Music Made From Windows Sounds

This is pretty amazing...



Link courtesy of laughingsquid.com

Serving Size Me: Part II

The ubiquitous 20 oz soda bottle is facing trouble from environmentalists and nutrition label readers alike. As I mentioned in a previous post, the food and beverage concept of a "serving size" is frequently absurd.

Visit the link below for more details...

America Tires Of 20 Ounce Coke Bottles

from PSFK Trend: PSFK by Piers Fawkes

Will the real Ken Kellogg please stand up?

Scott, I wouldn't mess with this guy. If he wants his name back, he will come with friends, and he will probably use deadly force.

Or, perhaps, he will sic Mike Huckabee's mad bass guitar slappin skillz on you.

The Real Kenny Kellogg


(don't ask how I found this)

Looking Minnesota, Feeling Minnesota

As many of my readers know, I listen to a lot of music. When I was in my heavy classic rock phase during high school, I frequented the sounds of CSNY. Little did I know that the styles of CSNY would frequent my life yet again.

And by styles, I mean hairstyles. Particularly, the hairstyle of David Crosby.



The hairstyle boils down to pride from hair lost, and insistence that long hair still looks good, despite bald-spot. Ladies and gentlemen, I bring you, the "David Crosby". (See also the "cryptkeeper" and the "hatless Santa" ).

The best part of this hairstyle? It's popularity in Minnesota. I have seen more "DCs" in the Twin Cities areas than I've seen meat auctions, curling rinks, or weather at zero kelvin*.

Now, I know it's probably not easy to go bald. Heck, Larry David taught me that bald people have a secret society (and hand signal) to bond over their follicle fate.


Let's come to grips with reality. You no longer look cool with long hair! The age of Aquarius has subsided, flower child. Respect yourself and go for the much more fashionable "Kenny Kellogg" or perhaps "Sergio Roth".

You can keep the mustache, though.


*the temperature at which matter stops moving. absolute zero.

I was elated when I saw this headline...

Dunkin' Donuts Kills Rachael Ray Ad

... then I realized that it contained the word "ad" at the end.

Pills Are Good

I'd like a venti skim double, uh, Provigil?

http://www.economist.com/science/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11402761

Brand Tags: Perception = Reality

I can't say enough about this site (www.brandtags.net). Simply put, the consumer perception is the brand reality. Brand Tags lets you peer into the collective perception of thousands, and the results are quite revealing.

That said, I wanted to check and see what the brand reality of companies where my various friends work. Here's the top 3 tags for each one...


3M: Tape, Sticky, Post-it

Adobe: Photos, PDF, Acrobat

Apple: Cool, Mac, iPod

Fidelity: Money, Insurance (?), Investment

Ford: Car, America, Truck

Google: Search, God, Awesome

Microsoft: Windows, Evil, Monopoly

MLB: Boring, Baseball, Steriods

Sears: Cheap, Old, Appliance

Target: Cheap, Bullseye, Design

Dutch Evans: Wicked Awesome

Buzzed Goats

It's always intrigued me how we have evolved our collective "menu" of food options over time. I recently heard about coffee's origins on NPR, and it makes for a great story. As the story goes, an Ethiopian farmer noticed that his goat herd became highly agitated after consuming a certain berry. From there, this farmer evidently initiated the consumption of a good that most people can't live without.

Though the coffee chain world is already crowded, sounds like there is a branding opportunity here too.

Story here.

[via extratexture.com]

Somebody's Getting Married

Congratulations to my sister Emily and her husband Jason. They were married two weeks ago at a story-book estate in suburban Philadelphia, and are currently traversing Europe. As a groomsman, I wasn't able to get photos of the procession, but I do have a few great behind the scenes pics.

Employee Service

Great post by Hegarty on Zappos' employee "retention" policy. I can't think of a better practice whereby you wean out people who are not committed to your company.

It's tragic that so few companies practice excellence in employee relations. The ones you do hear of - Starbucks, Southwest, and Nordstrom to name a few - are typically at the apex of their industries.

Herb Kelleher, the Wild Turkey sipping and Kool smoking co-founder of Southwest Airlines, summed up his approach to employee retention in the New York Times today.

“You have to treat your employees like customers,” he told Fortune in 2001. “When you treat them right, then they will treat your outside customers right. That has been a powerful competitive weapon for us.”

Full article here.

Gunner

Finally, we have indisputable evidence that, in fact, Hegarty was the biggest gunner at Kellogg.

Rat-a-tat-tat my friend. Rat-a-tat-tat.

Trip Advisor's Traveler's Choice Awards

I really like this communication from Trip Advisor. It's nice to see travel recommendations in a democratized fashion.

http://cdn.tripadvisor.com/pdfs/tca/TCDestinationsAwards2008.pdf

One shocking omission... where is Minneapolis on that list??

Videoshare: The Empire Strikes Barack

This was too funny to just gather dust in my long lines of shared postings...

When consumers realize your company has no soul: Part II

I wrote about Unilever's brand contradiction exposure back in November 2007, and I'm sorry to say that the good people at this Dutch-Anglo conglomerate are running into issues about brand disingenuousness (is that a word?) again.

Advertising Age has reported one whistle-blowing Photoshopper telling all about how he made the "real" models from the "Real Beauty" campaign, well, less real. Here's the link for more detail.

I'm not crying out against Photoshopping of consumer advertising images per se, but at the continued evidence of a company not standing by it's messaging. Sending a fabricated yet deeply moving message about self-esteem under the guise of "real" conveys to consumers that one is only out to make a buck. That, my friends, is an unsustainable proposition, especially in a consumer atmosphere where transparency and genuineness are paramount.

"There is no timetable for withdrawl."

Why does that notion sound familiar???

Dutch Shopping

This is one of the best executions of an entertaining online shopping experience I've seen. It's from Hema, which is a low price Dutch producer/retailer of common household goods. I'm not going to say any more, as I don't want to spoil the experience for you.

http://producten.hema.nl/