Business Notes for Feb. 16, 2025

The Gazette’s Business Notes is a compendium of the week’s promotions, new hires, certifications, added business lines and business events, among other items, in Cedar Rapids, Iowa City and the rest of the Corridor. Information and photos can be submitted at https://www.thegazette.com/business-notes/submit/

New hires

Michelle Wiegand-Bigger, DNP, has joined Mercy General Surgery Clinic’s acute care and trauma surgery team in Cedar Rapids.

Election

Kris Hopkins has been elected president of the National Association of Insurance and Financial Advisors (NAIFA)-Eastern Iowa for 2025. Other board members are immediate past president Michael Rozum; president-elect Tyler Auman; and executive secretary/treasurer Elizabeth Rickels-Ster.

Kudos

Forbes and SHOOK Research have recognized The Vander Leest & Wenzel Group (Baird) as the top wealth management agency in the Cedar Rapids-Iowa City Corridor. It also was named the No. 5 team in Iowa.

Other news

St. Luke’s adds K-9 officer: UnityPoint Health-St. Luke’s Hospital is adding Kyah, a 1-year-old German shepherd to its security team, the Cedar Rapids hospital said in a news release.

St. Luke’s Security Officer Jim Flint, with a decade of K-9 handling experience, will work with Kyah in deterring disruptive behavior, de-escalating violent situations and reducing stress and anxiety to patients and staff.

Andrew Novotny, the hospital’s security and telecommunications manager, said having “a trained K-9 on-site adds another layer of protection.”

The St. Luke’s Foundation donated funds to support the K-9 program.

Business Breakfast: The year’s first Business Breakfast Series, presented by The Gazette, will be at 8 a.m. Feb. 25 at Geonetric, 415 12th Ave. SE in Cedar Rapids, with a panel discussion on the physician shortage in Iowa.

Panelists are Dr. Dustin Arnold, chief medical officer at UnityPoint Health-St. Luke’s Hospital; Dr. Fadi Yacoub, chair of the Linn County Medical Society; Dr. Timothy Quinn, president and CEO of Mercy Cedar Rapids; and moderator Zack Kucharski, executive editor of The Gazette.

Those wishing to attend can register in advance at https://tinyurl.com/33hrxt3v or pay $5 at the door. The breakfast series is sponsored by The Gazette, with presenting sponsor, the Cedar Rapids Metro Economic Alliance, and supporting sponsors, the Better Business Bureau and Hills Bank.

Small business of the week: U.S. Sen. Joni Ernst, R-Iowa, last week announced BHFO of Linn County as her small business of the week.

In 2003, Jon and Stacie Sefton founded BHFO in the basement of their Cedar Rapids home. BHFO began as an online marketplace with two suppliers and has expanded across 18 marketplaces with hundreds of brand partnerships. The company’s 240,000-square-foot facility in Cedar Rapids, at 4520 20th Ave. SW, processes and distributes an extensive selection of discounted designer fashion — clothing, shoes, and accessories — to customers worldwide.

Ernst, chair of the Senate’s Small Business Committee, is naming one exceptional small business of the week in each of Iowa’s counties during this congressional session.