Rise of the gourmand December 8, 2007
Posted by Shel in Education, Trends.add a comment
One of the fields that is really coming into favor with students these days is cooking school. For the longest time, this field has been neglected by the mainstream and was only an option for the elite. Well, that’s not the case anymore. With schools like http://www.chefs.com/ gaining prominence, becoming a chef is a great option for a lot of people, who would never consider it earlier. I think the direction this field is taking is due to the way consumers spend their money these days.
The emphasis on going out and having a good meal is once again becoming all important. People are working harder than ever before and want to be able to enjoy themselves with the great meal. Restaurants are also becoming specialized and offering niche cuisines that were the domain of fancy hotels at one time. In general, gourmet food has become accessible to many more people and has led to a spurt in enrollments in cooking schools. I think this trend will continue for quite many years, and this would be a good career choice for those who are interested in doing something creative and have a flair of cooking.
Should I get an iPhone? December 3, 2007
Posted by Shel in Technology, Trends.1 comment so far
I’ve never been one of those people who has to have the latest of gadgets, so when it comes time to really decide which one to buy, I get hopelessly confused. My hubby got a Blackberry Pearl a few months back and is really happy with it, but I wanted to give the iPhone a try. The problem was that I needed to find a worthwhile review such as this iPhone review from Engadget or another iPhone review from Gizmodo to figure out if I wanted one for myself or not. Finding stuff like that on the internet is not the hardest thing in the world, and I came up with the answer pretty quickly.
The Apple iPhone release has been the most anticipated one in recent times and the lines that I saw in the paper for buying a new iPhone were ridiculously long. Thankfully, I am happy enough to get my gadget fix at a later time and now that time has come. Having read about the iPhone, I would like to visit a showroom and try it out in person myself. There is a showroom nearby in town, and I think we will be going there and checking it out in person this weekend.
Searching for local jobs October 20, 2007
Posted by Shel in Trends.1 comment so far
The key to being able to settle into a new home and new city is to be able to find the right help. Having access to a local job search is really the way to creating a comfort zone around yourself and taking care of all the innumerable daily requirements of running a home or business. Moving to a new city and country is no easy task and to find a new job in your new location can be quite a daunting task. The one place I usually head for are the local job search engines, where you can get a good idea of the local jobs.
Since we’ve been moving every couple of years, I have realized the importance of having a backup of such services as it really is what makes all the difference in settling in comfortably and struggling to make a home. Job searches have radically changed in the past few years and has become so much simpler and accessable, no matter where in the world you might be located. It will interesting to note how the industry changes with time, as it is one of the fastest evolving sectors, which combined with technology has carved a totally new niche for itself.
TGIFriday’s offers reduced size menu options May 18, 2007
Posted by Shel in Marketing, Trends.add a comment
TGIF’s decision to offer reduced portions for lower prices earlier this year is an interesting move. These “right portion right price” meals which cost less than a third of the regular sized orders. The company is marketing these meals as offering its customers choice, customization and convenience rather than a ‘reduced menu option’, which did not go down well with customers when it was done by Ruby Tuesday’s about three years back.
“This is a category issue stemming from consumer demand. The category needs to listen,” said Richard Snead, president and chief executive officer of Carlson Restaurants Worldwide, parent of T.G.I. Friday’s restaurants. “We are listening.”
Press Releases:
PR Newswire: T.G.I. Friday’s® Restaurants Take Leadership Role with Portion Control
CPSI Newsroom: T.G.I. Friday’s “Right Portion, Right Price” is Right Direction, Says CSPI:
Watch a video of the hotel before you decide to stay April 28, 2007
Posted by Shel in Travel, Trends.add a comment
Here’s a good way to really ensure that you have a hotel room that you like thanks to Trivop that is said to be the first online hotel video portal, the hotel gives a video walk-through, with videos starting at the street outside the hotel, into the lobby, public spaces and then the rooms. Springwise reports that there are video’s for each type of hotel room. The French Trivop allows users to upload their own videos of the hotel and has 154 hotels in Paris and 11 hotels in London listed on it’s site.
Trivop’s main challenge is to build content and traffic quickly, since TripAdvisor (which has 20 million unique visitors each month and is owned by Expedia), started letting users upload videos last month.
Live the good life in Bozeman, Montana April 24, 2007
Posted by Shel in Real Estate, Travel, Trends.add a comment
While the majority of people don’t think of most of the Midwest as traditionally picturesque or beautiful, I fell in love with the grandness of the sky of the Midwest. The big sky is quite common in most of the Midwestern states, and it’s an awe-inspiring feeling, to be dwarfed by the immensity of the world. The problem is that unless you’ve been there, you’ll never know how amazing the experience is and tourism and real estate are at the front of this new push towards the Midwestern states. Ever since movies such as A river runs through it and The Horse Whisperer have been made, bozeman montana real estate where the movies were shot have really picked up.
Other than tourism, the high quality of life is also attracting lots of people to smaller towns like Bozeman, Montana, people who want to try to lead simpler lives. It’s is really tempting actually, because you can be connected to the whole wide world via the Internet and telephone, while still being able to live in a beautiful open environment, short commutes if any and overall save money by not paying exorbitantly high rents and utility charges.
Big box retailers embrace green movement April 21, 2007
Posted by Shel in Marketing, Retail, Trends.add a comment
Big Box retailers are taking note of the green movement that is taking place in all aspects of the retail industry. While the majority of retailer have sold eco-friendly items for years, they are now getting more proactive about promoting them and advertising the fact that they are selling them. Critics also say that retailers are using this to deflect protests about large retailers moving into their communities. A lot of consumers never though of Wal-Mart as a ‘green’ retailer, and have been surprised to find a lot of eco-friendly products available there such as energy saving bulbs, organic milk and pasta etc.
Part of the new focus on green retailing can be attributed to the success of Gore’s movie, An Inconvenient Truth, which details the possible perils of global warming.
“It has gotten a lot of high-level [retail] executives thinking about this,” Daniel Butler, a vice president at the National Retail Federation, said of the film.
However, Butler, who follows environmental issues for the federation, said the move toward more eco-sensitive selling has been building for years. “I don’t see this as being a fad,” he said.
The U.S. organic industry alone grew 17 percent to reach $14.6 billion in consumer sales in 2005. The market for energy-efficient products is also estimated to be in the billions of dollars.
Organized retail raises farmers incomes January 24, 2007
Posted by Shel in Retail, Trends.add a comment
Business Standard reports that farmers in Punjab are expected to significantly increase their incomes with the arrival of large retailers on the agri scene, who are creating a huge demand for fresh fruits and vegetables. Several comapnies such as ITC, Reliance and Subhiksha have signed agreements with farmers to source products directly from them. According to an official at Subhiksha, “As there are less intermediaries between us and the farmers they get higher returns on their produce.”
Around 70 farmers in Sangrur, Hoshiarpur, Fatehgarh Sahib and Ropar have turned to net-house cultivation to produce high-value and off-season crops that are in high demand with the retailers, with technical help from the Punjab farmers commission and financial help from the State Bank of India. In Nawashahar and Jagraon, Centurian Bank of Punjab has teamed up with Chambal Fertilizers to finance 200 farmers to grow potatoes.
High Street fashions heading to malls November 17, 2006
Posted by Shel in Retail, Trends.add a comment
In an interesting turn of events, high street stores are slowly but steadily making their way to organized retail formats such as malls. A mall with only the regular chain stores can very soon become boring and repetitive. The perfect example would be the MBK Mall in Bangkok, which is a superb mix of branded stores and home grown retailers. The mall is organized by type of store, much like Inorbit Mall in Mumbai, but on a much larger scale. While larger high street retailers are accomodated along with branded chains, small high street vendors are grouped together at one end of the mall on the 3rd (or 4th, maybe) floor, in a tight maze of shops or rather stalls. The effect is one of street market and it is a great way to combine both types of retailers in one format.
In India, The Economic Times reports that several high street fashion brands are opening stores in their old rival, the malls. Mumbai eatery Rajdhani operated from just one location, until it opened in 7 outlets in malls. The first store opened in Inorbit Mall in Malad, a western suburb of Mumbai in 2003. FabIndia has always been exclusive to high street locations but has now become a prized tenant for most mall developers.
Inorbit Mall will soon be adding more small retailers such as Blue Tonic, a small high street retailer. Ansals Plaza has also added high street retailers such as CTC Plaza, B C Sen Jewelers and Leohom Shirts recently. Yogesh Samat, CEO of Inorbit Malls adds that,
“High-street retailers who have a very strong local presence tend to be an important way of differentiating. Merely having chain stores in a mall tends to give it a vanilla feel.”
Black Friday Midnight Madness November 7, 2006
Posted by Shel in Marketing, Retail, Trends.1 comment so far
The Chicago Tribune writes on the phenomenon that Thanksgiving sales are begining earlier each year. Instead of 5am, many retailers are planning to open stores at midnight to get started on special sales called ‘Midnight Madness’. With competition growing between traditional brick and mortar retailers as well as between retailers and the internet, customers have too much choice and retailers don’t want to miss out on an opportunity to create some buzz. Earlier these sales used to be called ‘Black Friday’, as shoppers would start their Christmas shopping on the friday after Thansgiving, but with each year its getting harder to hold on to customers.
“There’s no logic to it anymore,” said Keven Wilder, a Chicago-based retail consultant. “It’s getting harder and harder to get people into the stores. Malls are setting unbelievable hours for the whole season.”
