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Area business people showcase goods, services Thursday

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Rock Regional Business & Marketing Expo 2009

Photos from the 2009 Rock Regional Business & Marketing Expo, held at Janesville's Helgesen Industrial Center.

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JANESVILLE — If the local economy hasn't yet bottomed, it's pretty close, and about the only direction to chart is up.

That was the consensus of business people interviewed Thursday at the Rock Regional Business & Marketing Expo.

The expo presented by Forward Janesville took on a new look this year. The most notable was its location: the sprawling Helgesen Industrial Center on Janesville's southeast side.

About 150 exhibitors had ample room to showcase their goods and services in what has typically been a business-to-business marketing event. This year's expo, however, brought together chambers of commerce in Janesville, Beloit, Milton, Evansville, Edgerton, Delavan and Fort Atkinson in an effort to promote the region.

Organizers said the regional approach to the expo mirrors regional efforts to market southern Wisconsin to new businesses or those looking to expand.

"At least from a regional perspective, I think we're on an upswing with this business cycle," said Dan Topel, vice president of sales for A.M. Mailing Services in Edgerton.

A.M. provides high-volume, high-tech direct mail solutions both locally and nationally.

Topel said A.M. is starting to pick up business on the East and West coasts. He suspects the upturn soon will start moving into the nation's heartland.

But that won't happen without hard work, he said.

"Because we're on the marketing side of business, it becomes a knowledge and education thing on our part," he said. "We have to convince customers that (marketing) is not an expense but rather an investment.

"We have to educate small businesses to reinvent themselves to drive new business. It's all about acquiring new business and retaining what they have."

For small businesses such as OfficePro in Janesville, that means thinking even further outside the box, said Jamin Arn who owns the company that supplies office products, furniture and commercial janitorial supplies.

"And we've always been a company that thinks outside the box," Arn said.

Arn isn't convinced the local economy is starting to improve.

"I don't know the dynamics of the whole GM situation, but I gotta believe that within the next year there will be some people whose benefits start drying up, and when that happens, things are going to get real ugly," he said.

Still, he said, strong small businesses will survive the cyclical downturn, which he referred to as a "business forest fire" that will clear out weaker companies.

"In our business, this will make us stronger, smarter and a lot less complacent," he said.

Bill Mears said he's finally starting to see some activity in his business, commercial real estate, which is often considered an important indicator in an economic recovery.

Mears, a principal in the Janesville office of Coldwell Banker Commercial, said commercial real estate sales typically lag rebounds in housing sales.

Rock County homes sales were up for June, July and August, but Mears wasn't confident in calling that a trend just yet.

"I really think we're somewhere near the bottom," he said. "We've seen the cycles before."

In commercial real estate, the cycles follow a pattern, he said. Initially, there's lots of demand but no space available. Available space then starts to catch up with demand.

Finally, space becomes available, but there's no demand for it and commercial real estate values decline.

That's where Mears said the local market is right now.

"At least it's my hope that we're at the bottom and will soon start to turn some corners," he said.