Business Briefs for Oct. 14, 2012

Style America opens three salons in BR

Style America is opening three salons in Baton Rouge.

They are at 9618 Jefferson Highway in Bluebonnet Crossing; 8717 Siegen Lane in Siegen Perkins Plaza; and 1655 Millerville Road in Stirling Millerville. Services include cuts, styles, color, perms, highlights and waxing. The salons also carry a variety of hair-care products.

All locations are open 10 a.m.-6 p.m. Monday-Sunday. The salons have a no-appointment-needed policy.

Style America is owned and operated by Regis Corp., with more than 100 locations across the United States. Regis’ corporate and franchised locations operate under concepts such as Supercuts, Sassoon Salon, Regis Salons, MasterCuts, SmartStyle, Cost Cutters, Cool Cuts 4 Kids and Hair Club for Men and Women, with 10,000 worldwide locations.

LSU Flores MBA alumni meeting set

The LSU Flores MBA Alumni Association will hold its annual meeting at 5:30 p.m. Oct. 24 at the L’Auberge Baton Rouge Casino Hotel.

New directors and officers will be elected. The association also will discuss the 2013 edition of Louisiana Looking Up and the financials for the upcoming year, in addition to other topics.

For more information, contact Wendy Luedtke at [e-mail] or [phone].

LSU AgCenter works on football fields

The LSU AgCenter is working with high schools to improve their football fields as a way to reduce injuries.

The AgCenter’s Field of Excellence teaches coaches how to grow athletic turf. The program advises schools on when to water and fertilize, what chemicals to use and how often the field should be mowed.

Ron Strahan, LSU AgCenter turfgrass specialist, started the program after noticing that many fields across the state were in bad shape. Strahan helped with five fields last year.

Nonprofits receive foundation grants

A nonprofit from Baton Rouge and two in New Orleans are among more than 50 groups awarded grants from the Entergy Charitable Foundation in the second of three planned award cycles for 2012. The foundation said the local recipients are:

• New Schools for Baton Rouge, a $460,000 grant. It is an incubator of up to 25 new charter schools and works within north Baton Rouge’s newly created Achievement Zone.
• Posse New Orleans, a $50,000 grant. It identifies public high school students with extraordinary academic and leadership potential who may be overlooked by traditional college selection processes.
• The Second Harvest Food Bank of New Orleans, a $125,000 grant to support children’s feeding programs.

Appetite, obesity conference set

Top scientists in the field of appetite and obesity research will gather Wednesday to Saturday at Pennington Biomedical Research Center for the second International Conference on Hyperphagia and the 26th Annual Prader-Willi Syndrome Association.

Hyperphagia, an extreme unsatisfied drive to consume food, is a serious symptom shared by several rare genetic disorders. The most frequent is Prader Willi syndrome. Hyperphagia leading to obesity, diabetes and other serious medical disorders is also observed in some acquired disorders.

La. notaries plan annual convention

The Louisiana Notary Association will hold its annual convention Oct. 27-28 at the Embassy Suites Hotel at 4914 Constitution Ave. in Baton Rouge.

The theme is “Seal of Excellence — Competence is Key.”

For information, contact the LNA office at [phone]; email [e-mail]; or go to http://www.lna.org.

ASEAN trade event scheduled in Orleans

NEW ORLEANS — Ambassadors from the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, known as ASEAN, will be in New Orleans Oct. 25-26 for an event promoting trade and investment opportunities in the ASEAN and Gulf Coast regions.

The nations represented include Brunei, Malaysia, Myanmar, Singapore, the Philippines and Thailand.

The event is being sponsored by the World Trade Center, Chevron and Louisiana.

Louisiana exports to the ASEAN nations have grown from just $771.5 million to more than $3.1 billion since 2005 — with a 150 percent increase in agricultural exports and a 600 percent increase in the value of petroleum and coal exports. The ambassadors will participate in a number of site visits and receptions with local business and government leaders. They will also conduct presentations and host individual meetings that will provide insight into doing business with Southeast Asia.

W French Quarter completes project

NEW ORLEANS — The W French Quarter hotel at 316 Chartres St. in New Orleans has completed a $9 million renovation and redesign of the 97-room property.

The renovation included the opening of SoBou, one of Esquire magazine’s top 10 new restaurants in the country.

James Wroblewski is general manager.

The phone number is [phone] and website is http://www.wfrenchquarter.com.

LANtec awarded training contract

LAFAYETTE — LANtec of Louisiana has been awarded a $1 million nationwide training contract with the U.S. Department of Justice in Washington, D.C.

The project focuses on training Department of Justice attorneys, paralegals and support staff on the migration from Corel WordPerfect to Microsoft Word 2010. When complete, LANtec will have trained more than 11,000 DOJ employees over 800 training days in all 50 states, Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands and Guam.

LANtec of Louisiana is owned by CEO Rickie Comeaux. With locations in Baton Rouge, Lafayette, Lake Charles and Alexandria, LANtec offers instruction to business professionals for software, hardware, networking, programming and Internet technologies. Its website is at http://www.lantecctc.com.

Trahan Tennis Centre opening in Crowley

CROWLEY — The Glady Trahan Tennis Centre in Crowley will open Saturday during the 76th International Rice Festival.

The six-court complex was financed by private funding and a grant from the U.S. Tennis Association to become the hub of tennis activity in the area, which has had no more than two courts in any location.