Some friends, the husband, and I went out to dinner tonight at a place in Smithville, Missouri, near Kansas City, that was rated very highly by Zagat (29 out of 30). The entire experience typically takes 2-3 hours and it was well worth it. The restaurant is run by a husband-and-wife team, who converted the old…
In the post this morning about Brands and Brand Equity, I mentioned the Chick-fil-A scandal in passing; particularly how it has experienced a 50% drop in brand perception over the past few weeks as the scandal unfolds. One of the questions was too expansion to deal with in the comments thread so I put it…
As some of you probably surmised from the Neiman Marcus and Community Coffee Company posts, I have been studying brands and brand equity for the past few weeks. It is a fascinating concept that exists because of the interplay between basic economics and human psychology. Most of the time, brand equity changes slowly. More rarely,…
Last week, I posted on a 50-year investment history of shares of The Coca-Cola Company. As I was publishing this month’s About.com content, I began writing a piece that I called The Dividend Dilemma that focused on whether you should reinvest your dividends or not. Around the same time, one of the readers, Matt Nix,…
We’re finishing with the home upgrades, I need to run to the airport to pick up my brother … a lot of good things are happening!
This really is an amazing planet. A new version of my favorite “Earth from space” videos has been posted, this time with pictures from the International Space Station, set to music, and well-edited. Thank you Knate Myers for putting this together and to the folks who tipped me off about it. I recommend you watch…
Picture it: I had to do a favor for my brother. Aaron goes with me. We walk into Barnes & Noble after said favor is complete. As I make my way through the aisles on the upper level, I approach a near empty table with an Angry Bird plush ceremoniously placed in the center. Right over the opening to the lower floor. It took every ounce of my not inconsiderable self-control not to pick it up, yell the Angry Birds sound, and hurl it over the abyss.
For longer than I can remember, I have come across Community Coffee, a family-owned coffee roaster that is famous in the Southern United States, particularly the Louisiana area. I have always intended to order their coffee to try it for myself but it would slip my mind. During a recent episode of True Blood, I noticed it…
I’ve spent a big part of today doing investment research on synthetic gemstones vs natural gemstones. Following the recent reading foray into the world of jewelry retailing, distributing, and mining, I kept coming across a company called Chatham. They had reportedly perfected the art of manufacturing gemstones such as rubies and sapphires inside of a…
That is the average lifespan in the United States today: 27,375 days. If you are typical, that is what was deposited in your “time bank” when you were born. Every day, whether or not you want to, you make a withdrawal of 1 day. When the days run out, you die. Game over.