Marcel Is Back

Just so cuuuute...

Price Wars

Being in retail, my ears perked up when I heard about the newest level of price wars between fast food giants McDonald's and Burger King. Last week Burger King announced a dramatic cut in the cost of it's Chicken Nuggets. Burger King is now offering a 10 piece chicken nugget for $1.49. This comes on the heels of McDonald's ultra popular Monopoly game, which has proven to be a traffic driver for the food mecca. So what does McDonald's do? McDonald's "sees" Burger King's $1.49 10 piece Nugget and "raises" with a $5.00 20 piece nugget, plus offers the fan favorite Monopoly game to boot.

What does all this mean?

It means that in the proverbial pie of fast food sales, there are only so many pieces. The loss leader in competitive sales has become an every day thing. So what does all this mean for a little guy like me? It means a heck of a lot and here's why:

• Retailers make 30% of annual revenues during the holiday season. WHAT THAT USED TO MEAN: Shoppers will shop. Period. WHAT THAT MEANS NOW: Retailers need to attract the customer. Even loyal customers.
• For most retailers, the Internet has changed the way we do business. Heck, the internet has changed the world but for retailers that means there is a World Wide Web of competition out there for goods. We must stay competitive to stay in the game. So how do we do that?
• Black Friday used to be the busiest shopping day of the year! Thanks to "Door Busters", Black Friday sales and deep discounts, retailers have to have a strategy to make their numbers and that spells out DISCOUNT. 
• More sales and discounts are a necessity and are now commonplace in a sales plan. And more frequently that ever before.  

It's amazing to me that even the big guys like McDonald's worry about market shares.I'm aware that they, of course, worry about staying on top and I know that we all worry about the bottom line, but I am surprised to find that the biggies and I share a common ground. It's the new age of competitive sales and in this Internet world, nothing is for sure. Service and reputation are a big part of it, but the facts are what they are. If you can't attract the client to your location or your website or your restaurant, you are all done.

The bottom line now means that they won't buy if they don't come. 

Ebola Thots

I'm sorry to make a joke about something so serious, but I hardly know what else to do.

 It's all around us. It leads our news casts. It captures front page headlines. It's shared on social media and it's sprinkled into casual conversations so it's safe to say the world is not safe. 

I worry about my daughter. Studying in London and has already been to both Germany and Paris this month. The biggest problem she faces right now is what pub will she go to and how much it will cost? She thinks my warnings of being aware and being cautious are silly. How can I protect her? I worry about my son. Traveling on an airplane this weekend, domestically to come home, yet  part of me wants him to stay put. 

I thought about myself. I work with the public everyday. I apply makeup to people which requires close personal contact with them. How do I protect my staff? Myself? My clients? Panic is not our friend so collectively we apply logic to try and fail-safe measures and we listen to the experts. We don't need pandemonium.  The government is already scrambling. The experts are speaking and the medical professionals are putting their lives in jeopardy for the greater good. 

Punch "Ebola" into a Google search and see what you get. What do you believe and what do you follow? The CDC is talking to a ravenous public and we are listening, hanging on their every word and Bill O'Reilly and Dennis Miller are arguing about Dr Nancy Snyderman violating an Ebola isolation agreement.

All we can do is watch and wait. And wait and watch what happens and how it all plays out. All the while,  maybe not willing to admit we are concerned, that there is a slight frenzy over the outbreak in our own back yard. 

I'm going to do my part and admit, I'm concerned.

 

Into God's Hands

I lost a member of my family yesterday.
While this woman was not very close to us in recent history, she was at one point someone we cared about.

There was no personal reason for our loss of contact in recent years. No horrible tragedies or awful disagreements, but only that she became the victim of neglect and she didn't deserve it. She became a forgotten, inconvenient soul in the end and for that I am sad. Her life was a cautionary tale and I wonder if in her advanced years, sort of gave up. Falling victim to the cancer we surprisingly found out about in the end. There will be no memorial, no services or finger sandwiches and coffee with memories. Just silence for her soul.

I speak of her today so that she may know that her memory lives on in me. And the love I once felt for a family member meant something. Love is real, but never logical. Love is the only thing we know to be true.

I want you all to know that she mattered and that she was loved and anyone to else that reads this too. So she will know someone cared.

Friday Funny Flashback

*This is a re-post from The Daily Dandy, April 2010


Roger left for work on Friday morning. Friday was payday, so instead of going home, he stayed out the entire weekend partying with the boys and spending his entire pay packet.

Finally, Roger appeared at home on Sunday night, and obviously he was confronted by his angry wife, Martha who castigated Roger for nearly two hours with a tirade befitting his actions.

Finally, Martha stopped the nagging and said to Roger, 'How would you like it if you didn't see me for two or three days?'

Roger replied grimly, 'That would be fine with me.'

Monday went by and he didn't see his Martha. Tuesday and Wednesday came and went with the same results.

By the Thursday, the swelling had gone down just enough so that Roger, he could see Martha a little out of the corner of his left eye.

Have a great weekend bloggers and try think before you speak.

Cuz H's are EW!

I define myself in many ways; mother, wife, entrepreneur, and friend to name a few. But there is a part of me that lives on inside the woman that is all which I have described.

That part of me is still a 12 year old girl.

That's why I think this is so funny, brilliant, endearing and SPOT ON accurate!
It also makes me an even bigger Jimmy Fallon fan...like if that's even possible..like really.

This is the latest from the EW! franchise and I fricken love it.

Bright Eyed And Bushy Tailed

Ahhh, fresh off my "mini-cation" and I feel great! Nothing like a few days of R&R, good friends, shopping, laughing and eating to your heart's content! I tell ya, I could get used to this empty nest thing!

A few observations on the weekend:

• I love my blogger buddies! MarkD60 even though we have never met, I'm pleasantly surprised that you know me so well and that's awesome! You win the prize on where I went!

• Nothing like a Florida sunset, the open ocean, a couple of drinks and the love of some great friends. The foods and drinks taste better when you are with people you love, don't you agree? The gorgeous backdrop doesn't hurt either. 

• My Tommy! YES! My Tommy silenced the critics and everyone else who wanted to spew poison and spread crap about my boy and his commitment to his team. OK, so we won a big one. I'm not a romantic fool. I know that the team's problems are a lot bigger than anyone really knows, but I'm also not one to question it. For now, I'll happily take the momentum and move forward to Buffalo. You go Tommy!!  

• Funny, on Sunday afternoon, when we were sitting out at the beautiful bar on the beach looking at the sunset having drinks, we were chatting with the fun people sitting next to us. They were from Cincinnati and they were talking serious trash about how they were going to kill us in Sunday night's game. Believe it or not we took it! We bowed our heads and agreed that this may not be the Pats year and that there were serious issues with the team, with Brady-hes not happy, blah, blah, blah. We quietly and uncharacteristically agreed with the trash talk.......I couldn't help but think of them halfway through the first quarter of the game. 

• It always takes my dogs a good hour to re acclimate to us coming home. I read once that it causes stress to the "pack" when you separate dogs that live together. They must have been stressed this weekend, because they really take their time about getting right back into the family routine when we get home. It's like they are pissed at us or something. 

•  Happy are those who come home to rest their heads. As fun as it is to get away for a bit, it's always good to come home. That goes for here too bloggers! I'm happy to be back!