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June 2005

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If the automobile had followed the same development as the computer, a Rolls-Royce would today cost $100, get a million miles per gallon, and explode once a year, killing everyone inside.
- Nick Job

A flaw in the human character is that everyone wants to build and no one wants to do maintenance.
- Kurt Vonnegut

Do not confine your children to your own learning for they were born in a different time.
- Hebrew Proverb

“Today I realized the hour I extend my life by working out an hour every day has already been spent working out.”
- Jeffrey Ross

“It’s performance not competence that education is all about.”
- author Roger Schank

Thought for the month: Never trust a stock broker who’s married to a travel agent.

Health is merely the slowest possible rate at which one can die.
- Clay Whaley

Why do bagpipers always walk when they play? To get away from the noise.
- Roy Blount

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Meeting Energizer

Merchandising at the Bar

Post a chalkboard behind the bar that encourages patrons to buy a drink or an appetizer for a friend who isn’t there. Then write the customer’s name and the item waiting for them on the chalkboard legibly with color chalk. All your other customers see it as they visit the bar and many will impulsively buy a drink or appetizer for someone they know who isn’t there. When the new customer comes in and “cashes in”, erase their name from the chalkboard. Obviously, the drink buyer pays in advance and encourages the friend to visit your restaurant/bar ASAP.
Source: the Mind Your Own Business book. (available at www.sullivision.com)

Add spouses to your employee referral program. “Your employees’ husbands and wives know people too, they’re closely involved with their spouses’ careers, they understand your company culture and, in some cases, may be hooked into the same industry networks”.
Source: Success in Recruiting and Retaining

(Answer: It’s a tie). Question: What’s the hottest wedding month?
According to a recent article in Bride’s magazine Annual State of the Union report: September now ranks as high as June in U.S. nuptials. The average attendance is 186 guests. And what kind of tabs are people running up for these affairs? Well, the next time a bride is throwing a bouquet, single women might want to … duck, and restaurant owners want to make sure ! Average cost of a wedding is $18,874

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So Now What?
By Jim Sullivan, CEO Sullivision.com

“Numbers and statistics,” says my friend Jim Buelt, “should be used he way a drunk uses a lamp post - not for illumination, but for support.” This month I’d like to take exception to his rule and share a few numbers and statistics that both support and illuminate our industry. Individually, they’re useful. Collectively, they add up to a patchwork quilt of relevant consumer trends and foodservice potential and possibilities.

Finding Keepers.
Don’t focus your recognition efforts solely on median performers and overlook your high performers. “The best people are the most likely to leave…because they can,” says author Bruce Tulgan of Winning the Talent Wars.

Good Service means never
having to ask for anything
“Even if you have the empathy and the passion and you address the customer’s problem, you haven’t really given good customer service in total until you have eliminated the problem that caused her to call in the first place.”
Source: Author: Charles Fishman in Fast Company magazine

Common Applicant Lies
In order of frequency, job applicants lie most about:

Education.
Reasons for leaving past jobs.
Levels of salary.
Job titles.
Scope of duties.
Criminal records.

Source: Success in Recruiting and Retaining Newsletter, Ragan Press

Who’s now the largest
private employer in the USA?
Consider this: The largest private employer in the United States is not General Motors, Ford, Microsoft or any of the other accepted corporate behemoths. It is Milwaukee’s Manpower Inc., a temporary help agency with more than 1100 offices in the United States. On another note, American express estimates that the number one employer in the US in 2006 will be “self”.
Source: Free Agent Nation, Author: Daniel H. Pink, American Express.com/open

Staff to Serve
“Here’s a puzzler. Why do we hear this sentence so often: “We are experiencing higher-than-usual call volumes…If you’re experiencing higher-than-usual call volumes, then why aren’t you experiencing higher-than-usual staffing volumes? How hard is that? What the new information economy has done to customer service is exactly the opposite of what everyone predicted would happen”.
Source: Fortune, Ask Annie column

Top 5 Flavors in the USA
The top 5 individual flavors in the US are vanilla (33%), chocolate (19%), nut/caramel (7%), Neapolitan (5%), strawberry (4%). Experts say that flavors mimicking traditional Hispanic desserts like dulce de leche (a blend of caramel and milk), flan, and Tres Leches (a cake dessert made with cream, evaporated milk and sweetened condensed milk) will also grow in the next 5 years, along with tropical flavors like mango, guava, passion fruit, lemon and lime.
Source: QSR Magazine May 2005

Things that make ya go Hmmm…
If you think that gasoline is expensive, says a recent article in Business Week, remember these fluid numbers the next time you’re at the pump.

Snapple	Evian	Scope	Pepto-Bismol	Liquid Paper
(16 oz. $1.29)	(9oz. $1.49)	(8.4 oz. $3.19)	(4 oz. $3.85)	(0.6 oz. $1.99)
$10.32	$21.19	$48.61	$123.20	$424.53
per gallon	per gallon	per gallon	per gallon	per gallon

Jim Sullivan is the CEO of Sullivision, Inc., an Appleton, Wis. based consulting group whose clients include Walt Disney Company, Coca-Cola, American Express, Hershey’s, McDonald’s, Starbucks and Target. You can reach Jim at 920-830-3915 or www.sullivision.com

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