South Louisiana doesn’t usually get much recognition for being home to IT and biotech talent, but there are impressive start-up businesses you may never have heard of that are turning heads around the country. And beyond. Casey Roussel is Executive Vice President of Cloud Gavel, a company that is revolutionizing the way law enforcement officers…

Ann Connelly is a legend in the art world. Ann is founder and owner of Ann Connelly Fine Art where she is a curator, interior designer, and consultant to homeowners and businesses. Over the past 25 years, Ann has grown her business into a gallery that today carries the works of more than 40 creatives,…

Every place has a history and a past, but preserving the best of it and keeping it relevant doesn’t just happen, you have to work at it, through education, and preservation. Which is exactly what Stephanie’s guests on Out to Lunch do every single day. Michael Desmond is an architect and scholar in the LSU…

Andi Holliday is a professional home stager with a local firm called Stage Presence. Andi’s been dubbed the “House Doctor,” writing out design prescriptions that can sell the unsellable. Her firm offers a range of services, from full staging to less expensive walk-through and written consultations, as well as “redesign” services – that’s where Andi…

As the tech industry evolves and matures, all sorts of new opportunities are created for entrepreneurs, who see where existing technologies don’t meet a need or don’t go far enough to deliver what customers demand. But taking a good idea and developing it into the latest app – one that works – and then getting…

We talk a lot about business on this show, and what it takes to be successful in business. On this edition of Out to Lunch Stephanie focuses on an aspect of business that doesn’t typically get so much attention: ethics. Aaron Beam is a former executive who travels around the country lecturing on ethics in…

Technology plays an increasingly important role in all aspects of our lives today. The more entrenched it is in government systems, in our offices and in our home appliances the more vulnerable we are to cyber attacks. On this edition of Out to Lunch, Stephanie Riegel introduces two local experts on the subject of cyber…

There’s a lot of cool stuff going on in Baton Rouge. From the redevelopment of neighborhoods downtown and in Mid City to the young entrepreneurial culture that is fostering startup companies willing to take risk and take advantage of new technologies. Gerald Drefahl’s company, Kinesics, is a homegrown, biotech start up that licenses a software…

Though Baton Rouge, in many ways, is slow to change, in recent years there has been a gradual shift in the balance of power. New, young firms and new, young business leaders are taking over from the Baby Boomer generation that preceded them. One such leader is Julie Laperouse. Julie is Director of Training at…

Few industries in our economy today are changing as rapidly and dramatically as health care. In Baton Rouge we are far from immune to these national changes.  Teri Fontenot is President and CEO of Woman’s Hospital, the only independent, community-owned women’s and children’s hospital in the country and the largest birthing and neonatal intensive care…