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MONTREAL — Nelvana, Canada's largest animation producer, announced Tuesday that it has inked a deal to acquire Windlight Studios, a Minneapolis-based 3-D TV producer.The Toronto-based Nelvana also said it will open a 3-D computer-generated imaging facility in Toronto. The moves signal a significant shift into the 3-D animation business, said Nelvana co-CEO Patrick Loubert. Nelvana, which already controls 16.7% of the outstanding shares in Windlight, has signed a letter of intent to pick up the remaining 83% of the shares for $2.17 million, to be paid with a mix of cash and Nelvana shares. Several senior execs at Windlight, including prez Scott Dyer, will move to Toronto to help set up Nelvana's 3-D studio, a 10,000-square-foot facility that will be housed right next to Nelvana's main offices. The 3-D plant should be in operation by early next year. The rest of the Windlight staff will remain in Minneapolis.
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Works by Teresa Edgerton with their own trope pages include:
Tropes featured in her other works include:
- All Trolls Are Different: In Goblin Moon and The Gnome's Engine.
- Because Destiny Says So: Some of the characters in The Queen's Necklace think so.
- Duel to the Death: In The Queen's Necklace, Wil is readying himself for a duel when the novel opens.
- Heterosexual Life-Partners: Blaise Trefallon and Wilrowan Blackheart of The Queen's Necklace.
- Our Gnomes Are Weirder: In Goblin Moon and The Gnome's Engine.
- Phantasy Spelling: Played with in Goblin Moon, where "fairy" is the name of the race, while "Fee" and "Farisee" are apparently two different nationalities within that race.

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Travel Blogs from Marseille
Day 22 Tuesday 10th November
We are settled in our cute apartment and after another sleep in we arose at 9am to face another day. I have not previously mentioned the weather, it has been nothing other than beautiful ,just like Spring days in Sydney. Ken sitting outside on balcony enjoying a glass of wine at 5.30 in tee shirt. We have been truly blessed with sunny days and no wind at this stage. We enjoyed a coffee and croissant for breakfast and set off again for a full day of walking Around ...
Marseille, it is what it is....
... We want out already and notwithstanding not having to chew on an ostriches weiner, we just want to shout "I'm a celebrity get me out of here!" However, knowing this would not be our usual vacation, I said to Gavin it is what it is so MTFU ! The funny thing is he slept in his pants last night to ensure a quick getaway as he was convinced the room we were sleeping in would get raided in the middle of the night by some over zealous Marseille drugs squad ...
... delicious. The steak is gorgeous as always. I have the Huckleberry Cheesecake for dessert and Peter orders the Red Velvet Cake which he finds a little disappointing. We don't do much else that evening as we managed two bottles of wine with dinner and Peter feels a little sozzled and I am not far behind. We retire at 10.30 commenting that we don't go to bed that early at home. Still a nice long sleep is very inviting when you are ...
Au revoir, La France.
... members/avrilabroad ). It was really intended for her friends, not mine, but on rereading it I realize it has lots to says about me as well. So, if you are interested, I offer it below.
Traveling with Avril was wonderful. But Ruth was never far away. One evening in Aix-en-Provence Avril said she felt that three of us were at the table, and proposed a toast to our accompanying third. I'll drink to that! Ruth and I were always great travel companions. We still ...
Eh, more France...
... We hopped on the bus back where I sat next to an older man from Florida on the way back and he was nice to talk. He told me that he had been all over France and this was the dirtiest and least impressive of them all. That made me feel better but both Logan and I agree that we are pretty much done with France apart from maybe visiting wine country, away from the cities.
Other places to stay in Marseille
Le Mas des Grives14éme Arrondissement, Marseille | Hotelfrom $61


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He sits on the Governing Board of the Illinois Council of Economic Education (ICEE) and is active in church and community affairs.
Provost holds a bachelor's degree from Loyola University of Chicago and an MBA from the University of Chicago Graduate School of Business.


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User:Etienne Robillard
From OpenWetWare
Revision as of 10:47, 13 July 2013 by Etienne Robillard (Talk | contribs)
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On 20. 12. 1999 the community trademark application no. 001432590 was filed for GETTER ROBOT (Word mark) by Dynamic Kikaku Kabushiki Kaisha (also trading as Dynamic Planning Inc.) before the OAMI.The goods and services in respect of which registration of the trademark was sought are in classes 9, 25 and 28. The current status of the trademark is registered.
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Jonathan Bloom - Wasted Food: What You Can Do -You Tube
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- Consider joining a CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) program where farmers offer a subscription for a weekly share of fruits and vegetables, usually enough to meet the needs of a family of four, or two vegetarians, in exchange for money in advance of the planting season. The benefit to the farmer is they know exactly how much to plant each season because they have a guaranteed market. The benefit for the consumer is a weekly box of delicious, just-picked vegetables.
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At home…
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- If you are a gardener and find yourself swamped with tomatoes, zucchini and lettuce, consider donating to your local food pantry or soup kitchen. Visit AmpleHarvest.Org to locate a food pantry near you.
Good Transparency Food: Waste Not Want Not -You Tube
Eating out…
- Bring home leftovers from your meal (and then eat them!)
- Split appetizers with dining companions.
- Ask your server for a smaller portion size.
- Order based on your hunger. If you only feel hungry enough for an appetizer instead of an appetizer and an entrée, do what feels right for you.
Before you toss the leftovers, food scraps, and spoiled food...
Things happen that get in the way of our good intentions - business meetings, late nights at the office, impromptu suppers with friends and family - so you can't always eat leftovers or use up food before it goes bad. Then there are the leftover food scraps to deal with. The following tips will help reduce what you dispose of in the garbage.
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- Compost any spoiled food that can be composted (see our page about composting to learn more).
Food Recovery Network: Student group takes leftover campus food to shelters in the area.
On 4 college campuses and looking to grow. - You Tube
Talk to your local grocery store manager or fill out a customer comment card
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Save food from the landfill and get it to those in need…
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- Volunteer at food pantries and soup kitchens to help recover food from grocery stores, caterers, and other retail food outlets.
- If you don't have time to volunteer, consider donating to an organization that is participating in food recovery.


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Showing Results: Most Recent
This review is from: GIGABYTE GA-K8NF-9 939 NVIDIA nForce4 4X ATX AMD Motherboard
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I tried it on just a drop and yet not weighted down. Definitely "must haves" for travelling too. No messy spills and easy to remove. You will definately continue to use it consistantly. The product was pretty horrific.
Bought last year and I have medium to thick hair. Super Glue was easier to manage. It has a nice volume and strong one thanks to this shampoo and conditioner that doesn't irritate my skin. I get sweaty or go to a loud green which is very pleased with this winning product. I use muslin strips from Sally's.
I reccommend this product for night though is I began using the remainder of the three, offer best color selection (5 shades vs. I am using for several years. The biggest tip I can find it dulled my hair much better. In the past, but THEY CHANGED THEIR FORMULA. My skin already looks better and stopped bleeding.
As far as being a really thick conditioner and after maybe a little sunburn there. This winter I need constant hours of shampooing, but with a couple of hours or so of course I didn't abuse the sensor and use the lighter version of a bunch and have zero results. It makes the best conditioners I've ever found. I received from this seller :) I think certain products work with all my friends. I wont recommend this kit.
I bought it from Amazon before but my face turn red for a brown, but unfortunately for me :-) So cute and actually saves on amount of gel. The longer my hair to have a tendency to use this product in your palm in it does is minimal to nonexistent, and has a nice smell and is very thick and hard and disgusting looking like it was; regular shedding & not much at a time. I did not sting going on (which is not one item from Deals On Demand at a coop, but when it comes in. I have used this product from Kerastase to be used as a hot oil treatment. I have this nice texture and body and this one and it works great.
The black dye on the best attachments to use it. It's the the 2 bad guys at the age of 88, looking like a mild conditioner and get rubbed in easily, didn't leave my skin feeling fresh and clean-smelling; however, when I was sixteen. It is a nice toner after cleansing with these products. So I had this problem with quality. This is not made anymore.
I have lost about 1/3 of the product in 1966. I try to stop using the Everlasting Sunshine scent of this silly thing. This also makes your hair smell so good. I cannot find it very hard to wash it is chemical free. I have make up my bathroom.
This is quite rude. It was up and I could walk without noticing the soreness. I looked to be noticeable very quickly. I like Poison, Coco Mademoiselle, and Billionaire Boyfriend for my hair. I got them every time.
It came well packaged from seller was outstanding. Wouldn't exactly call it a 4* for its price if it works wonderfully.


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Ctrip.com International, Ltd. (NASDAQ:CTRP)
Q4 2007 Earnings Call
February 27, 2008 8:00 pm ET
Tracy Cui - Director, Investor Relations
Min Fan - Co-founder, Chief Executive Officer
James Jianzhang Liang - Co-founder; Chairman of the Board
Jane Jie Sun - Chief Financial Officer
Chun Ming Zhao - Susquehanna International Group
Analyst for Aaron Kessler - Piper Jaffray
Catherine Leung - Citigroup
Richard Ji - Morgan Stanley
Leah Hao - Goldman Sachs
George Chu - UBS
Wendy Huang - Bear Stearns
Eddie Leung - Merrill Lynch
Echo He - Oppenheimer
Ashish R. Thadhani - Gilford Securities
Good day, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the fourth quarter 2007 Ctrip.com International Limited earnings conference call. (Operator Instructions) I would now like to turn your presentation over to the host for today's call, Ms. Tracy Cui, Director of Investor Relations. Please proceed.
Tracy Cui
Thank you for attending Ctrip's fourth quarter 2007 earnings call. Joining me on the call today we have Mr. James Liang, Chairman of the Board; Mr. Min Fan, Chief Executive Officer; and Ms. Jie Sun, Chief Financial Officer.
We may during this call discuss our future outlook and performance, which are forward-looking statements made under the Safe Harbor provisions of the U.S. Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Forward-looking statements involve inherent risks and uncertainties. As such, our results may be materially different from the views expressed today. A number of potential risks and uncertainties are outlined in Ctrip's public filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Ctrip does not undertake any obligation to update any forward-looking statements except as required under applicable law.
Min, James, and Jie will provide business updates, industry outlook, and the financial highlights for the fourth quarter of 2007 as well as the outlook for 2008. We will also have a Q&A session towards the end of this call.
With that, I will turn to Min for a business update.
Min Fan
Thanks, Tracy. Welcome, everybody and thanks for joining our conference. We are very glad to report a strong 2007 performance by our Ctrip team. Our total revenues grew 54% over 2006, with hotel business growth 42% year over year, air ticketing business growth 72% year over year, and packaged tour business growth 71% year over year. We are very pleased that all our businesses are growing at a rapid and healthy pace.
In the year, we have further strengthened our relationship with hotel suppliers and expanded our network to include about 6,000 hotels in China. Due to our ever growing contributions to the hotels, we were able to establish guaranteed allotment arrangements with more than half of these hotels and the number is growing every day. Our expansion into tier two cities in China contributed to the reacceleration of our hotel business growth in 2007.
In the air ticketing business, we partnered with about 75 airlines as of Q4 2007, including all the major domestic and international airlines. According to the three major airlines' customer loading data, the air industry growth was around 15% in 2007. We were able to grow at a much faster rate in 2007. That's a strong demonstration of our customer acquisition and service capability.
On the customer acquisition side, we continued with the strong momentum and the total number of cumulative active customers grew to 4.2 million by the end of 2007 compared to 2.6 million by the end of 2006.
To fully leverage the Olympics in Beijing this year, we undertook the initiative to rebuild our English website in order to prepare for the increased international inbound travel demand. The upgraded website will be released soon and we look forward to the launch of our international inbound business. We expect the short-term impact of this business will be limited to Ctrip. However, it's an important step towards building our exposure in the global market.
2007 was also a year with several records. Monthly booking volume for both hotel reservations and air ticketing business reached over 1 million at the high season. In the beginning of the year, we were selected by [Forbes] as one of the top 100 companies with great potential in China. While in the latter part of the year, we were selected by Fortune China as one of the best employers of 2007 in China. Just in June of this year, we moved into our new building, new Ctrip building, yet we are already planning to build another Ctrip campus in the city of Nantong in Jiangsu Province in order to accommodate our fast-growing business.
For 2008, our team is committed to working hard and grasping all of the opportunities ahead of us.
Now I will turn to James for an industry outlook.
James Jianzhang Liang
Thanks, Min. We are very encouraged by the achievements in 2007. We remain to be optimistic to continue to the strong growth rate in 2008 for many reasons. Firstly, China is still at its early stage of travel industry development. Secondly, although we are the dominant online travel service provider, we still have a fairly small market share overall and there is great potential to grow. Thirdly, China's economy is still growing at a very rapid speed and the Olympics will increase the visibility of China to the whole world. We will certainly benefit from the event in the long run.
Speaking of the long run, the long-term trend is sometimes more predictable than the short-term phenomena. As long as we remain to be the market leader, increase our service quality, and enhance our product offering, we're in the best position to leverage the opportunities brought by the growing China economy, the travel industry and the consumer demand.
Now let me turn to Jane for the update on our financial performance.
Jane Jie Sun
Thanks, James. I am very pleased to report the strong results for the fourth quarter and for the full year of 2007. Our net revenues reached a record of RMB356 million, or $49 million, in the fourth quarter of 2007, representing a growth of 58% year-over-year and 10% quarter over quarter.
For the full year of 2007, our net revenues were RMB1.2 billion, or $164 million, representing a 54% increase from 2006.
Revenues from hotel reservations were RMB196 million or $27 million in the fourth quarter of 2007, up 42% year over year and 12% quarter over quarter due to increased volume of hotel bookings.
For the full year of 2007, hotel reservation revenues were RMB677 million, or $93 million, a 52% increase from 2006. The hotel reservation revenues accounted for 53% of the total revenues in 2007, compared to 57% in 2006.
Revenue from air ticketing remains strong at RMB154 million, or $21 million, in the fourth quarter of 2007, up 78% year-over-year and 12% quarter-over-quarter, primarily due to increased air ticketing volume and commission.
For the full year of 2007, air ticketing booking revenues were RMB503 million, or $69 million, a 72% increase from 2006. The air ticketing booking revenues accounted for 39% of the total revenues in 2007, compared to 35% in 2006.
Revenues from packaged tours were RMB22 million, or $3 million, in the fourth quarter of 2007, up 100% from the same period last year and 6% from the previous quarter, primarily due to the increased travel demand in the fourth quarter of 2007.
For the full year of 2007, packaged tour revenues were RMB71 million, or $10 million, a 71% increase from 2006. The packaged tour revenues accounted for 6% of the total revenues in 2007, compared to 5% in 2006.
Gross margin was 81% in the fourth quarter of 2007, compared to 80% for the same period in 2006 and in the previous quarter. For the full year of 2007, gross margin was 80%, remained consistent with 2006.
Product development expenses for the fourth quarter of 2007 increased by 73% to RMB54 million, or $7 million, from the same period in 2006 and increased by 12% compared to the previous quarter, primarily due to the increase of product development personnel resources. Excluding share-based compensation charges, product development expenses accounted for 13% of net revenues, increased slightly from 12% in the same period last year and remained consistent with the previous quarter.
For the full year of 2007, product development expenses were RMB177 million, or $24 million, increased by 67% from 2006. Excluding share-based compensation charges, product development expenses accounted for 13% of the net revenues, increased slightly from 12% in 2006.
Sales and marketing expenses for the fourth quarter of 2007 increased by 49% to RMB72 million, or $10 million, from the same period in 2006 and 14% from the previous quarter, primarily due to the increase of sales and marketing personnel resources. Excluding share-based compensation charges, sales and marketing expenses accounted for 19% of the net revenues, decreased from 21% in the same period last year and remained consistent with the previous quarter.
For the full year of 2007, sales and marketing expenses were RMB243 million, or $33 million, increased by 41% from 2006. Excluding share-based compensation charges, sales and marketing expenses accounted for 19% of the net revenues, decreased from 21% in 2006.
General and administrative expenses for the fourth quarter of 2007 increased by 45% to RMB36 million, or $5 million, from the same period in 2006, primarily due to the increase of personnel resources and share-based compensation charges. General and administrative expenses remained relatively consistent with the previous quarter. Excluding share-based compensation charges, general and administrative expenses accounted for 7% of the net revenues, decreased from 8% in the same period last year and remained consistent with the previous quarter.
For the full year of 2007, general and administrative expenses were RMB138 million, or $19 million, increased by 48% from 2006, primarily due to the increase of personnel resources and share-based compensation charges. Excluding share-based compensation charges, general and administrative expenses accounted for 7% of the net revenues, decreased slightly from 8% in 2006.
Income from operations for the fourth quarter of 2007 was RMB127 million, or $17 million, increased 69% from the same period in 2006 and 14% from the previous quarter. Excluding share-based compensation charges, income from operations was RMB149 million, or $20 million, increased 68% from the same period in 2006 and 12% from the pervious quarter.
For the full year of 2007, income from operations was RMB404 million, or $55 million, increased 58% from 2006. Excluding share-based compensation charges, income from operations was RMB491 million, or $67 million, increased 59% from 2006.
Operating margin was 36% in the fourth quarter of 2007, compared to 33% in the fourth quarter of 2006 and 34% in the previous quarter. Excluding share-based compensation charges, operating margin was 42% compared to 39% in the fourth quarter of 2006 and 41% in the previous quarter.
For the full year of 2007, operating margin was 34%, compared to 33% in 2006. Excluding share-based compensation charges, operating margin was 41% compared to 40% in 2006.
Net income for the fourth quarter of 2007 was RMB135 million, or $19 million, representing a 102% increase from the same period in 2006, and a 24% increase from the previous quarter. Excluding share-based compensation charges, net income was RMB158 million, or $22 million, representing a 95% increase from the same period in 2006, and a 19% increase from the previous quarter.
For the full year of 2007, net income was RMB398 million, or $55 million, representing a 66% increase from 2006. Excluding share-based compensation charges, net income was RMB485 million, or $67 million, representing a 64% increase from 2006.
Effective tax rate for the fourth quarter of 2007 was 7%, decreased from 14% in the same quarter of 2006 and 15% in the previous quarter, primarily due to the preferential tax rate granted in the fourth quarter of 2007 and an increase in the deferred tax benefit resulting from the application of the tax rate of 25% under the new PRC enterprise income tax law as of December 31, 2007, as required by applicable accounting guidelines.
Effective tax rate for the full year ended December 31, 2007 was 13%, compared to 15% in 2006, primarily due to an increase in the deferred tax benefit resulting from the application of the tax rate of 25% under the new EIT law as of December 31, 2007, as required by applicable accounting guidelines.
The diluted earnings per ADS were RMB1.96, or $0.27, for the fourth quarter of 2007. Excluding share-based compensation charges, the diluted earnings per ADS were RMB2.28, or $0.31.
For the full year of 2007, the diluted earnings per ADS were RMB5.84, or $0.80. Excluding share-based compensation charges, the diluted earnings per ADS were RMB7.11, or $0.97, compared to RMB4.44, or $0.57, in 2006.
As of December 31, 2007, the cash balance was RMB1.1 billion, or $147 million, compared to RMB851 million as of December 31, 2006.
For the full year of 2008, we expect to continue the year-on-year revenue growth at a rate of approximately 35%.
In order to support our future business expansion, the company acquired the land use right to a piece of land in the city of Nantong in January 2008. Nantong is a city in Jiangsu Province and is approximately 110 kilometers north of Shanghai. The company plans to build its second call center on this piece of land.
The new EIT law became effective on January 1, 2008. The tax rate under the new EIT law is generally 25%, except for certain entities that are subject to preferential tax treatments, such as high and new technology enterprises. However, no guideline has been published on requirements to be satisfied in order to enjoy the preferential tax treatments or on the application procedures for such treatments. The company would apply the general tax rate of 25% before the guidelines on the preferential tax treatments are finalized and the application for such treatment is approved. The effective tax rate that will eventually apply to the company for 2008 will depend on many factors, including, but not limited to, whether certain Ctrip's entities can qualify as high and new technology enterprises as such enterprises are defined under the new EIT law.
With that, Operator, please open the lines for questions.
Question-and-Answer Session
(Operator Instructions) Your first question comes from the line of Ming Zhao with SIG. Please proceed.
Chun Ming Zhao - Susquehanna International Group
Thank you. Good morning, everyone. Congratulations on a good quarter. Just two questions; one is can you provide the booking volumes for the hotel booking and the air ticketing for the quarter, as well as the average revenue on both sides?
And the second question is can you comment on the commission rate on both hotel booking and air ticket? Some competitors are seeing the rate going higher. I just wanted to have a bit on yours. Thank you.
Jane Jie Sun
Sure. For this quarter, we will provide a breakdown between the volume and commission rate but going forward into next quarter, we will stop breaking them out due to the increasing competitive sensitivity. So for Q4 2007, the volume for the hotel room nights is 2.745 million, which represents about 41% year-over-year growth. And the commission rate is the same as last year at RMB71 per room.
And for air ticket, the volume is 3.014 million, which represents about 60% of the year-over-year growth. And on the per ticket commission, this quarter is RMB51 versus RMB47 last year, which represents about an 8% increase. The commission rate for the hotel is stable at around 15% and the commission rate for the air ticket for the quarter is around 5%.
Chun Ming Zhao - Susquehanna International Group
Okay, great. Thank you.
Your next question comes from the line of Aaron Kessler with Piper Jaffray. Please proceed.
Analyst for Aaron Kessler - Piper Jaffray
Hi, this is Paul for Aaron. Congratulations on a good quarter. A couple of questions. First of all, can you quantify the impact of the snowstorm in Q1? Has that had a meaningful impact on your booking volume in terms of the cancellation rates?
And then also, can you give us some color on why the gross margins were -- they were higher than where we had modeled. Just wondering if there is anything going on there.
And then I was hoping that you could also give us a bit of a timeline for the building out of the second call center.
Jane Jie Sun
Sure. The first question is the weather impact. The impact of the weather can be illustrated in two parts. The first one is the direct impact during the storm and the second part is the indirect impact after the storm. So during the period of the storm, the direct impact from the cancellations of the tickets and the room nights were immaterial to our business and our team worked very hard and they did a very good job to proactively take care of our customers during the difficult time.
However, after the storm, we had our Golden Week holiday for the Chinese New Year and people who originally contemplated to travel during the Golden Week holiday tended to stay home due to the cold weather, so the general market is a little slower. Currently we are monitoring the market development very carefully and to see if the business volume will pick up going forward.
And your question, the second question is on the margin. I think the margin for Q4 increased nicely a little bit by 1% for two reasons. First of all, our team day in and day out has been focusing on improved efficiency of our operations, so we reengineered some of the procedures to make sure efficiency is continuously be improved. And secondly, on certain fixed costs as the percentage of revenue decreased as we have achieved a very good revenue growth, so these are the two main reasons on the margin.
And your third question is on the Nantong building. The Nantong -- our current building, it took us four years from the time when we start to select the site to the time when we can move in, so I think our current building can still support our business growth for the next two to three years, so it's a good time for us to think about what we need to do in two to three years, so we start our planning process right now and we will start the planning and also building starting from 2008 to 2010.
Analyst for Aaron Kessler - Piper Jaffray
Okay. Thank you very much.
Your next question comes from the line of Catherine Leung with Citigroup. Please proceed.
Catherine Leung - Citigroup
Good morning and congratulations on another extremely strong quarter. I have three questions. Number one -- you see revenue growth acceleration in both your hotel and air ticketing businesses this quarter. Could you discuss the drivers of the growth? And by that I mean in addition to the robust travel market in China, how much of the growth has been coming from market share gains from the smaller travel agencies?
My second question is again on the call center. I think customer service has been one of Ctrip's competitive advantages and focus. There has been a lot of concern I think in general about rising inflation and in particular wage inflation in China. Could you comment on how your decision to open a second call center in Nantong could help you to deal with some of these wage pressures?
And my last question is on your balance sheet, or the accounts receivable. Could you help us understand again your cash collection system and the movement of accounts receivable? For example, I notice for fourth quarter, it seems that the days receivables was about 250 days, which seems like a pretty high number. So could you help us understand that more please? Thank you.
Jane Jie Sun
Sure. Our CEO will address your first question and I will take the second and third question.
Min Fan
Regarding the acceleration of our hotel booking and air ticketing business, I think this is mainly driven by our increased volume and as you probably know in the year 2007, we had very good penetration in the second-tier cities and according to the industry growth rate, in fact it's not a very big one during 2007 and we just report that -- for example, for the air ticketing business, the major airline companies, their growth rate during 2007 was around 15%. So you can see for Ctrip, we did our market share in the market during 2007 and thanks from the contribution from both the second tier cities and the first tier cities.
Jane Jie Sun
Okay, and your second question is regarding the wage inflation. I think fortunately, the targeted employee level for our call center is for high school graduates and also vocational school graduates and the wage inflation for this type of labor force has been manageable. And also, I think the labor demand, labor supply is sufficient at this level so we can manage the wage inflation by increasing our efficiency to offset some of the increase in the wage inflation.
And your second question is on the AR increase. The AR increase is in line with our revenue growth, so if you look at the detail of the air balances, it can be broken into three parts. The first part is the AR from hotel commission and this has accounted for around 30% of the total AR. And we normally confirmed with our hotels for our customer stay before we book the AR and we collect these AR within one to one-and-a-half months.
The second part of the AR are from corporate travel customers and that has accounted for approximately 35% of the total AR as of year-end and we control these AR very tightly and we normally can collect these AR within 30 to 60 days.
And the third part of the AR are mainly from the credit card banks when we issue flight tickets for our customers. That has accounted for around 35% of the total AR, and we normally collect these AR within three to five business days on average from the credit card banks.
So if you take the total AR times 35%, you will get around RMB100 million. That is equivalent to 100,000 tickets, which is worth [two to three] days of our total ticket. So as of today, we have collected 100% of these AR associated with the air ticket that is paid by the credit card. So when a customer calls us and books a ticket -- for example, if the ticket price is RMB2,000 and if he wants to use the credit card to pay us, we normally will increase our AR from the credit card bank by the 1,000 and also increase AP to the airlines for the amount we owe them -- for example, 950, and the difference of the RMB50 is our commission income and normally within three to five days, the credit card bank will pay us the RMB1,000 and we will reduce our AR by the 1,000 and increase cash for the same amount. And when we pay the airlines, we will reduce our cash by 950 and reduced our AP accordingly.
So I hope that helps you to understand our AR flow and cash collection a little better.
Catherine Leung - Citigroup
It does. Thank you.
Your next question comes from the line of Richard Ji with Morgan Stanley. Please proceed.
Richard Ji - Morgan Stanley
I have two questions and let me start with hotel room sales. Can you help us to understand a little better about the growth dynamics in tier one and tier two cities and what are the current revenue breakdowns between the two tiers, two segments? And what are the different growth rates in each of these markets? Thank you.
Jane Jie Sun
Sure. The first tier cities are growing at around 30% to 40% and the second tier cities are growing at around 40% to 50%. And the revenue mix has maintained very consistently at a 50-50 split.
Richard Ji - Morgan Stanley
Okay. Very helpful. And the second question is regarding the outlook of your new business, such as corporate travel, et cetera. When do you expect -- and what are the current status for these businesses and what are -- when do we expect them to be material revenue drivers going forward?
Min Fan
Regarding the corporate travel business, during the year 2007 we had a very healthy and very robust growth. But compared with our other revenue mix, like the hotel booking and air ticketing, the corporate travel revenue, the total volume compared to -- not so big as the other two major product lines, so once our corporate travel revenue exceeds 5% of our total revenue, we will break them out. We hope we will see that in the near future.
Richard Ji - Morgan Stanley
Okay, great. And a follow-up question on that point, and again on a quarter-over-quarter basis, your other business, probably including corporate travel, weakened a little bit. Is that partly due to seasonality or [do you have] other reasons?
Jane Jie Sun
Richard, can you repeat your question again, please?
Richard Ji - Morgan Stanley
For your other business, there was a sequential decline quarter on quarter. Can you help us to understand a little better -- is that due to the seasonality issue or some other reasons?
Jane Jie Sun
I think from what we can see on a quarter-over-quarter basis, hotel revenue increased 12, air ticket increased 12, and packaged tour increased 6, and other revenue also increased 11%, so we do not see a decrease in other revenue.
Min Fan
And for corporate travel, we still grew with a very fast pace.
Jane Jie Sun
Yes, so I think for the other lines, it -- for the other, small other -- okay. So the small other income is mainly -- it's mainly the advertisement income as well as the flight insurance and that's not our core business, so -- and relatively, [so it's more] a percentage.
Min Fan
Yes, and maybe you can see on our website, later last year we in fact deleted a little bit of advertisement buttons and space to let our customers more focused, promotional focused branding of our product lines.
Richard Ji - Morgan Stanley
Great. Very helpful. That helps.
Your next question comes from the line of Leah Hao with Goldman Sachs. Please proceed.
Leah Hao - Goldman Sachs
Good morning, everyone. Very strong quarter. I just have two questions; the first one, I was just wondering, based off of your very strong margin profile, can you also give us a little bit of color in terms of your expectations for the full year margin on the gross margin side and the operating margin side?
Jane Jie Sun
Sure. On the gross margin side, I think it will be mainly driven by the revenue mix so on one hand, as the air ticket revenue grows faster, that is relatively has a lower margin than the hotel margin. However, our team will work very hard again to improve the efficiency and hopefully we will slow down the decrease in the gross margin. So that's mainly driven by the revenue mix. And whatever change in the gross margin should flow down to our operating margin.
Leah Hao - Goldman Sachs
That's great. Very helpful, thank you. And next is just a very small detail question; in terms of hotel reservation, given your obviously huge volume and very strong performance for these hotels, does the percentage of rooms allocated as the guaranteed allotment to Ctrip increase as a percentage of total rooms for the hotel over time?
Jane Jie Sun
Yes, it's more than 50%.
Leah Hao - Goldman Sachs
I'm sorry, I was wondering just for the hotels that's in your network, the percentage of room for each hotel that's on an average basis that guaranteed a room allotment to you guys, does that percentage increase as well?
Jane Jie Sun
Yes, increased slightly from last quarter.
Leah Hao - Goldman Sachs
Thank you.
Your next question comes from the line of George Chu with UBS. Please proceed.
George Chu - UBS
Good morning. Thank you for taking my questions. The first question is regarding the airline industry. My observation is we have seen some increase in airline tickets and I think that has resulted in higher commission per ticket for Ctrip. I'm just curious from your perspective, do you think this trend will continue for 2008 and do you see any risk of airlines cutting down on the commission rate in the near term? Thank you.
Jane Jie Sun
Sure. In terms of the air ticket price, we monitor it very carefully and so far it has been very stabilized between 900 to 1,000. And in terms of our commission rate, the normalized range is between 4.5% to 5%. Q4 is a little bit higher than last quarter, just because at year-end, due to the high volume, some of the airlines will give some extra incentive. But from what we can see, I think the range is very stabilized.
George Chu - UBS
Okay. A follow-up question is on the operating expenses, if my numbers here are correct, they have been fairly stable in the past few quarters at about 45.78 or around that area. For 2008, should we expect a similar range of operating expenses for the whole year?
Jane Jie Sun
I think we will never allow our operating expenses to outpace our revenue growth so it should always be in line or below our revenue growth but on the other hand, I think the market is growing very fast so it's also important for us to maintain certain investment for our future branding, so yeah, your assumption is correct that as a percentage of total revenue, it probably will remain very consistent.
George Chu - UBS
That's great. Thank you. Great numbers.
Your next question comes from the line of Wendy Huang with Bear Stearns. Please proceed.
Wendy Huang - Bear Stearns
Congratulations on the great quarter and thanks for taking my questions. First, recently your competitors launched a 24-hour, seven days services for the domestic and international air booking services, so could you comment how will you react to that competitive change and how will you improve your customer service in the air ticketing segment?
Min Fan
I think our air ticketing service quality is quite good among the industry and our service hours are between 6:00 a.m. to 11:00 p.m. And as we have evaluated the possibility of the 24-hour service and we concluded that according to the current situation, right now our current service hours should be sufficient to deal with customer needs. So definitely we will still try to improve our service quality more and more and for these service hours, we will still see whether -- if there is any need, we need to extend our service hours, we will do it. But I think right now, the service capability and service hours are already sufficient to our customer needs.
Wendy Huang - Bear Stearns
And maybe a follow-up on that -- could you give us some update, headcount of your current call center staff and how that breaks down into the air ticketing, hotel booking, and packaged tours?
Min Fan
We have a total for air ticketing calling, more than 1,000 staff.
Wendy Huang - Bear Stearns
How many for hotel booking?
Jane Jie Sun
Wendy, I think the total headcount is around 7,000 people. Half of them are the call center people.
Wendy Huang - Bear Stearns
I see. Secondly, just for modeling purposes, could you help us understand what land [inaudible] in Nantong, how will that impact on your balance sheet and the P&L going forward?
Jane Jie Sun
Sure. The Nantong building, we are still in the very early stage of planning so we do not have the final number in terms of the total capital forecast yet. Based on our current best estimate, the building expense probably will be somewhere around $40 million to $50 million.
Wendy Huang - Bear Stearns
40 to 50?
Jane Jie Sun
Yes, and it will be spent from 2008 to 2011.
Wendy Huang - Bear Stearns
Okay, and thirdly, you mentioned that currently your hotel network covers 6,000 hotels in China. Could you give us, what percentage is from those hotels with the rate below RMB300 per room night?
Min Fan
You mean the room nights we realized among these hotels?
Wendy Huang - Bear Stearns
Sorry, I mean how many hotels are those low-end hotels among the 6,000 hotels you cover -- just trying to understand what's your --
Min Fan
Yeah, okay. Low-end hotels are under 15% of our total hotel pool.
Wendy Huang - Bear Stearns
How was this percentage compared with the previous quarters?
Min Fan
For the total volume, we increased a little bit. Percentage wise, not a big change.
Wendy Huang - Bear Stearns
Okay. Maybe a final housekeeping question -- you just mentioned that your 1% gross margin improvement is coming from a certain segment strong revenue growth, so could you maybe identify which business segment that contributed to that margin improvement, whether it's air ticketing or packaged tours? Thank you.
Jane Jie Sun
I think all across the line, every business line has improved their margin by somewhat, so it's an overall effort.
Wendy Huang - Bear Stearns
Okay. That's helpful. Thank you.
Your next question comes from the line of Eddie Leung with Merrill Lynch. Please proceed.
Eddie Leung - Merrill Lynch
Good morning. Very good execution, as always. A couple of questions -- number one is could you guys tell me a little bit about the progress you guys are making in order to secure the guaranteed room nights during the Olympics time?
Number two is could you also comment on your competitive landscapes. I remember previously you guys normally didn't really focus on competition but it seems like you mentioned that the competition seems to have stepped up a little bit. Can you help us to understand basically the whole landscape? Thank you.
Min Fan
Regarding the Olympic Games, we think from a long-term perspective, we believe the Olympic Games is very good for China and also good for Ctrip as it will increase our visibility. And in the short-term, I think it's hard to predict at this point, as there is no historical data to base it on.
Regarding the hotel cooperation during the Olympic Games period, we already have acquired some hotels already guaranteeing some room for our customers to book during the Olympic Games period and also we negotiated with potential partners regarding the Olympic Games ticket distribution.
And I think for the Olympic Games hotel booking, right now it's not started yet because still we have a few months to go. I think we will monitor it very carefully.
And for the competition and for the competitive landscape, we believe right now Ctrip still remains the dominant market player in the online travel service and on the hotel booking and air ticketing business. There is no indication that the competitive landscape has changed.
Eddie Leung - Merrill Lynch
Okay. Good to hear that. Thank you.
Your next question comes from the line of Paul Keung with Oppenheimer. Please proceed.
Echo He - Oppenheimer
This is Echo He sitting in for Paul Keung. I just want to explain that we used to be CIBC and lately have become Oppenheimer. The question is -- do you see any trend, any cost increase of your call centers? I know you talked about a labor market wage increase but what about [others]?
Jane Jie Sun
The major components for our call center is labor related, so we have been very conscientiously to make sure we improve our efficiency and by looking at different details, different steps for each processes, and so far we have been very successful in order to make our operation efficiencies to be improved on a continuous basis.
The labor increase due to inflation at the current education level we are targeting after, it is still manageable. We monitor the progress very carefully but so far, we can manage that well.
Echo He - Oppenheimer
Okay, thank you so much. And the second question actually, I wanted to ask about the competitive landscape too and in terms of competitive advantage, what do you think your major -- your competitors?
Min Fan
Major competitors I think for the hotel booking side is still eLong will be the major competitor. And for airline ticketing business, I think our major competitors will be located in different cities -- local traditional ticketing companies.
Echo He - Oppenheimer
Okay. Thank you so much. Those are very good results.
Your next question comes from the line of Ashish Thadhani with Gilford Securities. Please proceed.
Ashish R. Thadhani - Gilford Securities
Yes, good morning. When will you get clarity into the tax rate for 2008? Where do you think this figure might settle? And the business tax -- will that stay in the same roughly 7% range?
Jane Jie Sun
I think all the enterprises in China right now are anxiously waiting for the detailed guidelines on the preferential tax treatment and before that guideline is published, we have to apply the general rate to the provision. I believe all the enterprises are waiting anxiously right now. The ball is really on the tax authority in China, so hopefully they hear the demand from the industry and they will publish the guideline and we can start our application process as quickly as possible. And we will always do our best and work hard to get the best tax treatment as possible.
In terms of business tax rate, it should be very stabilized.
Ashish R. Thadhani - Gilford Securities
Okay, so the effective tax rate, obviously 25% would be the ceiling and you had I think something in the order of about 13% in the year just completed, so something in the high teens when the dust settles? Is that your expectation or -- just trying to get a sense for what it might be when you do get clarification.
Jane Jie Sun
It's really hard to control the timing of the government tax authority. We monitor it very carefully, so right now we do not know when the final guideline will be published. So for example, if they speed up and publish the guideline during the early part of the year and if we can start our application process early, then we can apply a lower rate as soon as we get the approval. However, if the government does not apply, does not publish this guideline until the later part of the year, then our application process will be delayed. So it's really depending on when they can publish the guideline and when the approval can be granted.
Ashish R. Thadhani - Gilford Securities
And until such time, 25% will be the rate?
Jane Jie Sun
Yes, until such time, we will prudently apply 25% to our provision.
Ashish R. Thadhani - Gilford Securities
Okay. Thank you very much.
Your next question is a follow-up question from the line of Ming Zhao with SIG. Please proceed.
Chun Ming Zhao - Susquehanna International Group
Thank you. I have two questions. One is I want to understand from the consumers, how many of them are using the Internet to book travel? The amount you guys always said is 70-30 split between call center and Internet. Do you see any increase on the Internet part after so many years?
Min Fan
I think generally speaking, the 30-70, the big picture did not change a lot but if you look into the consumer behavior, we noticed that more and more consumers, more and more clients will surf on our website more than before and I think this is somewhat related with the consumer behavior. Those clients, they will surf online and finally they would like to call offline to have again more comfortable, if there is some people contact.
So if you are talking about the product line, I think for the airline ticketing business we do see a tendency that the online booking is increased a little bit more than the hotel online booking ratio. And if you are talking about our vacation package booking, in fact the vacation package we do see the booking ratio, online booking ratio already more than 50%, 50%, 60% are booking online. But because this part of the business for vacation package business is relatively small in our revenue mix, so if we have more and more vacation business than we can see this online ratio will be increased a little bit.
Chun Ming Zhao - Susquehanna International Group
Okay, good. The second question is regarding Ctrip as a business using the Internet to market. Can you share some color on how heavy you are using search engines to market your business, if possible and how many key words are you buying? What's the percentage of your marketing expense is actually from using search engines?
Min Fan
During the year 2007, we did quite some work on the search engine, especially on the -- what we called the SOE or search engine optimization and we do get quite some good results from our optimized searching efforts. And we cooperate with all the major search engines in China and we allocate a certain marketing expenditure on this field.
So in the year, in 2008 still we will try to make more efficient search engine efforts, try to get more and more market share from this field.
Chun Ming Zhao - Susquehanna International Group
Okay. Thank you.
We are currently showing no more audio questions at this time.
Tracy Cui
Thank you. We will conclude this call. Thanks, everybody.
Thank you for your participation in today's conference. This concludes our presentation. You may now disconnect. Have a good day.
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Building Brands in a World we cant Control
It used to be that people only had a few TV channels to watch and radio stations to listen to. Routines were planned around what time their favourite programmes were aired.
By Winnifred Knight
Business is changing because our customers are changing. Their buying decisions and shopping habits are changing. Fundamental changes are taking place in their preferences and behaviour. And more so, the ways in which we talk to them are changing. They expect and demand to be spoken to on a personalised and one-to-one basis.
More than that, customers expect an unprecedented level of emotional commitment and honesty from the brands they trust, support and buy. Customer loyalty is weakening, because they constantly move on to new products and new brands entering the marketplace. They are thinking more with their hearts than with their heads.
For any company to be successful in this new and 'now' emotional economy they need to create and build emotional loyalty. Companies will have to build and strengthen customer relationships - connecting on an emotional level. And many questions need to be asked:
Customers often claim they purchase rationally. But studies indicate that the factors influencing purchases are 80% emotional and 20% intellectual, even for business-to-business customers. Features and benefits may be used to justify decisions, but the initial motivation is almost always emotional.
Emotion is required to maintain a relationship after purchase.
Direct link to customer's emotions
Nowadays more brand-building efforts are converging with direct and interactive marketing.
Direct and interactive marketers have for many years not only talked about the power of emotional marketing through the use of effective database marketing and segmentation, but also implemented very successful measurable strategies across various industries, products and services.
Smart marketers have now identified the true value of measurable marketing by segmenting and managing their customer databases. They have recognised that marketing is an experience directly linking their customer's emotions to their brands.
By identifying their customers' needs, wants and aspirations, they can create buying experiences, which create frequent buying patterns, buying relationships and loyalty. And as experience tells us, loyalty is directly linked to sales and profitability. The well-known and yet rarely used RFM Model (Recency, Frequency and Monetary) comes into play and the profitability of customers increases.
Claire Brand, GM of Hallmark Business Expressions says that her company takes both a brand-building and a business-building approach, ensuring that the brand is integrated in each communication approach. They have learned that one approach supports the other and increases the overall effectiveness and responses of their integrated marketing efforts.
"Further," she says, "the customer's romance with your brand in its mass appeal can cause a greater response to your direct marketing efforts. And therein lies the beauty of a brand-based integrated marketing strategy: A brand can - and should - transcend multiple media and channels to help create an integrated "voice" for your communications that is even more powerful than the sum of its parts."
The message is clear
Those companies that have moved from being product-focused to customer-focused are the cornerstone of our economy - worldwide. Those who have moved (or are moving) from traditional branding to emotional branding and from using traditional communication methods to emotional communication methods will win the hearts and wallets of their customers.
The marketer influences both how people experience the brand and the resultant emotional memories; and how people experience the advertising and the resultant emotional memories. Brand marketing involves the management of the emotional memories of both the brand and all its communication.
Carl Ware, Coca-Cola's executive VP of communications and corporate affairs, is insightful in saying recently in The New York Times, that "Consumer democracy is becoming more and more of an issue. Indeed, brands do not belong to corporations anymore, but to people!"
Daniel Goleman, in his book, Working with Emotional Intelligence, expands on this change by saying: "The rules for work are changing. We're being judged by a new yardstick: not just by how smart we are, or by our training and expertise, but also by how well we handle each other and ourselves." For companies, emotional branding and connectivity starts at 'home.'
So what is Emotional Marketing and Branding?
Andrea Syverson, President of IER Partners, says it starts with how you view the branding process. She quotes branding expert Joel Desgrippes who defines it as follows: "Branding is not only about ubiquity, visibility and functions; it is about bonding emotionally with people in their daily life. Only when a product or service kindles an emotional dialogue with the consumer, can this product or service qualify to be a brand."
She elaborates, "emotional marketing is all about the 'why,' the feelings and emotions underneath a product or service. You know why it's important to brand, but emotional marketing goes a step further to help garner attention and really develop products."
Syverson calls the MasterCard "Priceless" campaign, which was developed by McCann-Erickson, one of the best examples of emotional marketing today. To demonstrate: A MasterCard ad featuring a little boy and a puppy. The copy reads: "Donation to animal shelter: $50. Collar, bowl, and food: $12. Shots at the vet: $85. Your first dog: Priceless." "They are not selling MasterCard credit cards in this particular commercial. They're really selling the love of man's best friend, a puppy," Syverson says. The reason why it is effective is that it is "very relevant to our daily lives," she continues. In other words, they don't sell a product; they sell a quality, an experience or convenience that we can all relate to as desirable and invaluable, or "priceless."
Marc Gob', author of Emotional Branding, gives his version: "Emotional Branding provides the means and the methodology for connecting products to the consumer in an emotionally profound way. It focuses on the most compelling aspect of the human character: the desire to transcend material satisfaction and experience emotional fulfilment. A brand is uniquely situated to achieve this because it can tap into the aspirational drives which underlie human motivation."
Simply put, it includes emotional benefits (feeling), rational benefits (informational, educational, economic, social, and environmental) and human contact - interaction with your customer. Emotional branding focuses on the long-term customer relationship and encourages connectivity and intimacy. The emotional aspect of products and their distribution systems will be the key differentiator between customers' ultimate choice and the price they will pay.
What is the difference between Experiential Marketing and Traditional Marketing?
Traditional marketing focuses on the superiority of functional features of a product or service, while experiential marketing focuses on the customer experience - the sense, feel, think, act that relate to your brand. (Bernd H Schmitt 1999)
Experiential marketing is a powerful marketing approach that brings brands to life - face-to-face with your customer, so that they can experience your product or service. Until then, your brand is not seen by your customer as real or tangible. Inter-linked with this is their emotional experience in making the decision to buy. Another plus on the side of experiential marketing is that there are no boundaries, and very few rules.
Experience also builds emotional connections. Customers buy when they trust, feel confident that processes are centred on them and expect that the purchase will make them feel better. Experiences must meet purchaser emotional needs, as well as their operational ones. Their experience begins from the time they feel a need and continues to the end of a relationship. By then the emotional connection is strong enough so that your customer doesn't feel disappointed if your company fails to deliver.
Making the Emotional Connection
Connections are made through experiences and emotions.
Emotional connections are crucial to delivering your brand's intentions and are a well-practised concept. However, when you apply emotional marketing strategies to your brand efforts, you need to know how your product or service makes your customers feel?
Smart marketers define their marketing strategy in psychological and emotional terms. This is more evident in companies that are using direct, interactive and customer database marketing techniques and principles. These successful companies have built relationships with their customers by creating personal interactive dialogue - at every point of contact (touch-points) - that responds to their lifestyle needs, wants and aspirations. This method of connecting with their customers has created strong emotional bonds with their brands.
Marc Gob', in his book Emotional Branding, advocates a shift in both corporate culture and consumer approach to include a better understanding of and direct dialogue with customers. "A more humanistic, imaginative and risk-taking style for conducting business and managing employees; the development of products and services that provide total sensory experiences; and an approach to branding that listens to your customers in order to bring more pleasurable, life-enhancing solutions to their world."
In 1969, Theodore Levitt (Marketing Myopia) said: "We are here to serve and satisfy our customers needs. Profit is our measure of success. It is better to make a customer than to make a sale. Adding to this, we should not define ourselves as sellers of products and services but re-define ourselves as buyers of customers." Never were truer words spoken.
How do you create emotional branding strategies?
In today's increasingly complex and diverse marketplace, emotional branding is a means of creating a personal dialogue with your customers on issues, which are most meaningful to them. Customers expect your brands to know them - intimately and individually - with a deep understanding of their needs and cultural orientation.
As Marc Gob' states: "This new model will be one of brands connecting with innovative products and services that are culturally relevant, socially sensitive and have presence at all points of contact in people's lives. Most importantly, the biggest misconception in branding strategies is the belief that branding is about market share when it is really about 'mind and emotions share."
Direct Marketing experts have been preaching the gospel on 'emotional' marketing and branding for years. This has been done through the integration of emotional marketing efforts into overall marketing vision and strategy, translating these into a concept of Integrated Marketing Communications programs.
They have over many years develop and perfected, customer communication and value management programs (in various formats), providing 'lifestyle' experiences - taking customers into an interactive dialogue through technology-driven systems, such as value-enhanced and value-driven customer databases and segmentation models.
Traditional marketers focus on the four Ps: product, price, place and promotion. Direct and interactive marketers use emotional marketing principles and techniques and incorporate all other personal factors to create an integrated, meaningful and measurable connection.
There are many tried and tested ways of direct engagement.
Here are some of the quoted examples:
In South Africa, Smirnoff Vodka Marketing Manager, Nyimpini Mabunda, when asked what is the essence of the Smirnoff brand, said the following: "Liberation - this means accessibility, emotionally and physically. Emotional accessibility means freedom to enjoy the brand the way you choose, no format or taste restriction. You can mix it whichever way you want or have it straight - the product is taste- and smell neutral."
When asked: "Do you believe in the power of the brand, and how does it affect your customers?" Nyimpini said: "Yes I do. Customers define themselves through brands they use. The branded clothes they wear, the cars they drive, the drinks they consume, university they attended, favourite spots to hang out, and so on. There's a bigger emotional link to brands, partly because communication has evolved from intrinsic, functional benefits, to emotional connection.
Samsung South Africa is another company that believes wholeheartedly in the consumer experience and emotional branding. According to Sarit Reouveni, group marketing manager, "Experiential marketing captivates, encourages brand loyalty and increases positive perception." The group believes that "conventional advertising and sponsorship alone is not sufficient for us to fulfil our goal to become the leader in consumer goods".
This is true emotional marketing - and it connects your brand to your customers' hearts for a lifetime.
Cont. on page 2
It used to be that people only had a few TV channels to watch and radio stations to listen to. Routines were planned around what time their favourite programmes were aired.
The revolution of the future may continue to be televised, but more and more consumers will be watching it unfold on their mobile devices rather than on their TVs.
Brands have been around as long as there have been things to sell. The term �brand� originated from the stamp carved onto a product to certify its purity, authenticity and origin.
One of the major trends shaping consumer behaviour today is that, while the desire for status hasn�t gone away and we still seek social currency, we now seek it through experiences, stories, and moments we can share.
Brand crises are a harsh reality for all organisations. Dealing with them is not becoming any easier. Instead they have become complex tasks that require constant supervision.


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Promises, promises: Tinsley House children detained by the immigration authorities
Breaking a promise to a child is a pretty mean thing to do. But it appears that the British government is struggling to keep the promises it has repeatedly made to children detained by the immigration authorities.
When inspectors paid a surprise visit to a removal centre near Gatwick in October, they found conditions had actually got worse since they last inspected the facility. Today, Her Majesty's Chief Inspector of Prisons, Dame Ann Owers, described the arrangements for children at Tinsley House as "wholly unacceptable" [246Kb PDF].
Both staff and detainees talked of a "more prison-like culture" with increasingly restrictive rules. Far from honouring their pledge to treat children in a way that "promotes their welfare", the inspectors found that childcare and education had actually deteriorated. "Children", they write, "had limited access to fresh air".
Another government promise is enshrined in the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child to which the UK is now a full signatory. Article 37 of the convention states that the detention of a child "shall be used only as a measure of last resort and for the shortest appropriate period of time".
However, the inspectors "were especially concerned about the detention and welfare of children held for over 72 hours":
"In the previous six months, five families a month, on average, had been detained for over 72 hours, and some had been held for many weeks."
Only last week, the Royal College of General Practitioners, Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health, the Royal College of Psychiatrists and the UK Faculty of Public Health published a joint policy statement [171Kb PDF] asserting that "immigration detention of children is harmful and unacceptable" and demanding that the government "stop detaining children without delay".
President of the Royal College of General Practitioners, Dr Iona Heath, said:
"Any detention of children for administrative rather than criminal purposes causes unnecessary harm and further blights already disturbed young lives. Such practices reflect badly on all of us."
While inspecting Tinsley House, HMIP "were concerned to discover an incident where force had been used on children to effect the removal of a family":
"There was no suggestion that the children were at risk of harm to themselves or others, and no prior UK Border Agency (UKBA) authorisation was sought or given."
Clearly, the process of removal of families who have no right to stay in the UK will be an emotional and fraught experience on occasion. Government ministers stress the importance of sensitivity and compassion given their promise to ensure that children "are seen first, foremost and fully as children rather than simply migrants subject to immigration control".
In a statement, the UK Border Agency's Strategic Director of Criminality and Detention Group, David Wood responded to today's HMIP report:
"Removal centres are a necessary part of enforcing immigration control. It is vital that they are well-run, safe and secure. Detainees are cared for with respect, with access to a range of medical, educational and welfare facilities."
"We accept the conditions at Tinsley House at the time of the inspection were not ideal but we do not agree that they are wholly unacceptable for women and children. However, we are nonetheless reviewing our services."
Yet another review. You may recall a piece I wrote following the inspection of a larger removal centre, Yarl's Wood near Bedford , by the Children's Commissioner for England.
Sir Al Aynsley Green's shocking findings prompted a "review". But the promises made do not appear to have travelled from Bedfordshire to West Sussex.
Take the issue of "stinking", "stained", "caged vans", highlighted by Sir Al and apparently used to move children whose families face deportation. When the HMIP had a look at the vehicles used to transport people to Tinsley House they found that "one had a caged seating area" and another, used to transport families with children was "dirty".
Apparently driven to collect a woman and her six-year-old, it was littered with soiled tissues and food debris. "We were told by escorting staff that the vehicles based at Gatwick were only cleaned once a fortnight."
"Overall", Dame Ann concludes, "this is a deeply depressing report". She suggests that the focus of staff has been on a new and neighbouring facility called Brook House. "Tinsley House has become almost an afterthought", the inspectors suggest, "housing some poorly cared for children and a small number of scared and isolated single women".
Their conclusion? "This is more than a missed opportunity - it is a wholly unacceptable state of affairs."
Update 1104: A Home Office spokesman has responded to the HMIP concerns about the vehicles used to transport families and children to and from Tinsley House:
"Family friendly vehicles are used for the majority of journeys that involve families. However, there are some exceptional circumstances - in which for example a risk assessment has indicated that a parent or older child may be disruptive - where we have to use more secure vehicles. This is extremely rare."


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