When I moved back to Louisville I half heartedly looked for a job for a few weeks. I hit the classifieds that came in the Courier, browsed Craig’s list, searched Monster and Career Builder and came up with great big piles of nothing in terms of actual job leads. The experience made me realize a) how much I love being an independent/entrepreneurial type and reminded me how much I want to make my living that way and b) boy, job listing websites are full of crap.

The reason job boards are full of crap seems pretty straightforward. Anyone can pay to list an ad and that ad will be listed. It doesn’t matter if it’s most likely a scam, or if it’s spam or it’s not really a local job (or a job that can be done locally) at all. Job boards will take the money, list the ad and everyone goes about their merry way. Well, everyone except the people who are actually looking for actual jobs.

I think a truly local, moderated job board with affordable listing fees can be an asset for both potential employees and local employers (including local branches of national companies). So I set one up.

The Consuming Louisville job board can hopefully streamline the hiring process for both job seekers and employee seekers interested in searching via the internet since no one will have to wade through sketchy “work from home” ads and only Louisville based potential employees will be targeted.

I will be moderating any ads that get posted. My approval criteria are pretty simple: real jobs, no spam, no cheesy scams. Long term, temp and freelance gigs are all good. Knowledge work, blue collar jobs, whatever. I don’t want only knowledge workers or larger companies to be served. My goal is for this to be useful to everyone who wants to use it. Looking for a job is hard enough without having to wade through a ton of “model/actresses need”, “work from home for real!” and “opportunities with the U.S. Military” ads to just get to the small percentage of real, potential jobs.

All that being said the Consuming Louisville job board is now open. A 30 day ad costs $25, the prime featured ad spot costs $50.