Main Street

PolyWorks’ biggest problem last year was finding enough people to triple the size of its workforce. Business has been very good for the North Smithfield designer of foams, plastics and gels, according to co-owner and Executive Vice President Roger LaFlamme. The best news is that it is only expected to get better.# May 19

Durval Tavares isn’t exactly reinventing the wheel, but in the world of marine technology he’s coming close and hopes his modification on underwater video equipment will receive the kind of innovation-inspired excitement from buyers that he has for his product. May 12

Before they created Bananagrams, the high-speed word game now played in elementary school classrooms and pubs and from Bristol to Brazil, the Nathanson family invented other games to pass summer-vacation hours by the beach in Narragansett. May 5

In a Warwick neighborhood located near T.F. Green Airport, William J. Riley started a plumbing business, working out of the family basement and garage. Thirty-five years later his company is still thriving, a survivor of the many housing booms and busts over the three-plus decades. According to operations director and employee of 24 years, Elizabeth “Liz” Muzzy, the secret to survival is the ability to adjust with the times and the ever-changing market. Apr 28

Business leaders often wear several hats and Paul Oberg, president and CEO of EPAC Software Technologies, is no exception. Apr 21

With the pleasure-craft market as depressed as it is now, two college students parading around Manhattan in tuxedos may not be able to convince anyone they are successful luxury-yacht designers like Gregory Beers and Cory Wood did in 1993. Apr 14

Commercial printing is an industry that caters to other businesses, providing a variety of services, from bound reports to pamphlets and digital photography. And as with other industries it has been greatly impacted by computer technology. Apr 7

It all started with rabbits. When Patrick Beck, a grass-fed-beef salesman for a local farm, decided he wanted a personal stake in the local protein business, he and a few friends bought silver-fox rabbits. Beck grazed them in a field near his home and sold them to local chefs, who were “very excited to have a superior. all-natural pastured rabbit,” he said. Mar 31

Before a brand-new iPhone or Droid makes its final trip to a store or mailbox, the device and its components have already traveled the world, as did their top-secret prototypes and the custom capital equipment that made them. With such valuable and delicate technology now logging more travel miles than ever before, the stakes involved in international shipping are higher and the consequences of failure greater than they once were. Mar 24

For the past 16 years, Kerry M. Tracey, president of Spectra Temps Inc., has witnessed the workforce change and fluctuate. Her temporary-employment and permanent-placement agency is a true barometer of local business, and the market, she said, is picking up. Mar 17