I had really no idea that this type of SPAM was still around! For a moment I had a flashback to 1999. Amazing! Technology has evolved but SPAM messaging has not 
{ 0 comments }
NY Times reported earlier this week that Netflix introduced a streaming subscription that is cheaper than their DVD rental service! Wow! This marks to me the end of the physical era for movies. Last year I witnessed the closing of the last Virgin Megastore in NYC which was the end of the physical Music era (it is now really hard to find CDs in NYC!).
Shopping streets will never again look the same: gone are the young crowds at music stores, folks renting movies for the weekend in the local video rental store and gone will be the shops filled with book lovers browsing the latest titles. It is just a matter of time… That is… unless existing shop owners are able to differentiate by adding complementary services and products. In Finland this has been happening in video/DVD rental stores for a long time: they have gone en mass in selling candies, ice cream and other sweets. That is of course not going to be enough to justify a shop.
What else besides music, movies and books will be digital soon?
Update November 25: NY times “Netflix a Fast-Growing Rival to Hollywood“, duh, that is an easy one!
{ 0 comments }
Getting support only gets better: real-time, online and using a big existing community. Best Buy at Union Square in New York City is promoting the Twitter support site: Twelpforce.
The beauty and arguably also the downside of care support on Twitter is of course that regardless the difficulty of the problem the question and answer will fit in 160 characters.
When looking at the Twitter page it is clear that it is not a stellar success yet, but who knows what this campaign will do.
What do you say: is support through Twitter a great idea or should we return to the good old discussion forums?
{ 0 comments }
We like(d) Skyr! Having been in Iceland twice it reminds us of this beautiful country, the nature, the freshness… everything that is good about Iceland. So, we were very happy to see Skyr here in the supermarket! While happily eating this delicious dairy treat I flipped over the the backside of the box. I literally could not believe what I was reading! E950, E951 and aspartame… WHAT? I thought, no .. I knew for sure that Skyr was the 100% pure nature dairy?
So I immediately went to http://www.skyr.is/ and guess what: you get a very healthy feeling from the brand ! There is even a Health section. From the site:
The healthy Icelandic cuisine springs from a Nordic heritage of fresh and wholesome foods prepared in simple ways. With Europe’s longest lifespan, the people of Iceland mix a nutritional heritage of hardworking farm living with a vibrant active lifestyle. Skyr is a part of life from infancy onwards and is considered a national treasure!
Wow! No mentioning everywhere about the additional artificial taste boosters and sweetener…
I wondered what was going on and checked all four Skyr variants sold here. It appears two of them have the E950, E591 and aspartame health boost, the others are natural.
The Skyr case is to me a good case on brand authenticity and honesty: the brand boozes health and nature but some of the products do not live up to that. The big question is: why is Skyr selling these? What is the end result? A confused consumer that does not trust Skyr anymore being a really healthy alternative (or at least not prior reading the product ingredients!)
{ 0 comments }
I had the opportunity to stay at the Mandala Suites in Berlin, a beautiful suite hotel at the Friedrichstraße in the heart of Berlin. They offer great rates online, so whenever you visit Berlin do check out their website!
The first thing I noticed when opening the door was the declaration of human rights placed on the table in the hallway. It made me feel even better about the Mandala Suite, they actually care and communicate they care!
With what good thing is your brand associated and are you actively communicating this positive association?
{ 0 comments }
Hello dear people at Twitter,
Once you become so important in people everyday’s life it hurts to see this message over and over. I am sure it also hurts your brand one way or the other. You are in a good position though, there is no real alternative to see Conan’s latest tweet. OMG… is there a new tweet? Please fix your systems:)!
Thank you!
{ 0 comments }
New York Magazine published a very interesting article about Barnes & Noble a while back. The article gives an insight into the thinking and doing at B&N.
Some quotes from the article and facts from other sources:
- The founder of B&N, Riggio, told a reporter a decade ago “I wake up and say that any business created before 1997 is going to be a fossil by the year 2010.”
- Yet, the company’s retail people saw Borders as the real competition
- Investing in technology was minimal “enough to be meaningful but not enough to cannibalize.”
- Amazon launched in 1995. B&N launched their website in May 1997.
- B&N debuted an e-book store in 2001. The adventure lasted a couple of years. Apparently there was also an e-reader but I did not find specs online (“too early is as bad as too late”)
- Amazon launched Kindle in 2007
- B&N launched Nook in 2009
- Kindle books sell more than hardcover books in 2010
- B&N pays about $13 wholesale for a hardcover book that retails for $26. With e-books, margins are far lower—as of now, typically in the neighborhood of $3 or $4.
- As of July 31, 2010, B&N operates 717 bookstores in 50 states and the District of Columbia. Barnes & Noble College Booksellers operated 633 college bookstores at colleges and universities across the United States.
I found this a scary recap of what has happened with B&N and the environment it operates in. For sure I hope B&N stores will not have the same faith as the Virgin Megastores (last store closing in NY). To me B&N stores equal a cosy environment in which you can browse and explore in peace or with some coffee topped with knowledgable and friendly employees.
What would you do if you were heading B&N, how would you continue to differentiate?
Update Feb 17: Borders filed for Chapter 11 first!
{ 0 comments }
Iittala paper shopping bag
The word “throwawayism” gives a little over 24000 hits on Google. Iittala has an opportunity to start owning this new made up word! Well, hopefully in the construction “against throwawayism”.
From the Iittala philosophy :
Have you noticed how easy it is, in our shopping-oriented world, to crowd your home with meaningless things? You find yourself with short-lived items that eventually cease to function, or go out of style. So they are thrown away, adding to the growing mountains of unusable rubbish on our planet, while you keep on shopping for new things.
I admire this approach and while many will argue that a really well designed product is by definition timeless (which I believe as well) it is so hard to actually live up to that. An interesting fact is that in pretty much every Finnish home you will find Iittala products and that is across all generations. In fact two of their popular “everyday drinking” lines Aino Aalto and Kartio have been around since 1932 and 1958 respectively. They are simple in design and totally timeless.
Iittala found a very nice point of difference.I hope the make sure not to jeopardize this with more time sensitive products or by focussing on short term revenues. Stay true to the brand and brand philosophy.
{ 0 comments }
I wrote about Jolicloud about a year ago and have been using it since on my netbook. It is simply great because it allows the average consumer to do what a netbook is made for: browsing the web, mail and light weight editing.
Jolicloud 1.0 is a big step forward! The UI is better, almost iPhone like. It’s easy to install apps, move them around and above all use your netbook for what its made for: the Cloud!
I wonder what will happen to market share of operating systems for netbooks. Will people switch from the heavy Windows 7 and not user friendly Ubuntu? Jolicloud is in my view the best alternative… because it is made for netbooks!
{ 0 comments }
Here is my case: I have about 1TB worth of data I never want to lose! All those thousands of photos, music albums and videos. Most of it is stored on my iMac and then some digitized VHS tapes are stored on external drives. For everything stored on my iMac I do make regular backups to an external drive and utilize an online backup service (Mozy). So, it seems all under control, so what is the problem?
This is where the problem comes in: I am using more computers and other devices at home and would like to have access to my media without having my iMac turned on all the time. So, I am in the market for a home server or network attached storage (NAS). Of course, these will need to have hard disk mirroring (RAID) so that when one drive fails the other takes over and I (in theory) never should lose any data. Here is where the issue comes in: after reading reviews of many many solutions there seem to be none without any issues…. some have data loss(!!), some have other issues. That makes me uncomfortable… I am planning to invest in a storage solution/ home server but basically still need to keep making separate backups ‘just in case’. Wow!
Here is an idea for manufacturers of storage solutions, home servers etc: create a solution that is truly safe of data loss and market it that way. Tap into the feeling of insecurity and provide trust. All in a package designed in an “Apple” way: beautiful and super easy to use. I am sure that with me there are plenty of people willing to pay the premium price!
{ 1 comment }
