MISSOULA – With the school year around the corner, a Montana start-up is working to get their invention in classrooms across Montana. They say the non-lethal product is more effective than pepper spray. Ben Gladwin, the assistant chief of the University of Montana Police department and education director for Reflex Protect, says the spray is Read More…

The Imerys talc mill in Three Forks is facing a union lockout if its members don’t accept a new contract from the mill’s French owners — a contract the union members have already rejected three times. The lockout would leave 32 union members and their families without paychecks or health care for an undetermined amount Read More…

Karen Alderman Harbert, President and Chief Executive Officer of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce’s Global Energy Institute will be the speaker at the annual Petroleum Industry Appreciation Day Luncheon on August 29. The event which is sponsored by the Montana Petroleum Association will be held at the Doubletree Hotel in Billings, and is open to Read More…

The newest member of the growing group of hotels in the Flathead Valley, TownePlace Suites by Marriott, opened its doors last week in Whitefish. The property had been under construction since last fall. The 81-room hotel on U.S. 93 South is focused on a specific set of clients: those who are staying five days or Read More…

Bias Brewing officially opened and features six beers brewed in house, cold brew coffee, and food from Food For The Soul 2. The brewery’s first beer menu features a variety of types of brews from stouts to pale ales. It offers 4-ounce taster sizes all the way up to small and large growlers. Bias also Read More…

LIVINGSTON – Livingston’s Printing For Less (PFL) held a ceremonial groundbreaking event Friday for its new 55,000-square-foot digital printing and fulfillment center. The company plans to add 100 new employees once the new center is complete. Just this past year it added 80 new positions at its Livingston location. “We’re obviously optimistic about our own Read More…

Since the beginning of 2016, in a two-and-a-half year span, Kalispell, Whitefish and Columbia Falls have added six new hotels with 500-plus rooms and more than 300,000 total square feet, counting four completed hotels and two scheduled for completion this summer. Now another new hotel is coming to Kalispell with the recent application of My Read More…

Instead of the massive pot rooms that once pumped out millions of pounds of aluminum, dozens of local residents saw sprawling holes at the Columbia Falls Aluminum Co. during a public presentation and tour on May 9, a show of progress at the contaminated Environmental Protection Agency Superfund site that is in the midst of Read More…

For those of you who have never visited the former Glasgow Air Force Base in St. Marie, Montana, it is definitely an interesting site to see. It looks like something out of a movie. You will drive down a street and see abandoned home after abandoned home with brown, overgrown lawns and boarded up windows- Read More…

Vacant for most of the last decade, the old National Guard armory building in downtown Bozeman is beginning to show signs of life. Plans are moving forward to repurpose the building into an eight-story boutique hotel complete with event space and at least a pair of restaurants, said Cory Lawrence, CEO of local travel company Read More…

The railroad’s planned investment will fund various initiatives, including a $1.4 million investment in the rail line between Butte-Silver Bow and near Lima to replace 10,000 crossties along our Montana Subdivision. UP also plans a $748,600 investment in the rail line between Moose Creek and Walkerville to replace curve rail along the railroad’s Montana Subdivision. Read More…

HELENA, Montana, April 24, 2018 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — Eagle Bancorp Montana, Inc. (NASDAQ:EBMT), (the “Company,” “Eagle”), the holding company of Opportunity Bank of Montana, today reported net income was $573,000, or $0.11 per diluted share, in the first quarter of 2018, compared to $763,000, or $0.20 per diluted share, in the first quarter of 2017. Read More…

The parent company of Herberger’s announced Thursday that going-out-of-business sales at Montana stores will start Friday. That includes the store at Rimrock Mall in Billings. The retailer moved into that spot and renovated the space three years ago after spending decades in a different wing of the mall. The announcement from corporate parent Bon Ton Read More…

Kalispell Regional Healthcare is undergoing a transition in its leadership team as three top executives, the director of its digestive health institute and a contingent of its internal design team have either departed or announced plans to retire. In recent weeks, three prominent members of the Kalispell Regional staff who also serve on the hospital Read More…

In the outside, Meissenburg Designs still looks a lot like it did when it was the site of Martin’s Peat, located southeast of Bigfork. Loyd and Laura Meissenburg acquired the property in 2013, with most of the changes occurring inside to accommodate their growing design and fabrication company. The magnificent Swan Mountains rise above the Read More…

Belgrade’s much-beloved Chalet Market has been named the state’s Retailer of the Year by the Montana Department of Commerce. The store, which sells a variety of meats smoked, cured and packaged onsite, along with sandwiches, ice cream and a collection of products made in Montana, was honored at the annual Made in Montana Tradeshow late Read More…

MISSOULA, Mont. — Missoula is getting two more breweries, one in downtown and one on the hip strip, bringing the city’s total to nine breweries, but the industry brings more to the community than just providing a unique blend of beer. On the corner of East Main Street and Pattee Street once sat a service Read More…

CUT BANK – Pardue Grain, Inc.’s $5.7-million project will include a food-grade processing line for pulse crops, which in Montana include chickpeas, peas and lentils. The upgraded facility should be open 12 miles west of Cut Bank in time for harvest and will add eight jobs to the economy, the Cut Bank Pioneer Press reported. Read More…

A Montana judge says a Nebraska-based insurance company is liable for a $43 million settlement between the state and people sickened by exposure to asbestos from a Libby vermiculite mine. National Indemnity Co. paid $16 million toward the 2009 settlement but later sued to recover the money. State District Judge Holly Brown said in ruling Read More…

Montana’s high-tech businesses want to demonstrate that they can play a meaningful role in growing the state’s economy by offering higher wages than other businesses in the state, adding more jobs, and generating quick revenue growth. That’s according to a report out today from the Montana High Tech Business Alliance. The organization, with assistance from Read More…

A local environmental nonprofit organization has filed an appeal with the state Department of Natural Resources and Conservation, seeking a reversal of the agency’s decision to grant a permit to a water-bottling plant in Creston. The Flathead Lakers announced the group would appeal the DNRC’s January decision to issue a water permit to the Montana Read More…

The nation’s first manufacturer of cross-laminated timber plans to set up shop in Maine, with a goal of creating 100 jobs at a $22 million mill, officials said Friday. SmartLam, LLC of Montana still seeks a mill site, but has committed to building a factory in Maine within 18 months. Founded in 2012, the company Read More…

The Front Brewing Company, a Great Falls brewery open since 2012, is in the process of being sold and changed. Jeremiah Johnson, the purchaser of The Front Brewing Company, said he and his wife are extremely fortunate. “I’m in the process of purchasing the Front Brewing Company from Linda Caricaburu and Brad Talcott here in Read More…

A mapping startup based in Missoula, Mont., which allows users to download sophisticated offline topographic maps outlining public and private lands and a number of other features geared towards hunting, fishing and camping, has pulled in its first major outside funding. onXmaps has closed a $20.3 million Series A round led by Summit Partners. Bessemer Read More…

Were it not for the stock market crash of the early 1970’s, James Stack might still be a mechanical engineer in Colorado. Stack graduated at the top of his engineering class at Montana State University in 1974 and went on to work as a project manager at IBM. Taking the advice of economists and Wall Read More…

WHITEFISH, Mont.–(BUSINESS WIRE)–BNSF Railway Company (BNSF) today announced that its 2018 capital expenditure program in Montana will be approximately $135 million. This year’s plan in Montana remains focused on maintenance projects to ensure BNSF continues to operate a safe and reliable rail network. The largest component of this year’s capital plan in the state will Read More…

GTUIT, LLC, a Billings based company, announced that it has recovered more than one million barrels of natural gas liquids (NGLs) from oil producing wellsites that would have otherwise been combusted in a flare stack. GTUIT designed, built, and operated all the mobile associated natural gas processing units responsible for achieving the million barrel milestone. Read More…

In the early 1800s, French soldiers conquering and colonizing Algeria were given daily rations of absinthe because military leaders thought it would help their men combat malaria. When those soldiers returned home, they started demanding the drink at their local watering holes in France. Its rise to popularity was swift, but so was its fall. Read More…

GREAT FALLS – Patrick Chapman, chances are if you have shopped at Super 1 foods on 10th Ave in Great Falls you know who Patrick is. Before Super One Patrick worked with NorthWestern Energy as one of their secondary life skills program students. This program teaches young adults with special needs how to be independent, Read More…

The University of Montana Bureau of Business and Economic Research’s 43rd annual economic outlook seminar will be held in Kalispell on Feb. 6, with this year’s program exploring the relationship between higher education and the state’s economy. The keynote speaker is Robert Nystuen, president of Glacier Bank and vice chair of the Montana University System Read More…

Negotiators were in Montreal, Canada for the sixth round of talks to renegotiate the North American Free Trade Agreement this week and Montana wheat and barley farmers paid close attention to the ongoing talks. According to Michelle Erickson-Jones, president of the Montana Grain Growers Association, NAFTA has been one of the most important agreements overall Read More…

A business coalition is asking a judge to stop state officials from imposing a fee on assets of Montana’s workers’ compensation fund to plug a budget gap. The suit filed Monday in state District Court in Lake County says employers pay into the fund to make sure injured workers get medical coverage and state officials Read More…

EVERGREEN – The Green Haus medical marijuana dispensary is a bright, airy space with wooden accents and friendly faces behind the counter, a dream owner Mike Eacker has spent at least a decade making come true. Each customer who walks in is greeted by name, and each tells stories of how medical cannabis has changed Read More…

Montana’s unemployment rate remained pretty much unchanged during the final month of the holiday season. State Senior Economist Barbara Wagner explains. “Montana’s unemployment rate is at 4.1% in December, that is the most recent month we have available,” said Wagner. “It is actually exactly even with the U.S. rate this month, which is a long Read More…

This story is the final chapter of a series focusing on how Missoula and its surrounding communities are grappling with challenges of sustainable growth. (If you haven’t yet, check out the first of the series here, the second one here, and the third here.) It was written by the The Missoulian and is published here Read More…