Seeing Red

The American consumer can be a fickle and unpredictable target, a fact that the Coca Cola company has just been reminded of.

In October, Coca Cola announced that it would, for the first time ever, be changing its red can to a limited edition white can in the US and Canada for the holidays. The reason: a partnership with the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) to support habitat conservation efforts for the polar bear, an icon of Coke's holiday advertising for decades. The company pledged a $3 million donation to WWF and up to another $1 million based on text messages sent in by consumers. In all, 1.4 billion white Coke cans would be available during the four months until the end of February 2012.

Coca Cola company's global beverage distribution system services consumers 1.7 billion times a day.

A multi-million dollar corporate donation to support a major and popular environmental cause; a partnership with a respected environmental champion; an opportunity for customers to make a difference; an historic, limited edition packaging design; and pictures of two cute polar bear cubs against the Yuletide snow.

What could possibly go wrong?

Plenty. One month later, Coke has announced that it is scaling back distribution of the white can and switching to a seasonal red can design. It seems that shortly after the white cans hit shelves, some consumers complained that the new can was so similar to the Diet Coke can they were accustomed to that they purchased the regular coke by mistake. Others insisted that the drink in the white cans tasted different from the regular Coke they know and love. Coca Cola denies that they hvae changed anything other than the design on the can. Customers saw red. Now, red cans will be in the majority by Christmas.

The complaints were posted online, at websites, Twitter and some telephone calls.

The company was rattled, no doubt remembering the public relations nightmare of New Coke from the mid-eighties, and folded: the red can would be brought back for Christmas.

Executives at Coca Cola can only dream of a white Christmas this year.

Going Nuts

You can bus’ a coconut water along the highway or on any number of street corners throughout the West Indies and other parts tropical.

But how do you go about selling fresh coconut water to consumers in North America?

Well, the story would go something like this:

1. Set up a sourcing and production deal in a country that grows coconuts—such as Brazil, Thailand or Indonesia—with a manufacturer that can process your product for export, i.e. flash-pasteurize and then bottle or Tetra-Pak it.
2. Develop a brand identity for your product, something youthful or tropical.
3. Craft a brand positioning for your coconut water: it’s all natural; it’s nutritionally perfect for rehydrating after sports or exercise; yoga moms love it.
4. Build up a distribution network from scratch. This usually means delivering the coconut water yourself to a few retail stores in small section of a major city until you find a beverage distributor who will handle your product.
5. Create a cute backstory for your brand that is hip, cool and funny—like, how the whole thing began with a couple of Brazilian girls in a bar—and features plenty of inspirational, youthful chutzpah.
6. Build a colourful website, like this one or this one.
7. As sales grow and mainstream awareness increases, take it to the next level by identifying, courting and signing a celebrity spokesperson for your product—a sports star like Kevin Garnett or a pop culture icon like Rihanna (playing on her sultry Caribbean origins).
8. Expect to make USD $100 million in sales this year.

Here's a piece that appeared recently in Slate that looks at the growing consumption of bottled coconut water in the USA, the hot new entry in the “lifestyle beverage” category. Two of the market leading brands are profiled, Vita Coco and Zico.

It turns out that coconut water is an overnight sensation that has been at least seven years in the making. Both companies were founded in 2004 and have ridden the health-and-wellness zeitgeist that has fueled the growth of flavoured waters, natural beverages and sports drinks in America.

I learned three very interesting things while preparing this post:

• Apparently, coconut water is the only natural substance that can be safely injected into the human blood stream.
• Brazilian women use coconut water as a facial toner and in place of ordinary water when shampooing their hair.
• Vita Coco says that it employs machinery “that uses a patented method to extract the water” from the nut. In this part of the world, that would be called a cutlass.

Read it at Slate.com: How coconut water suddenly became ubiquitous on American shelves.

BONUS: here's a video interview with one of the founders of Vita Coco, telling how it all began.

Slicing the Population Pie

On or around October 31 just gone, the population of the world was estimated to have reached seven billion living people. The history-making newborn was, in all likelihood, a boy born somewhere in India or China.

World population grew dramatically during the twentieth century and more than doubled since 1950 alone (the actual increase was 175%). But the graph is now tapering off: although population is continuing to rise, it is doing so at a slower rate. By the end of this century—the year 2100—the number of people on Earth is projected to be around 10 billion.

The islands of the Caribbean, including Puerto Rico and together with Guyana and Suriname, presently account for six-tenths of one percent (0.6%) of the world, around 43½ million people.  

Over the next 80 years, according to projections by the United Nations Population Division, the number of people living in the region is expected to grow by less than two percent.

Almost all of that increase, though, will be in Haiti and the Dominican Republic. The population figures for the vast majority of Caribbean nations are actually expected to fall over the course of this century—in some cases, dramatically: Cuba by more than one-third, and Jamaica, Trinidad & Tobago and Barbados each by 20% or more.

The present low birth rates in many of our islands is probably a major factor contributing to this projected decline, along with expectations of continuing levels of emigration (and in the case of Cuba, perhaps significant new emigration in the future).

[via guardian.co.uk]

The Caribbean is not the only region facing population decline, of course. Japan and most of Europe are famously aging and “shrinking” at a rapid rate but other countries such as Brazil, Thailand and, yes, even China are also expected to see significant reductions in headcount over the next two- to three generations. (As a result of demographic shifts and its vigorous population control policies over recent decades, China’s populace is projected to decrease by 30%, to fewer than one billion people, by the end of the century.)



In the decades ahead, the hotspots of population growth will be in Asia and sub-Saharan Africa. India will become Earth’s most populous nation—more than a billion-and-half people by 2100—and there is expected to be explosive growth in Nigeria, Tanzania, Niger and Zambia, where fertility rates are still high.

In the future, Caribbean people will have an even smaller space and smaller voice on an increasingly crowded planet. We’ll have to learn to shout that much harder in order to make ourselves heard on the world’s stage.

 

BONUS: Play the population numbers—and see where you and your country fit in—using the BBC's cool infographics tool.

See Mail

How many new Yahoo! e-mail messages have been sent around the world since you began reading this sentence? About 390,000, if you’re looking at this post on a typical workday morning.

And Yahoo! says that it blocks about five spam e-mails for every one valid message that it delivers.

Mail Visualization is a cool tool that gives you a peek into the mind-bogglingly massive data management operation that is Yahoo! Mail. You can learn how much e-mail is delivered through the network (65,000 messages every second, 5.6 billion per day, on average); how many new mail accounts are being opened (275,000 every day); and how Yahoo! Mail continuously analyses user actions in order to hone its ability to spot and intercept spam.

You get to view not just static information but also live data from the world’s e-mail stream. A nice feature is the ability to see the top 10 words used in e-mail subject lines over the preceding five minutes in any region of the world.

What were people is this part of the globe writing about at the very moment that we composed this blog post? Halloween, rose, wallpaper, treats and jobs (or maybe Jobs). And the subject of most of those hundreds of thousands of blocked spam messages? That's right: luxury, watches, replica, ejaculate and Viagra...

Even though its numbers are staggering, Yahoo! is only the world’s no. 2 e-mail service (after Hotmail). It’s been suggested that, as younger people increasingly choose to communicate using text messaging, tweets and BBM, we will begin to see a global decline in the use of e-mail. For right now, though, there seems to be more than plenty enough to go around. 

Check it out: visualize.yahoo.com

When You Wish Upon a Star

There’s been some diplomatic tension in the Caribbean in the last few weeks—not only among the political establishment but with some of our brand ambassadors, as well.

[Miss~Lisa/flickr]

In Jamaica, telecommunications company LIME just pulled the plug on a hot new reality show, on its new mobile TV channel Peppa, that featured dancehall star Vybz Kartel. Kartel was last week charged with murder following the discovery of a dead body at his house. He has had a history of run-ins with the law; a few days after the murder charge, he was once again before the courts charged with marijuana possession.

Rihanna has also had a troubling couple of weeks of bad publicity (is there really such a thing in the entertainment world?) of a different stripe. First, there was the unfortunate choice of what to wear to church in Brazil. Then a case of over-exposure in Northern Ireland. Most recently, in her interview appearing in the latest British Vogue, Rihanna professed her affinity for the “c-word” and declared that her fellow Barbadians use the sexual expletive in conversation as they would breathe air. This past June, Rihanna signed an exclusive multi-year contract with the government to promote Barbados tourism; she was previously proclaimed a cultural ambassador-at-large for the country.

[via JamaicaObserver.com]

The potential headaches involved in managing one’s brand ambassador may be a relatively new challenge for Caribbean companies but is not a novel one for the marketing profession. This past March, for instance, the American insurance company Aflac decided to part ways with comedian Gilbert Gottfried—the voice of the Aflac duck mascot in its famous TV commercials—after he posted online jokes about the Japanese tsunami. And, of course, Tiger Woods became the instant-classic case study of how personal failings led to the unwinding of his lucrative endorsement contracts with GM, Accenture, Gillette, Tag Heuer and AT&T.



Businesses have sought out the patronage and endorsement of the rich and famous for centuries, going back at least to the origins of the royal warrant. Today, brands recruit celebrity spokespersons and ambassadors— most often from the worlds of music, screen and sport— for the prestige, media attention, fan base and increased sales that they can bring. It’s important that the stars align: that the anointed one’s own personal brand be compatible with the values and aspirations of the business brand. The objective is, ultimately, that the minds, hearts and wallets of many new customers will be drawn into a profitable orbit by the gravitational pull of the new star; while, hopefully, the appeal of both brands is enhanced by the relationship.

In return for the financial reward, the brand ambassador is expected to represent, to endorse and promote the brand—to use or wear its product, star in its commercials or media, appear at its corporate events, tweet about it, or by any other means that the company’s marketing team can dream up and get written into a contract.

A brand, however, does not dictate how an ambassador lives their life and cannot be responsible for everything that they say or do. It therefore has to be prepared to take protective action if its representative unwisely begins to “do foolishness”. The brand will want to avoid contagion by association; protect its reputation with customers and the marketplace; and evaluate the value it is receiving for its endorsement investment. If necessary, contractual escape clauses will have to be invoked. It is most likely that Gilbert Gottfried was swiftly let go by Aflac not so much because his tsunami jokes were in questionable taste but because a huge chunk of the company’s business is generated in Japan; you do not make light of your own customers’ misfortune.

As marketers, we hitch our wagons to a shooting star and hope for a great ride. But stars do sometimes fall from the sky. And very occasionally, they blow up and self-destruct completely. A supernova is extremely bright and attracts a lot of attention but you don’t want to be standing next to one when it happens (cue footage from the Tiger Woods Story).

LIME made the right decision—and the only decision that it could—to place its relationship with Vybz Kartel on pause until his significant legal troubles have been closed out. In the case of Rihanna, perhaps someone in the Barbados Tourism Authority needs to temporarily recall the ambassador, have a quiet word and remind her that the objective of the relationship is actually to enhance Barbados’ appeal and thus to avoid saying things that will embarrass or damage the brand.

In announcing her endorsement contract in June, Rihanna was quoted as saying: “Barbados is a place like no other and one of the reasons for this is the spirit and national pride of our people.” It’s hard to reconcile fostering national pride with declaring to the world that Barbados is a place whose people love to accost each other in the most obscene way. (Whether or not there is any truth in what was said is not the issue here. The brand ambassador’s role is to portray her product in its best light, not its worst.)

In political diplomacy, a country’s representative is given the formal title of Ambassador Extraordinary. That sums up the expectation in brand diplomacy, as well: counting that the celebrity’s exceptional ability to command the spotlight and influence the taste of the consuming public will help the product to shine so much brighter.

[Rolex.com]

And by the nature of their position—their own visibility, the privilege of being associated with their sponsor, the financial investment involved—the ambassador is justly held to an extra-ordinary standard of performance. The brand ambassador is a role model--for their brand, even if for nothing else. And the job begins the moment they sign the endorsement contract and take the first cheque.

And happily, it seems that, even when brand stars fade or fall, redemption is still possible. Rolex has just embraced Tiger Woods as its newest brand ambassador, paying tribute to his “exceptional stature” in the sport of golf and expressing commitment to him for the long haul. Tiger’s star is ascendant once again. He has only to watch out for the flying hot-dogs as he gains altitude.

RIP Steve Jobs

Speak and Slide

Here’s a new web resource we recently discovered that can help anyone who has to speak and make presentations on the job, or off.

Speak and Slide is a blog with a mission: “to help you become a better public speaker and presenter”. Here you’ll find all kinds of good, practical information that can help make you shine during your next presentation or speaking engagement.

There are tips and tricks for mastering PowerPoint; advice on how to design and arrange your PowerPoint slides for maximum effect; and pointers on where to find images and photos for your presentations, or how best to setup a room for a talk. You also get insights that will help you not just talk, but really communicate your message to your audience.

André Bello, the blogger, is a dynamic sales professional, storyteller and speaker and he keeps the writing crisp, illuminating and practical, drawing from his own wide experience.

It’s looking good so far and we will definitely be keeping tabs on this one. Take a look: www.speakandslide.com

Catching Fish in the Desert

Israel is described as being “one of the world's foremost idea factories”, has attracted many of the top global technology companies and is said to have among the highest number of start-up businesses of any country anywhere.

What is its secret? I’ve just been re-reading the book, Start-up Nation: The Story of Israel’s Economic Miracle, by Dan Senor and Saul Singer. In it, the authors reveal and dissect the drivers behind Israel’s success in creating and sustaining national innovation and entrepreneurship.

For us here in the Caribbean, growing our economies, creating sustainable new businesses and stimulating a culture of innovation are now among our governments’ top development concerns. This book provides insights into what has helped Israel to see incredible success in this arena, particularly during the last 20 years. 

The geopolitical contexts are vastly different, of course, but our two regions do share some things in common: Israel was [is] a small society with very little in the way of natural resources and began with few obvious saleable products other than tourism.

Start-up Nation explores what has enabled the Israelis to embrace entrepreneurship and helped to propel their country to become a USD $195 billion economy:

• Information and communication technologies (ICT) widely dispersed and leveraged to bridge distance and connect the country to new markets.

• The critically important role that national miliary service plays in developing initiative, cross-disciplinary creativity, leadership skills and a positive attitude to risk among young Israelis.

• The crucial need for visionary political leadership and the power of BHAG’s (big, hairy audacious goals).

• A mindset that turns crisis into opportunity can create an entire new industry out of a need. “If life hands you lemons, make lemonade”, the old saw goes. In the Negev desert, if life hands you only brackish, salty water, you begin farming shrimp, lobster and tilapia for export. (Israel is today a world leader in agriculture, water conservation and solar energy.)

• Infrastructure that supports a venture capital financing network, that helps connect those at home with ideas to those abroad with money, while reducing investor risk.

• An immigration policy that attracts talent, knowledge and skills back to the country, particularly from among its Diaspora.

• The focused, deliberate building-up of industrial and academic clusters to create sustainable centres of excellence.

Anyone interested in learning what entrepreneurship and innovation need to grow will find this a worthwhile read. It’s accessible and well-paced; we learn what has worked in Israel and what hasn’t, and there are numerous stories of real-life entrepreneurs and business ventures. (The book was released in 2009 but the authors even presciently foreshadowed the social changes seen earlier this year during the Arab Spring.)

Check it out.

Under Wraps in the Congo

There are almost one million adults living with HIV-AIDS in the Democratic Republic of Congo. 

Yet why do the vast majority of Congolese refuse to use the free or cheap condoms that are widely available? Maybe the answer lies in how it’s all packaged.

In this four-minute talk at this year’s TEDGlobal, health specialist
Amy Lockwood illuminates the marketing dynamics of Selling Condoms in the Congo.

Leader of the Band

[Garry Knight/Flickr]

“The successful company is not the one with the most brains, but the most brains acting in concert.”

Musing on that thought from Peter Drucker, I wondered: if a successful company, business or organization is like a great concert, then how is the role of the leader of the organization like that of an orchestral concert conductor or a choirmaster? Here are some parallels that I saw.

The leader prompts and cues his players and directs execution and delivery of the performance.

The leader keeps time. You set the pace for your leadership team and for the organization as a whole. They will follow your lead. It’s your responsibility to adjust speed when needed as the performance progresses.

The leader maintains harmony between all the parts of the team.

The leader molds a team out of individual performers.

The leader follows the score. The analog of a score for a business is its vision, mission and strategic objectives. As leader, you are responsible for keeping the big picture in mind always, hearing the whole work and delivering the plan.

The leader delivers a quality product to the audience (your customers). You set the standard of quality for your group.

The leader listens to the individual performers on his team and monitors the harmony that they create together.

The leader is visible to all the performers. The members of your team need to be able to see you and get their cues from you.

The leader gives the audience something to look at. In a classical performance, the orchestra conductor is the one who is usually doing the most moving. But whatever the context, the leader is usually the name, the face and the voice that the public sees and associates with the team. As leader, people are watching you and your actions count; remember this.

Make It Like It Was

[via Digital Trends]

Emotion. That’s what the marketer and the advertiser are hoping that their commercial gets out of us. That their ad triggers a feeling—an emotional connection—with us, that we respond in some way. Desire. Wonder. Happiness. Lust. Sometimes, fear. But never apathy, never take-it-or-leave-it. That’s a commercial failure (in more ways than one).

Some of our strongest emotional responses are connected to our childhood and youth. That’s usually the time in our lives when we were most carefree, happiest, felt most loved, most desirable, in wonder of the world and everything in it (and most debt-free). And why advertisers often use nostalgic themes, and images of children and young people, in their work: to elicit those strong emotions within us and connect them with the product that they’re promoting.

Here is a brilliant new mashup video in which Don Draper of the TV show Mad Men pitches a novel technology product to clients: the new Timeline profile feature on Facebook. 

No, quantum physicists haven’t achieved time travel (and least, not yet). The video's creator has simply edited a scene from an episode of the show and replaced images of the original product with Facebook’s Timeline. It's completely fictitious, of course (doubly so). It’s also amazing how it works seamlessly—and does a really good job of showing how Timeline will actually work.

And Don Draper demonstrates the power of nostalgia to communicate with an audience.

Click through to watch the video.* This post thanks to Digital Trends.

*PS: the original video link above no longer works; the clip may have been taken down as a result of a rights infringement claim by one of the companies involved (which would be a pity). Here's another copy of the video that is still viewable at time of writing. The video was originally created by Eric Leist.

Four for the Road

Remember some of the great commercials of the Caribbean? The ones we (well, I) remember reading, watching and listening to while growing up, that promoted the classic brands and products of the region?

We're going to take a closer look at some of our great Caribbean brands in the days ahead on this blog. For now, we rummaged through the YouTube archive and found three of our favourite classic television ads. They all happen to be for drinks and spirits—a product category that is a strength for this region.

Malibu White Rum

This one is from the 1980’s when Malibu was being made with Jamaican rum. The technique of photographing everything in silhouette—echoing the visual style of the Malibu logo itself—is brilliant. And Marley's music makes it sing:

Cockspur Rum

More recent vintage, I think (maybe the 90's?). Not great but it got your attention the first few times you saw it: a brilliantly-coloured rooster taking a boss-man stroll around busy New York City:

Lucozade Energy

I love this commercial—one of the best, ever. Cartoon animation makes it timeless, the soca music is fantastic, the wit sweet (the bit at the end is the best). Imagine: a non-alcoholic drink that makes you want to party. This was the first in a series from a few years ago that had the 'stick man' getting out of all sorts of sticky situations thanks to Lucozade:

Bonus: Tia Maria
I came back and slipped this one in after finishing the original post. Tia Maria was for decades the iconic Jamaican liqueur. The video comments say that this is an Australian ad but I remember watching it on TV all the time as a youngster; the words to the jingle came right back to me. Again, the music makes this commercial magic:

What are some of your choices for other great Caribbean commercials? 

Act Different

Crossing Oceans, Connecting Peoples: Caribbean Marketing Mix, Sept 24

The Caribbean has been the crossroads of world history for 500 years. In this roundup of last week’s marketing news from around the region, we see Caribbean people and brands continuing to make connections around the globe. Our stories link Trinidad to Jamaica to Ghana to England to Barbados to Panama. Follow along.

Brand Bravo. Trinidadian cricketer Dwayne Bravo is seizing the future and shaping what happens next for him after West Indies cricket. Taking his cue from sport celebrities in other parts of the world, he’s about to monetize his appeal beyond the cricket field and develop “Brand Bravo”. He has just released a music video collaboration with Jamaican dancehall artist Beenie Man (and featuring Guyana’s Timeka Mashall), called “Beenie Man & Bravo”. Soon to follow will be his official website and the Dwayne Bravo Cricket Star Search.

[via caribpr.com]

Bravo has certainly been versatile on the cricket pitch, as both a batsman and medium-fast bowler.  He also has been blessed, in my view, with real charisma and star power even from his professional debut. He always exudes a joy and passion on the field, regardless of the team’s fortunes, with a smile nearly as wide as the cricket sightscreen. Recent injuries seem to have sidelined his West Indies team career but he’s bounced back to find favour in the IPL and other Twenty20 leagues elsewhere.

I’d love to—and expect to—see those values of versatility, resilience and passion demonstrated in whatever Brand Bravo ultimately becomes. After watching the music video for “Beenie Man & Bravo”, I predict that Dwayne will most likely focus his brand building efforts in non-musical directions in the future. Anyway, we sincerely wish you tons of success, DB.

[via SFLCN.com]

Jamaica Links. Jamaica is now helping to maintain the connection between the country of Ghana and the Ghanaian expatriate community in Great Britain.

JN Money Services, the remittance arm of the Jamaica National Building Society, has launched a new Ghana Money Transfer brand in the UK, in partnership with the Merchant Bank of Ghana.

Remittances from its Diaspora population remain an important source of foreign currency inflows into Ghana and this service targets the 90,000 Ghanaians living in Britain. National football star and English Premier League striker, Asamoah Gyan, has come on board as the brand ambassador.

JN Money Services has been operating in the UK for over 25 years is said to be the second largest remitter of funds to Jamaica, with branch offices and agents in 12 major cities across England.

[via ChelseaFC.com]

Sporting Barbados. Barbados has just signed a three-year promotional deal with the English football club Chelsea. 

The partnership will give the Barbados brand valuable exposure to Chelsea’s fans in the UK as well as in North America and the Caribbean. There is also a social component to the deal as Chelsea FC and the Barbados Tourism Authority plan to work together on various community projects in the two countries, including coaching programmes.

ECB

Barbados tourism planners have been keeping busy on the field: this football deal follows on from Barbados’ name sponsorship of the national T20 club cricket tournament in England this past summer. The Barbados Cockspur Rum Club Twenty20 competition brought exposure to 750 clubs across England and Wales. Ealing Cricket Club won the competition final on September 19 (beating Chester-Le-Street) and the match was broadcast live on Sky Sports.

Barbados Tourism Authority says that its promotional theme for 2012 will be The Year of Sport: From Grass Roots to World Class, as it plans to leverage Barbados’ impressive reputation for hosting world-class sporting events. So, stay tuned.

Barbados Telecoms. TeleBarbados, a voice and data telecommunications services provider, has launched a premium voice & internet service package for residential users, branded “VIP 4G Broadband”. Bandwidth up to 10 Mbps is available, with unlimited local and long-distance calls to the USA, United Kingdom and Canada.

Panama Silver Men. We couldn’t end this post without mentioning another cross-Caribbean connection—one that also goes across history. Barbadian filmmaker Alison Saunders is preparing to make a documentary telling the story of the thousands of Bajans and other West Indians who migrated to Panama at the beginning of the 20^th century to help construct the Panama Canal.

Panama Fever: A Caribbean Journey is currently in fund-raising and pre-production. It was one of the regional projects selected for participation in the CaribbeanTales incubator held at last month’s Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF).

Nearly 60,000 “silver men” are thought to have traveled from Barbados to Panama to help build the Canal. Their motivation was economic and the flow of remittances to families back at home helped to stave off poverty and enable a measure of social advancement for tens of thousands of Barbadians.

Alison Saunders made her debut as a feature film writer and director in 2007 with Hit for Six!, a Caribbean drama about, of course, cricket.

Retail Therapy

By now, we’re all familiar with some of the subtle techniques and signals that marketers and advertisers use to influence our perceptions and purchasing choices. The objective is to get the consumer to want the product, or to want to buy it right now.

“Early bird” discount prices on tickets for concerts and shows. Airline fares advertised as low as $9.99. Intimating how using this product can keep us, the consumer, healthy and youthful. Giving us a good laugh that not only makes the brand seem cool but that we just have to share with our friends (or on our blogs).

[Elizabeth Thomsen/Flickr]

In this piece from Fast Company, branding guru Martin Lindstrom presents an except from his new book “Brandwashed: Tricks Companies Use to Manipulate our Minds and Persuade Us to Buy”. 

It’s a case study of Whole Foods Market, the US natural and organic foods supermarket chain. Lindstrom reveals some of the smart, subtle ways that Whole Foods stage-manages its store environments in order to put customers into the most receptive state of mind to buy.

We learn from Lindstrom:

-  why there’s so much ice everywhere in the supermarket

-  why that apple you had for lunch might hold the secret of eternal youth

<  and why this colour is the absolute perfect shade of yellow for a banana.

You will probably recognize some of these very things from your own local shopping. There’s nothing wrong with what Whole Foods or any other grocer is doing, of course. It happens everywhere, not just at the supermarket: in the fragrance department of any major retail store; in the car showroom; at the Apple Store. Today, retail marketing is as much human psychology—and theatre—as it is commerce.

Read on: How Whole Foods "Primes" You to Shop.

Food & Wine and Rum

Barbados will host its second annual
Food & Wine and Rum Festival this coming November 18-21.

It will be four days of cooking demonstrations, rum and wine tastings and gourmet dinners to be held at some of the most fabulous restaurants, estates and attractions on the island.

Eight celebrity international chefs will be coming to cook, including Ming Tsai and Marcus Samuelsson. They will be joining six Bajan chefs, along with local and visiting wine and spirits experts, to put on an epicurean feast for all the senses.

We love the website. It's both simple and beautifully designed, with gorgeous use of colour and photography and nicely integrated media. The images of the cocktails and plated dishes from last year’s event make you want to dive right into your computer screen.

With so many world-class restaurants and chefs, and its own Zagat guide, Barbados has aspirations of becoming the culinary capital of the Caribbean. And, of course, it is the very birthplace of rum, which has been made in Barbados for 350 years.

Cheers to the Barbados Tourism Authority for building such a great website (unfortunately, there's no web designer credit shown on the site, so we can’t give them their props).

If you love good food and drink (who doesn’t?), then the third week in November in Barbados will definitely be the place to be.

Food, wine and rum. Eat, drink and be merry.

Feast your eyes: www.foodwinerum.com

Wisdom of a Warrior

As a communications practitioner and a member of both Toastmasters International and the International Association of Business Communicators, I am passionate about achieving and promoting excellence in both oral and written communication, in all spheres of life. This post is the first in an occasional series where I’ll share examples of great communication that I’ve found and techniques that anyone can use to improve their own speaking and writing.

[Alex Dunne/Flickr]

Padmasree Warrior is a Senior Vice President of Engineering and the Chief Technology Officer (CTO) of Cisco, the company that builds the hardware and software that make up the heart, bones and nerves of the global internet.

She is a respected leader in her company—responsible for driving innovation and strategy and overseeing the efforts of 24,000 engineers—as well as in her industry. She has been named one of the 100 most creative people in business and in 2009 was on President Obama’s shortlist of candidates to become the first CTO of the US federal government.

Here is the video of a keynote speech that Padmasree gave at the 2009 Women of Vision Awards ceremony honouring outstanding women in the field of technology. In it, she talks about leadership and managing personal change. I think it is a great example of excellence in public speaking. Padmasree delivers herself in a way that is engaging, authentic and memorable and she does so with great skill.

Regardless of whether your next speaking assignment is a talk before a social group, a business presentation or a dinnertime keynote address, here are five things you can learn and apply from this talk to improve your next speech.

1.   Speak from your personal experience. Padmasree devotes the biggest part of her talk here to sharing the story of her own personal and professional growth, beginning as a teenager in southern India and later traveling to the USA to further study and begin her career as an engineer. In talking about her life, she could relate to her audience—and them to her—since she was speaking to current and future women leaders working in Silicon Valley, like herself.

If you are invited to speak to a group, remember that it’s because they think you have something they want to hear. In deciding what to say, bear in mind that speaking out of your own experience or personal conviction will enable you to be most authentic and more engaging. Look into your own life for the experiences, insights or lessons that are most meaningful to you and that reflect your chosen subject; then share them in a way that will relate to and benefit your audience.

2.   Add a little laughter. Right at the beginning of her remarks, Padmasree is able to share in a natural, humorous way the conflicting advice that her friends gave her while she was preparing to deliver this very speech. Laughter puts everyone at ease—the speaker as well as the audience—and lets the audience know that, hey, this is someone I could listen to for the next 15 or 20 minutes. Never try to force jokes into your speech—especially if you’re terrible at telling them!—but it’s always good to start with something that will make everyone laugh a little and relax.

3.   Tell ‘em what you’re gonna tell ‘em. The speaker here starts the core of her talk by listing the five life lessons that she wants to share and then goes on to elaborate each point. This is a classic technique speakers use to build a talk: first, outline your main points, then develop each one in turn and, finally, recap and close. The audience knows exactly where you are going at any point and can follow along.

It’s best to make no more than three key points in a short speech—and never more than 5 or 6 even in a longer one. Outlining and reiterating your key points gives your audience a mental “frame” they can use to hang your words on and helps them to better recall your message after you’ve left.

4.   Smile. Padmasree’s smile is broad and warm all the way through her talk. A genuine smile while you speak helps gives your voice a warm and pleasant tone, shows that you’re relaxed (even if you don’t quite feel that way) and puts your audience at ease. So smile early and often whenever you have to speak in public.

5.   Practice. I’m sure that this masterful presentation by Padmasree didn’t happen by accident. From her choice of words, speech structure, poise and body language, you can clearly see that a good deal of preparation must have gone into delivering the final result. No matter whether your own speaking commitment is a major keynote address or just a few minutes of remarks, practice and rehearsal beforehand will always pay dividends on the day. You will get to hear and improve your voice, to fine-tune the words of your script and to really see how effectively the whole speech comes together.

Practice saying the words—out loud—and if you can, do so in front of another person(s) and get their honest feedback. When you take time to prepare in advance, it shows respect for your audience and allows you to deliver at your best.

Every businessperson and professional—man or woman—can take something valuable away from this excellent talk by Padmasree Warrior in which she also shares the five skills women need to be effective leaders today and in the future.

The video is in three short segments, you can begin watching the first part here. Enjoy.

BONUS: Early in her career as an executive, Padmasree Warrior sought out help to strengthen her personal communication skills. Feedback from her colleagues at the time indicated that she was seen as a brilliant and talented rising star. However, her peers thought that she was too soft-spoken and not assertive enough as a communicator and leader. I think you’ll agree that her years of work and practice in this area have really paid off! Padmasree sought out an executive coach but if you’re looking for a proven, inexpensive way to improve your own communication skills, consider looking into Toastmasters.