Issaquah-based Costco will report third quarter earnings Thursday, but analysts are unsure whether the wholesale warehouse company's results will benefit from the recession.

Costco, on one hand, has seen shoppers migrating from other stores in search of lower prices, but even its affluent customers are being conservative with their outlays.

The company's gross sales are also expected to decline because of lower gas prices than at this time last year. Costco sells gas at most of its stores.

The average of analysts' predictions is that the company will report a profit of 53 cents a share. That compares with 67 cents a share in the third quarter a year ago.

Some analysts say Costco is well-positioned to take advantage of a recovery as well-heeled customers loosen up their spending.

A new airline bearing the same name of a California carrier purchased by SeaTac's Alaska Airlines a quarter century ago will begin flying in mid-July.

That low-cost, no-frills airline, JetAmerica, won't have any connection with Alaska.

The new airline, modeling itself after the now-defunct Skybus Airlines, is scheduled to launch service in July 13 from the New York area's Newark Liberty Airport.

The old Jet America was a carrier based at Long Beach Airport in Southern California. Jet America's fleet of 10 McDonnell Douglas MD-80 jets connected Long Beach with a network of cities throughout the country including Chicago and Minneapolis.

Alaska absorbed that fleet and Jet America's personnel

Alaska spokeswoman Bobbie Eagan said Alaska is aware that the new carrier is using the name, but has no plans to challenge their right to do so.

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Retailers in downtown Seattle's premier shopping street have little to complain about compared with their peers in other tony shopping district around the world.

A new study by global real estate firm Colliers International comparing retail space rents in well-known shopping districts in dozens of cities throughout the world, shows Seattle's retail rents are on the reasonable end of the spectrum.

The study shows Seattle Fifth Avenue rents average $40 a square foot annually. That's less than three percent of the rental rates on Fifth Avenue's New York namesake, the most expensive retail street on the globe.

There retail space is renting for $1,400 a square foot on average. And that's a substantial drop from the $1,650 a square foot average retail rent merchants paid last year.

New York's Fifth Avenue is followed on Colliers' list by the Champs Elysees in Paris at $1,203 a square foot, by Russell Street in Hong Kong at $1,192 a square foot and New York's Madison Avenue at $750 a square foot.

Other notable retail locations in North America and their average rents: San Francisco's Union Square, $400 a square foot; Vancouver's Robson Street, $192 a square foot; Chicago's Michigan Avenue, $250 a square foot; Beverly Hills' Rodeo Drive, $400 a square foot, and Las Vegas Boulevard, $140 a square foot.

Port of Tacoma Commissioner Dick Marzano recently announced that he plans to run again for his seat.

The five-person port commission has three seats up for election this year.

Marzano was first elected to the commission in 1995. He has been re-elected two times since.

"I believe my experience on the commission and working my entire adult life on the waterfront will help in the problems we face," Marzano said in an e-mail to The News Tribune.

Marzano has worked as a longshoreman for almost four decades.

He is also former member of the Freight Mobility Strategic Investment Board, appointed by both former Washington Gov. Gary Locke and current Gov. Christine Gregoire, according to the port's Web site.

"The Port is experiencing some rough times as is most of the state, but I am confident we will come out of this better prepared to meet the challenges ahead and continue to be one of the economic engines of Pierce County," he said.

Marzano is 61.