Dennis Norman Musings

The other day a friend of mine sent me a link to a YouTube video.  Now this is no ordinary friend, this guy is probably hovering somewhere around brilliant on the smarts scale; he reads the works of the great philosophers for fun and seems to “study” everything.  The video is by Kevin Slavin and is title “How algorithms shape our world“.   While I’m not normally in the habit of watching math videos, this one seemed intriguing so I watched it.  If you haven’t seen the video, it’s worth seeing, click on the name and watch it…it’s fascinating and raises some interesting issues. Read more…

I attended a presentation on mobile technology for real estate today, part of which focused on social media and how to use it to market your business.  There was a fair amount of discussion about Facebook, Twitter, Twellow, Linkdn as well as some others.  The best part though was the speaker played a video that I had seen before but had forgotten about that does a great job of presenting the facts and figures on social media….clearly it works and it is here to stay.  While searching YouTube I actually found a new version of the video from last month that has updated statistics…. Read more…

“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”

This morning I saw an article on STL Today about a retired art teacher that was sentenced to 20 days in jail after he refused to make changes to art he has displayed in his front yard that “court and city officials have deemed dangerous.” Read more…

Wikipedia defines “Guerrilla Marketing” as:

…an unconventional system of promotions that relies on time, energy and imagination rather than a big marketing budget. Typically, guerrilla marketing campaigns are unexpected and unconventional; potentially interactive; and consumers are targeted in unexpected places. The objective of guerrilla marketing is to create a unique, engaging and thought-provoking concept to generate buzz, and consequently turn viral. Read more…

The National Day of Prayer (36 U.S.C. § 119) is a day designated by the United States Congress when people are asked “to turn to God in prayer and meditation“. The law formalizing its observance was enacted in 1952, and is being challenged in court.

On April 15, 2010, United States District Court Judge Barbara Crabb, for the Western District of Wisconsin, struck down the National Day of Prayer statute, 36 U.S.C. § 119, as violating the Establishment Clause. Judge Crabb ruled that the statute serves no secular purpose, but rather calls the nation to engage in a religious exercise – prayer.

The National Day of Prayer belongs to Americans. It is a tradition that dates back to 1775 and it is not for a Judge to take away. We the people called for the day of prayer and for 59 years we have practiced our freedom to gather and pray.

This is an attack upon our religious freedoms and it is a sad day in America when an atheist in Wisconsin can undermine this tradition for millions of others who simply wish to join their fellow citizens in praying for their country.

The National Day of Prayer provides an opportunity for all Americans to pray voluntarily according to their own faith – it does not violate the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment.

This video was sent to me and if it wasn’t for the fact it is probably a reasonably accurate depiction of the budget deficit, it would be funny.  It’s a great illustration of the Federal Budget, the deficit and Obama’s recent promise to cut $100 Million from the budget.

By: Dennis Norman

OK, I’ll admit it, I couldn’t figure out a way to write about this on any of the real estate blogs I write for so I had to write about it here.

I really didn’t think there could be a Congressman that could say something dumber than the things I have heard Rep Maxine Waters say in the past, but this morning that all changed.  Rep Hank Johnson proved he may know less than Rep Waters when he asked Admiral Robert Willard, commander of the U.S. Pacific Fleet, about the impact of U.S. troops on the island of Guam and expressed his concern that “… the whole island will become so overly populated that it will tip over and capsize,” …Yep, he said it, you have to watch the video below!  Oh yeah, kudos to Admiral Willard for somehow being able to restrain but busting out loud with laughter…he actually kept his composure and assured the Congressman that the island was not going to tip over.

Apparently outdoor-apparel manufacturer The North Face doesn’t think so.   I say this because of a recent lawsuit that was filed by North Face against South Butt, a company manufacturing outdoor clothing as a parody of North Face. 

The suit alleges that the South Butt brand is causing confusion amongst consumers with the North Face brand.  While the slogans are somewhat similar they invoke different messages I think: North Face, “Never Stop Exploring^TM“. South Butt, “Never Stop Relaxing^TM”

South Butt was started by 19-year-old University of Missouri student Jimmy Winkelmann in 2007 and I think was a relatively “unknown” company with it’s products only distributed in a couple of St. Louis area drug stores and available on their website at TheSouthButt.com.  That is, until The North Face started trying to curtail their business first with a cease and desist letter back in October, then a couple of months later a lawsuit.  

Thanks to the actions of The North Face, The South Butt suddenly began getting a ton of media attention (ah the power of GOING VIRAL!) which I would assume has brought them significant sales as well as support.  One of the supporters of The South Butt is St. Louis attorney Albert Watkins who has agreed to represent the company in exchange for a “nice bottle of wine”.   Included in the coverage (translation “Free Advertising”) was this video below on Fox News:

Fox News Coverage

OK, now for the good part.  I would think most people have not read an answer to a lawsuit file with a court, or certainly have not done it for entertainment, but you have to read the answer to The North Face lawsuit filed by Albert Watkins on behalf of the defendants, it’s quite unusual and comical.  You can read the entire answering by clicking on the link below but here are a few highlights:

“The South Butt” — evoking the opposite of Plaintiff’s historia nomen–being the soft undercarriage of the non-mountain climbing human anatomy, commonly known and referred to in non-salacious form as, among others, rump, bootie, bottom, buttocks, posterior, rear, saddle thumper and butt.”

“Rather, North Face has voluntarily and as a matter of public record, elected to depict the commercial undertakings of South Butt and its co-Defendants as “piracy”, evoking not intellectual property issues, but high crimes on the high seas, perhaps the South Seas, as contrasted with its oft explored polar opposite.”

There’s much more, it’s worth a read. South Butt Answer to Lawsuit

By: Dennis Norman

Wikipedia defines “Guerrilla Marketing” as:

The concept of guerrilla marketing was invented as an unconventional system of promotions that relies on time, energy and imagination rather than a big marketing budget. Typically, guerrilla marketing campaigns are unexpected and unconventional; potentially interactive; and consumers are targeted in unexpected places.The objective of guerrilla marketing is to create a unique, engaging and thought-provoking concept to generate buzz, and consequently turn viral 

Being a life-long entrepreneur and, often the “underdog” in the race, I have had to rely on guerrilla marketing tactics to promote myself and my businesses.  So, “having been there, done that”, I’m always impressed when I see good guerrilla marketing in action. 

Over the weekend I ran across a blog that highlighted, not only a great example of a business that acted upon a situation that was literally the textbook (well, wikipedia) example of a guerrilla marketing opportunity, but the story also contained a great example of another business that blew it and couldn’t have wasted the opportunity more.
I’m referring to a blog called DoctorWifeMom and the post was titled “A Tale of Two Managers”.  This was my first time to the site and while it appears to be a political blog of sorts.  In the header is the following statement;

“Blogging about life as a woman who wears many hats and lives in the red flyover states where we cling to our bibles and our guns and rely on hard work and ingenuity to make it”

However it was at this site I found a great example of guerrilla marketing.

Carolyn, the blogs author, wrote about a political rally she attended in St. Louis, Missouri which brought out a couple of thousand people.  the rally was held on, what sounds like, a busy corner with a shopping center across the street from the rally.  Being the best source of parking it appears many of the rally attendees chose to parking on the shopping center lot although the lot no doubt had signs posted that parking was for patrons of the shopping centers stores only.  Clearly some of the attendees, including Carolyn, did make a purchase from a business  in the center, but many did not. 

In the story there were managers of two businesses located in the shopping center that looked out onto the parking lot, saw all the “illegal parkers” as well as the crowd of people out front and took action.  One person responding was a manager of a major local grocery chain that does over $2 billion of sales in the St. Louis area a year (no doubt many of the rally attendees are customers) and his response was apparently not nice and was more combative than friendly.  The other response was from a manager of another business in the center; one Kyle Gilbertson, manager of Mr. Goodcents Subs and Pastas who took a different approach; he was friendly and nice to the 2,000 unexpected “guests” out front and had employees hand out coupons, food samples and so forth.  No doubt his sales that day were way above normal.  You gotta love it.  Carolyn’s story is much more detailed and complete and I would invite you to check it out by clicking here.

By: Dennis Norman

Investors, get those check books ready, maybe it’s time to buy again?  Adding to the list of recent positive reports on the housing market and home prices is the Housing Market Report that was issued this morning by Radarlogic.  According to the report home prices increased in June from the previous month in 23 out of the 25 metropolitan areas tracked by their company.

Overall the composite for all 25 metros showed a 3% gain in price from May to June representing one of the largest monthly gains reported by RadarLogic since June 2000. There has been a trend of price increases reported for the 25 metro areas for the past few months. In fact, the increase in the Radar Logic Composite from February to June outpaced the house price gains over the same period during the previous threes years, and the increase in house prices from April to June was the largest since the beginning of Radar Logic’s date in 2000.

Read more…