1

BI-MONTHLY BUSINESS

REPORT

Mission:

To build economic prosperity

by engaging businesses and

the community.

MOUNT PLEASANT

BU

SIN

ES

S

BU

SIN

ES

S R

EPO

RT

RE

PO

RT

Everything Texas

ISSUE 08 March/April 2014

2

Vision: “We will be Everything Texas.”

Values:

Trust

Economic Prosperity

X marks the spot

Awareness

Sustainability

3

PARTNERS

EAT LOCAL

CREATIVE DISPLAYS

FORT SHERMAN DAYS

B2B INSIDER

SOCIAL MEDIA MONITORING

CHAMBER CALENDAR

FACEBOOK HASHTAGS

4

New Partners

8TwentyOne Boutique AA's Treehouse Advantage Copy Systems Al Riddle Alan G. Carter Allen Scrap Metal American National Bank Automotive Sales & Salvage, LLC Bates Cooper Sloan Funeral Home Brown's GlassSuper Plaza Buddy Marshall Cannaday Business Services Champion Auto Chili’s Tennison City of Mount Pleasant Conroy Tractor Country Cottage Crazy 8’s Creative Catering Curry's Pools Cypress Bank Dekoron Wire and Cable Dennis Cameron Dr. Don Lutes Dynamics Health & Fitness East Texas Broadcasting East Texas Children’s Dentistry, P.A. Electronic Security Engage Concept Development ETMC Pittsburg Firmins Office Supply First Baptist Church Greater Hope Church of God in Christ Hale Electric

Heritage Park Village Herschels Restaurant Holiday Inn Express Hotel & Suites Hyland Park Hy-Marks Pet Service IntegraCare Home Health It's a Small World Jim & Karen Harmon John L. Greene DDS Just a $1.00 Kasseighs La Quinta Inn & Suites Lauras Cheesecake Lori Chism Luminant M.P. Seventh-Day Adventist Church Mardi Gras Seafood Mark Lesher Mason True Value Hardware Matkin Chiropractic, Inc. McGuire-Dyke CPAs & Investment Group Medical & Surgical Dermatology Mount Pleasant Burgers & Fries Mount Pleasant Habitat for Humanity Mount Pleasant Lions Club Mount Pleasant Quality Inn Mount Pleasant Recycling & Scrap Mt. Olive Baptist Church Newly Weds Foods, Inc. Northeast Texas Pump Services Open Imaging of TRMC Outlaw's BBQ Patriot Auto Paul Meriwether

Pediatric Clinic Pilgrim’s Priefert Logistics Quality Trailer Products R & R Marine Randy's Burgers Rapid Furniture & Appliance Redfearn Property Management Redfearn Real Estate Region VIII ESC Rustic C Sandlin Motors Inc. Servpro of Paris Simply Skin Stansells City Cleaners & Laundry Inc. Suddenlink Communications Super 1 Foods Super 8 Motel of Mount Pleasant Texas A&M Texas Helping Hands Inc. The 80 Acres Tim Taylor Titus County Cares Titus County Fresh Water Supply District Tri Special Utility District Trinity Baptist Church TRMC Tumey Funeral Home Vaughn's Visiting Angels Wal-Mart Welch Gas Wood Air Conditioning Inc. YGM

IT-oLogy All NEEDZ Plumbing Arby’s Texas Country Farm Supply Mount Pleasant Animal Clinic Secure Computer Networks Noodle Grill

Designs by Lisa Blalock Bar-B-Que Homeboy Sportswear Mills Flower Shop Edward Jones-David Patterson R/C Rentals & Sales, LLC Kathryn C. Dunn, DVM

The Ark Ministries Rustic C Northeast Texas Pump Services Mount Pleasant Animal Clinic H&R Distributors

LeveL!

Partners continuing to take Everything Texas to the next

January –February 2014

5 www.mtpleasanttx.com

IT-oLogy All NEEDZ Plumbing Arby’s Texas Country Farm Supply Mount Pleasant Animal Clinic Secure Computer Networks Noodle Grill

Designs by Lisa Blalock Bar-B-Que Homeboy Sportswear Mills Flower Shop Edward Jones-David Patterson R/C Rentals & Sales, LLC Kathryn C. Dunn, DVM

The Ark Ministries Rustic C Northeast Texas Pump Services Mount Pleasant Animal Clinic H&R Distributors

2014

Executive Board

Shannon Norfleet, Chairman

Titus Regional Medical Center

Richard Witherspoon, Chair-Elect

Herschel’s Restaurant

David Hooper, Vice-Chair

Echo Publishing

Brian Niblett, Treasurer

American National Bank

Martin Bell, Past-Chairman

Guaranty Bond Bank

Faustine Curry, CEO

Mount Pleasant/Titus County

Chamber of Commerce

Directors:

Beverly Austin,

Northeast Texas Small Business Administration

Rob Hedges,

Republic Services

Diana Kennedy,

Century 21 Landmark

Matt Klump,

Expert Computing

Brad Lowry,

Pilgrim Bank

Dennis Newman,

Newman’s Electronics

Tommy Shumate,

Sisk Motors

Mitchell Walker,

Dekoron Wire & Cable

Jey Yancey,

Offenhauser Insurance

“

Want to turn window shop-

pers into paying customers? One

of the keys is to create an eye-

catching window display that entic-

es them to come inside.

Kasseigh’s on the Mount

Pleasant Downtown Square is one

of the local shops doing it right.

Owner Linda Norris says she and

co-owner and daughter Krisan

Norris-Sears change the window

displays frequently to keep the

products and the theme fresh.

“We change the large window every two months and with the seasons and the

smaller one once a month,” she said. “You have to keep everything fresh. If not, people

think, ‘It’s the same old thing. Are they going out of business?’ It’s really important to

display new products.”

One of their most eye-catching displays was their Christmas 2013 window dis-

play that featured three large snowmen in a whimsical winter wonderland.

“Krisan put new lighting in the window, so everybody in town that had never

noticed the window before noticed those windows,” Norris said. “That was the most

successful one we’ve done. Krisan is very good at that and that’s really nice.”

Seasonal themes draw a lot of attention and pull people in, but don’t overlook

the main objective: displaying your wares.

“Putting product in there helps people know what’s in the store. Some people

don’t know we have a bridal and baby registry or a kitchen area unless they go all the

way through the store, so we try to do some unique things with those items,” Norris

said.

The creativity can’t stop at the storefront windows, though. It has to flow throughout the store with themes that showcase the different types of

products.

Norris says flow and convenience keep the customer moving through the store.

“You should group types of products together. Display home décor how you

would decorate at home. If you throw it all over the store they can’t see it visually in

their home,” she said. “Give them visual styles grouped with things that go well togeth-

er.”

Creating the displays does not have to be expensive either.

CREATIVE DISPLAYS DRAW CUSTOMERS OFF THE SIDEWALK

It’s the same old thing...

Are they going out of business?

It’s really important to

display new products.

“

6

“Krisan goes dumpster diving for old wood, old

shutters and windows from houses and makes interesting

displays with those,” she said.

Norris, whose gift boutique has been in business

for 21 years, says the biggest mistake is clutter. She said

uniqueness and simplicity are the most important aspects

of creating successful displays.

“Something that’s not real busy will catch a

shopper’s eye. If it’s too busy, it’s like a billboard. You

can’t see everything in it,” she said. “Keep it simple and

keep up with the times and let people see what you have.”

Of course, Norris said the most important thing in

business is to make the customer feel welcome when you

get them in the door.

“

Keep it simple and keep up

with the times and let people see

what you have.

1 Tell a visual story with your products.

2 Keep the focal point at eye level.

3 Create a single focal point.

4 Make a quick impression.

Merchants have, on average, only 2.5 seconds to grab a shopper’s attention. So it’s important that any display is attractive and well-lit.

5 Change window displays regularly.

Moving merchandise to a different place on the showroom floor often results in repeat custom-ers taking a second look at existing inventory.

6 If you don’t use a window display, turn large storefront windows into billboards.

Use attention-grabbing vinyl window films. Busi-nesses with large-paned windows can create eye-catching murals easily seen by those driving by.

Tips to Create Eye-Catching

Product Displays

“

7 www.mtpleasanttx.com

Social media monitoring crucial for today’s customer service

Think of your social media business

pages as your reception desk. Are you ignor-

ing the phone ringing and letting it go to

voicemail? You wouldn’t ignore a customer

that walked through your front door. Why

would you ignore the customer prompting Fa-

cebook, Twitter or Instagram notifications?

That box in the right-hand column of your Fa-

cebook page “Recent Post by others” or a pri-

vate message in your inbox could have a criti-

cal message that you need to address.

Even when it’s not a direct post on

your timeline, Leslie McLellan writes in a July

2013 article on TourismCurrents.com that or-

ganizations and businesses “must monitor

their social media channels and respond when

spoken to.”

“It seems pretty obvious, but it does

not happen as often as you’d expect,” she

said.

Jodi Weber, director of marketing and

public relations at Northeast Texas Community College, understands the art of listening and responding on social me-

dia.

“It’s not uncommon for me to answer questions [on social media] at 11 or 12 o’clock at night,” said Weber, who

has NTCC’s page notifications set to alert her on her phone.

“If you’re going to do social media, you need to commit to doing it well or stay out of it completely,” Weber said.

“If you put the page out there and neglect it and do nothing with it, it harms your reputation.”

While small businesses and one-person offic-

es aren’t expected to be on social media 24-7 and

still get their jobs done, it is a critical component

to customer service in 2014. Just like checking

phone messages and emails, checking your so-

cial media messages have become a must-do on

your task list throughout the day. Turning on noti-

fications helps, but there are also tools, like

TweetDeck on your desktop or laptop and the Hoot-

Suite phone app that let you manage mul-

tiple social media accounts in one

place.

Weber said she still manages

the college’s social media pages man-

ually and leaves them on her computer

in the background, checking them peri-

odically throughout the day.

8

“I never let more than a day go by without checking social media,” she said.

She said she recently received a private message on Facebook from a student who needed help with a financial

aid question and didn’t know where to get an answer.

“I immediately got back with her and checked with the folks in that department and we got it worked out,” Weber

said. “Within 30 minutes the student was totally happy.”

While Weber is not a frontline employee, she says “it’s really about meeting your customers where they are.

Once I see it, I have to take responsibility for it.”

Weber says some people don’t ever make a phone call and only ask questions on Facebook. “Even when I don’t

know the answer, I tell them ‘I’m going to have to look into it and get back with you.’ I always answer them and that im-

mediately makes them happy.” And, it isn’t just messages or posts to your page that you should pay attention to. Monitor-

ing and responding to certain hashtags or tweets that mention your Twitter handle is also part of today’s social media

world.

McLennan, from Tourism Currents says, “Not many of us can afford a staff for listening and responding on social

media, but that’s not a deterrent to providing good customer service. Between your smart phone, your computer and free

monitoring tools, you can rock your online world.”

“Between your smart phone, your computer and free monitoring tools, you can rock your online world.”

9

Take a trip...

Visitors to Lake Bob Sandlin State Park will seemingly jump through a time portal in late March during Fort Sherman Days. They’ll be transported to

pre-settlement days when Caddo and Choctaw Indian tribes dotted the Northeast Texas landscape. They’ll also witness the Republic of Texas era

when Fort Sherman, the first community in what is now Titus County, was an

active frontier military outpost.

10

back in time. Photo courtesy: Hudson Old

11

12

Established in December of 1938, the fort is believed to be located within the boundaries of the state park,

where the second annual event set for March 28-29, will be held.

John Shaffer, a member of the Titus County Historical Commission and the Titus County Historical Preservation

Society (TCHPS), has worked closely with the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department to verify the fort’s boundaries, a

project that is still in progress.

“Rich Mahoney, the original archeologist with Texas

Parks and Wildlife is convinced now that the site is inside the con-

fines of the park, but we don’t know exactly where” Shaffer said.

“The last time we talked with him he was trying to put us high on

the list to use ground penetrating radar to survey what we think

are the most likely areas where the fort might have been located

and find the foundations of the fort.”

Fort Sherman was active from 1838 to 1841 providing

protection for the early settlers living along the Cherokee Trace.

After its initial construction approximately eight or nine families,

including the Bell, Blundell, Harris, Coots, Dial, Dragoo and Gib-

son families, lived at Fort Sherman, according to the Texas State

Historical Association. After it was abandoned, the fort continued

to serve the community as a voting place for the 1842 and 1844

Republic of Texas elections and, after annexation, the U.S. Con-

gressional elections of 1846.

The inaugural Fort Sherman Days celebration was a one-

day event held in June 2013 that drew about 500 people. Hosted

by the TPWD and the TCHPS, the event was moved to March this

year to provide a cooler climate and to coincide with Texas Histo-

ry Month. The added weekday on Friday, March 28 was included

to provide a field trip opportunity for student groups studying Tex-

as history.

“The homeschoolers association is very interested and we’ve sent information out through Region 8 [Education

Service Center] to all of the social studies teachers in the area and we hope to have a number of school groups come

through,” Shaffer said.

The student day will include a reenactment of a Buffalo Soldiers detachment and educational workshops. Both

days’ activities will also include Caddo and Choctaw Indian demonstrations, campfire cooking, demonstrations on flint

knapping, which is the art of making arrowheads, vintage children’s games and a cannon firing demonstration.

“My favorite thing about this event is the firing of the six pound cannon. Most kids have never seen a cannon

firing. It’s most impressive. It’s a loud boom and everybody gets a kick out of that,” Shaffer said.

The Texas history buff encourages people to attend the event to dig into the area’s long and rich history.

“We’d like to show everyone in Titus County that this area was part of the Republic of Texas and was one of the

earliest settlements in Northeast Texas. “Come out, walk around and enjoy the sights and learn a little bit about the his-

tory of Titus County.”

Fort Sherman Days

13

Fort Sherman Days “My favorite thing

about this event is the

firing of the six pound

cannon. Most kids have

never seen a cannon fir-

ing. It’s most impres-

sive. It’s a loud boom

and everybody gets a

kick out of that,”

-John Shaffer

14

15

Did You Think Facebook Hashtags Did

Not Matter? Think Again.

By Erin Ryan, business2community.com contributor

Many businesses may not see the value in Facebook hashtags, even though there was an outcry for them

from general Facebook users. Some think that hashtags aren’t useful or may even hurt their posts on their Facebook

Pages.

The truth is, there is

a right and wrong way to create

hashtags and depending on how

you use them they can either be

helpful or hurtful. The wrong way

to use a Facebook hashtag is by

making up a word. This will defi-

nitely be useless to you and pro-

vide no value.

Using hashtags that are of

popular subjects and topics is the

right way to gain attention to your

post as well as, have it seen by

the appropriate audience. A

hashtag can be useful as it creates

an almost automatic RSS-like fea-

ture on Facebook and allows oth-

ers (even those outside your page)

to follow a specific topic that was

created into a Facebook hashtag.

As you can see this screenshot was taken not from a Facebook page, but instead, my Facebook newsfeed. If

you look right above the post, you will see #marketing and the amount of articles that have been associated with that

particular Facebook hashtag.

As seen #marketing was used within the text of the post and now displays as a resource to other like-minded

people wanting to know more about the topic.

Remember that adding repeated hashtags to every post is not necessarily going to have you obtain more so-

cial actions nor is it a guarantee that your post will become popular.

With that said, you will gain exposure. Never under value exposure, since not only in this instance will using a

Facebook hashtag help you gain

exposure on Facebook, but it too

is displaying your brand amongst

the appropriate targeted people.

Social Media & The Chamber

16 www.mtpleasanttx.com

Top Tax Issues for 2014 Filers

BY Alan Carter

Alan Carter is a Certified Public Accountant and Professor of Accounting at Northeast Texas Community College in Mount Pleasant, TX.

Obamacare

Most tax preparers are in a very difficult position in trying to advise and help their business clients plan for the future

or comply with the law. The good news is that only the businesses with over 50 full-time employees will be directly

affected by this law in 2015. However that does not mean that their employees will not be affected now. Any individ-

ual that is not covered by a health care insurance plan will be required to pay for insurance or be penalized with a

tax. That penalty starts low for 2014, but will increase each year to a much higher tax or penalty. Some lower in-

come individuals will be able to receive tax rebates or credits to cover their penalty.

Net Investment Tax

For higher income individuals - $200,000 for single taxpayers and $250,000 for married taxpayers - the new "Net

Investment Tax" and the additional Medicare Tax rates may impact a few taxpayers. Business owners and individu-

als should discuss these two new tax issues with their tax preparer for a better understanding of how they will im-

pact them.

Enhanced IRS Scrutiny

1 Audit Procedures for large corporation

The IRS plans to change audit procedures for large corporate taxpayers. This means that enhanced docu-

mentation will be required by the large businesses and the Information Document Request process will

result in penalties and other enforcement procedures if the process is not followed or due dates are

missed.

2 Small business owners and individuals in Real

Estate or Agribusinesses.

Beginning in 2014 every business with fixed assets

(almost all manufacturing, residential & commercial

real estate, and farming) must comply with the new

"Repair Regulations." Basically, these new regulations

impact major repairs made to existing fixed assets.

If the repairs add years of usefulness to the

business, the repairs must be capitalized

and expensed as depreciation over sev-

eral years based on the depreciation

rules in the tax codes. In the past,

businesses have simply expensed

those repairs as a current year

operating expense and reduced

their taxable income. This new

measure will not be as

friendly to the taxpayer.

Business2Business Insider

17

3 Small corporations taxed as a Sub Chapter S-Corporation

More and more small businesses are sole proprietors, partnerships or regular corporations have elected to be

"S-Corporations" for several tax advantages. The profits and losses of S-Corps have been allowed to pass

through to the stockholders and reported as income or losses to them individually. In addition, the S-Corp sta-

tus allowed the income to be exempt from the social security and Medicare taxes, unlike wages and self-

employment income. The profits of the S-Corp could be drawn out of the business without any tax effect. However, the

IRS now views the profits of the S-Corp not only being taxed for federal income taxes, but also as being subject to the

social security and Medicare tax if withdrawn from the business. Therefore, to avoid the IRS audit of S-Corp, we are in-

structing stockholders to pay and report wages from the business that are subject to all payroll taxes as any other em-

ployee or business owner. We are seeing this scrutiny now and expect it to increase in years to come. I estimate that

this will impact approximately one third of the small corporations in our community.

18

After boasting nearly $20,000 in sales revenue last year, the Mount Pleasant/Titus County Chamber of Commerce and its member restaurants are once again poised to celebrate the Eat Local Challenge in April.

The program began in 2012 as a way to help people from stay in Mount Pleasant to get their meals and was met with great response from the public.

“What a great time to support our local businesses and a chance to skip the cooking!,” marketing commit-tee chairman Tracie Smith said. “It’s good to focus on what we have here, we don’t have to drive an hour for a good meal.”

During the challenge, customers who save their receipts while dining at local chamber-member restaurants during the month have a chance to turn them in at the Chamber of Commerce to be entered in a drawing for a won-derful prize.

Last year, the Eat Local challenge winner, received a 40” Sony flat-screen television. While this year’s prize has not been selected, it is sure to be just as great!

According to Faustine Curry, Chamber CEO, the Eat Local Challenge is a win-win situation for everyone in Mount Pleasant. “Through this program, we are able to keep dollars here at home in Mount Pleasant and people here will be rewarded for their loyalty to our local businesses,” she said. “It’s just a great situation for everyone in-volved.”

April is EAT LOCAL month!

19

CHAMBER CALENDAR

05 Chamber Marketing Meeting | 8AM

Chamber, 1604 North Jefferson. Mount

Pleasant, TX www.mtpleasanttx.com,

903.572.8567

06 Ambassador Lunch | 12PM

Thai Lanna, 208 Lakewood Dr, Mount

Pleasant, TX, 903.577.1500

06 TRC VICTORY CELEBRATION | 5:30PM

The 80 Acres, 495 County Rd 3150.

Cookville, TX, www.the80acres.webs.com

10 Ribbon Cutting - Secure Networks | 10AM

Chamber, 1604 North Jefferson. Mount

Pleasant, TX, www.mtpleasanttx.com,

903.572.8567

13 Chamber Executive Board Meeting | 1:15PM

Chamber, 1604 North Jefferson, Mount

Pleasant, TX, www.mtpleasanttx.com,

903.572.8567

19 Chamber Board of Directors | 8AM

Chamber, 1604 North Jefferson, Mount

Pleasant, TX, www.mtpleasanttx.com,

903.572.8567

22 Sweet Charity | 7:30PM

NTCC Whatley Center, 2886 Farm to

Market 1735, Mount Pleasant, TX,

www.ntcc.edu/whatley/index.html,

903.434.8182

26 Chamber 101 | 8AM

Chamber, 1604 North Jefferson, Mount

Pleasant, TX, www.mtpleasanttx.com,

903.572.8567

27 Business After Hours | 5:30

Two Senoritas, 2601 W Ferguson Rd, Mount

Pleasant, TX, 903.572.5057 28-29 Fort Sherman Days | Fri. 9AM-3PM | Sat.

10AM-2PM Lake Bob Sandlin State Park,

Located on Highway 21 just North of Lake

Bob Sandlin, 903.572.5531

01Tourism Meeting | 8AM

Chamber, 1604 North Jefferson, Mount

Pleasant, TX, www.mtpleasanttx.com,

903.572.8567

02 Ambassador Lunch | 12PM

03 Ribbon Cutting - Family Care Center | 4:30PM

1610 South Jefferson, Mount Pleasant, TX,

www.titusregional.com, 903.577.6000

10 Chamber Executive Board Meeting | 1:15PM

Chamber, 1604 North Jefferson Mount

Pleasant, TX, mtpleasanttx.com,

903.572.8567

11-13 Robert Arellano “Dawg” Fest

Motorcycle Rally | Camp Langston

50 County Road 3227 Mount Pleasant, TX,

dawgfest.rally@gmail.com

16 Chamber Board of Directors Meeting | 8AM

Chamber, 1604 North Jefferson, Mount

Pleasant, TX, www.mtpleasanttx.com,

903.572.8567

24 Quarterly Business Breakfast | 7AM

Country Club of Mount Pleasant, 1000

Country Club Drive, Mount Pleasant, TX,

903.572.1804

MARCH

APRIL

20

Mount Pleasant/ Titus County Chamber of Commerce

1604 North Jefferson Avenue Mount Pleasant, TX 75455

www.mtpleasanttx.com

info@mtpleasanttx.com

(p) 903.572.8567 (f) 903.572.0613