitrator ruled that the salaries should be reduced to bring them in line with industry averages.

Alaska offered after that ruling to soften the paycuts, which reduced first officers' pay as much as 34 percent, in return for a five-year contract with a mid-term adjustment, but the pilots voted that proposal down.

The pilots want to recover lost ground from an airline that is one of the few legacy carriers not forced into bankruptcy after the 9-11 terrorist attacks.

The airline says that despite the pay cuts and cost-cutting all around, its per-seat, per-mile costs have again risen to the top of the pile because airlines such as Delta, United and Northwest have shed debts, forced labor concessions and dumped retirement plans in bankruptcy reorganization. As Delta emerged from bankruptcy this week, for instance, its seat-mile costs were reported to be about 7 cents a mile. Alaska says its costs are about 7.8 cents a mile.

=> Read more!

Qwest and Comcast both came out today with updates on how the company’s are doing selling phone and Internet services to consumers.

The two telecommunications providers are competing heavily to woo customers with new services and special offers.

Qwest: The number of customers who buy high-speed Internet through Qwest rose 167,000 to 2.3 million. Primary residential phone lines totaled 7.2 million. Qwest operated in 14 Western states including Washington.

Consumers spent an average of $52 for Qwest’s non-wireless services, up from $49 a year ago and from $51 in the previous three months.

If cable competition intensifies, Qwest may have to increase its spending on marketing and selling its own services, said Todd Rosenbluth, an analyst at Standard & Poor’s in New York told Bloomberg News.

Comcast: Comcast Corp. predicted that its telephone service will more than quadruple to 11 million lines in less than two years, the company told investors today.

Chief Executive Officer Brian Roberts is driving drive growth by selling packages of the three services, known as the “triple play.”

As many as 25 percent of homes passed by Comcast’s cable lines will be using Comcast phone service in 2009, Roberts forecast today.

Comcast also said Tuesday that cable revenue will rise 12 percent a year through 2009 on demand for packages of TV, telephone and Internet services.

Looking for an afternoon snack? Stop by Pizza Hut from 3 to 5 pm today, where the company's site says it's giving away slices of hand-tossed pizza.

The giveaway gimmick is the latest in the chain pizza wars. Pizza Hut doesn't hide from its competition on this one, touting its reworked hand-tossed pie as better than Domino's and Papa John's. But will it beat Subway's? The sandwich chain has been testing pizza for a decade now and announced last month that you'll see its personal pizzas in June, pepperoni and all.

Sea-Tac continues to enhance it's foreign connections with the announcement today of a new non-stop flight to Mexico City.

Aeromexico, Mexico's largest airline, will be begin flying to Mexico's capital on July 4. The flight will continue to Guadalajara.

The announcement marks the return year-round non-stop service to Mexico from Seattle. Alaska Airlines flies non-stop to the tourist destinations of Puerto Vallarta, Los Cabos and Cancun seasonally from Seattle.

Aeromexico will fly Boeing 737-700s on the flight which will leave Seattle at 8:30 a.m. and arrive in Mexico City at 3:40 p.m. The return flight will depart Mexico at 6 p.m. and arrive in Seattle at 9:35 p.m.

Years ago, Mexicana Airlines flew from the Puget Sound area to Mexico but abandoned that route for more lucrative ones.

The Aeromexico announcement is the second this year of a new foreign connection for Sea-Tac. Air France earlier this year announced a new non-stop flight to Paris.

Reports have surfaced of possible other Sea-Tac overseas connections: Virgin Atlantic to London, Phillipines to Manila and a Chinese carrier to China.