Tough enough for 2010: executives discuss their outlook for the year ahead at ColoradoBiz economic roundtable.

• Author: Cote, Mike
• Position: [roundtable] ECONOMIC FORECAST

Another Top Company trip to Napa Valley wine country, another morning-after economic wakeup call. When you take a bunch of executives on a trip to celebrate their good work and good fortune, reality is always waiting just beyond those rows of grape vines - especially for a bunch of people not quite disconnected from their Blackberrys.

The annual ColoradoBiz trip to Napa sponsored by UMB Bank, Holland & Hart and De-loitte includes an economic forecast presented by Bill Greiner, chief investment officer for UMB, followed by a roundtable discussion in which the participating businesses discuss their concerns and challenges for the year ahead.

This year's class represented a diverse group, including retail, energy, hospitality, law, accounting, technology, nonprofit, manufacturing and construction. Although most said they were feeling the pinch of the economy, some said their companies were enjoying extraordinary resilience even in a down climate due to their business niches.

The group's comments reflect a forecast from Greiner that called for growth of 2 percent to 3.5 percent in the coming year and tepid support for the recovery from consumers, who continue to battle depressed wages, reduced real estate equity and unemployment. The following is a transcript of the conversation, edited for clarity and space.

ColoradoBiz Editor Mike Cote - In his forecast, Bill talked about how we can't rely on the consumer to drive the economy coming out of this recession. Consumers play a big role for a few of the companies represented here: Natural Grocers by Vitamin Cottage, Rocky Mountain Natural Meats and to some degree Sage Hospitality.

Bob Dineen, Rocky Mountain Natural Meats

Our sales have increased through 2009 - we've had a great year. The consumer at Whole Foods, for instance, isn't the average consumer by any stretch. We're happy where we're at. The borrowing environment: and the lending environment obviously concern us. We've had some issues with customers who filed bankruptcy, but nothing that is going to hurt us long term. That's been our biggest concern: companies that we sell to that are struggling.

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Cote - How about you, Nancy? You're pretty much in the same market.

Nancy Flynn, Natural Grocers by Vitamin Cottage

I've noticed more changes because of the density of the population moving into the baby boomer stage. I think that has had an impact on our production. But we have continued to grow. We only tightened the belt for maybe six months, and now we're back on board again. And we're definitely ready to move into a more upward motion again. So I don't know if we're struggling as much as we would have had we not been cautious in our growth to begin with.

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Cote - Courteney, you have not only consumers as customers but business travelers. What do you see affecting your business?

Courteney Fisher

We're going to have a tough 2010. We're one of the last industries to come out of a downturn like this. The business travelers are just not there right now. The conventions aren't being booked. The people who are traveling now are getting great deals.

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We're expecting we might start to see an uptick mid-next year, but we're a little cautious about that. We would love to have...