Everything About Business Except The Bottom Line: FunnyBusiness

Black Friday & Cyber Monday Are Not Trend Indicators

Despite all the good retail news about Black Friday-- sales increased 1.3%--and the good news for Cyber Monday--sales were up 15%,--experts are warning not to read much into those sales figures.

More than 172 million shoppers visited stores and Web sites over the weekend, up from 147 million last year, according to the National Retail Federation.

Shoppers spent an average of $372.57, up 7.2 percent from last year's $347.55. And total spending reached an estimated $41 billion.

But something quickly happened when the glitz and sales of Friday passed. Spending dropped off.

On Saturday, sales fell 0.8 percent for the day compared with 2007 as many Black Friday sales and promotions ended, slowing retail activity, according to ShopperTrak RCT's National Retail Sales Estimate.
                                                                   IndyStar.com

And from MediaPost

The proportion of time that consumers spent on e-commerce sites hit an all-time low in October at 12.8%, according to new findings from the OPA. When it comes to spending, comScore reported that online retail sales from Nov. 1 to Dec. 1 were down 2% from a year ago, despite a 13% increase during the four-day period from Black Friday to Cyber Monday.

What are all these people doing with the extra time?
According to Gallop, at least 25% of them are visiting porn sites during office hours.

Victoria's Secret: Your Cheatin' Heart

Victoria's Secret has announced its in your face love affair with young tarts is over. It's cheatin' days are over.  The 1000 store chain wants to return to its high school sweet heart. The Girl Next Door.

 

So says the CEO of the Limited Brands who told financial analysts last week that the reason their net sales dropped 12% in the 4th quarter and 8% in 2007was the retailer had become "too sexy."

Their 1999 Super Bowl Ad is ranked as one of the top 10 sleaziest of all time

Victoria's Secret “Fashion Show” (1999): Advertising for a web-only lingerie fashion show, scores of scantily-clad models traipse in front of the camera. “The Broncos won’t be there. The Falcons won’t be there,” the text scrolling by says. “You won’t care.” Victoria's Secret later claims 1.2 million visitors to its web site. (A 30-second ad in 1999 cost $1.6 million.)

That was the last Super Bowl Ad for Victoria's Secret until this year...where they displayed their new toned down image.

Oh, and in another effort to win back the hearts of their jilted consumers, Victoria's Secret has been test marketing a brand of sportswear.

There's more on Victoria's Secret's attempts to win back the women they dumped. Check it out on BlogHer.

Image Credit: BloggingStocks and HotNutritionalsupplements

Are you taking a CyberMonday Shopping Break Today?

  Depending on who you listen to, the  Monday after Thanksgiving is the least productive workday of the year. Why? Because it's CyberMonday. As Single Ma's Fabulous Financials blogs,

"Last year, it was reported that 59% of Cyber Monday online shopping was via work computers, so employers are warned of decreased productivity levels. Imagine that! "Sorry boss, but I can't work today because I need to shop for a flat screen." Ha!"

CNN.Money is also reporting on the tendency of people to do their CyberMonday shopping at work. In an article that features research by Shopping.org - the folks that are home to CyberMonday.com     retailers are definitely offering "serious" discounts today. In return, employees say they'll be taking a Cybermonday Shopping Break.

"More than one-third of the 1,890 consumers surveyed for the report said they will use Internet access at work to browse or buy gifts online this holiday season. More than half of young adults the ages of 18 to 24, and nearly half of those aged 25 to 34 said they would shop online during work hours. Among the most-shopped categories last year on Cyber Monday were jewelry, consumer electronics, gourmet food, furniture and home décor, the report said."

Note: At 7:46 a.m. CST the site was down-- Could it be that folks on the East Coast were so eager to get an early start on their shopping that there was an online traffic jam? Whether or not CyberMonday is the biggest online shopping day of the year is debatable. Cleverhack dot com, a blog written by a self-described geek in her early 30s says Cyber Monday is more spin than reality.

"Speaking as a person formerly involved in E-commerce, I can tell you that Black Friday and the upcoming Cyber Monday won’t be all that. Sure, the weekend will be good for online retailers, but these won’t be the busiest days for online retailers during the 2006 Holiday Season. In fact, the busiest days for online retailers this year will be December 12th and 13th. The reason? Christmas is on a Monday this year, and that pushes up the last day for a package to ship via UPS Ground within the Continental US to Friday, December 15th. (You can spec out a shipment on the UPS Web site to see what I mean.) Many retailers will use the 14th as an extra day for shipping and handling and to sort out issues on their end. With that cleared up, there are a ton of great deals online and the bloggers are buzzing. The bulk of e-commerce shoppers are those who would rather not go shopping in brick and mortar stores, hence the waiting until the second week of December to shop, but who also don’t want to be bothered with expedited shipping expenses and/or waiting for a package to arrive at the last minute."

So if you are planning on shopping at work today, where should you go? Google Checkout,in an attempt to drive sales from Paypal,is making a major push to entice new users. From that DAMN PC,

"Best Advice: be proactive and seek out promo codes from online shopping sites; AOL consumer advisor Regina Lewis says the risk of sellout is high and advises us to shop wisely by letting technology do the hard work for us. Let online sites do your comparison shopping for you: Shopzilla.com, NextTag, etc. Also: Shop at night! Let your insominia work to your advantage. [FoxNews.com] You may also locate tech sale deals at: Boddit Fat Wallet, Slick Deals, Tech Bargains, Deal News, Deal Catcher, Anand Tech Ben’s Bargains Got a sales tip for online shopping? Please share here! Happy Cyber Monday!"

And,from my friend Lydia (not her real name) check out Restaurants.com where you can purchase a $25 gift certificate to a restaurant for just $10.

Have a great day.Save a lot.

Image Credit: Flickr Member Judy B
This is cross-posted at BlogHer.

Notes From The Road- San Francisco

First Impressions .When you think of the impression that a group of Irish students have about  the place where they are working in America  for the summer, what would you hope their take-away would be ?

That we are fair? Hard-working? Welcoming?

At least for the students I met on the BART going from the San Francisco Airport into the city, their impression is this:
 

Costco sells caskets.

The Irish students are working as food samplers at Costco.  They were quick to tell me they were not working for Costco but in Costco.  We started chatting because they had noticed me on the transit platform asking another passenger whether I was in the right place for the train into San Francisco. They asked me where I was going ,double checked their map ,and  then advised me that I should get off two stops after them.

They have been in San Francisco three weeks.   They are living in Berkley for the summer,staying at a Frat house with 25 Irish Students and a handful of Americans.They work Thurs-Sunday and each week  are sent to different Costco's to feature different food.While there is a lot that amazes them about the  Costco -- "It's so cheap and everything is in bulk,"The  thing that amazed them the most was the caskets.

Speaking to her compatriots, one of the four said in the freshest of fresh Irish Brogues,"Did you know you can buy caskets in Costco?"

They all acknowledged they were aware of this oddity and went into fits of laughter over the fact they were handing out food samples at a place where you can also shop for your casket.

They were also a bit impatient with Americans who tried to guess where they were from and either guessed Scotland or England. Their retort, " You Canadians are so funny."

Just moments before they started dissing Americans who couldn't tell an Irish brogue from a Scottish accent, I had fortunately guessed Irish , asking, " Are you from Ireland?" I made a mental note to self,"Don't guess about accents  anymore, you could be insulting someone without knowing it."

According to the students, Ireland doesn't have anything like a Costco. "We have supermarkets," explained one of the girls, but we have separate stores for food, tires, computers and  of course,caskets."

"So what food were you sampling today?"

I didn't get a chance to ask them if this All -American Snack food was popular in Ireland because they shared that after a day of handing out chips & salsa they never wanted to look at it again.

The conversation ended there. They got off the BART but they left me their map.

On another note today is the second anniversary of this blog. One of my earliest posts,Open -Toed Shoes is still the most popular, but Tattoo Lady is also a favorite.

To everyone who stops by, reads a post or two and shares some thoughts, thank you. I'm still having fun.

Credit Image: Flickr member cjanebuy

No More Snapper Lawnmowers at Wal-Mart

As part of its promotion for senior writer Charles Fishman's book, The Wal-Mart Effect, Fast Company is running some excerpts from the book. The latest issue includes a story called," The Man Who Said No To Wal-Mart"

"The vice president had a bigger surprise for Wier, though. Wal-Mart not only wanted to keep selling his lawn mowers, it wanted to sell lots more of them. Wal-Mart wanted to sell mowers nose-to-nose against Home Depot and Lowe's.

"Usually," says Wier, "I don't perspire easily." But perched on the edge of his chaise, "I felt my arms getting drippy."

Wier took a breath and said, "Let me tell you why it doesn't work."

Tens of thousands of executives make the pilgrimage to northwest Arkansas every year to woo Wal-Mart, marshaling whatever arguments, data, samples, and pure persuasive power they have in the hope of an order for their products, or an increase in their current order. Almost no matter what you're selling, the gravitational force of Wal-Mart's 3,811 U.S. "doorways" is irresistible. Very few people fly into Northwest Arkansas Regional Airport thinking about telling Wal-Mart no, or no more."

According to the excerpt, Weir said no to Wal-Mart for one key reason: it conflicted with his business strategy,

"Snapper is known in the outdoor-equipment business not for huge volume but for quality, reliability, durability. A well-maintained Snapper lawn mower will last decades; many customers buy the mowers as adults because their fathers used them when they were kids. But Snapper lawn mowers are not cheap, any more than a Viking range is cheap. The value isn't in the price, it's in the performance and the longevity."

It is a fundamental business concept: know who you are and what you stand for.Some people call that having a brand strategy.What takes your breathe away in reading this excerpt is the realization that few businesses are willing to defend that brand when someone is waving millions of dollars in their face.

Over at the Wal-Mart Watch, which a joint project of The Center for Community & Corporate Ethics,  devoted to studying the impact of large corporations on society, and its advocacy arm, Five Stones, Dr.Jonathan Rees of Colorado State University, reviewed the book saying,

"Fishman, a Senior Editor at Fast Company magazine, has done an extraordinary job at coaxing Wal-Mart suppliers to talk about their experiences even though the company seems to have imposed an unofficial code of silence on them.  Here you can read about how companies like Vlasic and Levi Strauss essentially destroyed their own markets by caving in to Wal-Mart’s demands for constantly lower prices, as well as why Jim Wier of Snapper mowers refused to do the same. "

Over at Fast Company's Blog which seems to promote a lot of the magazine contributor's books, they not so humbly say,

"Fast Company senior writer Charles Fishman's new book The Wal-Mart Effect -- which FC recently excerpted -- could very well be the most important book about the most important company in the world."

The post later explains,

"Wal-Mart is now so large, it has created its own business ecosystem, where Wal-Mart alone sets the tempo, the rules, the economic climate. That ecosystem, Fishman explains, literally allows Wal-Mart to stand outside the very market forces which we rely on to modulate and regulate all companies. Wal-Mart is so dominant, it can reshape even the rules of market capitalism."

So far 37 people have posted comments on this entry. There is the requisite post from busines owners who are now out of business thanks to Wal Mart and of course there is also the online squabbling over capitalism vs. fascism. Great Reading. Great Article.

Haven't read the book, but will be ordering it today.

Wag The Dog Fa La La La La La La La La

Oy. It started during Sunday lunch with my parents. My mom was irate: why were retailers insisting on calling it Holiday Shopping instead of Christmas Shopping?

"You're upset about this?" I asked,somewhat surprised and I might add  very confused since my mom, born in Israel, has never had a Christmas Tree, attended a cookie exchange, gone Christmas caroling or even sent anyone a Christmas Card. She opts for the very secular Seasons Greetings.

It wasn't until much later in the day that I figured out where her outrage was coming from--- She, like many octagenarians ( okay she won't be 80 until March)  are Fox News Devotees.

Fox has been wagging the dog concerning a mythical  War on Christmas for the past year--charging secular progressives are behind a plot to destroy our country.FOX is making a convoluted connection with the trend  of retailers to say Happy Holidays instead of Merry Christmas to all things evil .

Using the logic that smoking weed will lead to heroin addiction, these pretend war advocates claim that saying Happy Holidays instead of  Merry Christmas somehow promotes legalized abortion, drug addiction and gay marriage.

If my mom is any gauge of their success, they are winning this mythical war. As my daughter would say...annoying.

Now, from a retail perspective--if businesses start going into the "red" by advertising Ho HO Holidays instead of Merry Christmas then Merry Christmas it will be.

For retailers, its all about the 'green"--show them the money and the advertising will follow. It's not complicated.

USA TODAY has two editorials on the controversy. The left deals with the issue of the pretend war while the right deals with constitutional freedoms.

T. Jeremy Gunn ACLU Program on Freedom of Religion and Belief  opens his editorial with anecdote of what happened last year when a protest group came caroling at the ACLU's Washington Offices.

"To tell the truth, the ACLU is not often serenaded by Christmas carolers. So it was with some excitement that the staff went outside and joined in the singing. They brought with them cookies and warm drinks to share. One staff member, who is an ordained Baptist minister, did a little witnessing about his faith to some astonished proponents of family values.

Fox News did broadcast the event (as a part of its "war against Christmas" campaign). Although the visiting singers were shown, the cameras failed to include any footage showing that everyone had participated in the caroling. Rather than reporting the facts, the anchor preferred the propaganda: "We believe the ACLU heard the message loud and clear, but they don't care."

Randy Singer, author of The Judge Who Stole Christmas writes that the law doesn't mandate a secular Christmas

."...if we eliminate religious symbols from the public square, can the Christmas holiday itself be far behind? This is the specter of Christmas future. Let's not pretend. Christmas is a national holiday with religious roots that ultimately extend back to a manger in Bethlehem. If we want to preserve the Christmas holidays tomorrow, public officials today should continue the tradition of displays reflecting the diversity of our society — both religious and non-religious.

Under our Constitution, there's nothing wrong with acknowledging the historical origins of a religious holiday. Elected officials and federal judges are not required to replace our pluralistic society with an atheistic one.

We are a diverse people with rich religious traditions. There should be room in the square for us all

Which of course is what the retailers are trying to do by saying Happy Holidays in their advertising-- they are trying  to make room for all of us.

Merry Christmas! Happy Hanukah! And to quote T. Jeremy Gunn from his editorial,   "and for believers in all other traditions: Thank you for enriching our world!

Tipster

When you work in a coffee shop, a good day or bad day depends on large part on how many tips you get.

It's been nine months since Rikki started her career as a barista. Saturday was a very good day. She made over $20 in tips.

This is her first job. She works one day after school and on the weekends.

While the job has taught her many lessons,her biggest is that their is a hierarchy to the tip jar. At her coffee shop, there is one barista that everyone wants to work with because he racks in the tips more than anyone else.Saturday was her lucky day.

It paid off in espresso beans.

When I asked her why she thought this particular person was king of the tips,she didn't hesitate. Her answer stunned me.

She said,"He's cute."

Before Rikki mentioned anything about tip inequality, I just assumed that people typically put their loose change in the tip charge and that the person behind the counter was not that relevant to the "amount" they left.

I have never discussed with any of my friends what their coffee house tipping policy is .Now I realize that this impression of tipping policies is simply a self -generating belief- that's what I do so I've been assuming that's what everyone  else does.

Do people  really put in more money in the tip jar for a cute guy?  Would this indicate that more women then men frequent coffee houses?

If the demographics are not skewing female,  could the explanation be due to deep rooted societal biases?

Do these customers give  cute guys bigger tips because customers assume guys have more expenses than cute girls. 

Is the assumption that cute guys need and deserve more money than cute girls because there is a belief (albeit a false one) that  cute guys pay for dates while cute girls get taken out on dates?

Or is Rikki's observation, simply wrong? Is there really no such thing as  gender bias when he comes to giving and or receiving tips?

Here's the thing. Even if Rikki is wrong, she has this perception and in this case perception is  her reality. Her experience is forming her world view.

After nine months on the job, after nine months of counting, analyzing and observing her tips, Rikki has formed the belief that men will receive greater rewards for doing the same job, simply because they are guys. And if they are cute guys, they will really be rewarded.

Her lesson and her belief: it doesn't matter how nicely she greets them, how great she serves them, her tip jar will always be a bit smaller than king of the tips.

It would be nice if I could say,"This is just your imagination. Men couldn't possibly receive  bigger tips than women.

It would be nice if I could say, "I'm sorry that is happening but when when you get a "real" job  your income will not be affected by your chromosomes.

Of course I can't say that.

NOTE: RIKKI is a pseudonym.

Day Late, Dollar Short

Under the category of " You Can't Make This Stuff Up", The  Family Dollar Store in a small Tennessee town who fired an employee who went to Mississippi to rescue her siblings after the hurricane, is now offering her job back.

Yesterday, The Tennessean.com,  reported on the story of 20- year- old Kolonie Simms  who was fired from her job for taking time off to rescue her siblings from flood ravaged Mississippi. She had asked and received permission to take the trip to return to Mississippi.

"Her bosses didn't necessarily object to her trip, she said, but objected to her leaving work four hours early on Thursday and not leaving for Mississippi until late Friday.

Family Dollar officials declined to comment yesterday, citing a policy against talking about individual employee situations.

The company is helping employees affected by the hurricane, a spokeswoman said."

Several hours after the story appeared in the Tennessean and after the company was pummeled by the media, officials decided to offer Kolonie her job back.

"Reached yesterday afternoon shortly before heading to a live national TV appearance, Sims said she hadn't expected her story to generate so much attention or emotional outpouring from around the country.

"I'm a bit overwhelmed," she said.

The company offered to reinstate her as an assistant to the assistant manager and to compensate her for the work she missed. It did not offer her a raise or the management position she had been striving for, Sims said.

"We are waiting to hear back from Ms. Sims as to whether she will accept our offer of re-employment," a statement issued by the company said."

If Ms. Sims does decide to take the job, someone might one to give her a copy of the book I wrote about yesterday: How to Work for an Idiot: Survive & Thrive--Without Killing Your Boss.

She's going to need it.

The Fixer

It could be semantics. It could be different business practices. Or, it could be greed. This is a look at how different businesses interpret the request to "fix" a problem with a car.

The car in question is my son Noah's 94-dark green Jeep Grand Cherokee with about 150,000 miles on it. For the past year the electrical windows haven't worked.

This required some interesting maneuvering at drive up ATM's, fast food restaurants, and toll booths( we don't really have toll roads  in Minnesota and Wisconsin) but a trip to Chicago would require some interesting contortions to get the money in the "catcher" do-floppy at a toll booth,

But,given that we live in Minnesota and Noah goes to the University of Wisconsin, having a car with windows that didn't roll down wasn't that big of a deal. In the winter we like those windows rolled up.

After driving around this way for almost a year, Noah took the car to our favorite auto repair shop and they "fixed" the problem for $400.

Oh the joy of being able to electrically roll a window up and down.The joy lasted three weeks.

Unfortunately, the window stopped working in the down position. So now, instead of having a window that wouldn't roll down, Noah had a window that wouldn't roll up.

A window in the down position is a much bigger problem.

Noah took the car back to our favorite auto repair shop and they said it would now cost an additional $600 to fix the problem. They assured us that this was a new problem, not the old problem that cost $400.

Noah and I were not amused. Time for a second opinion. The second opinion cited a different problem and said it would cost $500 to “fix”.

Noah then took it to the Jeep dealership. They charged him $60 for the diagnosis and then quoted yet a completely different reason for the problem and quoted him about $1200 to get it fixed.

At this point we decided to go to our auto body shop, Wreck Bros ( I kid you not) and he recommended that we go to Sparks(I'm not making these names up)

Sparks“fixed” the problem for $200. With one inconvenience. Noah can’t open the passenger side window from the driver side control panel.

Sparks explained that the other businesses idea of “fixing” the problem was to install all new parts.

Sparks is in business to repair the malfunctioning part.

“So,” we asked, “what was the problem?”

Sparks responded, “A screw.”

“A screw?” we were incredulous.

“Yes,” said Sparks,“The screw had broken off so we glued a new one back on.”

End of repair. The car is fixed. We got screwed and saved a heap of money.

P.S. Noah called the Jeep Dealership and shared what happened. The Jeep dealership is refunding his $60.

Corporate Hide and Seek

The lengths some businesses go to hide their phone numbers makes a girl feel like they don't want to hear from her.  What's with that?

A couple of months ago I bought some software that I thought I could use on my Blackberry. When I realized the software was incompatible, I tried to look up the customer service number on the software company's website.

The didn't have one. They didn't even use traditional email. Instead, I had to complete a questionnaire that was  then submitted to their customer service department. Instead of sending me an email to let me know how the situation was being resolved, I was required to revisit their site and check on the status of my issue.

It's the new Corporate Hide & Seek. Corporations Hide their phone numbers and consumers spend hours seeking them out.

Over at Slate.com, Timothy Noah is making it part of his  personal mission in life  to Seek out phone numbers that companies are trying to hide.  It was Noah who gleefully published the phone number for customer service at  Amazon.com.In case you think you might need it it's 1-800-201-7575. ( I just checked and it is a working number)

Noah has not been as successful in getting the customer service number for iTunes.While he did find a number, it ended up as a dead end with a recorded message saying:

"If you're calling about a question relating to an iTunes music store purchase or gift certificate, please visit us on the Web at www.apple.com/support/iTunes and select the iTunes music store customer service link.

(Click! Dial tone.)

A classic bait-and-switch. Obviously, Apple Computer didn't know who it was dealing with.

I next tried 1-800-275-2273, a number I located, oddly enough, by logging on to Apple's "How To Contact Us" Web page. But all I could find there was "technical support," not customer service.."

Noah eventually called Apple Corporate Headquarters seeking the customer service phone number. He didn't get it. The Apple Operator said she would connect him with corporate customer relations but she wouldn't give him a direct dial number claiming it was just a button on her switchboard."

If anyone has the number, would you send it to Noah. He'll make sure the rest of us gets it.

Then there is advanced hide and seek. This is when you have the phone number of a business but instead of being placed in queue to talk to a customer service Representative,  you get a recorded message that all customer service representatives are busy and you'll have to call back later.

What good is having a number if no one will answer the phone?

This is a favorite hide and seek strategy of  the airlines and companies that are disciples of Six Sigma  Airline reservations systems do it to drive consumers to their websites to make reservations. Six Sigma companies do it to make sure their numbers sing.

It's actually called blocking calls. Here's what happens. When you are a Six Sigma company you  are constantly evaluated on performance. So let's say one of your performance standards is that you can't keep a customer on hold for longer than 5 minutes. If you do, your bosses will be very very unhappy. There are standards to keep.

This works great most of the year when you have an average number of callers. But in certain professions there are peak times of the year when call volume increases dramatically.

Oops...if you don't want to incur extra costs to handle the extra call volume then customers may have to wait longer to reach a real person. That will result in downward curve on performance time, Ugly Pareto Charts , and  most important,you will be hindering the CEO from reporting to the board of directors that the customer service metrics is in excellent shape and the team is performing at near Six Sigma.

Oh the pressure. What to do?  Go for the loophole. In this particular case, the loophole is that the customer service folks aren't  measured on calls that can't get through.  So as long as you block 20-30% of your customers from actually reaching you, you will still have great numbers to share with the CEO.

Don't you just love the new math?