Welcome to Jerome's blog page. For the latest and past thoughts.

 

POLL RESULTS

On behalf of the SPOT-O team, many thanks to all who participated in our poll.

On the question "WOULD YOU CONSIDER BECOMING A HUMAN BILLBOARD?" you answered;

72% YES

28% NO

Almost 3/4 of us would choose, in return for money, to have a brand name or logo tattoed on their bodies (either permanent or temporarely).

Surprised?

Have a look in your wardrobe. Now count the number of clothing that prominently display their brand name.

Did you come across Nike, Von Dutch, Gucci, Billabong or Quicksilver?

The point is that often YOU PAY  to adverise a brand name in public...! You pay to be a human billboard.

Soon you will be able to change this; keep your eyes open for SPOT-O's new feature........

Oh, I almost forgot to ask if anyone is interested in a SPOT-O T-shirt........

Jerome

 

HUMAN BILLBOARD

Remember the story of the 30 year old man from Macleod who wanted to offer his parents a special gift for their 40th wedding anniversary?

Grant Burton knew it could only be one thing; allowing his parents to travel through Europe one last time.

An expensive treat by any means and Grant needed to come up with an innovative way to fund the trip.

And so he approached a European company requesting them to pay for his present in return for having the company's logo permanently tattooed on his back.

Do you remember the name of the company?

It is "EuRail" indeed.

The company immediately saw the huge publicity opportunity. It agreed and cleverly used Facebook to extend on the advertising stunt.

At SPOT-O we are sure that Grant's parents are very proud of their son.

We are also confident that EuRail is satisfied with the outcome. Their website's "What would you do for a free EuRail Pass" contest is proof of that.

How about you? Would you consider carrying a company's logo in return for money or goods?

We are curious to find out......

Jerome

 

 

Are you scared...?

Predictions are that the cost of living will increase in the New Year.

ITEM

PREDICTION FOR 2010

Food

up 5 - 10%

Electricity

up 10%

Gas

up 15%

Petrol

up 10 cents a litre

Water

up 5%

Rent

up 7.1%

Plus economists tip the reserve bank to increase interest rates before March and then again throughout the year.

Not exactly the news we are waiting for after having spent so much over Christmas!

So, should you be scared?

Before you decide, let's have a look at some positive news;

  • ·         Cost of purchasing a car is predicted to decrease by 3%
  • ·         And the cost of electronic goods is going down by 20%

This is great if you plan to buy a new car or electronic goods in 2010.

But what if you don't?

Well, there are ways to compensate for the increasing cost of living ahead of us.

And SPOT-O might just have the solution for you.

My new year's resolution; "Be prepared, not scared".

Wishing you a happy, healthy and prosperous 2010,

Jerome

"SCHOOL CANTEENS FACE CLOSURE"

This is the heading of an article recently published in a national newspaper.

Alarming news for busy mums and dads and their kids. As a parent I know that we all need these canteens on days when there simply is no time to prepare lunch boxes.

The article mentioned two causes for the uncertain future of our school canteens;

  1. lack of volunteers
  2. lack of funding

The first reason, lack of volunteers, I understand. To cope with the increasing cost of living, most families need dual income. Meaning that both parents work. As a result neither mum nor dad has time to help out at their kid's school canteen. I can see this has a negative impact on the amount of volunteers. There is no quick solution to resolve this matter.

How about the second reason; lack of funding? I admit that I don't know the ins and outs of running a school canteen. Still, I think we must help here. You see, the children are our future. We all know that we need to invest in our future.

So we have school canteens that need money. They need it to cover part of the food costs and maybe to start hiring professional staff to compensate for the lack of volunteers.

Now take a business that produces a product which benefits a child's health and general well being. This could be educational-, food- or sports products.

Surely such a business can offer financial donations to suffering school canteens in return for having its product or service advertised.

This is a win/win situation. The canteen gets the much needed funding, whilst the business invests in its future customers.

I hope this gives you some food for thoughts.

Thank you for visiting SPOT-O,

Jerome