Business/Economy

Imagine summing up what is most relevant and distinct about Los Alamos in one sentence.

How would it read?

That is the challenge that North Star Destination Strategies is taking up for the county. Community Brand Supervisor Adam Winstead and Director of Strategic Planning Ed Barlow spent three days in Los Alamos last week, launching a four to five month process of developing that brand, which will be the end result of a $50,000 contract with the county.

“Every community is different across the nation, and so we aim to really uncover what is most relevant and distinct, and what Los Alamos County’s patent advantage is,” Winstead said. “Obviously you have a broad variety of assets and strengths, so we have to keep all that in mind as we develop a strategy.”

The pair met with representatives of the county, members of the community involved with tourism, economic development and the Creative District. They toured the county, ate in the restaurants and talked to the managers and owners of the businesses they visited.

A brainstorming session for business owners Tuesday attracted a fairly large crowd.

Many of the questions were standard: What comes to mind when you think of Los Alamos County? What assets does the community have? What are the challenges it faces?

Zia Realty Group Broker/Owner James Chrobocinski shrugs off the suggestion that he is a “mogul in the making.”

“I wouldn’t go that far,” he said.

But Chrobocinski’s expansion into the Los Alamos real estate market has been meteoric and his plans are undoubtedly ambitious.

Chrobocinski’s Los Alamos roots run deep. His grandfather, James Bramble, moved to Los Alamos to work on the Manhattan project.

LAPD Cmdr. Randy Chrobocinski Foster is his brother and his other brother Joe Foster, and his sister Jennifer Foster King, also live here.

Chrobocinski moved to Corpus Christi with his father just after junior high.

“I have been trying to get back here ever since,” Chrobocinski said. It took him 26 years to reach that goal. He and his wife Jacqueline, decided to move here with his son JJ in June 2011 in order to take care of his grandfather.

Chrobocinski’s career path echoes his mother’s, Jeannie Bramble Foster, who worked as a registered nurse in Los Alamos for a number of years before becoming a real estate agent for the Pat Rogers Agency.

Sheryl Sandberg is not backing down.

The Facebook chief operating officer's book "Lean In: Women, Work, and the Will to Lead" goes on sale Monday amid criticism that she's too successful and rich to lead a movement. But Sandberg says her focus remains on spurring action and progress among women.

"The conversation, the debate is all good, because where we were before was stagnation — and stagnation is bad," she said in an interview with The Associated Press. "And sometimes it takes real heated debate to wake people up and find a solution."

With "Lean In," Sandberg aims to arm women with the tools and guidance they need to keep moving forward in the workforce. The book's release is coupled with the launch of Sandberg's LeanIn.org, a nonprofit that will receive all of the book's proceeds.

The book isn't just for women. It calls on men to lend support, both at home and in the office.

Cruising around downtown, locals may notice some businesses are missing from their once familiar locations.

That’s because several longtime operations have recently moved, or are preparing to move, into spaces that are better suited to their current objectives.

Much of the activity is centered on Central Park Square, where changing storefronts and newly renovated spaces are a common site around the complex.

Each business has its own reasons for relocating, but there is one common factor among them all — to provide a better experience for customers.

RE/MAX of Los Alamos and Stewart Title Company
RE/MAX of Los Alamos outgrew its previous space long ago. Owner Kendra Henning says she’s been looking for a more suitable space since she bought the company nearly six years ago. There were too many agents crammed in space that wasn’t even large enough to hold their bi-weekly staff meetings.

Henning found the perfect place at 116 Central Park Square, in the space formerly occupied by Los Alamos Visiting Nurses, where she and Paula Glover, President of Stewart Title Company, decided to combine resources to renovate and occupy the space. Glover had the opposite problem; she had downsized in the past few years and was looking for something a bit smaller.