The IBJ Podcast with Mason King

The population of Indianapolis swelled by about 100,000 headed into Monday night’s College Football Playoff National Championship game. Fans from Georgia and Alabama filled hotel rooms, injected adrenalin into the local restaurant scene, rented cars, shelled out for keepsakes and, hopefully, told their friends back home how much they’re enjoying the city despite absolutely dreadful weather. City t...

In this week's episode, IBJ Editor Lesley Weidenbener steps in for host Mason King to lead a year-in-review discussion about 2021 and the people who made headlines in 2021. IBJ Managing Editor Greg Weaver and reporters Dave Lindquist and Mickey Shuey talk about the reasons that IBJ named The Sports Corp.'s Ryan Vaughn its newsmakers of the year and why the new IU president, chair of Newfields, Hig...

With the holidays upon us—and only a small percentage of kids vaccinated against COVID-19—host Mason King has been wondering what's safe when it comes to family gatherings, parties and public events So he called Dr. James Wood, a pediatric infectious disease specialist at Riley Children's Health, to talk about vaccinations for children, how latest strains of coronavirus are affecting younger kids...

Local tech executive Eric Tobias and two partners bought the entertainment business that stages events at the Vogue in Broad Ripple in early 2019. “When people ask me about this, I say, ‘Owning a music venue—best first year of my life … but maybe one of the most challenging second years,’” Tobias says. The Vogue closed abruptly on March 12, 2020, just as that night’s band—Drive-By Truckers—was war...

Investment adviser Morningstar has issued new guidance that changes the conventional wisdom about how much you can expect to withdraw from your investment accounts in retirement. The change in the so-called 4% rule has podcast host Mason King worried, and so he and Peter "Pete the Planner" Dunn dive into the details in search of clarity. Pete also predicts what the omicron variant will mean for th...

Experts expect shoppers to drop a record amount of money this holiday season. The National Retail Federation forecasts sales for November and December to grow between 8.5% and 10.5% over the same months in 2020. In total dollars, that would be between $843.4 billion and $859 billion. At the same time, the supply-chain issues that have plagued commerce since the start of the pandemic are expected t...

In the second part of a two-episode interview, Martha Hoover—founder of the Indianapolis-based Patachou Inc. restaurant company—explains how the pandemic pulled back the curtain on problems in the restaurant industry, especially how little workers are paid and how vulnerable most eateries really are. Hoover—known for restaurants including Cafe Patachou, Public Greens and Napolese—tells host Mason...

Indianapolis restauranteur Martha Hoover launched her first Cafe Patachou at 49th and Pennsylvania in 1989 and has since expanded her company to 13 eateries spread across several distinct concepts. Like other restaurants, though, Hoover had to close the doors at all of her Patachou Inc. locations when the pandemic hit, a time she calls "frightening." But Hoover tells host Mason King — in the first...

Veteran real estate agent Matt McLaughlin reached more than $1 billion in career sales in September after some 22 years as an agent for F.C. Tucker. It's a milestone the firm's CEO, Jim Litten, called "one of the most challenging to attain in our industry." And yet McLaughlin said it was not particularly a goal and he wasn't fully aware he was approaching it until the folks in his office mentioned...

Indiana’s unemployment rate inched down to 4% in September, but what does that actually mean? How many people are in the Indiana workforce? And why are so many companies struggling to find workers? Host Mason King talks with Fred Payne, commissioner of the Indiana Department of Workforce Development, about what the state is doing to help more Hoosiers find jobs and more companies find workers.  Pl...

A record 4.3 million workers in the U.S. quit their jobs in August and more are expected to do so as part of what analysts are calling the "Great Resignation." But can you afford to join them? Host Mason King talks with Peter "Pete the Planner" Dunn about how to prepare financially to leave your job. Plus, Pete offers a prediction about the stock market as the year comes to a close. Looking for an...

Nine teams representing students, researchers and autonomous vehicle experts from across the globe will convene at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway on Oct. 23 for an auto-racing competition without drivers. Or at least without a human in the cockpit. The "drivers" in this case are software systems coded in advance by the teams, who must just sit back on "race day" to see if the cars can direct them...

In the wake of criticism about conditions at last spring's women's basketball championship, the NCAA is considering a number of changes, including whether the men's and women's Final Fours should be played on the same weekend in the same city. IBJ's sports business reporter Mickey Shuey talks with host Mason King about why that would significantly shorten the list of cities that could host the Fin...

Riley Hospital for Children is preparing to unveil its $142 million maternity center—five floors of renovated space that will house labor and delivery rooms, intensive-care-unit rooms, emergency and triage rooms, operating rooms, and infant-resuscitation rooms. It's a new direction for Riley, which has traditionally served sick children and babies who need special care. But Indiana University Heal...

Some 11.5 million Americans quit their jobs in April, May and June, according to the U.S. Department of Labor. And a recent Gallup poll found that nearly half of all workers are actively searching for other work. It's part of what's become known as the Great Resignation—and if you're a manager, you might be wondering whether there's anything you can do to keep your employees on the job. Host Mason...

Podcast host Mason King recently used an online calculator to estimate what it might cost to send his 5-year-old son to college someday—and the answer shocked him. So he's talking with Peter "Pete the Planner" Dunn this week about when parents need to start saving, what savings vehicles to use and whether parents should go into debt to fund their kids' education.   The IBJ podcast is brought to yo...

Dale Neuburger is a former president of the Indiana Sports Corp. and treasurer of FINA, the International Federation for Aquatics. He spent several weeks in Japan for the Olympic Games, where he served as the International Olympic Committee’s competition director for swimming, with additional responsibilities for diving, water polo, artistic swimming and open-water swimming. IBJ sports business re...

IBJ Media’s recent acquisition of competitor Grow Indiana Media Ventures and the Inside INdiana Business and Inside Edge multimedia platforms raises a series of questions, starting with the extent to which the state’s two biggest business news brands actually overlap. Some see the deal as a combination of complementary businesses with different audiences, but the irony of the acquisition is that o...

Marion County Prosecutor Ryan Mears told IBJ last week that he hasn't decided whether his office will move to the new Community Justice Campus, which remains under construction in the Twin Aire neighborhood. The office was expected to be part of a second office building that Browning Investments planned to build at the site to complement a jail, Sheriff's Office and court system that will be movin...

It was about six years ago when Indianapolis arts organization Big Car bought an old factory in the Garfield Park neighborhood and started working on a plan to create an arts campus there. Fast forward to today and the group owns the Tube Factory Artspace in that former factory, an audio art space that houses a radio station, nine houses it has renovated for artists and another factory—this one 40...

At emergency rooms across central Indiana, “No Vacancy” signs are flashing at unprecedented rates. Emergency rooms are often overflowing with patients, prompting hospitals to divert ambulances to other hospitals for hours at a stretch, provided the cases aren’t life-threatening. On July 26, for example, at least 10 large hospitals in central Indiana went on diversion at some point, causing ambulan...

While intense heat waves and wildfires scorch the Western U.S. and freak rainstorms spawn massive floods in Europe and China, the weather in central Indiana has been fairly tame so far this year. Indeed, Indiana very well could sidestep some of the most extreme effects of climate change, but don’t get lulled into complacency, says Jeffrey Dukes, director of the Purdue Climate Change Research Cente...

Indy Chamber last month was recognized by its peers for work it has been doing that's not quite typical of chambers of commerce nationwide. The group won the 2021 Chamber of the Year award from an association that represents 1,600 chambers and economic development organizations. And it earned the honor for the work it has done on inclusive growth—primarily a rework of the city's economic incentive...

The pandemic wreaked havoc on the hospitality industry in Indianapolis and across the nation. Still, IBJ reporter Mickey Shuey finds that many of the hotels in the planning stages for downtown Indianapolis before the pandemic are still moving forward today. In fact, three hotels have opened since COVID-19 struck the state in March 2020. Host Mason King chats with Shuey about the state of the hotel...

Host Mason King and the folks in the Midtown Parents Facebook Group in Indianapolis have a lot of questions about money—specifically how they should be saving it for retirement and college. Should homeowners pay off a mortgage early? How do you plan for the future when one partner in a relationship is significantly older than the other? Should you prioritize retirement savings over college savings...