31 May 2006 
USS Scorpion Lost
Your Business Blogger has an article up at National Review Online. About the loss of the sub USS Scorpion.
I went to school with a girl whose dad is on eternal patrol.
Yolanda Mazzuchi was about the prettiest girl in our school class. Our dads were in the Navy, often gone for months at a time. And they would be welcomed home at dockside with cheers and homemade signs. These gatherings at the D&S Piers at the Naval Base in Norfolk, Virginia, were a regular part of our lives growing up….
At 1 in the afternoon on Monday, May 27, 1968, at the height of the Cold War the USS Scorpion was due in port.
Yolanda didn’t know it then, but her dad was already dead….
The loss still hurts four decades later. Read the rest.
Mudville Gazette has Open Post.
And visit the vanities.
Frugal Car Maintenance; Management by Your Business Blogger
Nearing the half million mark Your Business Blogger has two bar bets that I always win:
1) I’ve been fired from more jobs than you, and
2) I’ve got more miles than you. On my car, that is.
And the key to longevity is routine maintenance. And the key to maintenance is a competent mechanic.
The Dude pulling maintenance I’ve retained The Dude for the basics. And sometimes more.
He works well with little management supervision.
Call for rates.
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Thank you (foot)notes:
Full Disclosure: The Dude is eleven and employment could run afoul of labor laws in your state. Check local listings before asking for a quote.
Linked on the Festival of Frugality.
30 May 2006
Bribery as a Cost of Doing Business In Washington, DC
Your Business Blogger
with back office hardware
Bangalore, India In India it’s called “Speed Money.” In Mexico it’s call “Facilitation.” In China it’s called a “Relationship.”
In the US of A, it’s called a “Bribe.”
Except in Washington, DC, where it’s called “Love.”
Frank Robinson, an Inspector for the Washington, DC Department of Transportation was caught on tape asking for love; asking for a bribe. According to The Washington Times, May 25, 2006:
Mr. Robinson: You want your permit right away, right?
Contractor: D*mn right I want my permit.
Mr. Robinson: You need to love me, baby, you need to love me. I did my part; you didn’t get no fines or anything.
Contractor: Give me a price. I got to talk to my people about money. Tell me how much.
Mr. Robinson: What you think man? If you had somebody …watch something so you didn’t get a $2,500 ticket?
Contractor: Frank, I need a price.
Mr. Robinson: Give me $500.
Sounds much like doing business in a Third World Nation. Or maybe it is. As Washington, DC has often been compared.
Your Business Blogger once had a boss in the medical device business working the Washington, DC hospitals. He advised me on how to deliver “the gratuity” which was usually in a brown paper bag, to the key influencers and decision makers. My boss was a pro. He directed me to give the goods only after the contract was signed as a “reward.” Rather than before the signed order.
The “thank you” was a box of donuts.
A difference of degree from $100K Congressman Jefferson received as a “gratuity” I suppose.
As Your Business Blogger consults with international clients, particular attention is paid to the difference between a gratuity and a gratuity.
And I would lecture smugly on the superiority of God-fearing English-speaking Capitalists (that’d be us) ruling the world.
(Test: Find something in your house made in China Syria.)
People always ask, “What is the main difference in business between USA and [country X]?
The short answer is that North America has trust as then central tenet of business. The Puritan Work Ethic. I would advise, discreetly, that Americans expect an honest deal. The rest of the world expects to get screwed.
Nobel laureate Milton Friedman spoke to this. He said that a cultural prerequisite of making money is the holding of truthfulness as a common virtue.
When you can trust a merchant’s word, says Friedman, “it cut[s] down transaction costs.”
The North American flavor of capitalism makes the most money and leaves the best taste. Even with an occasional rotten apple in Your Nation’s Capital.
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27 May 2006
Jack Yoest Blogs in National Review On Line and Small Business Trends
NRO Your Business Blogger is honored to have articles up on National Review On Line, Small Business Trends and Small Business Trends Radio.
NRO has a tribute to the men and families of the USS Scorpion. A submarine lost during WWIII, the Cold War. Five Days in May:
Yolanda Mazzuchi was about the prettiest girl in our school class. Our dads were in the Navy, often gone for months at a time. And they would be welcomed home at dockside with cheers and homemade signs. These gatherings at the D&S Piers at the Naval Base in Norfolk, Virginia, were a regular part of our lives growing up….
At 1 in the afternoon on Monday, May 27, 1968, at the height of the Cold War the USS Scorpion was due in port.
Yolanda didn’t know it then, but her dad was already dead….
Small Business Trends Small Business Trends was founded and is edited by Forbes Magazine Award Winner Anita Campbell. Please visit — my column appears on Tuesdays.
See: Two Perfect Job Candidates? Here’s How to Choose. Say you are interviewing a homosexual and a perfect heterosexual preppie. What factor would be key in your decision? The answer will surprise you in this controversial post:
Hiring is one of the most time consuming and agonizing responsibilities of the small business owner. We are often confronted with candidates with nearly identical categories of knowledge, skills and abilities.
How does the business owner pick just one? The one right person?…
The first measure in marketing is return on investment. What sales were generated with which marketing campaign.
For small businesses — or even larger businesses — with limited marketing budgets, the demographics served by radio, podcasts and websites may produce the best sales per marketing dollar.
But the mediums must be considered carefully.
Radio has ratings numbers. Podcasts have down load numbers. Websites have pageviews.
Easy to compare….
Do visit and let me know what you think.
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Victoria’s Secret on Display
Cross post from Charmaine over at Reasoned Audacity. With another type of audacity. The coarse culture with coarse marketing. Or is it the other way around?
First, let me just state, that an extremely high percentage of the lingerie that I own [Charmaine’s post, remember] has a Victoria’s Secret label in it. I hesitate to reveal something so personal, but it’s not exactly a news flash: Victoria’s Secret is the lingerie colossus. They cornered the market on nice, but sexy underwear for American women.
So why go slutty? This picture (courtesy Andrea Lafferty) is from the window of a new Victoria’s Secret in Tyson’s Corner mall in Virginia. According to the Washington Post, this is part of a new national marketing campaign.
I’m very, very disappointed to see VS caving in to crudity. It’s just too easy to go sleazy.
But it’s a bad move for them. Competitors are easy to find.
Charmaine is right. As I travel to different countries studying business, the biggest difference I find is that Americans are demanding customers with little toleration for bad products. Or bad marketing.
24 May 2006
President Bush and Philadelphia Lawyers
There are two types of people you should never have at a negotiation table: lawyers and technologists.
Good lawyers play defense. Good consultants play offense. Technologists won’t play.
Your Business Blogger
and legal counsel
at the Franklin Institute
Your Business Blogger is in Central Philly attempting to do a deal. But there are lawyers everywhere; mine and theirs and probably yours. And all the legal counsels in chorus say no, no, no.
And I just wanna do business.
It’s no, no, no vs. money, money, money.
And Shakespeare said, First we kill all the lawyers. Timeless truth.
Nothing happens. While they still live.
So I’m back in the Sheraton, inside my room and I settle down to relax a bit and enjoy some idle time with one of my favorite capitalists on cable Ludlow.
But no. Shouting outside: Go Home Bush! Go Home Bush! Go Home Bush! Protesters everywhere and the racket reaches to my sixth floor eyrie.
I couldn’t tell if the unhappy screamers were Democrats. Or Republicans
Bush is working for the re-election of Congressmen Mike Fitzpatrick and Jim Gerlach doing a (big) deal a few floors up.
Jim Gerlach
Mike Fitzpatrick
President Bush is here for a fund raiser — he’ll do $600K — get a photo shot for $5k, a plate for $1,000. Bush knows how to make money.
Must be no lawyers in the room.
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Carnival at YoungRepublican.
John Wanamaker: Marketer, Post Master, Mason
Citizen
1838 — 1922
And who was most concerned about the return on the investment of his marketing budget:
Half the money I spend on advertising is wasted; the trouble is, I don’t know which half.
Wanamaker opened his first store in Philadelphia in 1861 with the revolutionary guarantee, “One price and goods returnable.”
Saint John is credited with opening the first department store — John Wanamaker & Co. also known as “The Grand Depot.”
US President Benjamin Harrison must have seen the cross over applications of Wanamaker’s marketing genius to the, the …Post Office.
(This is America!)
Wanamaker is acknowledged with producing the first commemorative stamp. Where Marketing meets government.
He also was a Presbyterian who founded the Bethany Sunday School, and was Worshipful Master of his Masonic Lodge.
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Thank you (foot)notes:
Also see Benjamin Franklin’s business model combining the Post Office and blogging newspapers.
22 May 2006
Automotive Body Work, A Frugal Solution
The Dude masking The monster SUV suffered an altercation resulting in just-below-deductible damage.
Where some would regrettably spend $500 on the repair, Your cheap Business Blogger saw a learning experience. For the Dude.
The Dude prime time I read somewhere, that A grandfather is one who let’s you hold the screwdriver. Something about a father’s impatience. And a grandfather’s wisdom.
In my life’s goal to grow-up to be a wise old man, I’m letting The Dude turn the wrenches rather than wait for my children’s childrens’ turn.
The Dude, Paint it Black
So The Dude learns a car-guy life skill. I save some money.
And we are both the richer.
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18 May 2006
What is the Best Marketing Tool?
Sports Illustrated A good marketing campaign includes reach, frequency and awareness. A great campaign would have a branding image installed in:
100% of all businesses.
Viewed by each office worker five times a day.
Five days a week.
50 weeks per year.
What gives a business that measure of exposure? A $100K billboard? Permission-based email blast with girlie content?
Nope. You have one on your wall now.
A calendar. Low tech. Dates on a grid. Paper on a nail. Common as paper clips.
You have a PDA down in your pocket. But there’s a calendar at eye level.
Lots of them.
If you are at work in a cubicle, you have an average of 2.5 each. At home you have four calendars.
Smart marketers understand that a calendar tells a story. Like a business card. And that calendars can be a business card on a wall.
Joe Bunsness from Triumph Calendars, Norwood Promotional Products reminds us that the research is compelling:
86% of people remember what the message is on the calendar or who gave them the calendar.
83% of organizations purchase the products of the business who supplied the calendar.
70% of what is heard is forgotten, but…
80% of what is seen, is retained.
What is experienced for 30 days becomes a habit.
The lowly calendar as
marketing vehicleSo send out 100 calendars with your logo and contact info. What happens? And how do we know?
Running the numbers down a funnel is easy. Research has also provided some predictability in what happens next:
Assume a cost of $3.00 per calendar. For every 100 calendars sent to a client:
An estimated 50% of the calendars will be hung up on the end-users’ wall.
A calendar is viewed five times per day per person.
A calendar is viewed by 1.5 persons per day.
A calendar is hung in an office open 5 days per week,
50 weeks per year.
I’ll the math, if you don’t mind.
100 X .5 X 5 X 1.5 X 5 X 50 = 93,750
If you would allow me a +/- 10% variance, the campaign could have 100,000 impressions for $300. (Marketers always round up.) Or .003 cents per impression. Cost would be a penny for three viewings. Cheap eyeballs.
At least compared to Super Bowls ad rates. $2.4 million / 86.8 million viewers. Nets to .03 cents per viewer.
So calendars are 10 times better than a Super Bowl ad. Even if you had a 7 figure ad budget.
Calendars can help your clients memorize your message. One day at a time.
Calendars, the
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Thank you (foot)notes:
Full Disclosure: Your Business Blogger owns a calendar company and has a patent pending for a particular market segment. Unfortunately this is not a sales pitch. My calendars are not for sale to the general public. But you should still consider calendars as a marketing tool.
Arlington National Cemetery, A Memorial Day Tribute
A cross post from Charmaine at Reasoned Audacity, last year.
Every time we’ve made the left turn onto Eisenhower Drive, and passed through the imposing brick gates of Arlington National Cemetery, I’ve been overwhelmed with emotion. Family members of those buried at Arlington National Cemetery are given a special pass and may drive onto the Hallowed Grounds to visit the grave of their loved one. It’s an enormous honor which makes me feel humbled.
The Penta-Posse
at Arlington National Cemetery
My husband’s father served thirty years in the United States Navy, and died the year I married into the family, so I didn’t know him well. And the fact is, after a lifetime of nine-month Mediterranean tours, wars, and rumors of war, there is a lot my husband doesn’t know as well.
However, over the 15 years that we’ve been married, I have gotten to know my mother-in-law well. She doesn’t talk either about the sacrifices she made, but there is one story that she has told me several times.
Once, when my father-in-law was out on tour, and she was home with three small children, the car broke down and, of course, she had to take care of it. My husband marched up and said, “Don’t worry, Mom, I’ll fix it.” He was about five years old at the time.
My mother-in-law laughs. . . the little man, takin’ care of things. But it makes me cry.
We owe a lot to our military families.
When we visited Arlington this past week, we passed at least three funeral ceremonies on the way to Section 64. I lost track of the fresh graves and the still-standing tents, either just vacated by other grieving families, or awaiting the afternoon’s fresh, raw sorrow.
As we pulled up on Bradley Avenue, an Air Force honor guard was marching precisely back to their bus after a ceremony for an airman who had been a POW in Korea. While we searched for my father-in-law’s headstone, an empty horse-drawn caisson lumbered past, and settled briefly in the shade nearby, awaiting their next assignment. . .
We found my father-in-law’s headstone: The front has the Christian Cross with the old Chief’s Curriculum Vita. Chief Yoest cut high school to catch World War II. He retired with rows of ribbons and a “v” device, and pinned butterbars on his boy. He now has a grandson, The Dude, who bears his name and wants to be a Navy pilot.
The reverse of the stone is blank, awaiting the inscripton for Chief Yoest’s high school sweetheart, his wife, Jack’s mom, “Babcia” (Polish for Grandmother), who is still with us. In the end, they will be buried together, an honor she earned.
As we turned to go, the Diva took her jingle-bell necklace from around her neck, and left it on the headstone. A fitting tribute for a warrior.
Sailors, rest your oars.
We drove back down Bradley Avenue — past a fresh grave covered by a tarp. In front of us, sparkling in the bright sunlight of a gorgeous day, stretched row after row of white marble markers, orderly, peaceful, some weathered, others new and crisply chiseled . . .
I turned to the Penta-Posse. “I want you to look,” I said. “I want you to understand, that each one of these headstones represents someone who gave their life so that you could be free.”
They were quiet and solemn. The weight of it is beyond measure.
The Dreamer said, “Don’t cry, Mom.”
We made the right turn onto Eisenhower. We drove slowly toward the exit, passing the drive to the Tomb of the Unknowns to our left, until we came to a crosswalk thronged with tourists. The guard on duty motioned to the crowd to stop, and we drove through, passing through the gates, back to a busy day, leaving behind — the curious crowds, the chattering school children. . . and the silent stones.
More on Arlington National Cemetery at the jump.
Other Memorial Day Links from last year:
Blackfive with “Opening the Gates of Heaven.”
Intel Dump
See Traffic Jam
Jo’s Cafe has Specials.
Mudville Gazette has Open Post.
Michelle Malkin has Memorial Day Links.
Wiz Bang has links.
LaShawn has tributes.
California Conservative has Memorial Day Tribute.
Continue reading…