Business category, Page 4
Rutter’s opens 1st store in Westmoreland CountyVideo
Rutter’s, the convenience chain founded by members of the Rutter farm family in York, opened its first location in Westmoreland County on Tuesday. The convenience store, gas station and truck stop located at the corner of Interstate 70 and Waltz Mill Road in Sewickley Township also includes a small bar...
Value City Furniture to close all Western Pa. locations
Value City Furniture and American Signature Furniture are going out of business. All retail stores will be permanently closing, including those in Western Pennsylvania. Value City Furniture’s parent company, American Signature Inc., filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in November. All remaining stores are being liquidated. There are four Value City...
Microsoft’s Brad Smith pushes Big Tech to ‘pay our way’ for AI data centers amid rising opposition
It won’t be easy for Big Tech companies to win the hearts and minds of Americans who are angered about massive artificial intelligence data centers sprouting up in their neighborhoods, straining electricity grids and drawing on local reservoirs. Microsoft is trying anyway. The software giant’s president, Brad Smith, is meeting...
Inflation cooled slightly in December though it remains above Fed’s target
WASHINGTON — Inflation cooled a bit last month as prices for gas and used cars fell, a sign that stubbornly elevated cost pressures are slowly easing. Consumer prices rose 0.3% in December from the prior month, the U.S. Labor Department said Tuesday, the same as in November. Excluding the volatile...
Richland play cafe owner looks to create place where children, parents can make memories together
After her childhood plan of becoming a school teacher didn’t turn out the way she thought it would, Ashley Domenick is pursuing a new dream of opening a play cafe. The Busy Berry Play Cafe is scheduled to open Jan. 19 at the Richland Mall in Richland, near Emiliano’s Mexican...
Apple calls on Google to help smarten up Siri and bring other AI features to iPhone
Apple will rely on Google to help finish its efforts to smarten up its virtual assistant Siri and bring other artificial intelligence features to the iPhone as the trendsetting company plays catch up in technology’s latest craze. The deal allowing Apple to tap into Google’s AI technology was disclosed Monday...
Allegheny Health Network promotes West Penn Hospital head to run regional doctors group
Allegheny Health Network tapped West Penn Hospital’s top official Monday to lead a regional affiliation of doctors and their practices. Dr. Brian Johnson, who’s been president of West Penn Hospital since 2020, was named medical director and chief population health officer at Physician Partners of Western PA. He succeeds Dr....
Dina Powell McCormick, wife of U.S. Sen. Dave McCormick, named Meta president
Dina Powell McCormick, a close ally of the Trump administration and the wife of U.S. Sen. Dave McCormick, is Meta’s new president and vice chairman. The Facebook parent company announced her appointment Monday, making a figure with Southwestern Pennsylvania ties a central decision-maker for one of the world’s largest tech...
China and the EU agree on steps to resolve their dispute over EV imports
HONG KONG — China and the European Union said Monday they have agreed on steps toward resolving their dispute over the bloc’s imports of Chinese-made electric vehicles. A “guidance document” released by the EU on Monday gives instructions for Chinese EV manufacturers on making price offers for EV exports, including...
Waiting game: More than 5 years after plans OK’d, Menards yet to arrive in Hempfield
Even though Menards didn’t have the decorative wood paneling Karl Doerk was looking for, he didn’t leave empty-handed. He settled on railroad toys instead. Doerk and his wife usually make the drive to the Menards near Morgantown, W.Va., once or twice a month from their home in Cumberland, Md., a...
Trump ‘inclined’ to keep ExxonMobil out of Venezuela after CEO response at White House meeting
ABOARD AIR FORCE ONE — President Donald Trump said Sunday that he is “inclined” to keep ExxonMobil out of Venezuela after its top executive was skeptical about oil investment efforts in the country after the toppling of former President Nicolás Maduro. “I didn’t like Exxon’s response,” Trump said to reporters...
Federal Reserve Chair Powell says DOJ has subpoenaed central bank, threatens criminal indictmentVideo
WASHINGTON — Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell said Sunday the Department of Justice has served the central bank with subpoenas and threatened it with a criminal indictment over his testimony this summer about the Fed’s building renovations. The move represents an unprecedented escalation in President Donald Trump’s battle with the...
Google teams up with Walmart and other retailers to enable shopping within Gemini AI chatbot
NEW YORK — Google said Sunday that it is expanding the shopping features in its AI chatbot by teaming up with Walmart, Shopify, Wayfair and other big retailers to turn the Gemini app into a virtual merchant as well as an assistant. An instant checkout function will allow customers to...
A $400,000 payout after Maduro’s capture is putting prediction markets in the spotlight
Prediction markets let people wager on anything from a basketball game to the outcome of a presidential election — and recently, the downfall of former Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro. The latter is drawing renewed scrutiny into this murky world of speculative, 24/7 transactions. Last week, an anonymous trader pocketed more...
Trump pushes a 1-year, 10% cap on credit card interest rates and banks balk
NEW YORK — Reviving a campaign pledge, President Donald Trump wants a one-year, 10% cap on credit card interest rates, a move that could save Americans tens of billions of dollars but drew immediate opposition from an industry that has been in his corner. Trump was not clear in his...
Hemingway’s Cafe closure prompted by family matters, changing drinking habits, owner says
When John Elavsky took over Hemingway’s Cafe in the early 1990s, one of the building’s owners — a mentor of his — imparted wisdom that stuck with him. “John, you better be here,” Elavsky, 68, remembers Leo Xyftis telling him. In other words, absentee ownership wasn’t going to cut it....
A high-risk, potentially high-reward way to pick stocks
“There are simple answers, just not easy ones,” Ronald Reagan once said. In stock investing, a simple, risky but surprisingly effective technique is to buy the cheapest stocks out there. That’s the point of my Robot Portfolio, a hypothetical portfolio in which the stocks are chosen by a computer, not...
Sluggish hiring closes out a frustrating year for job seekers though unemployment slips to 4.4%
WASHINGTON — Sluggish December hiring concluded a year of weak employment gains that have frustrated job seekers even though layoffs and unemployment remained low. Employers added just 50,000 jobs last month, nearly unchanged from a downwardly revised figure of 56,000 in November, the Labor Department said Friday. The unemployment rate...
Pittsburgh zoning board denies Strip District condos, but developer undeterred
Pittsburgh’s Zoning Board of Adjustment denied a proposed 14-story condo complex in the Strip District last week, in part over concerns its height would be inconsistent with that of surrounding buildings. Jonathan Moritz, head of Moritz Development, brought the project before the board in October, seeking permission to bend the...
‘It was a big family’: Former Volkswagen assembly line workers will gather in Hempfield
A group of former autoworkers at the Volkswagen of America assembly plant near New Stanton will gather Saturday to renew old friendships and reminisce about their experiences at the factory. The reunion begins at 1 p.m. Saturday at Cabin Bar & Grille, 918 S. Center Ave., Hempfield, just a short...
Meta funds expansion of Beaver Valley nuclear plant to help power AI
Meta announced Friday it’s funding an expansion of the Beaver Valley Nuclear Power Station as the tech giant hoovers up energy for its “superintelligence” initiative. The deal caps a dramatic reversal of fortunes for the Vistra-owned plant in Shippingport, Beaver County, which was at one point scheduled to shutter in...
Macy’s to shut down Pittsburgh Mills store in Frazer
Macy’s plans to close its Pittsburgh Mills store in 2026. According to a Macy’s spokesperson, the store in the increasingly vacant Frazer mall is among 150 locations the New York City-based company announced it plans to shutter through this year as part of its A Bold New Chapter strategy. “After...
Yinz Coffee opening in Downtown Pittsburgh’s Frick Building
A thinned office crowd isn’t stopping Ken Zeff, owner of Yinz Coffee, from quadrupling down on the Golden Triangle. The serial entrepreneur is preparing to open a nearly 4,000-square-foot cafe Monday in the Frick Building — his fourth in Downtown Pittsburgh, 11th total and largest ever. “I still see a...
Hemingway’s Cafe in Oakland to close
Hemingway’s Cafe, the popular bar along Forbes Avenue known for its cheap pitchers and lively trivia nights, is closing after more than four decades in Pittsburgh’s Oakland neighborhood. The business will wind down in May, owner John Elavsky said in a social media post Thursday afternoon. He did not give...
Hotel tax revenues doled out to help promote Westmoreland tourism
Dwight Brown knows that word of mouth isn’t enough to sustain business growth. Brown opened Great Scott Escape in November 2020, a Scottdale business that has grown over the last several years to include three separate rooms for gaming enthusiasts. He wants to see it continue to grow, and said...
