It’s lit: A new Lit Pizza is having i’s grand opening today in the City Square Shopping Center, at the corner of Bluebonnet Boulevard and Highland Road. The 3,2000-square-foot restaurant, which opens at 11 a.m., is the Baton Rouge-based pizza chain’s fourth location. Door prizes will be given to the first 100 customers this morning. The neighboring Izzo’s Illegal Burrito is set to open Nov. 27.
Sales trends: Retail sales rose a seasonally adjusted 0.8% in October, following two months of slight declines, the Commerce Department reported today. Excluding gasoline sales, which were inflated by higher prices, sales climbed 0.5%. The figures suggest consumers are pulling back a bit on their spending, which could slow growth in the final three months of the year. Read the full story.
Confidence in sunshine: A strong labor market and high profit trends, along with historically low inflation, are keeping small-business owners’ confidence at near-record levels, setting the stage for a strong fourth quarter, according to the National Federation of Independent Business. The small-business lobby said small businesses haven’t experienced this level of labor-market constraints since the late 1990s, when fears that the year 2000 would wreak havoc in computers and digital networks fueled demand for computer and programming specialists. Read the full story.
