News

Shop Local KC moving its flagship maker store to Brookside, expects flower business to bloom

By Tommy Felts / August 16, 2023

Shop Local KC is closing its flagship Midtown location as it prepares to open a new storefront in Brookside Sept. 1, according to owner Katie Mabry Van Dieren. The retail gift and flower shop plans to depart its original location at 3630 Main St. as the building developer, Exact Partners, seeks to use the space…

Investor returns to Kansas City with a message for his fellow VCs: It’s time to get your hands dirty 

By Tommy Felts / August 15, 2023

Traveling across the United States to listen and learn from various entrepreneurial ecosystems gave Nassir Criss the knowledge to be a better venture capitalist, he said. After nearly a year — and visiting more than a dozen cities — Criss has returned to Kansas City to share and apply what he experienced.  “I realized that…

Manufacturing talent: Kansas production mainstay designs its niche, from warfighters to healthcare 

By Tommy Felts / August 15, 2023

Startland News’ Startup Road Trip series explores innovative and uncommon ideas finding success in rural America and Midwestern startup hubs outside the Kansas City metro.  TOPEKA — The leader of a Kansas company specializing in custom equipment design and manufacturing hailed the work of its nearly 500 employees for allowing the organization to thrive during…

Autotech startup VINCUE secures Series B with fleet of industry investors, innovators

By Tommy Felts / August 15, 2023

A downtown Kansas City-headquartered startup’s first major institutional investment is expected to enable the company to scale operations, advance its product roadmap, and meet increasing market demand, its co-founders said Tuesday.  VINCUE — an end-to-end inventory lifecycle solution for retail automotive dealerships and one of Startland News’ Kansas City Startups to Watch in 2022 —…

Bottom line, their ‘Grief Forecast’ calculates how much ignoring employees’ loss will cost a company

By Tommy Felts / August 14, 2023

An Overland Park-based HRtech startup has added new tools to its B2B software platform that equips corporate leaders with the necessary knowledge to support grieving employees. This summer, Workplace Healing launched its Grief Forecast, a free resource that calculates how much a company will lose from its annual bottom line by not properly supporting employees…