Remember August 2001. Even priot to 9/11 it was pretty depressing for any white collar worker. Even in advertising. But there again, for as long as I can remember ad agencies have been moaning about how little money they make. In the wake of last year’s Olympics bonanza, advertising agencies are struggling I wrote for The Australian. WHEN marketers get cold feet, advertising agencies seem to catch a nasty dose of the flu. This bug is easily passed on. The […]
Recent posts
The Australian: the high price of government
Back in November 2001 I ran the rule over political advertising for The Australian’s Media section. The difficult thing at the time was trying to work out what exactly spent on advertising, PR, leaflets et.c.Crikey has been covering Senator Eric Abetz’s attack on the Clerk of the seante, Harry Evans over the Industrial relations reform ads. PRIME Minister John Howard’s attempt to repair damage from the leak of a highly critical memo written by Liberal Party president Shane Stone in […]
Designer kitchen on a budget
From Tomato Magazine. Catherine Zeta Jones has one. So does the wife Brit super chef Gordon Ramsay. But until recently few Aussies have discovered the joys of the flat pack kitchen, made famous by Ikea. UK design guru Terence Conran is a fan of Ikea, and who can blame him?
AFR Boss: negotiating tips
These tips still do it. From AFR Boss late 2002. Negotiating tips Know the rules “The number-one mistake is that most people go into negotiations with a different mindset to a trade-off mindset,” says Melbourne Business School’s Mara Olekalns. “You get faulty process when somebody doesn’t understand the rules.” She says compromise is not necessarily the game. “Staying is always a bit harder.” Know your power, even if you are coming from a position of weakness. “The fact that somebody […]
Let us know your thoughts
Foodchain may have lost David Jones almost $40 million in operating expenses, write-downs and provisions in 2002, but that doesn’t stop us noticing one thing the gourmet food stores are getting right: providing noticeboards on which customers can comment on the service and products. The boards invite customers to take a moment to “let us know your thoughts about us”.
AFR Boss: Who moved my management book?
From AFR Boss in 2002. And i still haven’t got around to writing one yet. So you want to write a business best-seller. Even if you do, you are still unlikely to get rich quick, reports Ed Charles MANAGEMENT BOOKS are big business for Australia’s publishers, however many copies they sell. But they aren’t necessarily a money-spinner for authors. Locally, respectable sales for any book would be 20,000 copies; for a management title, selling 5,000 is very good. Dymocks has […]
Nova breaks new ground…again
Sure Nova’s ratings have dropped off. But Paul Thompson is at it again launching a radio station aimed at people born between 1960 and 1965. I wrote this for the Financial Times on the launch of Nova in Melbourne in 2002. Now as Crikey reports Thompson is at it again. It’s anybody’s guess what programming tricks work in radio nowadays. But Paul Thompson, chief executive of Daily Mail Group in Australia was gob-smacked when his Melbourne station Nova hit the […]
The hydrogen economy is so happening.
This was written for a state government department a year or so ago. How can the state’s and the Federal government be so at odds on the environment and energy policy? Whatever happened to hype? We live in a hydrocarbon world. Eight out of ten of the world’s biggest companies are dependant on hydrocarbons. But within fifty years the focus of the world’s energy needs will be a clean non-polluting fuel, hydrogen. The hydrogen economy will be born. In theory […]
Rember Enron? The energy industry will
This was written for a state government department a year or so ago. How can the state’s and the Federal government be so at odds on the environment and energy policy? Enron changed everything. When the company, at the time the sixth largest in the world, collapsed investor sentiment turned against the seemingly copper-bottomed energy sector. In the report A world of difference – strategic options for Australia’s energy sector published by PricewaterhouseCoopers last November, the consultancy noted that Enron […]