Hey, where did my blog go?

Read This!

Well, I finally made the move. I just finished importing all my blog entries over to my web site. Unless my new site blows up or something, I won't be posting any more entries here at Blogger. To go straight to my new blog page, click here.

Study Questions Impact of DVD Sales on Video Rentals

This appeared in Supermarket News this morning. It's not exactly earth-shattering news, but it got my attention.

Findings from a new study from Lyra Research here question the widely held assumption that the increase of DVD sales has negatively impacted video rental activity, said the research company. "Flicks for Hire: A Video-Rental Survey" shows that people who own more DVDs also rent more DVDs. The report is based on a survey of video renters conducted in June and July. "We can construct obvious logical theories why consumers who own more DVDs would also rent more videos," said Steve Hoffenberg, principal analyst for the DTV View report series and Lyra Research's director of electronic media research. "For example, the more people like to watch videos, the more likely they are to both own and rent them. But such theories don't jibe with a commonly espoused assumption in the video rental industry that the dramatic growth in consumer purchases of prerecorded DVDs is the chief cause of this year's slump in video rentals. Our findings call into question whether DVD buying is indeed the primary factor reducing video rentals, and they suggest a more complex relationship between rentals and purchases."

I find it illogical that DVD sales are putting the damper on rentals. When you buy a DVD, you pay 3 to 5 times the cost of renting one. Presumably, this is because you like it enough that you plan on watching it over and over. This makes sense for children's videos and movies that you absolutely love, but that's been the case for years. We bought plenty of VHS tapes long before we owned a DVD player. Why would the advent of DVD's have a significantly greater impact on the propensity to buy versus rent a video?

Yes, there are those special features that appear on many DVD's and the picture quality is great, but it's still a movie. It still costs a lot more to buy it than it does to rent it, and face it, how many run-of-the-mill Hollywood products do you really want to see three times or more?

In our house, DVD purchases are virtually always in addition to our rental activity, not a substitute. The only exception is when we see something in the theater that we really love. In those cases, we'll often buy the DVD just to have it. Because of the quality and features. We might be slightly more motivated to buy the DVD today than we were the VHS version a few years, but that should be a benefit for the industry.

If the rental industry is broken, then why has NetFlix been so successful? And why is Wal-Mart getting in on the same business? Something doesn't add up.

The sinking value of the Wal-Mart experience

I stumbled across this commentary while reading one of my regular Wal-Mart-related feeds. I'm not disputing Stephen Crockett's points or debating his motivation for taking a stand against Wal-Mart. That's his business, and his reasons are well stated, whether I agree with them or not.

What caught my eye is the startling contradiction, if I may call it that, that emerges from his statements. On the one hand, he says:

I limited my [Wal-Mart] purchases somewhat as a result [of Wal-Mart's anti-union attitudes] but still bought some things because of convenience... I also limited my purchases there because Wal-Mart hurts many local businesses when it moves into a community.

Interestingly, these comments follow this admission:

I bought 20 pairs of the same type of shoe from Wal-Mart over the past six or seven years. Men are creatures of habit.

Two things really jump out at me. First, it sounds like Mr. Crockett shopped at Wal-Mart more often than he thinks he did. At the very least, it's safe to say that Wal-Mart was the first place he shopped for shoes. Second, people are indeed creatures of habit.

In these statements you find the fundamental building blocks of Wal-Mart's dominance: convenience and habit. That's why they have grown and why they continue to grow. As Wal-Mart opens more stores, they become even more convenient, and consumers become even more habitual in their shopping patterns.

I shop at Wal-Mart. I admit it. Sometimes I like what I find there. Sometimes I don't. I also shop at Lowe's, Target, Home Depot and other big box retailers. We all do. Why? Because this is what is available and convenient. These retailers have connected their operating models to American lifestyles and culture. The connection is so strong that even Mr. Crockett was willing, for a time, to disregard his strongly-held beliefs in order to buy shoes at Wal-Mart.

Mr. Crockett didn't stop shopping at Wal-Mart because of his ideology. It was because he was treated poorly as a customer. Poor customer service caused him to reevaluate everything he believes about shopping at Wal-Mart, not the least of which is Wal-Mart's abandonment of Sam Walton's "Buy American" purchasing ethic.

My point is this: Wal-Mart and other big box retailers will remain dominant until other retailers come along that can connect with customers even better than they do. Governments can try to stop the big boxes. Unions can organize to fight them. Individuals can start boycotts. Sure, Wal-Mart itself might hasten the process if they keep letting down customers like Mr. Crockett. But ultimately, only that quiet majority of consumers, those creatures of habit and convenience, will create substantive change.

And you know what? No one knows this better than Wal-Mart.

A Product is only as Good as the Company that Sells It

My primary transportation is a 2002 Volkswagen Jetta station wagon. Driving it is a drug. The performance is just amazing. Unfortunately, the quality is typical VW. Little stuff breaks all the time. I've had no major nightmares, and most of the problems have been covered by warranty. Nevertheless, there is indeed a trade-off between VW's performance and quality. (My experiences with the dealer's service department have echoed this, but that's another story.)

An article in the Cleveland Plain Dealer this morning tells the same story about the VW Passat wagon. Here's a company that makes cars that are simply amazing to drive and are priced affordably. But there's a catch. The company has a track record for being finicky about how they treat their customers.

Volkswagen has always had a reputation for occasional quality problems, but I don't think that's what hurts them the most. The only thing keeping me from considering another VW is the matter of whether or not I can trust VW to stand behind the product. Is the sublime performance worth the risk that I might get stuck paying for the product's shortcomings?

A remarkable product can be killed if a company gains a reputation for not standing behind it. People are willing to take some risk on quality if they know they are protected on the down side. Once doubt exists, the product's performance becomes nearly irrelevant. The review in the article would have been glowing, and I would have immediately put the Passat wagon on my short list of cars to consider next time. Unfortunately, all it did was confirm my doubts. Hopefully, VW will turn the corner. I hate the thought of giving up this wonderful driving experience.

Blogger's Spell Checker

Here's something interesting. The following words are not found and show as misspellings when you run Blogger's spell check on a post.

• blog
• blogger
• blogging
• blogged
• blogosphere

The first recommended alternative for blog is "flog."

Trivial, yet amusing.

Public and Experts Split Over E-voting Security

I blogged on this topic a couple weeks ago. It seems now that the experts are far less trusting of electronic voting than the general public. That's a real surprise to me. I would have expected the techno crowd to be more in favor of it than anyone.

Nevertheless, after reading my proposal from the other day and weighing it against these "expert" opinions, I'm refining my idea.

Let's skip the whole electronic thing for a while. (Presumably, it really will work someday. Apparently, now is not the time.) Instead, let's just implement the second part of my plan. We can call it the Voting Accountability for Morons (VAM) plan or something.

The gist: All voters are responsible for auditing their own ballots before they leave the polls. (This is completely optional. You only do this if you are concerned your punch card won't be read properly -- or if you're a freaky activist of some sort.)

How it works: You scan your punch card in a reader identical to what they will use to count the votes. You receive a printout showing how your card was read (i.e., how you voted). You then have the opportunity to report any discrepancies and make corrections on the spot. Otherwise, what you turn in is what stays in the system. Period.

It's not perfect, but it's got to be better than just putting up a sign that says "Please remove all hanging chad." Does anyone really believe that the folks in Palm Beach County are going to remember what a hanging chad is four years later?

Companies Find They Can't Buy Love With Bargains

Great article in the New York Times about customer satisfaction. I wasn't even familiar with the American Customer Satisfaction Index. It's a neat idea, and despite not knowing how the index is calculated, the contrasting scores reinforce my belief that the products retailers choose to carry often differ from what consumers really want.

The problem? Too many companies confuse selling clever gadgets at good prices with delighting customers. When so many products get cheaper every year, offering customers a great bargain will not necessarily win their loyalty. Someone else is bound to offer a better bargain, and besides, most customers have come to expect good deals. "Price has an effect on whether you buy or not," Dr. Fornell says. "It has less of an impact on whether you're satisfied or not."

Mass retailers perpetuate this problem. In fact, they may be the root cause.

It's virtually impossible to be a successful buyer for a major retailer today and be primarily focused on figuring out what customers want to buy and then carrying it. That's only the beginning, a prerequisite perhaps. The buyer's most important jobs are to:

• Consistently increase return on inventory investment year after year
• Grow top line sales every year

Bonuses are earned and lost on these criteria. Getting vendors to provide annual price reductions (typically referred to as "driving the business" or "adding value") is now the norm. Therefore, product improvements have become mere margin enhancements. "New and improved" usually means that the product had to be changed in order to keep its shelf space -- regardless of whether or not customers were happy with it the way it was.

A buyer's worst enemy is the product that customers buy year in and year out -- unchanged. It's very difficult to grow margins regularly on a product that stays the same. The vendor only has so much to give. Heinz ketchup is the perfect example. It's no wonder that they have the highest customer satisfaction score. They haven't messed with the product, and it continues to keep customers happy! Duh!

Vermont Teddy Bear is a small company whose impressive turnaround shows the power of creating a connection with customers rather than competing on price.

This connection is the relationship between the customer and the product. Retailers either enhance this connection or they hinder it. Price is only one of many elements that define the relationship with the consumer.

Yes, the retailer is also its own brand, but I doubt that has anything to do with the Heinz story. Maybe it did at one time, but those days are long gone. The retailer as a brand is a separate issue.

Why does Amazon produce such satisfied customers? Low prices and wide selection play a part. But plenty of retailers, on the Internet and at the mall, offer good deals and scads of merchandise. The real secret, says Bill Price, a former vice president of global customer service at Amazon, is the site's evolving menu of features and services that make it more friendly, more reliable and easier to use - little touches that personalize the site for each buyer.

Amazon gets it. They understand that price is an element. Free shipping is an element. But so are personalized service, excellent communication, product reviews, wish lists, and so on. Customers trust Amazon.com. They trust Amazon because the company is reliable, remarkable and consistent.

There is always someone with a lower price than Amazon, and some customers will always navigate toward the lowest-cost provider. Most will stick with Amazon, though, because trust doesn't cost much more.

Retailers need to focus more on building trust and carrying what customers want to buy. These efforts will grow markets and, frequently, market share. Healthy ROI and top line sales will follow.

Companies Ignore Customer Email

So much for good customer service. Articles like this one in Internet Retailer pop up once in a while. Although this story pursues the differences in response rates to emails written in English vs. Spanish, the abysmal response rates are just amazing:

Barely half of the world’s best-known brands answer e-mail from consumers...

In the first query, a request for product information got only a 42.7% response rate when submitted in English, and a 46.9% response rate when submitted in Spanish.

The second query, a complaint, got a greater response when submitted in English – 49.4% versus 35.8% for messages sent in Spanish.

The third message, a compliment about the site, got almost equal response rates in Spanish and English – 35.4% and 35.6%, respectively.

The fourth message, a question on where to buy the company’s products, got the highest response rate of any of the four messages when sent in English—50%—but only a 33.3% response when submitted in Spanish.

The top 100 brands included in the survey were drawn from an Interbrand and Business Week study published in 2003 and included global companies such as Colgate, Heineken, Kellogg’s, L’Oreal, Toyota and others.

How can companies possibly think that this is acceptable? Is it the fact that email is easy to put off compared to a phone call or a face-to-face encounter? Is it because upper management still doesn't "get it" when it comes to the technology?

An email contact from a customer is just as important as any other moment of truth. Ignoring it is the same as hanging up on a caller or slamming the door in a customer's face.

Surviving the Slog of Trade Shows

The New York Times has an amusing filler piece today about working at trade shows. The picture is hysterical -- boy can I relate! Some of the quotes are great:

"It just sucks the life force out of you, and you don't even know
why."

"I started keeping a journal because it keeps me busy when the booth is slow and it helps me channel my anxiety," said Kelly Sopp, who will exhibit at half a dozen children's apparel and gift shows this year to promote her Wry Baby clothing line. Typical of her journal notes: "Everybody hates my product."

For exhibitors, commentary overheard from the aisles can require thick skin - and a check on the urge to respond. "One woman walked by and she just rolled her eyes and said, 'Now who would put that on her child?' " Ms. Sopp recalled. "I wanted to yell back, '20,000 people so far,' but you just can't do that.''

Kids Get an Eyeful

The results of this survey featured in eMarketer are truly amazing. Although it's from the U.K., it probably portends a trend here in the U.S. as well.

The "UK Children Go Online" study, for which over 1,500 young people between the ages of 9 and 19 and more than 900 of their parents were surveyed, found that among those young people who go online least once a week:

* 57% have come into contact with pornography online (compared with 16% of parents who say their children have seen porn online)

* 46% say they have given out personal information online (while only 5% of parents realize it)

* 33% have received unwanted sexual or lewd comments online (though only 5% of parents are aware of it)

If seeing is believing, then seeing porn is certainly having an impact on our young people. I remember the effect that a single issue of Playboy had on me in 1976. (And I know where things went from there.) I cannot fathom the depth of the impact that online porn would have had on me at that age.

Today's kids are seeing things that they can never "unsee" just like I did, but they are seeing this stuff with greater frequency and in extremely graphic detail. It is inevitable that this is affecting our cultural values. Porn seems to have permeated our society so much that it has almost ceased to carry any stigma at all among much of the population. I'll never forget the first time I saw a teenager proudly wearing a "Porn Star" t-shirt. Think about what had to happen before this could become even remotely acceptable.

There has been much discussion this week concerning Family Video and the alleged adult section inside their new store in town. Assuming that they really are renting porn videos, should we really be surprised? Before the BlockBuster/Hollywood Video oligarchy, many local video stores in the area had an "adults only" section. Folks, if the statistics are true, then the video store is a yawner compared to what's going on in your living rooms!

This is something we have to deal with in our families and in our church. It's in the community, and I don't think that's going away -- maybe ever. If we're going to petition this retailer, fine. Maybe it is justifiable. But let's at least couple that with a look inside. We have much optical lumber to remove when it comes to pornography!

Lost electronic records from '02 raise '04 concern

This post on Boing Boing and the related news stories really make me wonder how they are ever going to get this whole mess straightened out.

Punch card ballots = hanging chads (i.e., subjective evaluation).

Electronic and touch-screen voting systems = likely crashes from time to time.  It just happens. We all use Microsoft Windows. We know it's going to happen. (Shut up, Mac users. You're in denial! Your computers crash too. I've seen it happen.)

So what are we supposed to do?

Here's an idea:

1) Use both systems -- simultaneously. The electronic votes count first since they're easier and more efficient to tally. If there is a problem such as a super close outcome, then the punch cards get used for the re-count only. (Obviously, this requires a device that records two identical votes at the same time, but that seems doable.)

2) All voters are responsible for auditing their own ballots before they leave the polls. You scan your own punch card in a reader, and then you receive a paper receipt showing how both methods were recorded. It's your responsibility to report any discrepancies on the spot. Otherwise, what you turned in is what stays in the system. Period.

Is this constitutional? Who knows. Half the eligible population, more or less, doesn't even bother to vote anyway, which makes me shake my head even more.

Skunk Gel repellent

I wonder if Dad would have used this when we were kids to stop us from getting into his toolbox (and not putting things back). I can think of all kinds of possible uses. The practical joke opportunities are endless!

Throw Away that Nose Hair Clipper

You know those weird news stories you read on Yahoo! from AP and Reuters? Well, here's a true story that would fit right in.

My large-nostriled brother just went through quite a scare. He has always harbored a deep rooted concern about excessive nose hair. But his efforts to trim the problem had some unexpected consequences this week.

It seems that one of his nose hair follicles became infected early this week. After a couple days, the bugger started to swell. By Wednesday it had developed into a full-blown staph infection and required urgent hospitalization. Oral antibiotics just weren't doing the trick, and his face was literally looking like the elephant man. 

The pain was so severe that morphine wasn't even taking the edge off. By Thursday night the IV antibiotics were winning the battle. All that's left now is a large pustule that requires an occasional Q-tip dredging.

Upon returning from the hospital, the first thing my brother did was throw out his nose hair clippers. It's just too risky to keep on using them.

Testing Hello from the Office

It works, even through the big firewall. I don't know whether to be thrilled or scared. (Don't give me a hard time. It's lunch hour.)  

Blogs Not Hotter than Hotbot

Seth Godin makes an excellent observation about how perception isn't always reality.  When it comes media coverage, by nature we assume that the more coverage something gets, the bigger it is. If it's being reported all over the place, then it must not only be a big deal, it must be a bigger deal than the things that are not being reported. Of course, this is not the case.
 
Although the Alexa data Seth cites may be flawed, it's still interesting that one of the web's most obscure search engines generates traffic tantamount to the entire universe of blogs. Of the dozen or so people with whom I've discussed my blog, only two knew what a blog is, and only one actually reads blogs. Forbes, Fast Company, Business Week -- they've all got articles about blogs and blogging. No one is writing about Hotbot.
 
News is what it is -- news. It is not a comprehensive barometer of actual trends in human behavior. Just look at the number of things on the Yahoo! Buzz Index or the Google Zeitgeist that make you scratch your head. Most of the stuff there is what's showing up in the media, but there are usually a few things on these lists that didn't make any mainstream headlines.

Testing Hello again

One last test.
If you're wondering what this is all about, click this icon ---> 

Testing Hello

Testing Hello. 

Most layoffs not due to offshoring

While I'm no fan of sending jobs overseas just because it's supposedly cheaper, this news story really puts all the current hype in perspective. Only 2.5% of the jobs lost in Q1 were from layoffs due to offshoring.

Leave it to the media to blow things way out of proportion. I understand that it's news and ought to be covered, but it's equally newsworthy when we learn that the trend isn't as prevalent as the quantity of coverage led us to believe.

As with so many things, offshoring your customer service department or your IT staff is the latest fad. Most companies will recognize it for what it is and will avoid it suspiciously. Many of those that try it will find that they dramatically overestimated the savings or underestimated the difficulty of managing customer relationships across two languages, a dozen time zones and other red tape.

The 7th P

For decades our CEO has expressed a list of guiding principles for our company that he refers to as the "Six P's." They are:

• Purpose
• People
• Products
• Process
• Patience/Perseverance
• Profit

Though it requires some elaboration to explain how they are applied at our company, they are pretty fundamental. It's easy to remember them once you hear the speech, but I won't go into that right now. That's not the point of this post.

What's new and interesting (and cool) is that recently Tom talked about the "Seventh P" -- Prayer. In over twelve years working with him, I've never heard Tom talk openly about this.

In Tom's words, "No major decision is made at this company without prayer." Like the other six P's, that's not exactly a revolutionary concept. But the fact he said it to the whole office staff is remarkable. Why the coming out? Why did he suddenly decide to add it to the list publicly, assuming that it has been on the unspoken list for some time?

Here's my theory (and it's just a theory at this point)... Tom added it to the list because what was an assumed principle to many in his generation -- a given -- is something that needs to be taught to younger managers raised in post-modern America. It's part of an untold legacy, one that now needs to be communicated more overtly.

Faith is personal for everyone, but for many of the people I've known in Tom's generation, my parents included, it is intensely private as well. While they'll probably stop short of outright evangelism, I think we're going to start learning more about this part of the lives of many business leaders who are closing in on retirement. If my theory is right and this develops into a trend, then I welcome it.

Walmart.com

Interesting story in this morning's Internet Retailer newsletter. Walmart.com is going to become a much stronger online player, but their business may look different than many of the other majors. With their store count and foot traffic so high, they are in a unique position to use their web site to generate in-store purchases (and vice versa).

The fact that you can return Walmart.com purchases to Wal-Mart stores also increases store visits and online consumer confidence. They are well ahead of the pack on this. They also run their own site and thus control their own destiny more readily than many other retailers. Target and Toys R Us, for instance, depend on their partnerships with Amazon.com.

Wal-Mart suppliers would do well to pursue programs that 1) convert online success with Walmart.com into store listings, and 2) encourage in-store programs that promote products that are only available at Walmart.com. Multi-channel marketing at its best!

Key Life

I just received my first CD from Key Life. I signed up to receive them a few weeks ago. Steve Brown is a wonderful teacher. Down to earth. Real. Biblical. Personal. From the CD, it sounds like he's a fellow pipe smoker too! Steve's messages are one of the few things connecting with me lately.

D-Mac's Comments on Wal-Mart Credit Card Figures

Wow, a comment on one of my posts! That's really something. (OK, I confess -- it's from a family member. Don't burst my bubble.)

At 6/2/2004 09:24:01 PM, D-Mac said...
Hey Rob. Sam's club only takes debit cards. WalMart had that anti-trust suit against MC/Visa a while back. Pretty viscious, which is why Sam's only take debit. Cuts out the merchant Fee. That probably explains part of the quirk. Also, the average American has 4 credit cards. So the statistics are probably off. It may only be 50 million people that actually have cards, it is just multiple cards.

Actually, Sam's does accept one credit card: Discover. Costco only accepts Amex. BJ's accepts all four major cards. The figures I was given were for Wal-Mart stores only; Sam's was not included in the calculation. (Incidentally, the average Sam's Club customer is _much_ more affluent than the typical Wal-Mart customer. I don't remember the difference in income level, but I was really surprised when I heard it.)

I did some more poking around for credit card ownership rates. The most recent data I could find indicated that the average American holds seven credit cards, which includes department store and oil company cards. I also found a slightly older reference to the total number of people carrying cards that put the number just over 200 million. That's in the ballpark with the 190 million I quoted earlier. (Sorry I don't have any supporting links. I was on the job and didn't have time to copy them. I think I found most of the info on Cardweb.com.)

Wal-Mart does not accept MasterCard debit cards. They do take Visa debit cards, though. I witnessed an "associate" explaining this to a customer last week. I am not sure about Sam's and debit cards. (I've never used a debit card in my life -- I wonder what the debit card demographics look like.)

Regardless of the figures, I am still amazed that half of Wal-Mart's customer's don't have credit cards.

Great Resource for Economics Info

Being the information junkie that I am, I felt like a kid in a candy store when I re-discovered Ed Yardeni's research site. (The link is in the upper right corner of the page.) The Consumer Handbook (With Baby Boom Charts) is particularly interesting from a marketing standpoint, and it is updated monthly.

Singing the Same Tune

Last night's edition of Frontline was about the music industry and all of its troubles. While this could have degenerated into another gagging regurgitation of the internet file sharing controversy, the program instead focused on the overall business and how it works.

Throughout the program, there was discussion of the retail distribution channels for music and how much the big retailers dominate the business. One record company exec said that Best Buy, Target and Wal-Mart together account for 50% of music sales. As is the case with so many other products, CD's now have to please the few dominant retailers before they are readily available to the consumer.

This is yet another illustration of my longstanding belief that merchandising has become less about carrying the products that consumers want to buy and more about retailers offering what they want to sell. More and more product offerings are retailer-driven, not consumer driven.

Although the retailing giants do not operate in a vacuum -- they cannot succeed if consumers are not willing to buy what is being offered, things are very different than they used to be. Oligopoly, which is basically what we have in much of retailing today, reduces the risk of failure for the dominant players. They have the foot traffic, so as long as they meet the minimum requirements, they'll sell whatever they offer. Remember the bread lines in the Soviet Union? Do you think quality was much of an issue? (Extreme example, I know, but it's still a relevant point.)

Maybe a more realistic example is the U.S. auto industry in the 1970's. They went for years offering an inferior product -- and people accepted it because that's what was available! It took many years of pressure from the Japanese before GM, Ford and Chrysler woke up and realized that consumers will, when given the choice, respond to better products when they are readily available.

Ultimately, I think many categories of retailing are on the same path. Sure, there are new factors like internet shopping, but I still believe that history will repeat itself. They only question is when.

Wal-Mart Stores RV Parking

I just found an FAQ buried on Wal-Mart's web site that talks about RV parking. This is great marketing. Here's an activity -- parking one's motor home -- that would drive most retailers and other business crazy. Wal-Mart, instead of patently prohibiting the activity, embraces it, knowing full well that they will pick up tremendous sales (and goodwill) by having people temporarily "live" at their doorstep. For all the annoying things that wal-Mart has become, they didn't become the largest company in the world by saying "no" to their customers.

Five years from now...

Interesting predictions from Seth Godin. They made me think...

Hard drive space is free

It's easy to see this happening already. Google's new gMail and Yahoo Briefcase are good examples. It's also remarkable how many places will host your images and other files for free.

Wifi like connections are everywhere

Yes, but with more and more Blade Runner/Minority Report-like advertising messages.

Connections speeds are 10 to 100 times faster

That would change everything. I wonder how much of today's hardware will be able to keep up with that. My hunch is that people are keeping their computer hardware longer. Are there any infrastructure barriers to this as well?

Everyone has a digital camera

No brainer. The camera is morphing into a device that is integrated into all kinds of other device platforms -- phones, PDA's, computers and camcorders.

Everyone carries a device that is sort of like a laptop, but cheap and tiny

I never would have believed that PDA sales would start tanking the way they have. Mine is indispensable. I guess they just don't improve productivity enough for many people. Whatever the replacement is, it will have to do a better job if it's going to take root.

The number of new products introduced every day is five times greater than now

At the rate things are coming out of China, it wouldn't surprise me. The growth in skilled product development and implementation there is mind boggling.

Wal-Mart's sales are three times as big

That's about 25% growth per year. They should easily get almost half that from their growth in the US. Factor in their international opportunities, and this is very doable.

Any manufactured product that's more than five years old in design sells at commodity pricing

This is almost true already. The Bose Wave Radio is the only exception I can think of off hand! Seriously, though, the product life cycle keeps getting shorter and shorter.

The retirement age will be five years higher than it is now

Will it really add a year each year? That seems a bit aggressive. Regardless of how fast it changes, people will certainly be retiring later and later in life.

Your current profession will either be gone or totally different

It's amazing how much it has changed in the past five years. Being in the CPG business, the rate of change is palpable. Our company figures that in five years, half of our current sales channel will be completely gone. We have five years to replace half our sales volume, or we're gone too.

State Tax Receipts are Rising Again

I just read a report that state income tax receipts have steadily improved over the past few months. Yet another encouraging sign that the economy is growing at a healthy pace. I've seen amazingly little coverage of this in the media. A search on Google News turns up a handful of articles including this one. As the coffers are refilled, I have to wonder how many states will rescind or reduce the tax increases they've enacted over the past couple years. With few exceptions, I bet they won't. Spending will rise to fill the gap long before any tax reductions pass through the legislatures.

Always a Low Price. Not Always a Credit Card.

I heard something interesting about Wal-Mart. Over 100 million people shop at Wal-Mart Stores each week. Not a big surprise given how many stores they have. Amazingly, though, only 50% of these customers have credit cards. Given that the US population is 300 million and 190 million people carry credit cards, I am having trouble with the math. If true, this implies that virtually everyone in the country who doesn't have a credit card shops at Wal-Mart and those with credit cards are more likely to shop elsewhere in any given week. With that many customers each week, one would think Wal-Mart's customers would look more like the general population.

First Post

Well, this is my first post. Still not sure what I'm going to do with this, but blogging is really, really cool. At least I think so. Stay tuned!