One of the most treasured commodities in the Rio Grande Valley is water, especially good-tasting, clean water. Much of the water in the Valley comes from the Rio Grande and is full of minerals and pollutants and often has an unpleasant taste. Municipalities around the Valley do a good job of cleaning up their water supplies, but the water is nevertheless mineralized – hard water. Restaurants, hospitals and families can…
Hypnosis became a treatment modality accepted by the American Medical Association in 1958. According to Certified Hypnotherapist Wayne Walker, hypnosis is used for pre- and post-surgery pain management. “If a person undergoes hypnosis prior to surgery, they go in calmer, come out with fewer complications, and heal 30 to 40 percent quicker. They are also less reliant on pain medications.” Various hospitals employ hypnotists because it improves patient outcomes. Walker…
The building that looks like a New Age cotton gin in east Harlingen may reflect the region’s agricultural past, but inside it embodies the border’s future: healthcare services. Valley Physician Services, occupying the 8,000 square foot space since 2005, lets doctors’ offices outsource the complex billing procedures that stand between their medical services and receiving payment for those services. In 1980 Anne Flory began handling the billing for her father,…
Tip Johnston, owner of CENTURY 21 Johnston Company, has been in real estate for over 30 years and is a member of the Board of Realtors in McAllen, Harlingen and Brownsville-South Padre Island. He talked with VBR’s editor about the unprecedented, unnerving real estate market including REOs, the property held by lending institutions. Q What is going on with the housing market in the Valley? A The real estate market…
The hook in the jingle —the phrase people remember— must be simple, according to Ben McCampbell, owner of Dune Tunes. He writes music and lyrics for advertising jingles and knows the elements that make a commercial immediately memorable. “The catch phrase needs to be simple: eight words is too verbose.” Merging words and music has been McCampbell’s forte for almost 30 years. A 30-second commercial should not be a list…
At 16, John Kreidler was driving an ambulance, actually a 1956 Pontiac hearse with a single cherry red light on top. That duty was a given in the family that started Kreidler Undertaking in 1912 in the backroom of McAllen’s Western Union office. In the 1960s, the teenaged Kreidler decided he was not going to become a funeral director, primarily because of the round-the-clock demands of the ambulance service, a…
Who doesn’t want more energy, agility, muscle tone and strength paired with reduced anxiety, feeling healthier, better balance, a flatter stomach and a tighter tushie? Yes, it requires exercise but nowadays getting in shape and staying in shape can be fun. No, really. Fitness centers, gyms, zumba studios, personal trainers and yoga and tai chi teachers across the Valley are staying in business by making working out fun and, in…
FibeRio Technology’s nanofiber-producing machinery is drawing international manufacturers and R&D companies to Sharyland Business Park. The attraction is FibeRio’s disruptive technology: the capability of producing nanofibers quickly, cheaply and with less material. Microscopic nanofibers (1,000 bundled nanofibers are as thick as a human hair) are capable of adding tensile strength, conductive and insulative capacity, corrosion resistance, water impermeability, bacterial barriers or thermal protection to a product, depending on what material…
The sign reads Fry’s Pharmacy and Registered Pharmacist Ben Fry is behind the counter. But Fry sold his business to pharmacist Ed Walsh in 2004 and has been an employee since. Fry’s jump from boss to employee demonstrates one man’s approach to the question, “Is there life after selling your business?” In 1972 after graduating from the University of Houston Pharmacy School, Ben Fry returned home to San Benito and…
Without the philanthropic support of area businesses, Guadalupe Regional Middle School (GRMS), a tuition-free, three-year Catholic school, would not exist. Partnered with Brownsville businesses such as Ziwa Construction, the Martinez Barrera and Martinez law firm, Luke Fruia Motors, Falcon International Bank and Esco Marine, the compact urban school raises its entire budget through year-round contributions and sponsorship of events by committed business and organizations. The long term result is better-educated,…