At B&D, there was an oft used expression”CLT”.
That stood for “Career Limiting Transaction”:
A gaffe or mistake that was so consequential that it was virtually certain to bring a manager’s career progress to a screeching halt, never to be restarted.
In last night’s debate, Gov. Rick Perry became the poster child for CLTs.
Warning: Whether you like the guy or not, this vid is painful to watch.
Though IPO investors disagree, I still think Groupon’s business model is suspect and market valuation is wacky.
Here’s the latest from the WSJ:
Rivals of Groupon are threatening the daily deal site leader by offering quicker payment to merchants, potentially jeopardizing a key part of the company’s business model.
Groupon, which offers online deals for local merchants, keeps itself in cash by collecting money immediately when it sells its daily coupons to consumers while dragging out payments to the merchants over 60 days.
For instance, a hair salon might run a deal offering $100 of services for just $50 on Groupon’s website, which then keeps as much as half of the total collected and sends the remainder to the salon in three installments about 25 to 30 days apart.
“You want to get paid in full as quickly as possible. We’re the ones that have to cover the cost of goods for giving away everything at half price,”
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Groupon pays merchants in installments of 33% over a period of 60 days
LivingSocial pays merchants their full share in 15 days.
Amazon Local, pays immediately.
Google Offers promises 80% of the merchant’s cut within four days, and the remainder over 90 days.
Thanks to SMH for feeding the lead …
In their book Academically Adrift, authors Arum and Roksa … name all the key actors involved in higher education – parents, students, professors, administrators, and government funding agencies – and explain why, given the behavior of all the other actors, no one wants to do anything about high cost and “limited learning” at most universities.
They argue that limited learning on college campuses is not a crisis because the institutional actors implicated in the system are receiving the organizational outcomes they seek,
In other words, the system satisfies the needs of all the players … which explains why everybody seems satisfied with the status quo.
And, explains why there will be a loud cheer when the President issues an Executive order to dismiss all student loans.
Source EconoLib
Thanks to Tags for feeding the lead.
Take Away: Jim Beam looks to boost its market share by diversifying its product portfolio with lighter, fruiters drinks aimed at women. Jimmy hopes to drive new in-home occasions with females, tapping into the ‘ladies night-in’ concept.
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Excerpted from Businessweek.com, “Jim Beam pulls a gender bender”
… After 216 years of catering to guys’ guy, with tattooed singer Kid Rock as a pitchman — Jim Beam whiskey is now chasing women.
“Two years ago, 100 percent of our marketing was geared to men,”
Beam is now touting women-friendly Courvoisier cognac infused with red wine, tart Pucker vodka, and low-calorie Skinnygirl-brand cocktails … trying to reach female consumers with lighter or fruitier quaffs they can consume outside of bars and restaurants.…
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The gender-bending marketing shift happened almost by accident.
In 2009 the distiller introduced a black cherry-infused version of Jim Beam called Red Stag and signed Kid Rock to pitch the product.
As sales took off, Beam discovered that women were buying the sweeter concoction at almost three times the rate at which they typically bought bourbon.
Further research revealed what the company marketing executives came to call the “girlfriend connection … Women tend to drink with other women or in a very social setting.”
“We wanted to understand the emotional reasons why women drink wine or spirits.”
While women make up almost half of spirits drinkers, they consume just 25% of the spirits sold — far less than their 58% of wine consumption,
“We started to understand how to move that wine occasion to a spirits occasion”
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Sales of Beam’s Sauza tequila also benefited from the women’s focus.
About 57 percent of the tequila sold in the U.S. is mixed in margaritas,
Two-thirds of those margaritas are consumed by women. Yet tequila marketers always targeted men.
Sauza began marketing itself around the notion of a “ladies’ night in,” hosting 1,000 in-home margarita parties and advertising on Food Network (SNI). … the company teamed up with restaurants to brand so-called “Sauza-Ritas.”
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The bottom line: Beam is rolling out drinks targeted at women to fuel sales in the $19.2 billion spirits business, which grew 2.3 percent last year.
Edit by KJM
The Homa Files 