Here's how to think about supporting local. Getty images

Businesses everywhere are struggling to survive during these strange times. From the largest global companies to the local mom and pops, these organizations are on the brink of losing the good fight.

Brands we all rely on — including J Crew, JC Penney, Neiman Marcus, Modell's Sporting Goods, and Gold's Gym — have filed or are expected to file for bankruptcy protection in the coming days.

Those are some of the national brands. Local brands come and go with such frequency that many times only the most loyal of consumers are the only ones that realize their demise outside of the owners and employees.

What is a local brand?

Echoing throughout our everyday quarantined lives is the mantra to support your local community businesses. What exactly does that mean? A neighbor of mine is the general manager of a large national retail store in our community. It is not a local business…or is it? I certainly do not want him to fail and lose his job due to a corporate decision to shut down locations. That would affect hundreds of folks in our area that work there.

Then there is the local flower shop that is a one-location mom and pop that a family has poured everything it has into building their retail dream. Now, they face a nightmare of losing it all if things do not turn around soon enough.

What does this all have to do with brand equity?

The equity in your brand is that perceived value customers place in your services or products that makes your brand stand out. It includes brand loyalty, perceived quality and your overall brand awareness. It is why a customer choose one brand over another as price is removed from the equation.

As consumers venture out from the COVID-19 isolation more and more each day, they have decisions to make. Decisions like "Where am I going to spend my money?" This gets even more compounded by the shocking number of furloughed and unemployed people that only weeks ago were humming along fine. Discretionary income is almost becoming a thing of the recent past, meaning every dollar spent beyond rent and food is under extreme scrutiny.

It is at this very point that brand equity can make or break a local business. We all know that the coming months will be trying, and brands are simply trying to hang on to make it through the unprecedented downturn. But guess which brands will come out of this with a chance to realize even more greatness down the road? Those companies that realized from day one the importance of their brand. How people perceive it. How to build value beyond the physical goods or services. The culture of their brand and whether it permeates the organization and every brand touchpoint with consumers.

Think of building brand equity like you would when shopping for home insurance. You do not go get insurance on your home after the fire destroys it. You plan ahead and build home equity by mitigating risk. The same holds for brand equity. You plan ahead and place the importance of an effective brand strategy at the very top of your business priorities.

I have worked on brand strategy from global brands to local and regional brands and you would be surprised to see how brand strategy is undervalued regardless of company size. Too many times (actually, almost always) I see companies large and small treat the brand and marketing strategy as an afterthought, once accounting, purchasing, HR, manufacturing, sales and more are given their proper due.

Brands face pressures daily from all sides including competition, government regulations, changing consumer preferences, technology, advertising expense and more. So those brands that have the focused leadership to build a strong brand platform, as a priority from day one, will win in the long term.

The higher the level of your brand equity in your marketplace, the more likely a consumer will migrate toward your business as they begin thawing their wallets from the pandemic freeze of uncertainty. Spending is under more scrutiny than most of us have ever seen, and brand stewards that have built a strong platform of awareness, value, service, quality and overall experience stand the best chance to earn that sale from loyal customers that appreciate brand equity, even though those customers may not understand how to actually define it.

It's not too late.

While you have the time, even though the slow crawl back to some sort of normalcy can seem overwhelming, prioritize your brand strategy. Spend time each day as you would with accounting and sales to consider how to improve the equity, the value, of your brand among your customer base.

Ask yourself how you can differentiate. What are the ways you can value-add to your services that make your product even more memorable with consumers? What about employee training? Consider whether or not your people believe in your business and have the passion to exemplify those brand attributes you clearly demonstrate day in and day out. Are you following up with customers to build loyalty and learn about how to improve?

Look at the competition, regardless of size, and build a list of what makes your brand better. Then continue to find ways to express that. There is still time if you prioritize differently.

There's an old sugar-packet saying I heard early in my career that I still use today, over 40 years later that goes something like this:

"He Who Has a Thing to Sell
And Goes and Whispers in a Well
Is Not as Apt to Make the Dollars
As He Who Climbs a Tree and Hollers"

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Mike Albrecht is currently a partner and director of business development at Houston-based 9thWonder, a large general market advertising and PR agency based in Houston with offices around the globe.

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Expert on Houston’s energy advantage: Building affordability, reliability for all

Guest Column

As the energy capital of the world, Houston has been at the forefront of innovation, powering industries and communities for generations. Many Houston families, however, are facing a reality that undermines our leadership: high energy bills and ongoing concerns about grid reliability.

Affordability and reliability are not just technical issues; they’re equity issues. To remain the world leader in energy, we must ensure that every household has access to affordable and dependable power.

Affordability: The First Step Toward Equity

According to the recent 2025 study by The Texas Energy Poverty Research Institute, nearly 80% of low- to moderate-income Houstonians scaled back on basic needs to cover electric bills. Rising costs mean some Houstonians are forced to choose between paying their utility bill or paying for groceries.

Additionally, Houston now has the highest poverty rate among America’s most populous cities. Energy should not be a privilege for only half of our city’s population. That’s why affordability needs to be at the center of Houston’s energy conversation.

Several practical solutions exist to help address this inequity:

  • We can increase transparency in electricity pricing and help families better understand their electricity facts labels to make smarter choices.
  • We can expand energy efficiency programs, like weatherizing homes and apartments, swapping out old light bulbs for LEDs, and adopting smart thermostats.
  • Incentives to help families invest in these changes can deliver long-term benefits for both them and apartment complex owners.

Many small changes, when combined, can add up to significant savings for families while reducing overall demand on the grid.

Reliability: A Shared Community Priority

The memories of Hurricane Beryl, Derecho, and Winter Storm Uri are still fresh in the minds of Texans. We saw firsthand the fragility of our grid and how devastating outages are to families, especially those without resources to handle extreme weather. Reliability of the grid is an issue of public health, economic stability, and community safety.

Houston has an opportunity to lead by embracing innovation. Grid modernization, from deploying microgrids to expanding battery storage, can provide stability when the system is under stress. Partnerships between utilities, businesses, and community organizations are key to building resilience. With Houston’s innovation ecosystem, we can pilot solutions here that other regions will look to replicate.

Energy Equity in Action

Reliable, affordable energy strengthens equity in tangible ways. When households spend less on utilities, they have more to invest in their children’s education or save for the future. When power is stable, schools remain open, businesses continue to operate, and communities thrive. Extending energy efficiency programs across all neighborhoods creates a fairer, more balanced system, breaking down inequities tied to income and geography.

Studies show that expanding urban green spaces such as community gardens and tree-planting programs can lower neighborhood temperatures, reduce energy use for cooling, and improve air quality in disadvantaged areas, directly reducing household utility burdens.

In Houston, for example, the median energy burden for low-income households is 7.1% of income, more than twice that of the general population, with over 20% of households having energy burdens above 6%.

Research also demonstrates that community solar programs and urban cooling investments deliver clean, affordable power, helping to mitigate heat stress and making them high-impact strategies for energy equity and climate resilience in vulnerable neighborhoods.

Public-Private Partnerships Make the Difference

The solutions to affordability and reliability challenges must come from cross-sector collaboration. For example, CenterPoint Energy offers incentives through its Residential and Hard-to-Reach Programs, which support contractors and community agencies in delivering energy efficiency upgrades, including weatherization, to low-income households in the greater Houston area.

Nonprofits like the Houston Advanced Research Center (HARC) received a $1.9 million Department of Energy grant to lead a weatherization program tailored for underserved communities in Harris County, helping to lower bills and improve housing safety

Meanwhile, the City of Houston’s Green Office Challenge and Better Buildings Initiative bring private-sector sponsors, nonprofits, and city leadership together to drive energy reductions across millions of square feet of commercial buildings, backed by training and financial incentives. Together, these partnerships can result in real impact that brings more equity and access to affordable energy.

BKV Energy is committed to being part of the solution by promoting practical, consumer-focused strategies that help families save money and use energy more efficiently. We offer a suite of programs designed to provide customers with financial benefits and alleviate the burden of rising electricity bills. Programs like BKV Energy’s demonstrate how utilities can ease financial strain for families while building stronger customer loyalty and trust. Expanding similar initiatives across Houston would not only lower household energy burdens but also set a new standard for how energy companies can invest directly in their communities.

By proactively addressing affordability, energy companies can help ensure that rising costs don’t disproportionately impact vulnerable households. These efforts also contribute to a more resilient and equitable energy future for Houston, where all residents can access reliable power without sacrificing financial stability.

Houston as a Blueprint

Houston has always been a city of leadership and innovation, whether pioneering the space race, driving advancements in medical research at the Texas Medical Center, or anchoring the global energy industry. Today, our challenge is just as urgent: affordability and reliability must become the cornerstones of our energy future. Houston has the expertise and the collaborative spirit to show how it can be done.

By scaling innovative solutions, Houston can make energy more equitable, strengthening our own community while setting a blueprint for the nation. As the energy capital of the world, it is both our responsibility and our opportunity to lead the way to a more equitable future for all.

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Sam Luna is director at BKV Energy, where he oversees brand and go-to-market strategy, customer experience, marketing execution, and more.

Texas-based energy startup raises $1 billion on heels of Houston expansion

Powering Up

Austin-based startup Base Power, which offers battery-supported energy in the Houston area and other regions, has raised $1 billion in series C funding—making it one of the largest venture capital deals this year in the U.S.

VC firm Addition led the $1 billion round. All of Base Power’s existing major investors also participated, including Trust Ventures, Valor Equity Partners, Thrive Capital, Lightspeed Venture Partners, Andreessen Horowitz (a16z), Altimeter, StepStone Group, 137 Ventures, Terrain, Waybury Capital, and entrepreneur Elad Gil. New investors include Ribbit Capital, Google-backed CapitalG, Spark Capital, Bond, Lowercarbon Capital, Avenir Growth Capital, Glade Brook Capital Partners, Positive Sum and 1789 Capital Management.

Coupled with the new $1 billion round, Base Power has hauled in more than $1.27 billion in funding since it was founded in 2023.

Base Power supplies power to homeowners and the electric grid through a distributed storage network.

“The chance to reinvent our power system comes once in a generation,” Zach Dell, co-founder and CEO of Base Power, said in a news release. “The challenge ahead requires the best engineers and operators to solve it, and we’re scaling the team to make our abundant energy future a reality.”

Zach Dell is the son of Austin billionaire and Houston native Michael Dell, chairman and CEO of Round Rock-based Dell Technologies.

In less than two years, Base Power has developed more than 100 megawatt-hours of battery-enabled storage capacity. One megawatt-hour represents one hour of energy use at a rate of one million watts.

Base Power recently expanded its service to the city of Houston. It already was delivering energy to several other communities in the Houston area. To serve the Houston region, the startup has opened an office in Katy.

The startup also serves the Dallas-Fort Worth and Austin markets. At some point, Base Power plans to launch a nationwide expansion.

To meet current and future demand, Base Power is building its first energy storage and power electronics factory at the former downtown Austin site of the Austin American-Statesman’s printing presses.

“We’re building domestic manufacturing capacity for fixing the grid,” Justin Lopas, co-founder and chief operating officer of Base Power, added in the release. “The only way to add capacity to the grid is [by] physically deploying hardware, and we need to make that here in the U.S. ... This factory in Austin is our first, and we’re already planning for our second.”

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This article originally appeared on EnergyCapitalHTX.com.

Houston professor awarded $2.6M grant for retina, neurological research

seeing green

University of Houston College of Optometry Professor John O’Brien has received a $2.6 million grant from the National Eye Institute to continue his research on the retina and neurological functions.

O’Brien is considered a leading expert in retinal neuroscience with more than 20 years of research in the field. The new funding will allow O’Brien and his team to continue to study the dense assembly of proteins associated with electrical synapses, or gap junctions, in the retina.

Gap junctions transfer electrical signals between neurons. And the plasticity of gap junctions changes the strength of a synapse, in turn changing how visual information is processed. Previous research has shown that reduced functions of electrical synapses could be linked to autism, while their hyperfunction may lead to seizures.

“The research we propose will significantly advance our understanding of the molecular complexes that control the function of electrical synapses,” O’Brien said in a news release.

The team at UH will work to identify the proteins and examine how they impact electrical synapses. It is particularly interested in the Connexin 36, or Cx36, protein. According to O’Brien, phosphorylation of Cx36, a short-term chemical modification of the protein, serves as a key driver of plasticity. And the protein has been linked to refractive error development, which is one of the largest vision problems in the world today.

Additionally, OBrien’s research has shown that plasticity is essential for all-day vision, allowing the retina to adjust sensitivity and sharpen images. He has also built a catalog of the core set of proteins surrounding electrical synapses that are conserved across species. His research has been funded by the NEI since 2000.