Building and Managing Your Brand

[Excerpt] Have you eaten at Zoup!, Smashburger, or Big Al\u27s Steaks? Have you stayed at Andaz, Aloft, or Element? If you haven\u27t yet experienced one of these products, let alone heard of them, it\u27s probably because they are brands that are still in the building process. Each of these brands is relatively new in their industry sector, but they may someday be as familiar as Taco Bell or Marriott. From Andaz to Zoup!, these companies were built with a simple but powerful promise to guests that they will receive specific benefits from patronizing that brand. Smashburger\u27s promise, for instance, is to be THE place for burger lovers…Where smash, sizzle, savor, means a dedication to creating the best-tasting \u27cooked-to-order\u27 burger. Building a brand is not a new idea, but the process has become increasingly sophisticated and supported by marketing research. This chapter helps you to think like a brand marketer. Even as an independent operator, you can borrow from the playbook of the established brands and take a strategic approach to brand building and management. If you do work for an established brand—or are thinking about affiliating with one, this chapter helps you to understand the importance of branding in a crowded marketplace. The approach to brand strategy I introduce in this chapter is derived in part from a course on Service Experience Management that I teach at Cornell University\u27s School of Hotel Administration, as well as lessons I\u27ve learned while providing brand-strategy consulting to hotel companies, cruise lines, and tourism destinations. The centerpiece of the approach is a Process Framework for Strategic Branding that serves as a guide for diagnosing brand problems and opportunities and for building successful brand experiences

Letter Written by Edith Speert to Victor A. Speert Dated October 28, 1944

[Transcription begins] Saturday night 10/28/44 In Ukie’s room Dearest Darling, Boy, I really did work tonight. I wrote either letters or cards to the following people, either answering mail from them, or asking them why they haven’t written, or, trying to locate their whereabouts: Geo. Miller, Esther Moskowitz, Fred Grail, Sid Raiken, Evelyn Meinkoff, Helen Curley, Mort, Alice Pevsner, Tom Kentes, Jerry Black, Leo Shaw, and Syl Hirshfield. Some of the letters I answered, I’m sending to you. Today we received a letter from Harriet Faliurin. Ed is still in this country in the midst of changing stations. Also, we received a card from Geo. Miller. He is now a physical exercise instructor at Brooke General Hosp. in the midst of Heaven called San Antonio, Texas. What a lucky, lucky boy, and I think he knows it! At least, he writes about how swell it is down there! I received two letters from you today. One was written 10/16, and the other, 10/18. However, my darling, if you have written me every day I’m missing many letters from the time you left until about the 14th of this month. Did you write every day, or, haven’t I received all the mail, as yet? As I write to our friends, I tell them of your change of address. However, sweetheart, what do you mean when you say “APO’s are good for 6 mos. always?” Thanks for Stan’s letter. I read it, copied the new address, and threw it away. I really have nothing to write him, but will send him one of our Xmas cards. Gee sweets--you really must have been pretty tired the day you wrote me that I could take a nip out of your “tussie” and you wouldn’t even squawk. I’m going to put that down in my notebook and hold you to it someday, as it has been one of my life-long ambitions, and golly hones, it sure will taste good. I adore you, my dearest one! Honey, I thoroughly enjoy your letters, and I’m particularly glad you notice things that will interest me: for instance, like children. You probably know, no doubt, that the state of a nation can be told by looking at many of their children. No doubt in most of those war devastated countries, the children’s faces show their wants and hopes! I definitely would not like to see any more bloodshed after this war, but honey, I can’t help but hope that this “color question” becomes an issue. Unless minority rights and liberties are insured [sic], what kind of a democracy have we? Okay, don’t answer that--it’s known we only have “our form” of gov’t called a democracy. Which reminds me--wouldn’t it be the worst thing that could happen, if Roosevelt carries the majority of votes, but Dewey wins by the electral [sic] votes? Ukie helped out in the nursery today since we were short-staffed. Personally, she likes working with older children as she definitely likes the “teaching angle,” while I prefer the younger ones, because there is where you can mold for a social and emotional angle. I had a half day off, so Uk and I went to the library, and I fished around for plays for my dramatics group, but I was unsuccessful as they don’t have “Janie” or “Junior Miss” in, and I thought of submitting those two to the group for approval. I feel if they can vote on the play they want to do, we’ll get better response. I saw “Hostages” at the library and looked through it, but since it deals with Germany and the Gestapo (right?), I don’t feel like reading it. However, if you really think it is a “super” book, say so, and I’ll read it! Uk has a cold in her head so I’m glad she didn’t have a date for tonight and could stay in bed. Here’s some news (gossip). Shirley Berger Lurie gave birth. However, I understand, that husband, Capt. Lurie, is in a general hospital with some sort of mental trouble! Arnoff was bought out by Jacobson, and now is trying to say he has retired. Since he’s not with Jacobson any longer, his wife and he are not on as good terms as they should be, and people have been smelling the ugly word, “divorce.” My cousin Maxie, after having his grocery store for about 2½ months, decided he is working too hard and now wants to sell it in order to buy a “smoking shop”--commonly known as a poolroom. Personally, I think the guy is crazy as I understand the grocery was a “going” business. Oh yes, bought Alma a very nice box of stationary [sic] for her birthday. My back is starting to hurt as I’m sitting on a stool instead of a chair. And anyhow, I guess I’ve just run out of anything more to say in this letter, except that I feel fine, still taking the pills, and hope I lose weight. How do you look my sweets? Gosh, I can just about smell you near me now, and I love it. You know, dearest, I wouldn’t admit it before, but when I think of you, I always thing [sic] of you as when you come off the field in your fatigues, sweating and dirty, with your 5 o’clock shadow--you really look very virile, and your hairy chest sparkles with sweat and you seem all aglow, which you probably are with so much prespiration [sic] on you. I adore you, Bubsie--and I’m “tickled pink” that you are all mine! I certainly am all yours--no doubt about it. Ever yours, Edith [Transcription ends

Collaboration in Musical Theatre Writing

Good musical theatre writing is generally assessed by how intentional it is in telling its story. Since it is a very difficult thing to tell a story using music, writers must exercise extreme caution in allowing a story to unfold in an effective, economic way. Recently, there has been a trend in theatre for projects to be developed in a way that utilizes less time of writers sitting alone in a room, and more of material being developed on its feet. Devised theatre, as it is often called, is anathema to the traditional practices of musical theatre writing. The results of this project, the music and lyrics for a modern adaptation of Aristophanes\u27 Lysistrata, shed light on musical theatre writing and its relationship to collaboration. Though the songs that were generated as a result of Lysistrata were often fraught with errors in terms of structure, rhyme, and meter, the artistic ambition contained in the songs was at least slightly commendable. If devising has a place in musical theatre writing, it is as a method of generating new material, not as a way of refining material with high standards

The Things We Carry

A soldier’s wife describes the burdens of silence and heartache. Articles, stories, and other compositions in this archive were written by participants in the Mighty Pen Project. The program, developed by author David L. Robbins, and in partnership with Virginia Commonwealth University and the Virginia War Memorial in Richmond, Virginia, offers veterans and their family members a customized twelve-week writing class, free of charge. The program encourages, supports, and assists participants in sharing their stories and experiences of military experience so both writer and audience may benefit

Racism on Every Side: Good Unionism Will Lead to Good Race Relations . . . Someday

[Excerpt] This is not a black union, white union, red, brown, or green. This is a union of workers who, over the past 50 years or so, have struggled to make life a little easier for future members of this great union. These workers have had to put up with the likes of the Chicago Board of Education, the City of Chicago, the Chicago Park District, and the Cook County Commissioners. And, we must be prepared to continue this struggle. As a black man, as a former union organizer in both the North and South, and now as a local President, I know about white racism. I know what to expect and I\u27m ready for it. But racism from every side — sometimes subtle, sometimes explicit — is more difficult to deal with. Sometimes you confront it directly, sometimes you have to ignore it. Sometimes you make a point and move on. Always, you agitate and organize

Blue Skies: Education in Second Life

This article examines the educational possibilities of the online environment of Second Life, by Linden Labs. Second Life’s economic growth has attracted the attention of corporations, non-profit organizations and government entities. Unlike traditional web-based instruction, Second Life provides a three-dimensional interface through which teachers and students can enjoy a limited form of eye-contact and body language. It also permits collaboration and learning in groups. The article goes on to discuss some of the advantages and disadvantages of using the interface for online learning. It goes on to examine current educational applications and possible future enhancements

"WE SHALL OVERCOME": FROM BLACK CHURCH MUSIC TO FREEDOM SONG

The music sung by protesters in the American Civil Rights Movement was inseparable from the music in black Protestant churches. Despite the firm boundaries between the sacred and the secular in black Baptist and Methodist traditions, protesters adapted sacred hymns for secular protest use. Termed freedom songs, the music bound protesters together by shared spiritual associations with the music and by a communal performance experience. This study explores the adaptation process of the freedom song using "We Shall Overcome" as a case study. An examination of the traditions of black American church institutions and the musical and textual attributes of the adapted song genres clarifies the methods by which protesters transformed sacred hymns and songs. Elements of black sacred music, simple and repetitive melodies and texts and universal themes, facilitated the adaptation of sacred hymns and songs. "We Shall Overcome" embodied all the adaptive musical characteristics inherent in freedom songs but at an elevated level. Moreover, additional functions of the black church, for example to serve as socioeconomic support to the oppressed black community in post-Civil War America, transformed social activism into a spiritual endeavor. It was inevitable that sacred traditions, namely music, aided social activism