Houston is an extremely large city, with hundreds of miles of highways, freeways, streets and roads for drivers to navigate. For this reason, a large number of retail stores, contractors, vendors, restaurants, delis, and other commercial businesses rely heavily on commercial vehicles to help operate their business.

Establishing a retail business takes substantial work, as owners develop a business idea and company strategy, build inventory, develop a customer base, market and advertise their business, and plan for the future. All of these steps require hard work, patience, quality employees, investment capital, and equipment and other assets.

In our rapidly expanding Houston economy, there has been an increase of projects for Contractors. All throughout the city and in surrounding suburbs, there are extensive construction projects planned for roads, office towers, retail centers, apartment complexes, and new residential communities. With these also come the need for excavation, electrical, plumbing, HVAC and other kinds of Subcontractors and Specialty Contractors.

New Year's Resolutions are often made on an individual level, such as improving health, better time management, or reaching financial goals. However, business owners and entrepreneurs can benefit greatly by creating resolutions or goals for their business in 2014.  This proactive process gives owners an opportunity to take stock of the current health of the company, set financial, sales or growth goals, and also reflect on past successes or mistakes to learn from them for the future.

Business owners spend a great deal of time, money and energy developing a business plan and implementing steps to ensure success and future growth. These steps often include securing financial backing, finding an ideal location, developing a customer base, and creating a strong social media presence for marketing. However, one of the most important steps in ensuring the future success of a new business is getting proper business insurance coverage to protect from all kinds of incidents and events.

Running a successful restaurant in the Houston area involves making many critical decisions, such as finding a prime location for your business, securing financial backing from lenders and investors, hiring quality cooks and wait staff, and also obtaining all permits and licenses needed to operate. One other key decision restaurant owners must make involves securing quality insurance for the restaurant and employees.

In the last decade, there has been a steady increase in food production awareness, as people learn more about food industry and the various chemicals, hormones, pesticides and genetically modified materials used to create a growing percentage of food in America. As a result of this information, more people are choosing to purchase and consume organic and locally sourced produce, meats and dairy.

Business owners know that it is vitally important to protect valuable company assets, such as buildings and office space, electronic equipment, specialized machinery, inventory, business vehicles and other company property. Protecting these assets often includes the use of parking lot cameras, secured card-key entry and exit doors, and security guards to protect the business during off-hours.

There are few jobs in the country as demanding and rewarding as being a small business owner. In our volatile economy, many small business owners work day and night to increase revenue, expand their market share, attract new customers and retain quality employees. In the quest to turn a simple business idea into a thriving business reality, many small business owners focus only on customer growth and revenues but fail to make adequate plans for the future.

Five years ago this week, residents and business owners throughout the greater Houston and Galveston region were devastated by the impact of Hurricane Ike, a Category 4 storm that decimated entire communities. Hundreds of thousands throughout the Gulf Coast were left with no electricity, damaged homes and businesses, and a massive cleanup.