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August 29,
2006
Written
by Bob Meyer, Editor of BarterNews
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From the desk of Bob
Meyer...
08/29/06
Travelocity and Points.com To Offer Program For Purchasing
Travel Services Using Frequent Flyer Miles
Thanks
to Peter Tucker, CEO of
CTEX.com,
for sending us the disclosure from Travelocity. We did not
publish his missive herein, because it was a much longer
story than our parameters for the Tuesday Report. (We
will be sending out a separate mailing, so you can read his
entire comments, to our e-mail list shortly.)
Most noteworthy
about this announcement is the fact that millions of people
(from a myriad loyalty programs worldwide) will now have a
way to directly spend their frequent flyer miles on travel
services.
The new program
?Book with Points,? will allow loyalty program members
access to Travelocity?s online booking engine. They will use
points or miles to book and purchase the travel reward,
exactly as if they were purchasing their travel with cash,
rather than loyalty points and miles.
Book with Points
will be available both on the
Points.com
consumer portal and as a stand-alone, branded product for
individual loyalty program operators. It?s expected to be
operational in the fourth quarter of 2006.
Rob MacLean,
Points International?s CEO, summed it up nicely: ?While
millions of flights, hotel nights and other rewards are
provided every year, there continues to be demand for even
more access and availability. Our agreement with Travelocity
is uniquely positioned to help loyalty programs finally
follow through on the ?any award, any time? travel promise,
and to do so using our two companies? world-leading
technologies.?
This effort
creates a huge multi-billion-dollar open trade exchange
system, further reinforcing the promise and staggering
possibilities when melding many diverse partners into one
giant network.
Incredible Success Story
The first company
in India to be listed on the Nasdaq stock exchange, back in
1999, was Infosys. The company, with 58,000 employees today,
was launched with $250 in 1981 by six young guys from India.
Chairman N.R.
Narayana Murthy, 60, stepped down last week after 25 years
at the helm of the company he co-founded and helped grow.
Annual revenues today are more than $2 billion, and the
market capitalization is $21 billion.
Infosys? biggest
challenge came in 1995 when Murthy and his team decided they
couldn?t accept the tough conditions demanded by General
Electric. They walked away from the U.S. firm?s business at
a time when it made up 25% of Infosys?s revenue and 8% of
its profit.
BBX Reports Barter Company ?First?
Business Barter
Exchange (BBX) of Hornsby, NSW, Australia, has listed its
second company on a stock exchange...the BBX Property
Investment Fund. The Newcastle Stock Exchange listing was
initiated August 25, 2006, with a funding of over $4 million
in both cash and BBX trade dollars. BBX hopes to transfer
the fund to the Australian Stock Exchange later this year
for a full main-board listing.
All back issues of
"From the Desk...? can be accessed by
clicking
here.
(Please feel
free to forward our newsletter to your friends and
colleagues. We have a ?box? at the end of the
newsletter for your convenience.
See you next week. . .) |
Trade Exchange Owners...
Build Rapport & Empathy With Your Client Base!!
The
most powerful marketing tool in the barter industry, The
Competitive Edge newsletter, is a monthly, ready to use,
professional 4-page publication...no work is needed! (Click
here.)
Bank Of International Art Money
 In
our August 1 issue we reported on Lars Kraemmer, CEO of Bank of
International Art Money (BIAM), and his ingenious trading format
using Art Money. Below is a copy of a piece of Art Money, which one
can consider as art or as money.
You can frame the 12-cm x 18-cm
(4.5? x 7?) work on the wall, or spend it when shopping in
registered BIAM shops, when booking overnight stays at a BIAM host,
and when purchasing art from the many registered BIAM artists. You
will find all of these functions on the web site:
http://www.art-money.org.
The following listings are
a service to our readers. Please note that
due diligence is advised
in all of your business transactions...cash or barter.
Talk Radio Syndicator Willing
To Barter Big-Time!
National
Exposure On Full Trade
National Trade Association?s
corporate trade broker Jill Halper has a contract with a major
radio syndicator and can provide your company national (or
regional) coverage on trade.
Several prominent, national
radio talk shows, covering an array of topics, are obtainable.
To build your company?s brand with this vast national
exposure that?s available on trade, contact Jill Halper via
e-mail at
jhalper@ntatrade.com.
Real Estate Economist Anticipates
Hard Landing, Saying, ?It?s Ugly Out There?
A bearish real estate economist, Christopher
Thornberg, says the Southern California housing market is a bubble
and beginning to pop. Thornberg was one of the first economists to
declare that the housing market was peaking in September 2005.
He says there has been large-scale overbuilding
of homes and condominiums nationwide, and in So. California massive
price appreciation has taken place that is just not justifiable by
any kind of standards of reasonable economics.
?With interest rates rising in recent months
and sales declining, the bubble is popping,? Thornberg concluded,
?just like a bubble is supposed to.? If you look at what your house
was valued at three years ago and what it is now, he queried, is it
really worth 70% more? His answer, ?There is no way you can justify
the math.?
Other Points Of View
Angelo R. Mozilo, 67-year-old chief executive
of Countrywide Financial (the nation?s biggest home-mortgage
lender), who has personally been in business for more than five
decades, also had a sobering message for investors: ?Buckle your
seat belts, I?ve never seen a soft landing in 53 years.?
And the CEO of the country?s biggest auto
retailer, Mike Jackson of AutoNation, delivered a stern message to
his troops last week, ?Rising interest rates are going to pop the
bubble in real estate, and that, combined with rising gas prices, is
toxic to the consumer.?
Editor?s
Note: U.S. homebuilder
optimism sank for a seventh consecutive month in August to its
lowest level in 15 years, as a dearth of buyers caused inventories
of unsold homes to pile up. The National Association of Home
Builders said its index of sentiment among homebuilders sank to 32.
(A reading below 50 means more builders view sales conditions as
poor rather than good.)
Hotel
General Managers
Here?s
The Easiest $100,000 You?ll Ever
Bring To The Bottomline!
Collect
cash, as usual, from the guest accounts staying at your
facility that require the use of professional AV services.
And rather than shouldering your ongoing employee costs, or
your current vendor?s cash agreement for AV services,
here?s a much better alternative:
Work
with a proven national vendor (a sterling 25-year track
record) who will provide all of the AV services for your
hotel on a 100% TRADE BASIS! (Payment to be in the form of
hotel rooms and/or trade dollars.)
Your hotel?s annual AV billings must be a minimum of $200,000, and this
offer is available only in the continental United States.
For a
confidential introduction contact Bob Meyer via e-mail:
bmeyer@barternews.com.
(Please type in AV Services On Trade in the subject
line of your e-mail.)
Attention Trade Exchange Owners:
If your
member hotel(s) have a minimum of 10,000 sq. feet of meeting
space and annual billings of at least $200,000 for AV
services this is a great opportunity to earn substantial
cash service fees on the hundreds of thousands of trade
dollars your hotel member will be paying the vendor. Contact
Bob Meyer at the above e-mail. |
The following
information was provided to us by the National Association of Trade
Exchanges.
Trade Exchange Contingent Enjoys
Annual Convention In Toronto
The National Association of Trade Exchanges
(NATE) held its 22nd Annual Convention August 10-12 at the Delta
Chelsea Hotel in Toronto. Although the convention was not as well
attended as previous events, NATE attendees enjoyed an extremely
positive and productive three days of seminars, and sales and broker
training. All attendees said they came away with a great deal of
useful information that they plan to implement within their own
trade exchanges.
NATE continues to keep pace with the latest
innovations in technology, and many of its convention sessions
covered such topics as search engine optimization, and how to use
technology to improve the visibility and efficiency of their trade
exchange.
Two viable ways that NATE is leading the pack,
regarding technological advances in the barter industry, are through
its newly redesigned NATE and Banc
Web sites. Tom McDowell, Executive Director of NATE, said the
association has received tremendous feedback from its members as to
the ease of navigation and usefulness of these two sites.
NATE continues to stand at the forefront of the
barter industry as the premier association for independent trade
exchanges worldwide. But, like any industry, the world of barter is
facing many significant challenges that impact the bottom line of
each trade exchange owner. NATE addressed several of these
challenges with such discussions as ?Our New Competition and How to
Combat It.?
This session helped to identify and deal with
the effects of the Internet, superstores, and other factors that are
infiltrating the barter industry and affecting the way trade
exchanges do business.
As NATE looks to battle new competitors,
members turned their attention to addressing the needs of their
existing clients. Jonathan Weaver of Peak Performers conducted an
intense sales session designed to help NATE trade exchange owners
learn how to understand and speak their customers? language, as well
as to show how prospects and members view their business.
NATE also selected the following committee
chairs for the next year. Ric Zampatti of The Barter Company in
Atlanta is chairman of the Barter Association National Currency (Banc)
Committee, and Jerry Howell of Midwest Business Exchange in
Kalamazoo (MI) is chair of the Programs Committee. Dale Mardak of
International Monetary Systems in New Berlin (WI) is chair of the
Membership Committee.
NATE president Fran Crumpton of Gulf Coast
Trade Exchange in Pensacola (FL) will continue to chair the
Education Committee. Jim Cassidy of Barter Partners in St. Joseph
(MI) will remain chair of the Technology Committee.
Eight trade brokers earned the prestigious
Certified Trade Broker designation during the NATE convention. The
trade brokers successfully completed the standards and met the
qualifications to attain Certified Trade Broker status are Mark
Reilly, Shannon Niebergall, Dave Schiff, Jordan Kruger, and
Francisco Theoduloz of Barter Network Limited in Toronto; Mark
Bowman of IMS Barter in New Berlin (WI); and Miriam Worsnop and
Jonathan Fantham of XO Limited in New Zealand.
?The NATE Certified Trade Broker Program
challenges each one of us to strive for the highest level of service
to our clients and ensures the continued growth and expansion of our
industry,? said Fran Crumpton, President of NATE. ?This particular
group of well-trained brokers will continue to be an asset to the
barter industry.?
The CTB Program is offered annually
during the NATE convention. Lisa Boudreau of IMS Barter-Connecticut
and Anna McDowell of ATX The Barter Company in Cleveland, assisted
with the CTB training.
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Aliant Jumps On Popularity of
Electronic Gift Cards...Offering Merchants Free Card Programs
Recently we reported on the survey by Stored Value Systems that
revealed 76% of adults bought and used gift cards last year. (A gift
card is a store-branded card with a predetermined value that a
consumer purchases from a business...much like a pre-paid credit
card.)
Aliant Financial Services, one of the country?s leading providers
in electronic payment services, has announced that they will be
giving business owners a Free Gift Card Program with service for
life of their account, as long as the merchants process their credit
cards through Aliant.
Aliant says it?s the only free gift-card program in the
electronic payment industry.
For more information on their free gift card program go to
http://www.freegiftcardprogram.com.
The Growth and Use of Secondary
Capital (New Money) Creates Unprecedented Wealth In Today?s New Age
Of Possibility
There are
many forms of secondary capital?which can be defined as any
financial instrument that measures and communicates value in a
common language. Would you like to see and learn more about the many
forms of secondary capital?
We have 70
free, informative and inspiring, articles for you in our ?Secondary
Capital Section.? Check it out...
www.barternews.com/secondary_capital.htm.
Top 10 Countries With Online Users
The number of Internet users, age 15 and older, as of June, 2006:
|
United States |
153 million |
|
China |
78 ? |
|
Japan |
53 ? |
|
Germany |
32 ? |
|
United Kingdom |
30 ? |
|
South Korea |
25 ? |
|
France |
24 ? |
|
Canada |
20 ? |
|
India |
17 ? |
|
Italy |
17 ? |
(Source: comScore
Networks.)
Get
New Money-Making Ideas And Valuable Contacts!
You can obtain
useful, informative ideas and contacts in every available back-issue
of BarterNews.
Every
barter company in the world is listed on our web site,
click through to our Global List
of Barter Companies.
We welcome your
comments, questions, and observations.
?
Copyright BarterNews 2006. Redistribution of BarterNews
content expressly prohibited without the prior written permission of BarterNews.
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