JESSICA HARPER TAD JOHNSON DERRICK WILLIAMS
‘Trade-in and Save’ – boost or bust? 2A Something missing in business community 8A Entrepreneur uses life savings to open restaurant 44A
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DATE ##, 2009 MARCH 18, 2010
VOLUME 31, 30, NUMBER NUMBER 3 # VOLUME
Dakota County Tribune Since 1884
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INSIDE BIZ
A good life as a village druggist
FORUM
Education attainment is one of the most powerful economic propellents, yet some believe college isn’t for everyone. 4A
DANE SMITH BUSINESS 101
Jerry Erickson built business, community in Lakeville
Photo by Larry Werner
Jerry and his wife, Martha, opened Erickson Drugs in downtown Lakeville in August of 1963. They spend time now reminiscing about their years in business.
PETER LATNER
Service-learning photography projects allow private businesses and nonprof its to inexpensively evolve their brand. 6A
BUSINESS 101
by Larry Werner
civic institutions as the chamber of commerce, TRIBUNE EDITOR youth baseball and the annual summer festival “Hi, Larry,� he’d say, reaching across the he named the Panorama of Progress, or Pancounter for a hearty handshake. “How’s Ann?� O-Prog, for short. That kind of greeting at the pharmacy These are days for reflecting on the accomcounter of Erickson Drugs helped make my plishments of Jerry and Martha, who were move from north of the river to Lakeville a named businesspersons of the year in 2000, little easier back in the spring of 1999. spot on main street for their own store. Over the year they sold the drug store, which still It came from Jerry Erickson who, like me, the years, Jerry and Martha have not only been carries the Erickson name. Jerry, 81, is home had moved to the community from Edina and, accepted in Lakeville but have made significant bound with emphysema and COPD. Tethered like me, wondered whether he would be ac- contributions to their adopted city’s commer- to an oxygen hose, he spends his days at the cepted by the locals. kitchen table of the house he and Martha built cial and civic life. Erickson had come almost 40 years earlier In addition to operating a successful drug on Lake Marion in 1991. to a Lakeville that was very different: a square- store, Jerry started the Ben Franklin, which his They watch TV and the squirrels and birds mile village with 1,000 residents, compared son, Scott, still operates two doors south of the welcoming another spring. They reminisce with a city of more than 50,000 in 38 square drug store. And Jerry was a founder of such about their time in a community that has given miles today. The city grew, but in the histhem much – to which they toric downtown, where have given much back. Erickson Drugs “It’s been a wonwas opened by Jerry and derful place to raise a famihis wife, Martha, in Auly,� Martha said as we pored gust of 1963, the smallover newspaper clippings town atmosphere lives on. and photos that document It lives on in large part the Jerry Erickson era in because Erickson and other Lakeville. downtown business owners They came to worked hard to keep things Lakeville because, Jerry small and friendly. said, “I was bound and deJerry and Martha, college termined I would have my sweethearts at the University own drug store.� He was of Minnesota, chased Jerry’s working as a pharmacist at dream to own a pharmacy from Photo by Derrick Williams 50th and Xerxes in south his job as a pharmacist in south The two Lakeville mainstays that Jerry Erickson Minneapolis when WalMinneapolis to a village neither founded, Erickson Drugs and Ben Franklin, stand two doors apart on green’s offered him a franknew before they were offered a the main street of Holyoke Avenue. See Erickson, Page 5A
Tribune Columnist Larry Werner
Anticipate and embrace change in a digital world. Doing so allows one to be proactive rather than reactive. ROSEALEE 6A LEE CAPITOL COMMERCE
TIM BUDIG
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Minnesota House and Senate pass a $1 billion bonding bill, and Gov. Pawlenty trims it with a line-item veto. 10A
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