Christmas!!!

We finally got our Christmas decorations up last night– just in time for me to leave this morning!!  I’m going to be out of town until next Tuesday, so I won’t get to enjoy our decorations for a while, but at least I’ll come home to a warm, holiday home…

For now, I’m pretty happy to be in Kansas! I’ve got TWO radio stations playing holiday music, and my grandma is watching Fa-la-la-la Lifetime on TV. Definitely feels like the holidays here, too.

Travel days are always a bit confusing on my system. I woke up at 5:30 am to get to the airport, and I rode all the way there with this little girl on my lap:

She is always SO sad when I leave…  she usually lays right next to my suitcase the night before my business trips, so that I don’t forget about her! Poor girl.   At least she had a fun ride to the airport this morning, and I’m sure she kept my husband company on the way home. They’re probably throwing a house-party together as we speak.

The airport was a mad-house this morning, with everyone coming home from their Thanksgiving trips. Fortunately, LAX is pretty efficient at dealing with mass chaos. Once I got through security, I bought some magazines:

Can you believe Oprah’s news?? It will be hard to imagine daytime TV without Oprah… but 25 years is a lot for her, I’m sure!!

I had an iced green tea from Starbucks while I waited to board my flight:

As well as a bottle of water:

I always bring a bottle of water with me on airplanes, because I don’t like drinking airplane water. (and it’s so dry in those cabins!!) I love the taste of Aquafina (it’s like crack to me!) and I like being able to put a lid on my water so I don’t knock it over if I fall asleep!

Speaking of… I had a great nap on my flight today– I woke up when we landed! Perfect.

Now I’m off to the mall, for some last-minute shopping before I have to work tomorrow! Hope you all have a great Sunday!!

Just a reminder: Today and tomorrow are the last days to help Katie and her Operation Chocolate Covered Kindness! Visit her blog and click around to help her raise money for The Enough Project!!

]]> http://newsfromthefront.wordpress.com/2009/11/18/31/ Wed, 18 Nov 2009 19:58:12 +0000 A. http://newsfromthefront.wordpress.com/2009/11/18/31/

part of an ongoing series of columns I’ve written for the TU Rambler; reprinted here in full (instead of the trimmed-down snippet of drivel they published under my name).

September, 2009.
Let’s talk about water.

We can’t live without it; it quenches thirst better than Gatorade, and apparently, it’s on the moon.  For most of us living in the First World, it also comes out of the tap for free.  And yet, for some reason or another, lots of people insist on buying bottled water.  I’m sorry, but am I missing something here?  You pay money…for something that you could get for free…that you can only use once. Meanwhile, people in Fiji live under a military dictatorship, suffering from typhoid and without access to clean drinking water.

This really puzzles me.  Fiji Water sells for almost three times as much as regular bottled water, is now our country’s #1 imported water, and yet is considered by many to be a “green” bottled water because the company that owns it contributes to liberal and progressive causes (like, for example, John McCain).

Fiji Water is put into heavy bottles (fresh-made with Chinese plastic) in a diesel-fueled factory in a town where the water is considered “unfit for human consumption”.  Bottled water is wasteful enough, but the very fact that this “green” water has to come across the ocean on a gas-guzzling cargo ship makes this a huge steaming pile of hypocrisy. Maybe politicians who are having trouble ending our addiction to foreign oil should start smaller and instead try ending our addiction to overpriced, greenwashed bottled water.

So, you might ask, how can we help solve the bottled water problem?  It’s simple—don’t buy it.  Ask your grandparents how they got through their days without their bottle of Evian or Aquafina or Fiji.  They didn’t, because such a thing would be totally preposterous to them, and it should be to us, too.  Buy a reusable Nalgene bottle from the campus bookstore, and then go over to the water fountain or the faucet (last I checked, every building on campus had running water; just be grateful you don’t have to pump it by hand), and fill ‘er up!  Commit to using your reusable bottle, and start making sustainability the new standard.

Dear Maker of the 16.9fl oz AQUAFINA water:
Why must you fill your bottles up to the tip top? No matter how hard I try to avoid the spillage of water upon opening the cap off your bottle to quench my thirst, it never fails. From wet spots on my pants, to puddles on my desk, my paper towel usage increases with every new 24-case of water purchased.
Thank you AQUAFINA.

Sincerely, a wet jeaned (but fully hydrated) Pam.

In 1981 two individuals in Wisconsin talked to local PepsiCo bottlers about bottling water.  I’m sure it seem ludicrous to the bottlers at the time, as water is plentiful in Wisconsin, and my guess is they told the men to take a hike.  Fast forward two decades and bottled water is everywhere – and one of the main quenchers of America’s insatiable thirst is Aquafina (which just so happens to be a PepsiCo product).

The two men, Charles Joyce and James Voigt, recently filed a claim stating PepsiCo had misappropriated a trade secret – with the trade secret being the idea to bottle water.  The funny part is that PepsiCo, in all its legal glory, never responded to the complaint – and a whopping default judgment of $1.26 billion was entered.  When PepsiCo was alerted of the verdict it scrambled to figure out what had gone wrong.  Apparently, the company was served correctly, but a secretary forgot to pass the file along because she was too busy preparing for a meeting.  Oops.

But fear not, PepsiCo worked it’s legal magic and wiggled out of the judgment.  Mistakes and minor clerical errors such as this sometimes enough for a party to vacate a default judgment. Further, there was also that pesky little problem of a statute of limitations.  Apparently, if you want to claim someone has misappropriated your trade secret in Wisconsin, you better do it within three years….

The following information was provided by Pete Van Cleave, Water for Life http://www.waterforlifeonline.com/

Everybody is susceptible to being scammed, simply because they want to believe!

Nowhere is this more obvious than in the drinking water business. Politics spawns a lot of lies in the water business since the government is responsible for making tap water. Franchising and exclusive territories also spawn lies.  The internet has spawned much nonsense, too, with it’s uncensored, wild west sort of approach to business. It is truly alarming to see the explosion of internet products claiming to infuse water with magical properties to cure all your ills. These specially altered waters claim to be superior because they’re wetter, oxygenated, clustered, enhanced, magnetized, energized, alkalized, vitalized, or some other pseudoscientific term.  These empty promises simply do not hold water.

We always look for scientific and verifiable data from reliable third parties than can provide the proven facts about the various treatment technologies and how pure water works to support good health.  Education is the only way to battle bogus claims. I have studied water for 20 years and I stand firm in my commitment to bring you the very best possible drinking water and water purification systems based upon the best information available.

Distillation is the only method to produce legally purified water

Since 2002, it is one of three methods to produce legally purified water.  Competitors only selling one thing tend to defend it well, but also get their blinders on regarding other advances.  Biopure Everclean Reverse Osmosis also produces microbiologically pure water according to the NSF without electricity. We believe independence protects consumers best.

Common Reverse Osmosis works as well as NSF Nano filter/Everclean Rinse Reverse Osmosis

Common Reverse Osmosis systems degrade from day one like a filter does. Microbiological contaminants often migrate through the membrane or o-rings. Everclean Rinse Reverse Osmosis prevents the membrane from degrading and keeps the water 100% consistently pure. It costs more, but the value is there because the membrane does not have to be replaced like it does with common RO.  The NSF Nano filter technology gives a non electric system barrier protection against all forms of bacteria for those undergoing chemotherapy, organ transplant, or HIV/Aids.

Throwaway bottles are not a problem because they break down in the landfill.

There is an area of floating plastic trash in the Northern Pacific ocean that is twice the size of the continental United States. Experts tell us that dangerous chemicals from industrial waste stick to the plastics and enter the food chain as it is ingested by birds and marine life.  Americans bought about 50,000,000,000 plastic bottles in 2006 and the cost of energy and pollution is staggering! It takes enough crude oil to fuel 100,000 cars for a year to make a year’s supply of those plastic bottles. It takes 1000 years for these bottles to break down 100%.

Energized, vitalized, living, hexagonal, activated, ionized, and restructured water is purported to slow aging, restore cellular balance, or raise consciousness, and promote world peace.

All scams and hoaxes supported by testimonial evidence which only tries to take advantage of feel good placebo marketing. Absolutely no third party testing or science supports this.

 Oxygenated water enhances performance and post recovery workout.

The grossly overpriced Penta water is priced at $15.00 per gallon.  Perfect water by Amway is priced at $36.00 per case. Infused with 30- 40% more oxygen than ordinary water, it is marketed on the premise that the body can actually absorb oxygen directly into the bloodstream via the digestive system. The only way to get oxygen into the blood is through the lungs.  Trying to get oxygen into your body from water is called “drowning”! Unless you have gills, there is no need to search out water with extra oxygen.  This is a case of pure fraud without physiologic foundation.

 Clustered water is the fountain of youth.

Each year, university researchers on human aging bestow their annual “Silver Fleece” award on anti-aging quackery.  The 2002 recipient was “clustered” water. Water only really clusters when it crystallizes during freezing.

Magnetic water can cure all manner of human ailments.

There is no scientific evidence that water can even be magnetized in the first place.  This scam is at odds with the fundamental laws of physics.

Advanced filters can protect you as well as legal purifiers

Filters do not protect against microbiological or inorganic contaminants. They are often not changed properly, they break down, they dump, they channel, and they produce a declining level of performance the older they get. I often test the water coming out of them worse than the water going into them because they have no automatic shutdown devices.

 Cheap spring or national brand water in 16.9 oz bottles is the answer to tap water problems.  

Teton Springs, Quibell, Lithia Springs, and Big Springs are all local springs that have gone out of business in Georgia in the past 15 years because they failed to protect their customers from microbiological contamination in their water. Crystal Springs, Dasani, and Aquafina have all been cited for contaminants in their water in the past 8 years. We have tested our water against Deer Park, Zephyr Hills, Nestle Pure Life, Crystal Geyser, and every cheap brand sold in the state of Georgia. They all test out with contamination higher than tap water.

Municipal water systems are still keeping our drinking water safe.  Every system using chlorine contains the cancer causing agent trihalomethanes.  63% of waterborne illnesses in the U.S. are directly caused by Cryptosporidium and Giardia cysts, which are city water chlorine tolerant.  Flouride is ineffective and has serious health risks.  The American Dental Association is now warning parents not to use fluoridated water in the preparation of formula. After so many “boil water” alerts, chemical spills, broken water mains, and now AP’s pharmaceutical expose, Municipalities and states are now spending $63 billion dollars a year to try to keep up, but they can’t.  Legal testing requirements and repairs are currently routinely granted waivers. Many municipalities are using the exact same technology that has been in place for 100 years.  TDS levels, by my own testing are double what they were 20 years ago.  Standards are getting tougher as we find out new scientific facts and more contaminants are being discovered.  For example, in January 2006, the standard for Arsenic was reduced from 50 PPB to 10 PPB.  That means the previous standard was off by 500 percent! The distribution system is completely laden with problems: over 237,000 water main breaks in 2006.  The distribution system is coated with dangerous layers of mineral, biological, and chemical deposits that recontaminate the water as it travels in pipes from treatment plant to homes.  We now have over 2100 chemical contaminants in the drinking water that we can test for but we don’t. The EPA estimates there is a gap of $22 billion per year between what is needed and what is done. The fact is that in the next 30 years, every city water supply in the U.S. will reach or exceed it’s expected lifetime, costing the American taxpayer somewhere near $300 billion just to fix the underground pipes. 

Respectfully,

Pete Van Cleave

Water for Life

(770) 578-0600

Although you may think that bottled water is a safer option than tap, two new reports show that the store-bought stuff is actually less regulated than the water you get out of your faucet for free. What’s in your water? You may be hard pressed to find out, reports the Environmental Working Group.

The Food and Drug Administration has little authority to regulate bottled brands, according to a U.S. Congressional report released recently. While municipal water utilities are required to provide public reports of test results, bottled-water makers are not. (On the other hand, well water, which is found in many rural areas, isn’t regulated as water provided by towns and cities is.) So although you may fork over a pretty penny for bottled water, that doesn’t mean it’s any better than what’s coming out of your faucet. In fact, it could be worse and you’d never know it. The new research is backed by a second report from the Environmental Working Group.

The nonprofit advocacy organization surveyed the labels and web sites of nearly 200 popular bottled-water brands and found that less than 2 percent disclosed three important facts that can affect safety: the water’s source, purification methods, and chemical pollutants in each bottle.

Beyond H2O is different and is delivering water the way it should be – pure and refreshing – while disclosing its source, purification process, and the pollutants it DOES NOT have in it.

For more information visit our website today:

http://www.DrinkBeyondH2O.com

Beyond H2O Bottled Water Is Quickly Becoming The New Water Of Choice

Many mistakenly believe drinking spring or mineral water provides a good source for minerals. However, according to the American Medical Journal, “The minerals which the human body needs that are in the water are insignificant to those in food … and anyone simply eating a varied diet, not even a balanced diet, could hardly suffer a mineral deficiency.”

The main reason minerals in water are insignificant is because they’re mostly inorganic, which the body cannot easily utilize. However, the body much easier utilizes minerals in food because they’re in a bio-available (organic) state.

Dr. Charles Mayo of the world-renowned Mayo Clinic said, “The only minerals that the body can utilize are the organic minerals. All other types of minerals are foreign substances to the body and must be eliminated.” In other words, the only thing that belongs in your water is water. Dehydration, by definition, means “excessive loss of water.” If you eat the right diet, you’ll get most, if not all, the minerals you need from food.

Furthermore, we believe our bodies may gain additional benefits from utilizing an ultra-purified water like Beyond H2O which has be re-mineralized with trace amounts of organic minerals.

For more info visit our website today:

http://www.DrinkBeyondH2O.com

I found myself wondering one day… how the hell people sell water. Other than the obvious branding stuff.

How do they … make their water sound better than another company’s water?

My lastest search: aquafina, dasani and evian

Bottled water. My favourite brands at that.

Yes, I have favourite brands of BOTTLED WATER. Goes to show how well the people have branded… their brands into my brain.

As expected, their pages were aesthetically pleasing, however boring the actual sites were… bit bland (like water)

I don’t blame them, what could you possibly put on a site for BOTTLED WATER. Needless to say though, the text was enough to get me thirsty. So thirsty for their bottled water. Reverse osmosis; my purification process of choice.

Anyway… as expected there really wasn’t any interesting stuff they had to say about water. It’s interesting to see how marketers sell water… they’d probably be really good at their job you know and it’s always nice to see professionals at work. Water is about the most necessary thing someone would buy. There’s basically no need to encourage anyone to buy water. But since it’s bottled water… I guess it’s a different story.

Surprisingly… they have wallpapers available for download. I expected… EXTREMELY AWESOME WATER PHOTOGRAPHY… but I was disappointed. : (

Main selling points: PURITY. HEALTH.

DASANI (tied for number one with AQUAFINA)

AQUAFINA

evian

Excuse my boring / pointless post.

PepsiCo lanza versión peruana de Aquafina bajo la marca San Carlos

Esta semana, PepsiCo puso a la venta una versión relanzada de agua de mesa San Carlos, la cual habría sido introducida a través de las franquicias de Delosi. El producto tiene como particularidad el adoptar la imagen de Aquafina, marca de agua de la empresa para el mercado estadounidense.

‘Cuida tu cuerpo. Protege tu mundo’, sería el slogan de la nueva San Carlos, inicialmente disponible en botellas de 630 ml. que incluyen el nuevo logo de Pepsi en su etiqueta. Este hecho anticipa un cercano lanzamiento de la nueva imagen de la cola negra en el Perú, la misma que ya fue develada en otros mercados de la región como Argentina.

Lee también:

- La nueva imagen de Pepsi: La eterna rival de Coca-Cola ‘refresca’ su identidad.

Next to oxygen, water is truly the most important substance for survival and better health and well-being. Below you will discover 7 reasons why water is essential to your life and the proper functioning of the body.

1.)Water increases the efficiency of the red blood cells in collecting oxygen in the lungs.
2.)Water is used for the transport of all substances in the body.
3.)Water is the main solvent for all foods, vitamins, and minerals.
4.)Water is the bonding adhesive in the architectural design of the cell structure.
5.)Water generates electrical and magnetic energy inside each and every cell of the body.
6.)Water shortage kills some aspects of the body.
7.)Without water nothing lives.

Visit www.BEYOND-H2O.com for more information.

I chose this first because it really embodies what I’m getting at with “10 Things.”  These are very little things, but done consistently, together, can begin to change our collective situation.  My goal for this blogpost is to explain what the impact of this is, how you can take part in the solution, and why this makes sense.  Maybe I will inspire you to act, maybe I will get you to pass a link to this on so that someone else can read it.  If all else fails I’m increasing awareness and that’s never a bad thing.

Let’s open with a clip from CNN

So how much do we spend on bottled water?  Seems like a small thing really, nothing which could make any real impact, right?  According to Fast Company magazine Americans spent fifteen billion dollars on tapwater+bottle in 2006.  That’s roughly $127.50 per year for every household in America.  That could buy a few tanks of gas couldn’t it?  In fact, the bottled water industry is second only to soda-pop in revenue from bottled consumable liquids, but at least soda manufacturers give you chemicals and processed sugar for your money!

It’s more than just that:  Americans are throwing 38 billion water bottles into landfills every year.  That’s like throwing away $1,000,000,000 worth of plastic annually.  In a time when families are scraping for the gas money to drive to a job they are lucky to have we are literally throwing away billions of dollars.  Not to mention the environmental effects.  I don’t care which side of global warming you are on, I think we can all agree that when you throw away a bottle it goes into a land fill.  Over time that landfill gets bigger, which means less land for everything else.

“But I thought we were recycling that stuff now?”

We are, and it is getting somewhat better.  That doesn’t mean we have a handle on it.  A quick visual aid will help put this into context.

We've decreased production of new plastics recently but the problem remains unsolved...

Get the picture?  This is one small way we, collectively, can begin to address the problems within our country.  This is a small thing, but done collectively it will have an impact on our bottom line.

“So stop buying bottled water, okay, but I still need clean water…“

There are many options, all of which will save you many dollars.  Water filtration systems produce the same quality water you get from the bottle, but for much less.  Depending on how you buy it, bottled water can run you anywhere from $1.50 to just over $6.00 a gallon.  Compare that with a range of $0.12 to $0.28 a gallon for filtered water.  The Brita company, for example, provides a range of filtration methods to choose from.

Companies like Brita, Pur, and others provide the cure to your bottled water blues.

Now all you need is a container and you are off and running.  Luckily for you, your options are many.  Find the one that is right for you and just say no to bottled water.  Filtered water won’t cost you any money money, it will actually cost you less, but it will cost more effort.  That $127.50 a year was bound to cost you something, that’s just the way the world works.

In the end, this one thing alone will not change the world, or even fix America.  This is a part of a larger conversation about how and why we do the things we do.  Along the way there are opportunities to do things differently, and this is one of those.  In the end, it will be in the accumulation of these opportunities that we begin to see progress.  If this makes sense to you please pass a link to this blog on, via email, facebook or whatever.

Semper Magnus

Cameron

If you were wondering, 40% of bottled water is tap water, or maybe worse.

Want the facts?

• Up to 40% of bottled water is basically TAP WATER that corporations, such as PEPSI, COKE, and NESTLE, sell for huge profits.
• COKE’s DASANI – plain, ol’ TAP WATER guys!
• PEPSI’s AQUAFINA – Yep, TAP WATER too!
• NESTLE’s PURE LIFE – Once again, TAP WATER?!

I know I know, you HAVE to be kidding, right?

NO! WE ARE NOT!!!! www.ThinkOutsidetheBottle.org wants us to CHALLENGE CORPORATE CONTROL of WATER.

Why?? Because if we don’t act soon the quality of our public water will suffer due to corporate control. Do you want to be able to still drink that same water from your sink???? THEN KEEP READING!

—->

Corporate Accountability International had a table set up outside Whole Foods in Boston, Massachusetts today. Being the health conscious folks that we are at Food & Truth, ran over to find out more about their cause. We learned that PEPSI COKE AND NESTLE are three of the many CORPORATIONS FOOLING US, SCAMMING US, yet again, for another EASY, QUICK BUCK, with your hard-earned cash. Next time you go to buy a bottled water, remember that it’s tap water, aka water from your very sink. Sad, yes it is. What happened to the good ol’ days when my grandmother could pull over on the side of the road and got the water that ran down from the mountains while on our way to the beach? Those days are long gone.

COKE NESTLE AND PEPSI cleverly market their product to undermine people’s confidence in the very same public tap water that they use. In reality, tap water is better regulated than bottled water! Plus our public water systems DISCLOSE the quality of water while MOST BOTTLERS REFUSE TO DO THE SAME!

Some bottlers run roughshod over communities’ concerns and the environment when they extract water and build bottling plants to get local spring and ground water.

WE NEED TO CHALLENGE THE BOTTLED WATER INDUSTRY AND GALVANIZE SUPPORT FOR THE PUBLIC WATER SYSTEMS.

Did you know COKE, NESTLE, AND PEPSI do not reveal their sources and sites of the water used for bottling?! YOU are paying $2.00 or more for bottled water at various vendors, and you don’t know where your water comes from?

WE NEED TO DEMAND that these corporations:

• reveal the sources and sites for the water used for bottling
• publicly report breaches in bottled water quality, comparable to reports by public water systems
• STOP THREATENING LOCAL CONTROL OF WATER WHEN SITING AND OPERATING BOTTLED WATER PLANTS!!!!!!!

STOP TRYING TO FORCE US TO BUY OUR OWN NATURAL WATER WE’RE ENTITLED TO CORPORATE AMERICA!!!!!!!

Draft 1

Photo: Youn-A Kim

Product: Aquafina

Slogan: Pure Water Pure Performance

This is the first draft for the final project of Ad class. Now I don’t have enough time(I got 1 day) to visually elaborate this ads. My inspiration is the pronouncing sound of “Aquafina.” To me, it sounds like “ballerina.” tried to depict rhythm and smoothness, freshness with Queen Youn-A Kim.

Designed by Sangmin Lim

Over the course of the last year or so, I wrote a book called Bottled Spunk – Its all about branding, and how it impacts, how it works and how to create your own. I haven’t yet got around to looking for a publisher, so I thought I would publish the introduction on here to see whether there was any form of market for it and to see what people’s initial reaction was.

If I get some good comments. then I’ll either publish the full text on here or go out and look for someone to help me take it to market. It’s 20,000 words and in truth has taken me about 20 years of research to get to this draft. So here goes..

1. Bottled spunk anyone?
In February 2004, worried by the success of their Rival Pepsi’s purified water product called Aquafina, Coca Cola felt they were being left out of the fast growing and extremely profitable bottled water market. So, after a great deal of studying the market, hundreds of thousands of pounds poured into research they launched Dasani Water to the UK, expecting a similar success to that which greeted its US introduction.

With this successful launch under their belt, they took the decision to recycle the marketing campaigns that had worked so well on the other side of the Atlantic. But in an incredible oversight on the language front, they directed their eager public to their US website. On the front of this was a bikini clad lady, next to a bottle of Dasani water, shaking her wet hair with the slogan ‘Can’t live without spunk’

Can't live without Spunk? Hmmmm, I think I can!

The concept of ‘bottled spunk’ for the advertising and for any mainstream consumer website may not have absolutely universal appeal.

Testing potential issues with a brand name throughout the world is the work of experts, checking a slogan such as this would seem to be a fairly simple exercise – particularly with the might, budgets and brains of Coca Cola behind you. All this work and they failed to spot that in the US, spunk has a rather different meaning – and possibly taste!

Now they may have survived one mistake, but even after that rather shaky start, things still got worse.

A few weeks into the launch, The Grocer magazine happened to note that the water was taken from a commercial water supply in Sidcup, Kent that had been filtered. In effect it was nothing more than tap water. The claims were that because of their secret filtration process and adding of vitamins and minerals, it was particularly pure – even if it wasn’t actually spring water.

The proximity to Peckham could not be missed by the tabloids and they cited the similarity to the Peckham Spring Water that Dell Boy attempted to make famous in one episode of Only Fools and Horses.

Perhaps they could have survived two big mistakes?

But then, to make matters worse again, trading standards got involved to investigate their claims of purity and discovered traces of bromate – a potential carcinogenic that had been banned in some countries.

All the glossy packaging and advertising budgets in the world cannot hide a lie these days. The truth will out.

Our tap water in the UK is 99.96% clean and is the best in any developed nation in the world, according to latest OFWAT figures and costs 0.2 pence per litre. Theirs cost over £1, tasted the same, but could actually be more detrimental to your wellbeing.

When the press outed them, Coca Cola were forced to recall over 500,000 bottles and remove the product from sale only 38 days after they launched. They were left with lots of egg on their face, a redundant factory and a £7m waste of advertising money.

Worse than this, the story ran throughout most of mainland Europe, so planned launches to the lucrative markets of Germany and Spain were both shelved before they ever even began.

If it had been one thing, they still stood a chance, two and it was going to be more tricky, but with mistakes piling up around them, they were left with an impossible situation that only left them with retreat as an option.

Coca Cola are one of the most exceptional brand owners in the world and still made these mistakes by underestimating the global power of brands and the world we now live in where information is instant and worldwide. It is what economists describe as an almost perfect market. It is changing everything we do with brands and you need to work within the opportunities and restrictions it presents.

All of these mistakes could (and would) have been prevented by applying some of the simple rules that we lay down in this book.

What we’re going to show here, is how simple it is to begin to build an exceptional brand for yourself.

We’re going to show you what does and doesn’t make up a brand.

Then give you some simple examples and a step by step procedure to follow to create your own.

We’ll introduce you to the golden rules of what you can and can’t do with a brand and show you where some have taken their brands to the brink, only to save them at the last minute.

And show what some of the best (and worst) examples in the world can teach us about the strange and mysterious art of branding.