November 27, 2007

Howard Miller Clocks

I have an uncle who collects clocks. Part of each summer vacation when I was growing up was spent helping him dust and lemon-wax the cases, and hearing his stories about the origins of each clock and the special qualities and functions built into them. Both of us have health problems that keep us from traveling these days, but we’ve remained close via phone calls and emails. A couple of years ago we were talking about his clocks and how special they were to both of us. A few days later I was surprised to get a large package from him and to find a beautiful heirloom, key-wound mantle clock inside! It holds a place of honor in my bedroom and brings on instant fits of nostalgia every time I see it or give it a little TLC with lemon wax. I’d love to have one of his grandfather clocks, too, but shipping from his home in the desert near Big Bend, Texas to my home in the islands is a nightmare neither of us wants to contemplate.

Whether you’re a collector or not, fine quality clocks make a wonderful legacy to pass on to succeeding generations. Unlike Grandmother’s brooch or Aunt Sophie’s turkey platter, they can be on display, used and enjoyed every day. Howard Miller grandfather clocks has an extensive collection that includes contemporary grandfather clocks that would actually work better with my decor than the vintage ones my uncle has. I have several lighted curio cabinets in my living room and found a grandfather clock that includes a mirrored curio cabinet and would be a perfect match with my existing room design. My son lives in a compact space and is a watch collector. He’s looking to buy his own more spacious home, though, and a grand clock like this is something he would enjoy having there when old Mom kicks off and leaves everything to him.

I found a post at clocksblog.com that can help me (or you) decide which clock is just right before buying. It’s the first in a planned series of posts about clock buying. The blog also has feature articles on various clockmakers, collections and even how to maintain a fine clock so you can pass it on to the kids. If you’re hoping to find a really special gift for someone this holiday season go there and do your homework first, then check out Howard Miller Clocks. They have something for every taste and decor and can help you make a grand gift-giving statement.

[tags]clock blogs, clocks, grandfather clocks, heirloom clocks, mantle clocks[/tags]

August 16, 2007

Shop for free window blinds

Shopping for free anything might not seem like a good concept for a merchant to advertise, unless you’re savvy enough to think outside the box. Smart business people know that we talk about the things we buy. Smarter ones look for a way to use that to their advantage. Word of mouth marketing is effective because the people we talk to about our purchases know us and are interested in our opinions. If we tell a friend that XYZ widget is the best widget ever, that’s what they’ll look for the next time the need arises. If a merchant rewards us for sending them customers, everyone wins. Your friends get a product you’ve already tried and been pleased with. You get a reward when your referrals make a purchase. The merchant gets a steady stream of new customers. Sounds like a pretty smart concept to me, and it’s the way things work when you Shop for Free Window Blinds and share the word! Check out the press release to see how freeblinds.com creates a winning situation out of every sale:

FREEblinds.com Debuts Patent-Pending Shopping Concept

June 20, 2007
St. Augustine, Florida

FREEblinds.com, Inc. (www.freeblinds.com) announced today the launch of their FREEblinds.com website, a Next-Generation Internet shopping site offering an extensive variety of window coverings with the ability to earn back 100% of their product purchase price. It’s just the first of many websites providing customers the opportunity to get their products for FREE through the patent-pending FREEshopping.com Rewards Program.
With the look and feel of other consumer websites, FREEblinds.com operates in similar fashion. First you shop from a vast array of products offered at some of the lowest prices to be found on the Internet; you make your selection; then submit your order. It’s at checkout where the similarity to all other sites ends. Upon conclusion of checkout, the customer is assigned a unique code, and presented with the option to share that code with others interested in purchasing window coverings. Then each time a referred customer’s order has been completed, 20% of the referred customer’s product purchase amount is Rewarded (via a check refund) to the original referring customer. This process continues for each referred order until 100% of the original customer’s product purchase amount has been returned. Customers have a full FIVE years to earn back their product costs. And, every referred customer has the same opportunity to earn back their total purchase amount through the Rewards Program.

The process of “Totally Free Products” was created by FREEblinds.com and FREEshopping.com founder Joe Mehm. A pioneer in online retailing, Mehm asks, “Why shop anywhere else? What’s better than free?” And, since we sell our products at the most competitive prices on the Internet, even if you don’t earn a single Reward, you will still save money.” he asserts. “That’s reason enough to shop at FREEblinds.com. Then giving customers the opportunity to earn back 100% of their product cost, is just icing on the cake!” Mehm concludes.

The process making this concept possible is so distinct, so unique that Mehm has been awarded Patent Pending Status by the United States Patent Office.

Simply put, the customer rewards are offset by savings realized from reduced expenditures of conventional Internet advertising. FREEblinds.com pays past customers to bring in new customers. While it might be said that one expense just replaces the other, this process does much more than that. Internet advertising costs, as with other conventional advertising costs, are not tied to results. Therefore, one pays for advertising whether business is created from that advertising or not. With the FREEshopping process, advertising is only paid after sales are made, for revenue already generated. And, like a gift that keeps on giving, satisfied, fully Rewarded customers are naturally going to continue to tell others how smart they were to shop FreeBlinds.com, now creating business free from any advertising expense.

To make it easy for customers to get their referrals started, FREEblinds.com has positioned valuable tools at the end of order checkout to help automate the referral process. Customers can easily print a sheet of referral cards formatted with their name and referral code. Another feature allows the customer to enter the names and email addresses of friends and family, so that an automated link explaining the program is forwarded to them along with the referrer’s code. And, for those customers with their own website, MySpace site, etc., a section of copy and paste text is available for pasting a small banner on their site. Once pasted on their site, any purchase made through that link, embedded with their referral code, automatically posts a credit to the customer’s account. It then becomes possible for a customer to receive all of their money back without ever having to refer someone personally.

FREEblinds.com…the first of an exclusive group of fine merchants offering consumers quality products along with the process to receive back 100% of the cost of their product purchases. Next-Generation shopping is here today!

Contact Information:
Media Relations Director:
Robert (Rewards Rob) Till at (866) 254-6314 ext 10.
RewardsRob@FREEshopping.com
www.freeblinds.com

FREEshopping.com vendor program:
Joe Mehm at (866) 254-6314 ext 18.
Joe@FREEshopping.com
www.freeshopping.com

[tags]free window blinds, dhopping, shopping concepts, marketing, window blinds[/tags]

July 23, 2007

Creative recycling

I just went out to get my mail and discovered that yet another palm frond has fallen. Both of my palm trees are tall enough now that I can’t just reach up and whack the dying fronds off like I used to do. If I have the ladder out for other chores I usually check them and cut away any fronds that are getting ready to fall, but most of the time I just wait and let nature take its course. The problem with this is that by the time they fall naturally, the base and the thick central stem are very hard and woody, so I can’t cut them up with my machete or clippers. I can saw them into pieces, but my writsts are really bad lately and it’s pretty painful for me to do that. My friend Paul has been promising for weeks that he’d come whack them up and take them to the greenwaste facility for me, but he’s not exactly the reliable type, so now I have eight or ten giant palm fronds taking up my spare parking slot. This got me to thinking about ways I could use them up instead of throwing them out. I’d like to try to use the scoop-like base of one to make an orchid planter, but that will still leave me with a large supply. If I were the truely creative type I could pretend I’m one of the Lost survivors and and build myself some Bush furniture out of the deadfall. I’m pretty sure I could handle weaving chair seats out of the leaves, but I’d need a lot of help for the rest of the construction. Help from someone who is skilled in building furniture. Um, yeah, that would be Paul. Guess I’d better take this idea back to the drawing board.

[tags]furniture, palm trees, recycling[/tags]

July 5, 2007

I need a desk - maybe

I’m a little worried about my desk. It’s over seven years old and has taken a lot of wear and tear over the years. I bought it when I first started my business. Furniture should last more than seven years, but I bought a cheap, flat-pack desk. I was on a tight budget and it didn’t seem cheap at the time, but it does now. The problem with most flat-pack furniture is that it’s made of that compressed sawdust stuff with veneers on top to make it look decent. It’s got heavy screws and bolts to hold it together, but after a while the hardware starts to grate against the compressed wood and the furniture gets wobbly. My desk is getting wobbly. The only time I notice it is when Lancie flops down in the cubby beneath the desk. He throws himself against the upright supporting one side and the desk wobbles. I have nightmare visions of it falling on him one day and killing him and my computer. So I need to go shopping for some contemporary furniture to go with my contemporary office. I don’t want to, but I think I have to.

I like having a hutch over my desk to hold my software and address books and other cluttery stuff, and I like my rolling cart that goes under the desk and hold my CPU and more software and has slots on the side for more stuff. I’m used to it and I know where stuff is. It wouldn’t make much sense to buy the same desk again, though, would it? If I’m going to go for change, I should get something totally different, right? I’ll have to clean up and organize all of the cluttery stuff before I go shopping. I should do that so I can “assess my needs” and make sure I’m getting the right desk for the job. Maybe after I do that I’ll see if there’s a way to reinforce the joints on this desk and make it last a little longer. That would be cool. I’m not too fond of change. Change is scary.

[tags]desk, furniture, just stuff, office furniture[/tags]

May 2, 2007

Decorating vacation rentals

I did another Wiakiki condo inspection yesterday. I’ve inspected hundreds of these places over the years. The scheduling can be tricky because many of them are being used as vacation rentals and are continuously occupied, even when they’re being marketed and while they’re in escrow. My inspection has to be worked in between guests, though every now and then someone screws up and I have to inspect an occupied condo. I did that recently and it was kind of fun because the tourists took pictures of me doing my thing. I guess they wanted photos to help them remember every minute of their Hawaiian vacation. I can just imagine the slide show they’ll make their neighbors watch when they get home. “And did you know that they even send people around to make sure you don’t have termites in your suite?”

While the views are spectacular, it’s always struck me a little oddly how many of these places look exactly like any place you would rent on the mainland. I wonder if the tourists find that a little disappointing. How much trouble would it be to add some aloha print bedspreads and maybe some framed art from Studio RTA Furniture to give the places a little local flavor? It wouldn’t cost any more than the bland stuff they’re using and would be good selling point on their promotional websites. If you were searching for a place to rent for a Hawiian vacation, wouldn’t you find a place that looked like it was in Hawaii a little more appealing than one that looked like a hotel room in Anytown, USA?

[tags]furniture, art, Hawaii, photos, vacations, work[/tags]