The holiday shopping season is upon us, and I asked some of our local merchants to share their ideas for my extensive gift list. For other ideas, view our eNews on shopping and giving local.

Patience is a virtue in the development business. Patience paid off ten fold in the case of 2917 Mayfield Road, just west of Honda Motorcars. The building, vacated by In House Furniture a few years ago, sat forlornly, watching the thousands of cars make their daily commute downtown. Its patience was rewarded when Cleveland Heights resident Yanbing Chen purchased the building in January 2008.

All About U Fitness (AAUF) is a new personal training facility located in the Rockefeller Pointe building at the corner of Mayfield Road and Lee Boulevard. Owner and certified personal fitness trainer Eric Price is fulfilling his lifelong dream of operating his own training center in the city he loves.

Three Coventry stores are celebrating anniversaries this month.  Mac’s Backs is turning 30, Vidstar Video 25, and Big Fun 18.

Mac's Backs Founder Jim McSherry opened the book store 30 years ago when he was a graduate student at Kent State University. He then moved it to his hometown of Chagrin Falls and, in 1982 opened the second location in Cleveland Heights. Both stores operated simultaneously for several years and now the Coventry store is his only location.

Cedar Fairmount, Coventry Village, and Cedar Lee, the three Cleveland Heights commercial areas that have formed special improvement districts (SID), held their annual meetings and elected new trustees. Each SID is a nonprofit organization of property owners who tax themselves to provide maintenance, landscaping, and other amenities for a business district.

The whole idea behind creating images for your family is to hold on to memories, to preserve relationships.  Everyday pictures can do this, and it is that one photograph that captures the essence of the person, relationship or family that becomes precious.  Creating precious images is a passion for Chris Holley-Starling. She believes that “every human being is beautiful” and when she can “find what makes them smile and light up, and capture that on film” then she’s in a special place.  Capturing that light is what she enjoys most about photography. She considers the opportunity as a special privilege.

Good bars are like old jeans -well-worn but supremely comfortable. They’re not sited in lifestyle centers or defined by the 100-plus martini variations they don’t actually make. Their dart boards and pool tables, chicken wings, and Pabst Blue Ribbon don't aspire to lure the well-heeled.

What if your spending habits could channel money directly back into your community, help our local economy and positively contribute to our community's overall quality of life? When you buy local, that’s exactly what happens. Buying local has a big impact on our local economy. When you purchase from a locally owned and operated store, $68 out of every $100 stays in our community, versus $43 when you buy from a chain store. Thanks to the Council of Smaller Enterprises’ (COSE) I Buy Northeast Ohio (I Buy NEO) Program, making a difference in the local economy by buying local is simple.

Claire Laffey has fulfilled her long time goal by opening her own business. Since graduating from cosmetology school at Brush High School and then barber school, Claire has envisioned owning her own establishment.

Claire’s dream was realized when she opened CL Barber Salon at 12395 Cedar Road in Cleveland Heights in August. It is located between Nighttown and Zoss Bakery. With her family’s help, she remodeled and updated the space of the former Brigitte’s Hair Salon with clean lines, birch cabinetry, and white walls contrasting with a shot of Montego Blue paint. Add to this black and white tile floors, four streamlined black leather barber chairs and black sinks. The atmosphere is one of calm and tranquility.

Cleveland Heights celebrated its local businesses at the 4th annual Best of Cleveland Heights Awards ceremony, held at Nighttown, on Sunday, September 28.  Hosted by FutureHeights, a civic engagement organization whose HeightsShops program promotes economic sustainablity through support of local, independent businesses,awards are generated through a consumer survey process. This year's awards drew over 500 unique votes.

I spend a lot of time thinking about my house (call it a mild obsession). I try to concentrate on the space at large; the rooms, the flow, etc. but often find my attention alighting upon my things, my quirky chairs and odd sculptural objects or upon the vacancies where I want to put new things.

The latest object of my desire is a Danish rosewood credenza, circa 1966, from BOOM Modern on Lee Boulevard. One of the reasons I love this piece is, that like so many pieces at BOOM, it blends easily with what I have from other eras and other styles, be they traditional - a round foyer table - or more modern; an oddball, Jetson-era plaid chair -think George Jetson's version of the La-Z-Boy, also from BOOM.

What is money? It’s a ridiculous question. Right? It’s the bills and coins in our pocket.

Money has many functions. It’s a medium of exchange, dollars in the US, and euros, yen or other currencies elsewhere. Money is a means of transferring value from place to place, replacing the need to lug a bag of rice to the local hardware store to trade for a gallon of paint.

Weeks Automotive, a new auto repair shop, has taken the place of Quick Copy at 1503 Warrenville Center Road. Weeks Automotive repairs both foreign and domestic vehicles, offering fair and competitive prices with service that sets a new benchmark for the auto repair industry. Tim Weeks, owner and active manager, has 35 years of experience. Working at a wide range of auto repair shops, from places like Sohio and Dowd Oldsmobile, to his latest residence at Alternative Solutions, Tim has gained a name for himself both in the Heights and in neighboring communities. He has helped to pioneer the repair of many automotive makes and models.

Integrating business principles is essential for Catholic schools to operate successfully today. To guide schools and nonprofits with this integration process, former Beaumont School leaders Sister Ritamary Welsh, OSU and Stacey Picard have launched SDG Advisors LLC, a consulting firm that works primarily with Catholic K-12 schools, to help them strengthen their infrastructure so they can better fulfill their mission.

Bob Roth, owner and son of the founder of Roth Cedar Fairmount Pharmacy, has closed his drug store after 19 years at the Fairmount location, and 46 years in the pharmacy business.Bob’s father opened his first pharmacy at 1619 Euclid Avenue in 1941. Bob followed in his father’s footsteps and graduated with a degree in pharmacology. He joined his father in the family-owned business at their Euclid Avenue store. Since then Roth Pharmacy has had six locations. They moved the drug store to 2458 Fairmount Boulevard in 1989, after a drug store owned by Phil Parson was vacated. It became Cedar Fairmount Pharmacy.

The Mad Greek restaurant, 2466 Fairmount Boulevard, was opened in 1977 by Loki and Nickie Chopra. After 32 years, the restaurant continues to offer a menu of contemporary American, Greek, and Indian fare. All ingredients are fresh and all recipes made from scratch. Over the years the restaurant has been recognized for outstanding food and service including most recently the Cleveland Magazine Silver Spoon Award and Northern Ohio Live’s award for Best Greek Food.

Programs aimed at persuading shoppers to spend their dollars with local independent businesses are springing up all over the country. Locally, FutureHeights has been selling gift certificates redeemable at participating Cleveland Heights businesses for several years. Now Motorcars Cleveland, one of the Heights area’s largest employers, is joining the trend with a shop local program of its own.

You want to provide nothing but the best for your kids, right? You want them to play to their heart’s content, chasing their friends from one room to the next, playing fetch (I mean catch) outside and tug of war inside, and even lounging poolside on hot summer days. And, then there’s nap time and snack time, of course, and the dogged tiredness that comes from playing all day long.

Ten years ago when Laura Griffith and her husband decided to move from Chicago, they explored numerous cities in Northeast Ohio looking for just the right community. They settled on Cleveland Heights. Four years ago, when Laura decided to open her own hair salon, she knew that the Cedar-Lee Business District was the right location. Today, CUT Hair Studio, 2254 Lee Road, is a thriving business that exemplifies Laura’s commitment to Cleveland Heights.

The year was 1966, the days of the Beehive Hair styles, when women used knitting needles to scratch their heads and they had their hair set once a week. Sabina Schaner’s mother, Brigitte, decided to open a beauty shop.

 

Liberty Bank, N.A. has appointed Cleveland Heights resident Peter G. Shaw as vice president of commercial lending.

“Peter is a proven professional lender who has a strong commitment to the Northeast Ohio market,” said William A. Valerian, chairman and CEO of Liberty Bank “His experience and knowledge give the bank a decided edge in our mission to help customers grow and prosper.”

Fifteen thousand pounds -- that’s how much wheat flour Bialy’s Bagels owners Mark and Ellen Osolin require each week to keep up with customer demand. Anyone who has sampled a freshly-baked bagel from Bialy’s understands why these glazed, donut-shaped Jewish yeast rolls are so popular. They come in 18 different varieties, from traditional egg, sesame or poppy seed to the more eclectic cinnamon cranberry, French toast and “mish mash.” On Sunday mornings Bialy’s customers line up outside the door of the University Heights store, waiting patiently for the delectable bagels.

What’s “green” about a car? Many people ask how a car can be good for the environment when it uses gasoline. Well, I have the answer for you: The Honda Civic GX Natural Gas Car. It’s the “greenest” internal combustion engine in the world, having earned the top spot on the American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy “Greenest Vehicles" list for the fifth straight year.

As an "almost lifetime" resident of the Heights area, I have seen businesses come and go, but rarely have I had the opportunity to witness the birth, development, evolution, and reinvention of a family-owned-and-operated full service facility. This is exactly the case in Quintana's Barber and Dream Spa which recently expanded into an exquisitely renovated three-story facility at 2200 South Taylor Road in Cleveland Heights.

What does it mean to "buy local"? Does it mean to shop within the Heights' borders? Does the size of the business matter? Or does buy local mean refusing to shop at chain retailers and limiting your spending to "mom and pop" stores?