GM halts more sales of Chevrolet Cruzes

DETROIT – General Motors Co. has told its dealers to stop selling any Chevrolet Cruze cars equipped with 1.4-liter turbo engines on their lots.

The stop-sale order is for 2013 and 2014 model year Cruze sedans with the gasoline turbocharged engine, not the diesel version, said Alan Adler, a GM spokesman. It amounts to about a third of the Cruze inventory at Chevrolet dealers.

The automaker did not provide any information why it issued the order.

Recall will include 824,000 more GM cars

DETROIT – General Motors is adding 824,000 small cars to its ongoing recall tied to defective ignition switches.

The company will add vehicles from the 2008-2011 model years to a recall that initially covered cars only through the 2007 model year. The Chevrolet Cobalt, Chevrolet HHR, Pontiac G5, Pontiac Solstice, Saturn Ion and Saturn Sky are all involved in the recall.

The defect is linked to 12 deaths but GM says it’s not aware of any fatalities connected to the defect in the 2008-2011 models.

The ignition switches can move out of the “run” position and cause the engine to stall.

Workshop will cover brief business pitches

Organizers of the next Startup Weekend Spokane are hosting a workshop explaining how to present a one-minute business pitch.

The next Startup Weekend will be April 11-13. It’s a three-day competition that involves teams working on a startup business idea.

The preliminary workshop April 5 from 1-4 p.m. will teach people how to make a one-minute “elevator” pitch.

A week later, actual business pitches will be presented during Startup Weekend’s first night.

The workshop will be at Sixth Man Marketing’s office, 542 W. Cataldo Ave. It costs $5.

The facilitator for the workshop is Startup Weekend Spokane organizer Dan Gayle, who is a Web developer for The Spokesman-Review.

To register, go to the Eventbrite link at http://tinyurl.com/n5lz2my.

Peanut butter jars dumped in bankruptcy

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. – Nearly a million jars of peanut butter are being dumped at a New Mexico landfill to expedite the sale of a bankrupt peanut-processing plant at the heart of a 2012 salmonella outbreak.

The move comes after Costco Wholesale refused the product and declined requests to let it be donated to food banks or repackaged or sold.

The peanut butter was made with $2.8 million worth of Valencia peanuts owned by Costco and had been sitting in the warehouse since the plant shut down and filed for bankruptcy last fall, according to court documents.

Costco had previously agreed to take the peanut butter, but rejected it after getting eight loads saying it is “not merchantable” because of leaky peanut oil.

McDonald’s offers free cup of joe as promotion

NEW YORK – McDonald’s is offering free coffee to its customers for a limited time as competition for the breakfast crowd intensifies.

The world’s biggest hamburger chain announced Friday that participating U.S. locations will offer small cups of McCafe coffee at no charge during breakfast hours from Monday through April 13.

McDonald’s said that this is the first time it’s ever had a free coffee event nationwide. The company is hoping that the coffee giveaway will bring in new customers and get existing customers to come in more frequently.

Breakfast is an important component of McDonald’s business, comprising about 20 percent of its U.S. sales.