Overheard

Springfield’s economic development and some of the city’s top businesspeople were featured in a “special section” this month for the business journals in St. Louis and Kansas City, both owned by American City Business Journals.

Six local entities headed up by Springfield Business & Development Corp. paid $18,000 for the 16-page insert that profiled the household names of Hammons, Morris, O’Reilly and Stack; a higher education population exceeding 40,000; $1 billion worth of health-care expansions; growing interest in Jordan Valley Innovation Center; unmatched job creation; a booming bank market; and SBDC’s business recruitment efforts.

“We thought this was a great opportunity to extend our message,” said Greg Williams, SBDC senior vice president of economic development, adding that it was a follow-up to a central Missouri awareness campaign a year ago.

Not by chance, Williams said a St. Louis developer with national clients visited Springfield on April 19. He said the piece is particularly important in St. Louis, where eight out of 10 people think of Springfield, Ill., when they hear the city name.

“We are three times the market size of that other Springfield,” he said.

The paid insert was estimated to reach more than 100,000 businesspersons and professionals in those cities; they were mailed with the April 7 St. Louis Business Journal and the April 14 Kansas City Business Journal.

Commerce M&A

Commerce Bancshares is growing its holdings through mergers and acquisitions. The Kansas City-based bank with more than $1 billion in deposits among 25 branches locally reached agreements with two financial institutions in April.

The larger, an $80.9 million stock-and-cash merger with West Pointe Bancorp, would add $477 million in assets and $402 million in deposits. Eight days before the West Pointe Bancorp deal, Commerce officials struck a deal for Boone National Savings and Loan Association’s four Columbia branches and loan production offices in Ashland and Lake of the Ozarks. Boone National S&L had $15.4 million in equity as of Dec. 31, and Commerce will pay an additional $16.25 million premium for the business.

Boone National is the sole savings and loan subsidiary of The Jones Financial Cos. LLLP, whose primary operating subsidiary is Edward D. Jones & Co. LP. Both deals are pending regulatory approvals.

¿Hablo a Real Estate?

To serve non-English speaking homebuyers, the Missouri Association of Realtors has signed with Immobel.com for an undisclosed amount to provide translations in 12 languages for Web-based home listings. Missouri Association of Realtors members will have free access to the service, allowing them to list homes on their own Web sites in all the languages. R. Dennis McClelland, executive vice president and CEO of the Missouri Association of Realtors, said his group is the first statewide association to adopt the service, citing an initiative for “cultural diversity.”

Harvard University’s Joint Center for Housing Studies has determined that 31 percent of American households that will be established between 2000 and 2010 will be Hispanic and 13 percent will be Asian.[[In-content Ad]]