Negotiating the Cliff

The Fiscal Cliff Crisis is a Process Management Problem

 

"The fiscal crisis is not an economics problem. It is not a political problem. It is not, as one pundit put it, a math problem.  The Fiscal Cliff is a process management problem."  Slim Fairview.

The Negotiation Procedure

The standard procedure for negotiations:

You express you opinion.

I express my opinion.

You give your facts.

I give my facts.

You offer your conclusions.

I offer my conclusions.

We resolve nothing.

My procedure.

You express your opinion.

I express your opinion.

You give your facts.

I give your facts.

You offer your conclusions.

I offer your conclusions.

Result.  If I am wrong and you are right, I learn something.  If you are wrong and I am right, you learn something.

The impediments:

• Who's to say what's right or wrong?
• We should be building bridges not walls.
• There is no right or wrong.
• We should try to find a win-win resolution.

Now to solve the problem.

This is reminiscent of a joke heard on Fareed Zakaria GPS with Fareed Zakaria. 

"Two Soviet economists were talking about the economy.  One was explaining his solution to the economic crisis.  When he was finished, his colleague said, "Yes, it will work in practice, but it won't work in theory."   Therein lies the problem on Capitol Hill.

I did prepare a Fiscal Crisis Solution Worksheet.  You may want to review it. 

The Republicans

 The Republicans claim that closing loopholes will solve the problem.  Hold their feet to the fire.

Slim Fairview's Four Rules of Communication:

• Precision
• Concision
• Enumerate
• Specify

 Demand a bulleted list.

The list of loop-holes to close.

The number of dollars that the Government will receive as a result.

Close all the loop-holes for everyone earning more than one million dollars.

The Democrats

The Democrats demand tax increases.  Okay, have them start producing numbers.

After we come up with the increased revenue figures from closing the loop-holes, we subtract that from the number of dollars we need.  Then we start raising tax rates and calculate the number of dollars the Government will receive.

The top 0.5%  How many dollars?

The top 1.0%  How many dollars?

The top 1.5%  How many dollars?

The top 2.0%  How many dollars?

We add up the number of dollars that the government will receive.

Wealth

The Petersons own a home. Their only asset.  If they sell their home and pay off their mortgage, they will have a net worth of $50,000.

The Andersons own a home.  Their only asset.  If they sell their home and pay off their mortgage, they will have net worth of One Million Dollars. 

The Petersons earn $250,000 a year. Their taxes go up.

The Andersons earn $200,000 a year. Their taxes don't go up.

That is a problem.  Fix it.

Spending

Demand that the Democrats produce a bulleted list of cuts and the number of spending dollars that will not be spent as a result of cuts. (Not as a result of programmes ending. Not as a result of paying bills later.  I didn't just fall off the back of a turnip wagon.)

Provide that there will be no spending increases for 18 months.  Except!

The Stimulus Money requested by The President.

I once pointed out that 800 Billion Dollars would employ 4 million people for 5 years at $40,000 per year. (Please check my math.)  Those jobs never materialised.  This time, a list of who receives money and how much they get!

The nice thing about this process is that it follows the spirit of the old Soviet joke.

A Soviet farmer is attempting to plow his field. He struggles behind a plow pulled by a mule.  Off in the distance he sees his neighbor plowing his field.  He easily follows his plow pulled by two mules.  He looks up to heaven and prays:  "God, I have one mule and I struggle to plow my field. My neighbor has two mules and plows his field easily.  Please, God, kill one of my neighbor's mules."

The solution above will allow each party to feel that it has killed one of the other party's mules.

Regards,

Slim

slimfairview@yahoo.com

Copyright © 2012 Slim Fairview

All rights reserved.

If you find anything herein to be helpful, please don't hesitate to send me a really tricked-out lap top and to tuck more than a few dollars into the envelope along with the thank-you note. Slim

The Volt Age and Dead Batteries

GM Jump Starts Volt sales.

Okay, here's the deal:


Batteries Die 

***************

"Did you forget something, Ward?"

"No, no.  The battery on the car is dead."

"Heck, Dad, you want me to call Lumpy's Dad to see if he can give you a jump?"

"No thank you, Wally.  Lumpy's, uh, Clarence's Dad just went by on the way to work."

"Jeepers, Beav.  Dad is really gonna clobber you when he finds out you killed his battery listening to the radio."

I couldn't help it, Wally. The battery on my transistor radio died."

********************* 

• Car batteries die.
• Transistor radio batteries die.
• Remote control batteries die.
• Gillette Mach 19 razor batteries die. 

Now GM is attempting to sell an electric car.  Let me see if I can pitch in and help out.



Does the Consumer have any questions?


I watch the commercials. I still don't know the answers to the following questions:

• How far will the Volt go on a full charge?
• How many gallons of gasoline does the tank hold?
• How many miles per gallon will I get? City/mpg
• How many miles per gallon will I get? Highway/mpg

Then we have the commercial itself.


Who is your target market?  From what I understand, it is a middle-class, suburban husband who takes his wife out for clown-food.  [ I notice that commercial was dropped after this article was posted.]

Who will buy your automobiles in the future?  The goofy kid who finds the place where you pour the electricity in.

Arthur Godfrey made headlines, and sold a lot of chicken noodle soup, ridiculing the product.  He did not become a sensation by ridiculing the people who eat chicken noodle soup. 

Warmest regards,

Slim

slimfairview@yahoo.com

ps.  If this helps you to sell a few extra Volts, please don't hesitate to send me a really tricked-out laptop and to tuck more than a few dollars into the envelope along with the thank you note.  Slim

[Thanks, Slim. Very helpful. We sent along a little gift for you.] Look up my address: See below.

www.linkedin.com/in/slimfairview/

Additional reading.

Your logo

I wrote three articles about JCP and their peccadilloes. 


Your Logo
JCP and 1000 Pennies
Ackman sells Penney-Stocks

The pertinent one concerns "your logo" 

What does your logo look like?

Wrong!

I could ask, "What does your logo look like to your customer", but that would be misleading.  A better question would be, "What does your customer see when he looks at your logo? How does your customer feel when he looks at your logo."  The problem arises from the fact that you are confusing your logo with a graphic.

Now, how does the consumer feel when he watches your commercial for the Volt?  Like the [adjective of your choice] who takes his wife out for clown food.



Compare and Contrast 


Here is my compare and contrast for JCP and Macy's:

While Mayor Ed Koch may have brought umbrage down upon himself while running for Governor of New York by disparaging Sears Roebuck suits, when I think of a suit from JCP the only thing that comes to mind is "I didn't buy this suit at Sears I bought it at J C Penney."

I did buy a Harris Tweed sports coat at Macy's though.  The Logo?  A snifter of single-malt whisky.  What snifter of single-malt whisky?  The snifter of single-malt whisky I am sipping in front of a fire while wearing that Harris Tweed sports coat. (Okay, maybe Macy's is piggy-backing on the Harris Tweed Logo, still....)


Appeal to the Consumers' Image


A far better image is the husband in evening clothes attempting to start his Volt.

The wife:  It looks like where out of gas.
Husband:  That's okay. I'll just switch to electric.
The wife:  (Turning off the car.)  "It looks like we're out of gas."

Husband carrying wife back into the house.

VO:  The Chevy Volt.  Even when you're not going anywhere, you're still getting somewhere. 


Okay, I don't do ad copy.  However, from the disappointing sales figure.....follow the path of the trajectory.

Warmest regards,

Slim

slimfairview@yahoo.com








 Copyright © 2012 Slim Fairview. All rights reserved.

Ackman: Selling Penney-Stocks

Bill Ackman was on CNBC Tuesday.  His purpose seemed to be selling J C Penney Stocks.

Let's Review

My first article on the topic was Your Logo  (Friday 7. September 2012) There I posed the question, "What does your logo look like?  You're probably wrong."  The reason? You are confusing logos with the graphics.

In my second article  JCP and 1000 Pennies, I reviewed,:

The Catalogue, Slim Fairview's Illustration of Empirical Analysis, and Miracle Marketing. 

Here, I will bring the discussion closer to home.

Consumers do not check sales figures, profit margins, and the stock market before deciding where to shop.

You don't convince consumers to buy cloths by convincing investors to buy stock.  You convince investors to buy stock by convincing consumers to buy clothes. 

You don't attract customers by attracting investors, you attract investor by attracting customers. 


Comparing Apples to Penneys

Apple:

i-Pod 
i-Pad
i-Phone
i-Pad
i-Mac

You don't need a lot of square footage to sell apples.  The analogy was invalid.  Worse!  Remember the Hippocratic Oath?  "First, do no harm...."


Coupons 

One thing I can say without fear of contradiction. Every living American man, woman, and child has one thing in common.  "We all eat."  And, unless you're "Ole Grandpappy Amos is the head of the clan, he roars like a lion but he's gentle as a lamb" (Harry Ruby, From The Real McCoys) you buy your food in a supermarket.  When you go to the supermarket, you brig coupons.  They are in the Sunday Edition of almost every newspaper in America.  People write books about couponing.  There is a television programme about couponing.  Couponing even has a Queen!

Mr Ackman believes, people don't want to wait for a sale, wait for coupons, or go to the store with whole bunches of coupons.  JCP even sent customers a letter to that effect.  (And they included a coupon.)


Let's Be Completely Truthful

Mr. Ackman owns a lot of Penney-Stock.  He as a vested interest in the stock going up.  Still, he is not a majority owner.  He may be the biggest kid on the block, but he is not bigger than all the other kids put together.

Here is something my Dad taught me before Mr. Ackman was born.

"You can win the argument and lose the sale."

Keep arguing with the consumers. You have nothing to lose.  They're not going into your store anyway.

Warmest regards,

Slim


If you find anything here to be helpful, please do not hesitate to send me a really tricked-out laptop and to put a few dollars into the envelope along with the thank you note. Slim


Contact information available on Linkedin www.linkedin.com/in/slimfairview/ 

Slim

PS  Now, I think I will read Andrew Ross Sorkin's Op-Ed piece in the New York Times.

Slimfairview@yahoo.com

Copyright © 2012 Slim Fairview

All rights reserved.

JCP and 1000 Pennies

This is the follow-up to my article Your Logo. There I offered a brief compare and contrast analysis between JCP® and Macy's®.  This is the extension.

One thousand pennies equals $10.00 (ten dollars).  That is the value of the coupon offered by JCP, heretofore known as J. C. Penney's.  On television, this has been reported as JCP sends customers letter explaining why they don't offer coupons. The letter included a coupon.  

However, shoppers seldom, if ever, conduct a review of the stock prices, the growth curve, or the business news before going shopping.


Your Logo

Your logo is actually how a customer feels when shopping in your store or buying your product.  How the customer feels is the why of 'why a customer goes to your store'.

Let's watch a customer in Sears®.  A Mom, with several children, sees a dress.  The dress is $11.00. Mom knows she can buy that dress at Family Dollar® for $7.00.  The difference?  Well, two dresses means a third dress.  Eight ($8.00) dollars can be a night's meal.  Two nights for a smaller family. 

Have you ever heard this conversation?

"The mall is crowded.  I can't find a parking spot."

"Just park over by Penneys.  We can go through Penneys into the mall.  We just have to remember we parked by Penneys."

That is not very flattering.  Is it true?  Do you know?  Did you ask?  Did you issue a statement saying how much your customers love shopping at JCPenney?

Your Catalogue

Does your catalogue look inviting?  Or does your catalogue look more like a catalogue for clip-art? Do you know? Did you ask? Whom did you ask?  Now we have this conversation:

"Can you put that picture of the sweater on my website?"

"Not a problem.  A simple copy-paste. No extra charge."

"Thanks."

Sorry, folks, but I found the catalogue uninspiring.  Of course, that is only my opinion.  How are your sales figures? Your profit figures. Your stocks?

I've walked through JCP.  Nothing enticed me to stop and look.  I've walked through Macy's. I stop, I look, I shop.  Men's Clothing. Men's Shoes.  The place where they sell that cookware stuff. (Real people do not speak the same language as the people in marketing.)


Slim Fairview's Illustration of Empirical Analysis.

Did you try it?  Yes.
Did things get more high, good, better? No.
Did things get more low, bad, worse? Yes.
Conclusion?  Don't do that.

Of course, only you can know what is going on inside.  However, it seems intuitively obvious to the casual observer that you might not know what is going inside the shopper's head.  You may not know what the shopper is feeling.

Miracle Marketing

JCP is not Walmart. JCP is not Macy's.  As Jim Cramer pointed out: Gimbel's.

There are some things the marketing department cannot do.  For example: For the last two months of every year--the prime shopping time--Macy's becomes the Miracle on 34th Street.

"Uh, since the United States Government declares this man to be Santa Claus, this court will not dispute it. Case dismissed"


What? How? Who? Why? 

What are you?
Who are your customers?
How do your customers feel?
Who does your marketing?
Why? 

Rethink the way your rethink the problem. Rethink the way you rethink the solution.

JCP: a thousand pennies.

Regards, 

Slim 

Slimfairview@yahoo.com

Copyright © 2012 Slim Fairview

Childhood Obesity in America: A Moral Issue

What do people around the world see?  Believe?

Poor people in third world nations and in emerging nations do not analyze graphs and data.  They know what they see around them and what they hear from their leaders; and from the opposition.

If leaders say the US feeds poor starving children around the world, will they believe it if they are surrounded by poor starving children?  Will they believe the opposition leaders who tell them that the US does not feed poor starving children?

On to emerging nations: those nations with Internet access.  What do they hear, what do they see?  America suffers [suffers?] from an epidemic of childhood obesity.

To the rest of the world, childhood obesity in America is a moral issue.

What makes this a moral issue is that they also hear that 40% of American children go to be hungry.  Why?  Because they have no food.   

Elsewhere, being fat is a sign of prosperity.  They hear that in America, obesity is a sign of poverty.

It is about time that we rethink the way we see ourselves.

O wad some Pow'r the giftie gie us
To see oursels as ithers see us!
It wad frae mony a blunder free us,
An' foolish notion:
What airs in dress an' gait wad lea'e us,
An' ev'n devotion! -- Robert Burns

Translation:

And would some Power the small gift give us
To see ourselves as others see us!
It would from many a blunder free us,
And foolish notion:
What airs in dress and gait would leave us,
And even devotion! 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/To_a_Louse

Regards, 

Slim

slimfairview@yahoo.com

Copyright (c) 2012 Slim Fairview