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September 19,
2006
Written
by Bob Meyer, Editor of BarterNews
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From the desk of Bob
Meyer...
09/19/06
Commercial Barter Industry Looks To Emulate Visa Card Model
The seed has been
planted and the commercial barter industry, struggling to
find its place in the world of commerce, will undergo a
transformation in the coming years that promises to catapult
it into an incredibly important position in the business
world.
In 1968, a
38-year-old assistant banker in Seattle named Dee Hock
revolutionized the way the banking community interacted with
the Visa credit card model, where banks would cooperate with
one another to process Visa cards anywhere at any time.
Today the Visa
International network is the largest business enterprise
globally, with annual sales volume of $4 trillion. There are
22,000 financial institutions operating in over 200
countries, serving one billion customers.
The world?s gross
domestic product now approximates $49 trillion. Therefore, a
conservative figure of the unused time and unsold products
would number in the trillions.
By emulating the
Visa model, the commercial barter industry can create a new
enterprise whereby millions of business owners could
monetize their unsold time/products. The incredible wealth
created could provide the needed capitalization to build
business communities around the globe, provide needed jobs
and other opportunities, as well as moving millions out of
poverty.
See the first
article following this column for more information on how
this historic possibility for the commercial barter industry
has come about?
Martin Pushes Client Enrollments To New Highs
Barbara Martin,
national sales manager for International Monetary Systems (OTCBB:INLM),
is leading the company?s sales efforts to new heights. The
company?s outside sales force signed up 118 new clients in
July, second at that time to the 121 that IMS Barter
enrolled in January.
The August number
for new member enrollments totaled 190, shattering all
previous records and validating the company?s commitment to
organic growth through new client sales.
Marketing Professor Says Direct Trading Is
Huge
According to Dr.
Rich Rexeisen, a marketing professor at the University of
St. Thomas Business School in Minneapolis, bartering is a
bonanza for consumers. Bartering locally through internet
contacts is exciting, he asserted, because it makes people
begin to think about ?what really does value mean.?
Online Retailer Offers Barter Link
A wide selection
of newborn infant and toddler baby clothes can be found at
TheRetroBaby.com. They have added a link that says,
?Wanna Barter, Baby?? By clicking the link, one can review
what items and services are eligible for trade.
Can You Guess The Largest U.S. Seller Of
Single-Family Homes?
It?s the Housing
and Urban Development (HUD) Agency. HUD, along with the U.S.
Department of Agriculture and the Veterans Administration,
take possession of foreclosed homes and return them to the
market. Properties are sold ?as is? and at or below
appraised value.
The agencies,
especially HUD, make them easy to buy with generous loan
terms and low up-front costs. HUD sold 57,930 homes during
the last 12 months with an average selling price of about
$79,000.
Current U.S. Listing Information...
Value Card
Alliance
7454 E. Broadway Blvd., #105
Tucson, AZ 85710
Ph: (520) 325-9914
Fax: (520) 731-8882
E-mail:
info@valuecardalliance.com
www.valuecardalliance.com
Name change
(from Barter Brokers USA):
Value Card
Alliance
2243 E. Rose Garden Lp, #C-2
Phoenix, AZ 85024
Ph: (602) 308-0385
Fax: (602) 765-0109
E-mail:
info@valuecardalliance.com
www.valuecardalliance.com
Current Global Listing Information...
XO Limited
Level 1, 87 Springs Road
East Tamaki, Auckland 1001
New Zealand
E-mail:
info@barter-software.com
www.barter-software.com
OzoneCard
International Ltd.
Level 1, Remuera Road
Remuera, Auckland 1001
New Zealand
E-mail:
franchises@ozonecard.com
www.ozonecard.com
(XO Limited
brought 10 people from their staff of 41 to the IRTA
convention. The firm develops, markets, implements, and
supports a range of solutions for the barter and
countertrade industries. For more info go to
http://www.barter-software.com.)
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. . .) |
?It?s time to re-conceive the
very idea of ?barter exchange? and payment to realize the full
potential of cashless exchange.?
?Thomas Greco, Jr.,
Keynote Speaker at IRTA Convention,
September 15, 2006
A three-year persistent focus by IRTA?s (International Reciprocal
Trade Association) Executive Director Krista Vardabash and the Board
of Directors, led by President Lois Dale, has made an impact on the
commercial barter industry?by changing the vision of possibilities
within the commercial barter industry.
A door has been pushed open revealing heretofore unimagined
opportunities and, predictably, the ?business as usual? thinking of
the past is no longer enough.
The evolution is underway, and could well morph into a huge
inter-connecting network of trade exchanges working cooperatively
together. This global network would provide service to millions of
business owners, enabling them to turn unused time and unsold
products & services into a valuable form of capital to build and
expand their companies.
The focus on catapulting the industry forward began on IRTA?s 25th
Anniversary, at the 2004 Cancun convention, when former IRTA
Executive director Paul Suplizio (who passionately led the
organization its first 16 years) provided his lucid vision of the
future. (Story on lower right side of home page.)
Then last year Bernard Lietaer, an expert on monetary systems
(while at the Central Bank of Belgium he co-designed and implemented
the convergence mechanism, ECU, for the single European currency
system) and author of The Future of Money: Creating New Wealth,
Work and a Wiser World, addressed attendees at IRTA?s convention
in Orlando.
He skillfully carried the baton forward when he pointed out to
the IRTA members the problems with the many world currencies, even
suggesting that within five years we will see financial convulsions
in world financial markets. (http://www.barternews.com/future_of_money.htm
and
http://www.barternews.com/archieve/10_11_05.htm)
Lietaer further elaborated that the commercial barter industry
had an unprecedented, immense opportunity to create an organization
of such importance that it could someday rank among the elite
institutions of the world. And he emphasized that it was possible to
achieve, if action were taken by the assembled entrepreneurs.
?We?ve proven it can fly, but we?re now like the Wright Brothers
years ago?just at the beginning of something that?s going to be
dramatic.? Lietaer further assured the group it could all begin with
a few visionaries willing to take bold action by beginning to walk
in the footsteps of Dee Hock, the architect of Visa. ?We?re all, the
people in this room, putting the blocks in place to build a
beautiful cathedral.?
It was a stunning eye-opener from a world-renowned monetary
authority. The attendees left the convention wrestling with his
suggestion that the possibility existed to literally make a positive
change in the world?s financial infrastructure.
This year?s keynote speaker was Thomas Greco, Jr., an independent
scholar, educator and writer, who has been working at the leading
edge of transformational restructuring for more than 30 years.
His expertise includes private currency and exchange system
development, the theory and history of money and banking,
statistical analysis, and survey research. Greco?s books include:
Money: Understanding and Creating Alternatives to Legal Tender,
New Money for Healthy Communities, and Money and Debt: A
solution to the Global Crisis.
His bold, succinct message paralleled that of his two
predecessors, and once again he hammered home that the commercial
barter industry could build the financial stabilizer for the world
business community through the development of a global trade
exchange network...utilizing a valuable goods/services backed
currency.
Greco pointed out to the trade exchange owners that the fastest
way to amp up the worth of their own network is to work together. As
participating exchanges expand their membership to include all
levels of the supply chain (from retailers to wholesalers to
manufacturers to basic commodity producers to consumers and workers)
every member is able to pay their suppliers with trade credits. Thus
becoming a global payment system for the business community
As this larger ?Network? becomes more valuable, so will each
individual exchange within the network. When established, the
?Network? will be an enabling organization that exists for the sole
purpose of assisting participating exchanges and their members. It
will operate separately from the industry?s trade associations.
With the knowledge of the past and the technology that exists
today, immense possibilities are now at the industry?s beckoning.
After decades of effort and striving there are now trade exchanges
in 42 countries around the world...widening the path to greater
possibilities of success and accomplishment.
What we do today as an industry will determine what we will be
tomorrow.
Thomas Greco, Jr. can be contacted at:
P.O. Box 42663, Tucson, Arizona 85733
Ph: (520) 795-8930; e-mail:
thg@mindspring.com
Web site:
http://www.reinventingmoney.com
(More on the IRTA convention in next week?s report.)
?This idea is something that
is very important to the barter world and of great interest to me
personally.?
?Karen Welch, President
of We Trade Network
I was so heartened with the presentations and conversations at
the IRTA convention just concluded at the TradeWinds Hotel in St.
Petersburg Beach (FL).
Specifically, I was interested in the GETS program (Global
Exchange Trading System). This is proposed to work much like the
Visa model where various trade exchanges keep their fee structure,
brand, etc.; and the system allows members to see items available
from members of other trade exchanges, and actually make purchases
and/or sales.
There will need to be some sort of standard that trade exchanges
must meet in order to participate. This is exactly what my partner
and I have been discussing as an ideal for the industry.
I?m thankful to see that someone?s taking the steps to implement
such a system. I would love to offer whatever help I can in order to
get this moving forward. We?re a small exchange in Montana, but this
idea is something that is very important to the barter world and of
great interest to me personally.
For those exchanges that are well-established this many not seem
as important, and change is challenging. But the benefits of such a
system far outweigh the energy required to implement it.
Member to member trading on a broader basis than local, would
make trade much more valuable to all individual members, and the
exchanges. More trade would be the result.
Cooperation works so much better than competition.
Karen Welch, CTB, President
We Trade Network
Kalispell and Missoula, Montana
Phone (406) 833-5022
E-mail:
Karen@wetradenetwork.com
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.)
Building A Better World: Find A
Need And Fill It!
BarterNews received this e-mail two days ago that illustrates,
as well as reinforces, the foregoing editorial?
I live and operate businesses in Australia. I am wanting to visit
the USA and the Caribbean, and I would like to know which barter
company I can join that will enable me to stay in hotels on
trade?thank you.
Chris
http://www.thoughtsarethings.net
Get
New Money-Making Ideas And Valuable Contacts!
You can obtain
useful, informative ideas and contacts in every available back-issue
of BarterNews.
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. |
Will Internet Have New Marketing
Venue Rival?
The largest wireless companies in the U.S. are starting to allow
advertising on their cell-phone networks. Their hope is that these
small screens eventually will rival the Internet as a powerful
marketing medium.
Many marketers are intrigued by cell-phone ads since they can
target customers more precisely than ads on television, online, or
in print. Targeting is easier because the phone companies have a lot
of their customers? personal information...from billing records to
locations where they are using their phones in real time.
Carriers can potentially track which wireless web sites a
customer is browsing, for instance, and send them targeted ads while
they?re using the service.
It is believed consumers will be more willing to accept
advertising if they get information and entertainment on their
cell-phones for lower fees, or free.
(Advertisement)
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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.
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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