2200 miles... down!

Amy! I’m in St. Louis! Meet me?

Wow — what a roadtrip. It’s been amazing to talk to people across the country about what this economic crisis has meant to them.

I left Lincoln, Nebraska, Tuesday afternoon and drove through what can only be described as postcard Midwest. Corn fields — and blue sky — everywhere.

Eventually I landed in the town of Blue Springs, just south of Independence, Missouri. This morning I got up and went to econ class (was not tardy!) at Blue Springs High School. Sat through Mr. (Ron) Settle’s class of juniors and seniors who are studying the current financial crisis and are remarkably up-to-date on what’s going on. One of them even referenced yesterday’s news about the AIG executives who took a bunch of their bailout money and went on an extravagant spa retreat.

Mr. Settle broke them up into teams at the beginning of the year to do some stock-picking-and-researching exercises… apparently there’s a district contest… and one of the teams has actually made money in this market. They bought some GE stock in the last few weeks… as well as Potash shares. Warren Buffett, meet your match! We’ll have much more from Mr. Settle’s class on this weekend’s Marketplace Money show.

This afternoon I drove to Jefferson City to meet up with Rich McCarty and the clients at his barbershop. (I think you visited a barbershop yourself earlier in our travels?) Couple of them are members of an investment club. All in their 60’s and 70’s and you know what? They’re not terribly concerned about this market mayhem. Seen it all before, they said. We may have collectively lost two trillion dollars from our nest eggs… but at least one of them… 74 years old… is still holding about 99 percent of his portfolio in stocks. It’ll come back, he said. Wow.

FYI that’s CNBC on the telly in the background.

I’ll be interested to talk to you about the different perspectives we’ve found during our trips. I heard your report on Marketplace today where you talked to two people who’d just lost their jobs. That’s what we’re told will happen more and more as this recession reaches deeper and deeper. But I found that, for the most part, as unscientific as our sampling is, the common theme running through it all from San Francisco to St. Louis was that people have absolute faith that the country will get through this historic moment just like it’s gotten through other tough times. There is no sense of panic. There is no sense of impending doom. There is much blame heaped those of us in the media for “hyping” the troubles. And there is much excitement over the drop in gas prices. Look what I paid in Blue Springs today.

Hope your travels were safe today.

Meet me in St. Louis? I’m here!

• Oct 8, 2008 7:53 PM PT — Tess Vigeland
• 1 Comments

Oh yeah... it's winter

Sometimes we Californians forget that there is a winter out there… and it’s a-comin’. No sign for the first four hours of my commute from Denver to Lincoln, Nebraska, today:

Not so much for the last four hours of the commute:

Heard the market tanked again today. Bailout schmailout, eh? Well I have to say in the (very) brief conversations I had at rest stops along I-80, folks are more into the drop in gas prices than the drop in their 401ks.

Arrived in Lincoln just in time for dinner with the wonderful Landis-McKibbin family. We talked about the economy while dining on chicken and veggies (first homecooked meal of the trip!). Oh… and let me tempt your tastebuds with dessert:

They’re confused, angry, and very wise about how Wall Street got itself — and the rest of us — into this mess. More on Wednesday’s Marketplace. That’s all for tonight… more tomorrow… must… sleep… now…

Meet me in St. Louis?

• Oct 6, 2008 8:18 PM PT — Tess Vigeland
• 1 Comments

The roadtrips back in time

Looks like we both tripped into the past over the weekend, Amy.

250 years for you… only 149 for me.

It’s the great Pumpkin Harvest Festival of Glendale, Colorado. Community festivals across the country are bracing for a drop in donations and other financial support because of the economy. The 80-year-old Englewood Days festival nearby was canceled for this past weekend. And the city’s big December Parade of Lights is asking the public for help for the first time ever.

The irony, of course, is that more and more people are looking for ways to be entertained close to home… and at the bargain price of free. This festival takes place at Four Mile Historic Park, where you’ll also find the oldest home in Colorado from 1859. Tune in to Monday’s Marketplace Morning Report for the story! Meanwhile… check out my new friends Amelia and Ian… unfortunately their scarecrow-in-progress isn’t scaring off the economic downturn.

Driving to Lincoln, Nebraska, Monday morning. So let’s see that means… 1350 miles down… only 850 to go!

Meet me in St. Louis?

• Oct 5, 2008 7:52 PM PT — Tess Vigeland
• 1 Comments

Uh oh -- did I lose the bet?

I have to come clean ‘cause everybody’s gonna hear it this afternoon.

I said it.

Main Street.

But I have a super-good reason… Lamb’s Grill is on Main Street.

So… what else could I do?

Nice photo of your setup, by the way… you have a photographer with you or something?

Meet me in St. Louis?

• Oct 3, 2008 12:51 PM PT — Tess Vigeland
• 0 Comments

Glamorous? You wanted glamorous?

Oh Amy your photo just makes me sad… no Mustang should ever be put down in such a manner. But so much for the glamour of a road trip. You wanna know what the rental agency gave me for my trip from SF to Reno over the Sierras at 7,000 ft? A Dodge with manual rolldown windows and a trunk that I could only pop by turning off the car, removing the key, and walking back to the trunk. I didn’t think they made those anymore.

Oh well. Today I’m at one of the local public radio stations here in Salt Lake City, KUER, to file stories for Marketplace Money and this afternoon’s Marketplace show. Guess who’s here with me? Your former NY bureau mate (and current senior biz correspondent in LA) Bob Moon! He happened to be in town on family biz and generously offered to come in to the studio and do a chat about this bailout package that’s finally passed, as well as all the other financial news of the week. He says “hi.”

It sounds like you and I are finding similar themes along our routes. Seems like the anger is turning in to resignation about the bailout… good thing, I suppose, given that it’ll be law as soon as the President signs it.

Only 1,300 miles to go… I’m off to Denver in a couple of hours… looking forward to that fresh air you mentioned (though it’s awfully nice here in SLC, too). Safe travels over the weekend!

Meet me in St. Louis?

• Oct 3, 2008 11:06 AM PT — Tess Vigeland
• 0 Comments

The mayor and me

Amy! Where are you these days? West Virginia, I think?

I’m in a hotel in Salt Lake City watching the vice presidential debate while I write up scripts for this week’s Marketplace Money show.

Had a great conversation this afternoon with three gentlemen from this city. Mayor Ralph Becker (D); Stephen Eccles Denkers, whose great-uncle was Fed chairman back in the 30’s and helped create the FDIC; and John Speros, owner of Lamb’s restaurant, a local institution where we all sat down to bread and water at a table covered in white linen. Old school. Loved it. Here’s a photo of our gathering:

All three had very mixed feelings about the bailout. They think it’s necessary, but they swallow hard when saying so. Salt Lake is actually doing pretty well in light of the national economic difficulties. But they say the city lags behind the nation in times like this, and they expect things will get worse before they get better.

We’ll have much more from all three of them on this weekend’s show. Tomorrow I’m headed to Denver for the weekend. Would love to hear from some folks there who might like to sit down for a chat about the financial fallout and its effect on their lives.

Hope all’s well with you, Amy! Meet me in St. Louis…?

• Oct 2, 2008 7:26 PM PT — Tess Vigeland
• 0 Comments

Roadtrip sausage

Here’s a photo of my hotel “studio.”

• Oct 2, 2008 10:15 AM PT — Tess Vigeland
• 1 Comments

No sign of impending economic doom in the Sierras

Hi Amy and blog readers! That was some drive from San Fran. Through America’s Salad Bowl and into the wilderness of the Sierras).

220 miles down… coupla thousand to go.

Just back from dinner here in Reno. I was totally envious of your soul food meal there in Charlotte… until I found this little Vietnamese noodle shop down the street from the casino. Nothin’ like a little pho after a day on the road.

When I got here I decided to roam the streets for comment on the bailout and the economy in general. What I found was striking, but not terribly surprising. At least here in Reno the biting anger seems to have subsided, but both visitors and residents told me they’re still not sure why the bailout is truly necessary. As I’ve mentioned elsewhere — they simply don’t believe that the problem is that bad. If the country slides into recession, so be it, we’ll get through it just like other challenges to the nation. No rewards, though, for the folks who got us here. And that includes not just Wall Streeters, but people who bought homes they couldn’t afford. Interesting to still be hearing that, given the calls for the 700 billion dollars to go directly to fix bad mortgages.

You know what else? They weren’t buying my whole “Wall Street is like a casino” argument. One couple I talked to, up from Texas, said they’d definitely made money over the years from stocks. But they haven’t won anything in towns like this.

Of course all this is just a slice… a small sampling of thoughts and feelings from… LAKE Street. (Not that other street… see, I still haven’t mentioned it.) But hopefully interesting nonetheless.

By the way I lost a dollar in the slots. Played a dollar. Lost a dollar.

Off to Salt Lake City tomorrow. Meet me in St. Louis?

• Oct 1, 2008 6:05 PM PT — Tess Vigeland
• 1 Comments

Only 2,200 miles to go! Good thing Congress isn't managing this budget...

Amy! Are you ready for this?? Blog readers! Are you ready for this?? It’ll be a trip, that’s for sure.

So I’m starting in San Francisco at the original headquarters of Bank of America. It was the Bank of Italy before B of I swallowed up B of A back in the 20’s.

B of A, of course, generated headlines a couple of weeks ago when it gobbled up Merrill Lynch. Basically we now have three massive banks in this country … B of A, Citi, and JP Morgan. What does that mean??? I know it certainly means that former customers of Washington Mutual, Merrill Lynch and Wachovia are confused and will start getting lots of mail from their new bank.

I suppose what we’re really after here is to find that vaunted “Main Street” (wanna see who can go the longest without using that phrase?) and explore where all this seething anger is coming from and what folks think a better solution might be.

Happy trails, my friend. After San Fran I’m off to do some gambling. No, no, no, not with derivatives and credit default swaps in my 401k.

I’m headed to Reno.

They say there are casinos there to rival Wall Street.

Snake eyes to you…

Meet me in St. Louis?

• Sep 30, 2008 3:37 PM PT — Tess Vigeland
• 2 Comments

I made it too!

I guess I lose the race. You beat me here, Tess, and I only drove 1640 miles. That feels like plenty!

I had planned to go straight from Michigan to Indianapolis on my way here. But once again, we heard from a listener with an interesting story to tell. So I switched gears and drove to Cincinnati, Ohio, where I met Morton McArthur. He tells me he normally doesn’t have a goatee, but the recent windstorms left him without power for 12 days. (That doesn’t quite explain why it’s not a full beard, but I didn’t press the issue.)

Anyway, Morton runs a small used car dealership, Mort’s Imports. (I swear he went into business just for the name.) He started the business about four years ago, and it was doing great until the economic downturn and credit crunch hit. He says people who can afford to buy cars are holding tight to their money right now…and those who can’t are having trouble getting loans. He hasn’t paid himself a salary in several months and may have to close the business.

Like you mentioned, Tess, Morton is also very optimistic about this country and its ability to ride this out. And even if he has to close the business, he figures he’ll hold onto his dealer’s license until he can open a new lot. Will that kind of spirit get us through?

Off to bed now, but I look forward to swapping stories from the road.

We met in St. Louis!

• Oct 8, 2008 9:37 PM PT — Amy Scott
• 0 Comments

Ypsilanti, MI

Speaking of wacky weather, I woke up shivering in Ann Arbor, Michigan yesterday and then ate dinner last night on a patio near Cincinnati, where a bottle of mosquito repellent was thoughtfully placed by each table. It was about 70 degrees.

Spent most of yesterday driving through southeastern Michigan. A labor professor I met at the University of Michigan directed me to the Bomber Restaurant in Ypsilanti. It’s been in business for more than 75 years. Owner John Sebastian told me it got its name from the nearby Willow Run Ford plant, where B-24 bombers were made during World War II. The place is full of model planes, wartime memorabilia, and Michiganders who are fed up with their state economy.

Economists say Michigan has been in recession for several years. And just about everyone I talked to knew someone who’d been laid off recently. As I was packing up to hit the road, a young woman and man approached me. She’d just been told her last day at a community college job would be Halloween. He’d been laid off from an auto part supplier last month, had lined up two jobs, and then both of them fell through because of additional layoffs.

Michigan was considered an important “battleground state” in the presidential election, until John McCain pulled the plug on his campaign there last week…at least temporarily. I talked to some voters who were bewildered by the decision. A few of them aren’t sold on Barack Obama either, but McCain’s decision felt like one more example of the state getting left behind.

1240 miles down. 350 to go!

Meet me in St. Louis?

• Oct 8, 2008 9:04 AM PT — Amy Scott
• 0 Comments

Youngstown, OH

So remember when I worried about pulling into Detroit in my Korean import? Well, I should have worried about Lordstown, OH.

Actually, no one gave me a hard time. But this is definitely GM country. Ken Jakubec worked at the Lordstown plant for more than 36 years. He retired just too early to get one of those big buyout packages, but told me he has no regrets. Now he’s happy coordinating this weekly classic car show at the Quaker Steak and Lube in Austintown.

Locals are all revved up about the new Chevrolet Cruze, coming in 2010.

As drivers shift to more fuel-efficient cars, the Lordstown plant has already added a third shift to pump out the Chevy Cobalt and Pontiac G5. And local realtors like Leon Turek hope the extra workers will help jump start the economy in nearby Youngstown, where the foreclosure rate is among the highest in the country.

So tomorrow, it’s on to the original Motor City, Detroit.

But in just a few days now…meet me in St. Louis?

• Oct 6, 2008 8:13 PM PT — Amy Scott
• 0 Comments

Pittsburgh, PA

I guess you did lose the bet, Tess. You owe me a beer in St. Louis. Though looking at that map, I should really buy you one for all the extra distance you’re covering.

I did actually speak to someone on literal Main Street, in a little town called Princeton, West Virginia. A real nice lady, Gwen Ramey, who owns Sisters Coffee House. She’s been there about eleven years, and says business has been pretty steady. But she says the local economy is tough. She’s seen several small businesses around her close recently. But her business is debt-free and hanging in there.

I spent today in Pittsburgh, visiting small businesses in the Strip District and hanging out at the city’s 250th birthday celebration at Point State Park, at the confluence of Pittsburgh’s three rivers.These 18th century reenactors gave me an earful about the rising price of coachwhips. (Okay, not really.)

[See Alexander Heilner’s slide show of people expressing their concerns about the economy.]

I did meet one young man who saw an interesting parallel between the financial rescue package Congress just approved and the post-9/11 airline bailout. Back then he worked for Northwest Airlines, and lost his job in spite of the aid. He wondered how much this $700 billion dollar rescue will really do for homeowners and the employees of these banks.

Now I’ve crossed the border into Youngstown, Ohio, where I’ll be looking at how the switch to smaller cars may breathe new life into a former steel town.

Meet me in St. Louis?

• Oct 4, 2008 7:22 PM PT — Amy Scott
• 0 Comments

Life on the road

Okay, Tess. We might have to have a glamor-off. How’s this for a motel room studio?

I hate to kill the mystique of radio, but yes, we sometimes have to record our narration buried beneath a fluffy down comforter. Otherwise my story about the Charlotte senior coffee klatch would have sounded a bit echo-y. Reminds me of the time I had to file a story in Boston while an oompah band was playing right outside my window. The duvet was no match for that tuba.

So, that station in Salt Lake is sounding pretty posh, Tess. But I know you’ll be back on the road soon enough. Can’t wait to hear the show.

Just checked in with Kai from the front of the West Virginia capitol building, where I tried to look minerly.

The coal industry still dominates this state, and I expect we’ll see a few signs of it as we make our way along the Appalachians toward Pennsylvania.

Meet me in St. Louis?

• Oct 3, 2008 12:07 PM PT — Amy Scott
• 0 Comments

Made it to Charleston!

Hi, Tess! Sorry to be out of touch.

It is, after all, a road trip. So things will inevitably come up. I started out yesterday morning in a classic roadtrip car—a white Ford Mustang. But after driving around Charlotte for the better part of a day I suddenly couldn’t get the key to turn in the ignition. So I called the rental car company and they sent me a far less glamorous Hyundai. Hope that doesn’t work against me when I pull into Detroit.

And, as with any road trip, plans changed. I’d intended to leave for Charleston, West Virginia, Wednesday night. But then we got a letter from a listener inviting me to come visit his morning coffee group at a Charlotte mall. Nearly every day this gaggle of mostly retired folks gets together to chat about life, work, and lately, the financial crisis. So I stayed an extra night in Charlotte and stopped by the coffee klatch in the morning. Check out Friday’s Morning Report for that story.

One last thing about Charlotte. On a colleague’s recommendation, I stopped by Simmons restaurant in the Fourth Ward for some soul food. If you ever find yourself there, be sure to try the banana pudding.

So I arrived in Charleston just in time to catch the Charleston Catholic High School ladies’ volleyball match and get an earful about how the financial crisis is hitting home here. I’ll be talking to Kai about that Friday evening.

Tess, I hope you have fun in my home state of Colorado! Breathe in some of that mountain air for me.

And once again…meet me in St. Louis?

• Oct 2, 2008 9:28 PM PT — Amy Scott
• 0 Comments

First Stop: Charlotte, N.C.

Hiya, Tess, and readers. I think I’m ready!

It’s been more than four years since I last went to Charlotte, for a story on the city’s rise as a financial center.

At the time, former Mayor Harvey Gantt told me, “We’re always one acquisition away from someone moving the center of gravity out of this town.” Meaning, if Bank of America or Wachovia were snapped up by some other bank, the whole thing could fall apart. I couldn’t help but think of those words this week as news broke that Citigroup had agreed to buy Wachovia’s banking operations.

But just as one of the city’s corporate icons teeters, another thrives. After snapping up Countrywide earlier this year and Merrill Lynch a few weeks ago, Bank of America appears to be one of the few winners to come out of this mess. For now.

As Wall Street as we’ve known it crumbles, it seems fitting to leave my home in New York to begin this journey in the country’s second-largest banking center. The retired chairman of Bank of America, Hugh McColl, once told me there was nothing happening in New York that couldn’t happen in Charlotte. With the bank he helped build now set to become the world’s largest brokerage, his swagger seems a bit more justified.

Now, on to Charleston, West Virginia. But not before I sneak in some of Charlotte’s famous soul food and look into this gasoline shortage we’ve been hearing about.

So, assuming I can fill up … Meet me in St. Louis?

• Oct 1, 2008 1:17 PM PT — Amy Scott
• 2 Comments