Plum TV

Tom Scott founded Nantucket nectars by selling home-made juice to vacationers in Nantucket harbor.  In 1997, he sold the company to Ocean Spray for $70 million.

 

Then, he realized that there was a niche in the TV market of upscale vacation destinations, because of vacation home owners with time on their hands.

 

So, he founded Plum TV, which broadcasts local news, events, and business programming in places like Nantucket, the Hampton's, Martha's Vineyard, Vail, and Aspen.

Read More

Six Simple Steps For Lottery Winners

Its very hard for people to spend wisely when they recieve a windfall.

 

This article in the Chicago Tribune spotlights a September 11 widow who blew most of her $5 million death benefit on designer clothes, shoes, trips, and gifts.

 

It also offers six tips for lottery winners, and others who have recieved windfalls:

 

1. Don't do anything with the money for 3-6 months.

 

2. Develop relationships with professionals who can help you with things such as taxes, fiancial and estate planning, and insurance.

 

3. Dream a little.  Indulge a little bit, and select meaningful long-term goals.

 

4. Make a plan.  Treat the money with the same respect you would treat a paycheck.

 

5. Enjoy the money in moderation.  Before buying a BMW, rent one for a few weeks to see if the thrill wears off.

 

6. Give. Share money wisely with family members and/or charities.

 

 

Read More

Congress to Change Company Stock Options Deductions?

It looks like Congress is also getting alarmed at the recent scandal of companies timing the stock options of executives.

 

Congress may try to reduce or eliminate the tax deduction for corporate stock options.

Read More

Abbott Lab's New Drug-Coated Stent

According to this article in the Chicago Tribune,  Abbott Laboratory's new drug-coated stent, Xience, which goes on sale in Europe next month, did better in a trial than the current market leader, Boston Scientific Corp's Taxus.

 

Stents are wire mesh devices that are used to unblock clogged arteries.  Stents are now being drug-coated, because uncoated stents sometimes close in patients.

Read More

Cartoon Characters on Fruit and Vegetable Packaging

According to this article in the Chicago Tribune,  fruit and vegetable growers are starting to license cartoon characters, such as Mickey Mouse, SpongeBob, and Dora the Explorer.

 

Disney and Imagination Farms have struck a deal to market fruits and vegetables under the "Disney Garden" brand.

 

This type of branding has become appealing to entertainment companies because they want to associate their cartoon characters with health-consiousness.

Read More

Forbes 400 List

Forbes magazine published their annual list of the 400 richest Americans.

Read More

Sheldon Adelson, Steve Wynn, and Macau

Macau, a tiny peninsula and 2 islands off of China, was controlled by the Portuguese, but handed back to China in 1999.  It is 1/6 the size of Washington, DC. and is the only place in China that allows casinos.

 

Sheldon Adelson, the casino billionaire who controls Las Vegas Sands Corp., figured that Macau would take off, and so he opened up the Sands Macau Casino in 2004.

 

His bet paid off.  Macau may unseat Las Vegas as the gambling capital of the world.  Adelson spent $265 million on the casino, and he recouped his investment in one year.  Adelson is now the third richest American on the Forbes 400 list.

 

Adelson's Las Vegas rival, Steve Wynn (number 107 on the Forbes 400), is now opening up his own casino in Macao.

 

Read More

Present Moment Goal Setting

We have dreams that will be achieved some day, in the future.  There is nothing wrong with having dreams.  In fact, they are good because they give meaning and focus to your life.

 

However, they are not enough to motivate you on a day to day basis.

 

You may then think the answer is conventional goal setting. This helps - however, the goals are still in time.  Goals can have timetables of 6 months, or a year, or a decade - but they are still not going to happen today.

 

Instead, I have found that a better, more effortless way to achieve success is to have present-moment goals - which are aligned with your longer-term dreams, and achieved in minutes.

 

For example, if you have a desire for financial independence, you can have a present moment goal of not impulse buying.  Any time you then pass a department store, for example, your goal is invoked, and has a lifespan of minutes.  Either it is achieved, or it ends without being achieved.

 

Now, this may sound like semantics.  You may think I am simply taking what would be a step in a long-term goal, and calling it a "present moment goal".  But, it is more than semantics - its a complete mindset shift. 

 

Your mind needs to think of these as separate, independent, and complete goals by themselves.  This way, you will measure progress in the moment.  If you pass by a store twice, and impulse buy once, you are not 50% successful.  These were independent goals.  You should not link them. 

 

Another example is weight-loss.  I lost 30 pounds, and have kept it off for 4 years, because I didn't set a goal of losing 30 pounds.  I set present-moment goals.  For example, at every meal, I set a goal to not overeat.   I will achieve it or I won't.   Either way, I will set the goal again later in the day, and the "score" is 0-0.

 

Another example could be a sport, like football.  If you are a player, you shouldn't care if its practice, or a regular season game, or the super bowl.  Don't care about the score or the standings.  Just set a goal of making the play ahead of you.  If you achieve it, great!  Now, set a new goal of the next play.  As long as your present-moment goal is aligned with your bigger dream, the longer-term things will happen.

 

Golfers who want to sink a putt from 50 feet don't aim at the hole.  They learn to aim at a point on the ground just a few feet ahead of the ball, on the line they want.

 

To sum it up: switch the focus from big dreams to small concrete steps in the right direction.

Read More

Financial and Branding Lessons from Tyra Banks

The Forbes Magazine's "Celebrity 100" issue listed and profiled the 100 top celebrities that they ranked by a combination of yearly earnings and influence (i.e. number of news stories about them).  Unfortunately, they no longer provide free access to back articles from the magazine, so I can't give a link directly to the story.

 

Among the celebrities profiled was Tyra Banks, who was #84 on the list.  It was interesting to read how she has leveraged her intitial modelling success into other ventures, thereby building her brand, and avoiding the limited career lifespan of modeling.

 

Banks began modeling at 15, and retired last year at 32.  She is now the star, co-producer, and co-owner of the show "America's Next Top Model" (ANTM), which is a big hit with the 18-34 female demographic.  Soon, she will have her own talk show, and has other ventures in the pipeline.  She looks towards Oprah Winfrey and Martha Stewart as her inspirations to building a franchise.

 

Here are some lessons that I think both businesses and individuals can learn from this story:

 

Don't be satisfied with success just in your intial field. At her modeling peak, Banks was earning $50,000 a day.  She could have just coasted along.  However, she says she always had aspirations beyond what she calls the typical model's "booking mentality" - i.e. just tell the model where to show up, and she does the job.

 

Don't give up if your first efforts at branching out don't meet with success.  While still modeling, Banks tried acting and singing.  Though these were not big successes, she made producing connections that paid off when she pitched the idea for ANTM.  Today, she is using her ANTM experience to venture back into combination acting/producing roles.

 

Be professional. When she first formed her production company, she called it "Ty Ty Baby", which was her childhood nickname.  She since renamed it to the more professional sounding "Bankable Productions".

 

Educate yourself in new areas.  When a businessman asked Banks budgetary questions about ANTM, and she could not answer, she decided to learn about finance.

To learn about talk shows, she did a 2 year apprenticeship on the Oprah Winfrey show.

 

Learn from failed investments.  Banks lost $100,000 on an internet investment with rap mogul Russell Simmons.  However, she said that "she would do it again", and is now working on creating an internet community with others.

 

Find good partners and stick with them.  Banks' new talk show will be in partnership with the veteran reality producer who co-owns ANTM with her.  She has used the same Merrill Lynch money manager since she was 19.

Read More