INSIDE ALASKA BUSINESS

McKinley Management

Arctic Slope Regional Corporation is giving up its Alaska Growth Capital (AGC) subsidiary, which is becoming a fourth line of business for McKinley Management. Bristol Bay Native Corporation is partnering with McKinley as a shareholder of the renamed McKinley Alaska Growth Capital. Former AGC president Logan Birch, who switched to working for McKinley, is now in charge of AGC again. All AGC employees are being retained, and the company is colocating with McKinley's offices at the JL Tower in midtown Anchorage. mckinleycapital.com

Carrs-Safeway | Fred Meyer

The parent companies of Fred Meyer and Carrs-Safeway agreed to merge. Pending regulatory approval, Ohio-based Kroger would pay $24.6 billion for all outstanding shares of Idaho-based Albertsons, creating a combined company with 710,000 employees at 4,996 stores in fortyeight states. Fred Meyer stores employ more than 3,300 Alaskans; Carrs-Safeway, which combined in 1999, employs almost 3,000. Albertsons, which took over Safeway in 2014, would create a spinoff company named SpinCo to hold between 100 and 375 stores divested from the merged company, in hopes of maintaining competition. carrsqc.com | fredmeyer.com

Frontier Media

All six commercial radio stations in Juneau are being sold to an out-ofstate owner. Cliff Dumas, a morning host in Bakersfield, California, is buying KINY, KJNO, KTKU, KSUP, KXXJ, and Hawk 107.9 from Frontier Media. The $1.3 million deal also includes two stations each in Sitka and Ketchikan, as well as Frontier Media’s six-station cluster in Texarkana, Texas. Dumas previously hosted a syndicated show with Frontier Media co-owner Sharon Burns. She and her husband Richard, both from Australia, became the first foreigners to own US broadcast licenses in 2017 when they acquired Juneau Alaska Communications. kinyradio.com

OfficeTECH | Kelley Connect

Office equipment supplier Kelley Connect is expanding its Alaska presence by acquiring Anchoragebased OfficeTECH. From its original founding in Spenard, OfficeTECH has established branches in Kodiak and western and eastern Washington. Seattle-based Kelley Connect already has sales offices in Anchorage, Soldotna, Fairbanks, Juneau, and Ketchikan, as well as Washington, Oregon, Idaho, and Montana. The addition of OfficeTECH means both Xerox and Quadient mail solutions are added to the Kelley Connect portfolio. kelleyconnect.com

ConocoPhillips

The Prudhoe Bay unit, still the largest oil field in North America, is getting larger with the addition of an adjacent area leased by ConocoPhillips. The ADL 47466 lease at Gwydyr Bay, northwest Prudhoe Bay, has been held by Conoco since 1969, with only one well drilled and plugged in 1981. After years of dispute with state regulators, ConocoPhillips requested amending Prudhoe Bay to add Gwydyr Bay to the unit, splitting its shares with Prudhoe Bay’s other owners, ExxonMobil and Hilcorp. alaska.conocophillips.com

Alaska Plastics Recovery

A first-of-its-kind mobile plastics processor is being deployed in Alaska. The system fits in a 53-foot trailer and takes plastic collected from Alaska’s beaches and local communities, converting it into lumber-shaped products. American Cierra Plastics of Auburn, New York designed and built the processor for Alaska Plastics Recovery, a subsidiary of PKS Consulting. The first demonstrations were in Palmer and Seward. PKS Consulting’s president, Patrick Simpson, who is receiving funding from the US Environmental Protection Agency’s Small Business Innovation Research program, says he hopes “plastic can be viewed as a local resource and not as trash.” pksconsulting.biz

Tastee-Freez

The Tastee-Freez shop in West Anchorage is under new ownership for the first time in almost thirty years. Owner (and chief ice cream tester) Rich Owens retired September 1, passing the business at the corner of Raspberry Road and Jewel Lake Road to Linwood and Darlene Stowe, two former employees. Operating since 1958, the Tastee-Freez is the oldest location in the chain; Owens bought it in 1994. tfalaska.com

ECONOMIC INDICATORS

ANS Crude Oil Production 493,503 barrels 5.3% change from previous month ANS West Coast Crude Oil Prices $92.99 per barrel 6.9% change from previous month Statewide Employment 360,700 labor force 4.4% unemployment