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Solar Energy for Your Business: 6 Tips from an Installer

Installing a solar energy system for your commercial building can be a great choice, with both financial and environmental benefits. In 2019, I spoke with Taylor Poff, a project manager with solar installer JBL Solar Energy, a Sonoma County company with extensive experience in commercial installations, who passed on some important tips for business owners

Tenant Improvements: 4 Tips to Make Them Work for Your Business

Tenant improvements (TIs) – also known as leasehold improvements or build-outs – are changes you make to a leased commercial space to make it ready for you to do business. The cost of these improvements will typically be partially or fully defrayed by your landlord through a tenant improvement allowance (TIA) you negotiate during

Retail Design Planning to Maximize Your Business’s Sales

Retail design is the art of creating a space that makes customers want to engage with and purchase your products and services. A thoughtfully designed space can help increase your sales, while a poorly designed one can lose you both current and future sales. Focusing on a few key elements during the planning stages

Design Ideas to Make Your Cannabis Dispensary Stand Out

Recently, I wrote about the essentials of cannabis dispensary design. Today, I want to dig a little deeper into how you can use design-based branding strategies to differentiate your business from the competition in this growing industry. Design for the Clients You Want In any retail business, it’s important to understand your client base and

Cannabis Dispensary Design Essentials

Since California voters passed Proposition 64 in 2016, running a state-licensed cannabis dispensary has become a legal business. Dispensaries are burgeoning in areas that permit them, including Santa Rosa and San Francisco.  The California Bureau of Cannabis Control website notes that there were 1,045 licensed cannabis distributors dotting the state as of November 4, 2021.

What’s In an Architectural Style?

If you’ve done any house-hunting in the Bay Area, you might have heard the terms Art Deco, Arts and Crafts Style, Bungalow, Modern, Contemporary, Mid-Century Modern, Cape Cod Style, Colonial and Victorian – to name a few of the architectural styles. The problem is, some of these terms are used interchangeably, when they are distinct.