It's Acadiana: Out to Lunch

Sometime over the past few years, the meaning of the world "business" has changed. Business used to be something that men in suits conducted in offices and on golf courses. Today, some of the most successful men in business don t own a suit. And business is no longer a boy s only club. Shows like Shark Tank make business look like a game anybody can play if you re prepared to roll the dice and par...

We often hear financial news pundits talking about manufacturing. Mostly in terms of how manufacturing has all but disappeared from the United States. Locally, you might think of manufacturing as the businesses on Highway 90, and other industrial locations, that make equipment for the oil field. But there are other forms of manufacturing that are not giant plants churning out things made of steel....

You may have heard the story about the famous bank robber, Slick Willie Sutton. In the early 1950 s, after a series of bank robberies, the police finally caught up with Slick Willie. When he was asked why he robbed banks, Mr. Sutton explained, "Because that s where the money is." Well, times have changed. Today, we think of someone completely different when we hear the name "Slick Willie." And ban...

When you have a small business in a small market, like Acadiana, you re facing challenges today that nobody has faced before you. There is no previous generation to turn to for advice on how to compete with online retailers. Or how to market to your local customers who might live next door but are getting all of their information online. These are essential issues that every small business has to...

There seems to be a never ending debate about healthcare in the United States. In this debate there are four main parties. The patient. Government. Insurance companies. And doctors. Despite their differences of opinion, all of these parties claim to agree on one simple thing. And that is, medical decisions are best made by doctors. Despite that, the fact is we have a healthcare system that is anyt...

After the oil crash of the mid 80 s, everybody around here realized that for the economy to come back, and for us to have a chance of surviving a future downturn, we d need to diversify. In other words, we d have to start up businesses here that employ people in fields other than oil and gas. That s easy to say. But we live in a free market economy. Politicians can t direct people to startup busin...

One of the things we like to do on this show is introduce you to people who have businesses and occupations you might not be aware of. Or that are, shall we say "out of the ordinary." In that regard, we may have outdone ourselves with this edition of Out to Lunch. Rusty Wilson is a vermiculturalist. Also known as a worm farmer. Yes, worms. Down on the Acadiana Worm Farm, Rusty has hundreds of thou...

We hear a lot these days about how we re all living in our own bubble. As more of us create our own TV channels with Netflix, our own radio stations with Spotify, and get our news from personalized social media feeds, we no longer have the kind of shared experiences we used to have, where we would laugh about last night s Seinfeld or agree how lame Brittney Spears new song was. If you re a TV chan...

We launched Out to Lunch Acadiana in July 2015. When we went on the air, KRVS in Lafayette was as it still is a mostly music station. We didn t know if we d have a single listener to a show about Acadiana business. Even knowing that, our very first guests, Matt Stuller from Stuller Inc and Anya Burgess from Sola Violins, were gracious enough to come on the show. In the intervening years, Out to Lu...

As social animals, we humans tend to ask each other two main questions. "How are you " And "What do you do " When we ask "How are you " we re looking a one word answer, something like "Fine," not a full medical report. But the response to "What do you do " tells us a lot of information about someone, besides what they do. For example, the reply, "I m a neuro scientist" or "I m a bass player in a p...

The expression "the bottom line" comes from business. It refers to the bottom line of a balance sheet which is the total sum of money you ve made or lost. In general conversation we take it to mean the absolute fundamental basis of something. On this edition of Out to Lunch Acadiana, Aileen and guests are talking about the real world bottom line, for all of us. Life and death. And the business bot...

For the last couple of hundred years we ve been making food in Acadiana that tastes totally different from anything you find anywhere else in the world. But, with the notable exception of New Iberia s Tabasco which is a hugely successful international brand it s only been relatively recently that Acadian food manufacturers have tried exporting our tastes beyond the borders of Louisiana. Aileen s l...

It s not unheard of for us to jump into something with two feet and totally commit to it only to discover some time later that things aren t working out exactly as we planned and we need to take some remedial action. On your wedding day, for example, you don t imagine you re going to find yourself a few years later making an appointment for couples therapy. When you drive off the lot in your fabul...

Many indigenous populations have a view of their place in the universe that defines them as stewards of the Earth. Australian Aborigines, Native Americans, and others, see themselves as intimately connected to the land. Here in Acadiana we re intimately connected to the land in an agricultural sense, but you wouldn t expect to see Neil deGrasse Tyson delivering a lecture on Cajun Cosmology. If any...

For as long as human beings have been on earth, we ve been on the move. If you re a Creationist, Adam and Eve were the first travelers when God told them to pack up their fig leaves and get out of The Garden of Eden. If you re an Evolutionist, geological finds support the theory that early humans wandered far and wide across the continents in search of food. Today, millions of us are on the move....

Here in Acadiana, whether you re a recent arrival or your family s been here for generations, there s one thing we all agree on we have a unique culture that we need to preserve. That s a great sentiment. But even though we all have it, wishing doesn t make it happen. For culture to be preserved, somebody has to actually preserve it. Most of us are busy, working and raising families. Despite whate...

You may remember in the late 1990 s a company called BASF had a massive TV marketing campaign, based on what they didn t make. They had a number of commercials that said things like, "At BASF we don t make the cooler, we make it cooler." And "At BASF we don t make the jeans, we make them bluer." All these beautifully shot and expensive looking commercials would end with, "At BASF we don t make a l...

A lot of people around here in Acadiana compare the recent downturn in the oil business to the downturn in the 1980 s. The general consensus seems to be that although this downturn is having a longer term effect within the oil business itself, it s having a lesser effect on the overall Acadian economy. The reason everybody gives for that is one word diversification. And it s true. Over the past co...

If you re the kind of person who doesn t like meat, you might want to keep this show on in the background and not listen too closely. If you re the kind of person who believes there are certain jobs that women just shouldn t do for example, that there s nothing sexy about a lady pig farmer or a woman who knows her way around a butcher shop you ll probably be happier listening to an old Skynyrd alb...

In Acadiana we love music. Not only do we listen to it, but many of us play it. There are probably more musicians per capita here than anywhere in the country. Music, for many families, is a way of both celebrating and passing on our culture. It is, as the late Eddie LeJeune, said, "In the Blood." Despite the fact that music is a central part of our lives, making a living from music is not easy ar...

When we talk about somebody being in business, our underlying assumption is that they re in business to make a profit. For themselves. That assumption does not always hold true. Admittedly, exceptions are rare. And that s what makes them all the more remarkable. It would hard to find a more remarkable exception than Kim James Boudreaux. Kim is the Executive Director of Catholic Services in Lafayet...

On his album Purple Rain, Prince famously opens his dance party with the lines, "Dearly beloved, we are gathered here today, to get through this thing called Life." Prince s point is that we re all on our individual journey to find happiness, but we re also all in this together. Most of us quietly go about our lives, making our own discoveries and mistakes, and hopefully getting wiser as we do. Th...

In the past, one of the indications of being good in business and a successful and respectable person in general was job stability. You graduated from high school or college, you got a job and you stuck at it for 40 years. If you did well, you d work your way up through the ranks and end up in management. But even if you didn t, you appreciated the security, you were loyal to the company, and you...

Here in Southwest Louisiana we are buffeted by elements and forces largely beyond our control. We don t have the luxury of debating whether climate change is man made or a natural phenomenon. Whomever is causing it man or nature we have to live with the reality that changing weather is bringing one hundred and 500 year storms far more frequently than centuries apart. And eroding coasts are robbing...

It s not totally unheard of for a husband and wife to start up a business together. There are small businesses that are labor intensive and require long hours that a couple can split, and keep whatever profit they can make in the family. Traditionally, businesses like family farms come to mind. Or convenience stores. Gas stations. And, perhaps more stereotypically than true these days, the mom and...