by Max Hartshorne on May 16, 2012
After a bruising fight during the past year against Amazon, officials from Macy’s realized they needed more warehouses to ship their on-line purchases from. Then it hit them. They’ve got 800 buildings, far more than Amazon will ever have, so why not use them?
Now a new move to build shipping centers has turned the back rooms of 292 Macy’s 800 stores around the country into de facto distribution centers. When someone orders a black pair of women’s shoes size 5, a worker will stroll out into the Macy’s sales floor, find the item, and bring it into the back and ship it. Since the buyer lives close to the store, the shipping is peanuts. And in some cases, the shoppers come to the store and pick up their order in a yellow plastic Macy’s bag.
While Amazon uses robots to fetch items and bring them to people in their cavernous distribution centers, and the machines never fail to read exactly what book, or what size and color, the item should be, the story in the WSJ by Dana Mattioli hinted that Macy’s is taking on a Herculean amount of labor and a lot of frustration. People aren’t as good at finding thousands of items a day as the mobile robots are.
A Macy’s executive explained why this move makes sense when he cited a special Chanel perfume that went on sale on their website only, and sold out in just one day. Yet stores across the country had to discount the fragrance to get it off their shelves. The policy of taking hot-sellers off the website once they were gone left lots of unsold inventory, and now, they can find anything people want to buy from their own store shelves.
by Max Hartshorne on May 15, 2012
La Sagrada in Barcelona
As the Greeks protest austerity and elect representatives who will push back against Germany and put their heads in the sand, once again, things look pretty grim for the European economy.
Yet Americans still want to take vacations in Europe, how could they not? It’s still full of reasons to visit, whether to see the ancient buildings and monuments or to just live that relaxed European lifestyle, even for a week.
I got an email from my cousin Rob who asked me advice about where to go. He has a week in August and last summer he spent a month in Costa Rica learning Spanish while living with a family. My reply? Barcelona!
Spain is a wonderful destination….and Barcelona has got to be one of the world’s most fun cities. I suggested to him that he go down to his local bank and buy euros. The rate now is about $1.30 which is an all-time low. And unless Greece is your vacation destination, you will always be able to use the money later. Buying euros before you leave avoids the uncertainty that I often get when I go abroad. When am I gonna change money? How much will the commission be? What if I have to buy them for $1.60 each, that sucks!
The other advice I gave Rob is to check out Airbnb.com. Pulling up Barcelona, I found dozens of apartments and rooms that people rent out there…all vetted with comments and lots of photos. It’s sure a lot cheaper than a hotel. And you can get an apartment and cook meals while you visit.
Another tip–Don’t buy your airline ticket through Expedia or Travelocity. I have found again and again that going direct to the airline is a much better idea. These middle men create a lot of barriers and make changing the ticket a big pain. Delta, American, Iberia, they all fly direct and it’s a better deal to just call them than try to do it all on line alone.
by Max Hartshorne on May 14, 2012
USS Pueblo crewmen showing their N. Korean captors the "Hawaiian Good Luck Sign."
This morning I was happy to wake up in the rain and learn something from my friend Fred Lepide’s wonderful website. One of his entries was about a long-ago episode in espionage, when the USS Pueblo, a spy ship, was captured by the North Koreans and the crew was held hostage for 11 months in 1968.
During their captivity, the crew was forced to watch many propaganda movies extolling the virtues of the great communist state. In one shot in London, a bus full of DPRK soccer players passes by a man who gives it the finger. Later on the same thing happens, Londoners flipping off the commies. The censors left these snips in the movies, demonstrating to the Pueblo crewmen that North Koreans had no idea what the erect middle finger meant.
From then on, every time the crew was photographed, one or more of the white uniformed men would give the camera the finger. Later on they were asked about it by their captors and they lied, telling them that it was the Hawaiian Good luck sign.
But Time magazine decided to run a photo and printed an explanation of the real meaning of the term, “a hand symbol of extreme derisiveness and contempt.”
The next day when the Koreans found out what it meant, the crewmen were tortured. “Thank you Time magazine,” wrote the crew.
by Max Hartshorne on May 13, 2012
What could be more fun to mock than the defeated former president of the Confederacy dressed up in women’s clothes? Back in 1865, this scenario played itself out when Jeffferson Davis, fleeing from arrest by the Union army, grabbed his wife’s petticoat in haste and dashed out the door.
What happened next was the story of the press gone wild, like a transcontinental game of telephone. Cartoons began appearing in northern newspapers showing Davis dressed in flowing gowns with his black men’s boots sticking out.
This week an exhibit collected by photography dealer Charles Schwartz will open, displaying more than 40 different cards depicting the humiliation of the ex-president, embellished in the style of Thomas Nast. “Cartes de visite” were cards people collected with topical themes like this.
“It’s amazing to see what the Northerners did with the little information given to them,” says Erin Barnett, curator of the exhibit that’s called ‘Presidents in Petticoats! Civil War propoganda in Photographs.” Cardmakers created photo montages as well as hand drawn caricatures, with Davis in full hoop skirt and bonnet. Later these images made their way into popular magazines like Harper’s Weekly and Frank Leslie’s Illustrated Newspaper. Collector Schwartz was able to amass about 100 images of the subject, scouring flea markets and antique shops.
