Business & Personal Finance

The cost of not keeping up with the times.

My great aunt had a killer portfolio.  Almost every stock that she owned shares in were considered blue chip at the time, with one of her most prized stock holdings being that of Eastman Kodak.  Kodak, at that time in the 1960's, was a safe investment that returned good dividends - after all who wasn't taking pictures and getting them developed at the drugstore?

It was my aunt I was thinking of as I was reading of the recent downward spiral of Kodak, on the brink of bankruptcy, trying to sell off its vast patent holdings to stay afloat.   In a recent article in the Toronto Star, entitled "The last picture show", David Olive points out that companies that become complacent risk losing everything, especially today, where technology touches every aspect of our lives. 

How do you keep relevant in today's fast changing environment?  Brian Nichelson outlines 4 steps in "Keeping Up with Technology", by developing a technology awareness strategy.  It's easier than you would think and many of the resources he suggested are available at the library, including magazines, newspapers, the Internet and seeking out knowledgeable colleagues. 

Check out a few recent additions to our collection on business technology management:

         

 Interested in the storied history of Kodak and the man who founded it?  Try some of these titles:

      

 

 

There's no business like show business

It's that time of year.  Oscar buzz is abounding at our house.  Once the nominees are announced the race is on to predict who will take home the golden statue.  This years race is particularly interesting, with the silent film "The Artist" up for 10 awards, including one for best picture.  If it wins, it will be the first silent movie to win top honors since the very first award was presented in 1929 for the picture "Wings".

"The Artist", follows the path of a silent film star who is not able to make the leap to the "talkies" in the late 1920's.  If an actor could not make the transition, his career would most likely be at an end.  The movie industry today is going through another major upheaval, with video streaming, bootleg copies of current films abounding, the industry is faced with similar challenges that it encountered when it had to accept that talking pictures were the future. 

So what is the future of movies?  A vast array of ideas come up (mainly technology related) including holograms, 3D.  Check out a PBS discussion on this topic.

According to a DataMonitor industry report (available through Marketline -an on-line database available at North York Central Library and Toronto Reference Library),  the global movies and entertainment market shrank by 1.1% in 2010.  The North American market accounts for 42% of the market value of this industry, and despite its shrinking market value, this industry still has a large number of buyers and investors, since it is such a major part of popular culture.   Sony Corporation is identified as the top player in the market.  Check out this source and other business databases available through the TPL website.

Want more information about the history of silent films?  Check out Silent Films, a website that will take you through some of the great silent movies of all time.  Want to read up on the history of film companies?  Check out a few titles available at the library:

       

   

Enjoy the awards ceremony on February 26th.  Guess which movie I will be rooting for!

Movers and shakers

 

I visited the new Loblaws at Maple Gardens the other day and was very impressed by how the building was used to create a retail space while at the same time preserving its architectural heritage. Not an easy task.  Loblaws has been a fixture in Canada since 1919 when the first store was opened in Toronto by Theodore Pringle Loblaw.

Theodore came to Toronto from Alliston, Ontario with only a few dollars in his pocket.  He quickly found work in a grocery store and decided that one day he would own his own business. He began a partnership with J. Milton Cork and together they started a chain of grocery stores making their mark by using innovative merchandising methods that continue to this day.

So, what does it take to be successful in business? Is it persistence, competitive drive, vision or just plain luck? Every successful entrepreneur has their own idea of what it takes to make it big.  Do you have what it takes?  Want to find out? The library has many biographies of famous entrepreneurs that started out with an idea, just a few dollars in their pocket and lots of ambition.  Check out these new titles:

 

Shopping for a cause.

I have always been a big fan of Coke and its iconic red can, so the recent announcement by Coke to change the color of its can to all white for a brief time (from November 1, 2011 to January 15, 2012) to help support the World Wildlife Federation's efforts to save endangered animals in the polar region, caught my eye.  By buying a "white" Coke during this time I will be helping contribute to saving the polar bears!

With the Christmas season around the corner, and more shopping to be done than any other time of the year, do efforts like this influence how we shop? 

A number of companies donate a portion of their sales to worthy causes.  A few examples include Tom's shoes which donates a new pair of shoes to a child in need for every pair sold,  Better World Books, an on-line used book site that  helps find new homes for unwanted books, donating 3.3 million books to date to partner programs around the world.  Their five primary literacy partners are : Books for Africa, Room to Read, Worldfund, the National Center for Family Literacy, and Invisible Children and The Body Shop, which runs a program called Community Trade, that has the Body Shop purchasing ingredients, gifts and accessories from marginalized countries - giving small entrepreneurs access to a global distribution market. 

Corporate social responsibility (CSR, also called corporate conscience, corporate citizenship, social performance, or sustainable responsible business), has become one of the benchmarks when a company is evaluated by investors and well as potential employees.  If done right, it can elevate a company's profile and is good for the bottom line.  If done incorrectly, it can smack of hypocrisy and insincerity.   

Check out some other examples of CSR done right and wrong.  Toronto Public Library has a number of books on this topic.  Check out a few recent examples below:

         

TPL also subscribes to a periodical entitled Corporate Knights, which is devoted entirely to this topic, as well as having a number of websites bookmarked that discuss CSR. 

Do you support a company that is trying to make the world a better place?  

 

 

 

 

Small Business Forum 2011 - "Learn Today, Grow Tomorrow"

Enterprise Toronto's Small Business Forum 2011 will take place on Tuesday, October 18th, from 9:00 - 7:30 pm at the Metro Toronto Convention Centre, 222 Bremner Boulavard, South Building, Level 700, 9am - 7:30pm.

This exciting event will include a morning keynote speaker, Nadja Piatka, Founder of Nadja Foods, fifteen seminars, and a business-to-business tradeshow with over ninety exhibitors.

Don't forget to check out TPL's tradeshow booth #417!

See you there!

 

Food for thought

Did you know that potato chips were accidentally invented in 1853 by a cook named George Crum?  When a customer complained about the thickness of the french fries he was served, Crum angrily produced a very thin french fry which could not be eaten with a fork. The customer loved them and the rest is history. 

Did you know that In 1847 Joseph Fry, of Fry's cocoa fame, discovered a way to mix some melted cacao butter back into defatted cocoa powder to create a paste that could be pressed in a mould resulting in bar candy? 

Did you also know that Vernon Rudolph bought a secret recipe for a yeast-raised donut from a New Orleans French chef and began selling Krispy Kreme donuts to stores in 1837? As people passed his factory and smelled the delicious aroma of the baked goods they asked if they could buy hot donuts. He soon knocked out part of an outside wall of his factory and started selling donuts directly to customers.

Books, DVD's and magazines about these and other foods are available at the Toronto Public Library.  Here are a few titles to get you started:

 

 

 

 

 

The season for lists

One of the first collection assignments I had when I joined the Business department at the Toronto Reference Library, was overseeing the annual reports collection.  This collection is arguably one of the best publicly accessible, historic Canadian annual reports collections in Canada.  One of the biggest challenges that I encountered was how to determine which companies which were up and coming and would be of interest years down the road to researchers.   And likewise, which were fading fast and perhaps would not fit the criteria that we had for this collection.

This time of the year three publications come out that made my job a whole lot easier.  They provide a scorecard of the top companies in Canada.  Each has a bit of a different take on what is considered "best" or "biggest".  For this reason it is good to look at all three.

They are:

        
Canadian Business magazine's annual Investor 500, includes articles on the market year in review.  Seven leading investment managers name 25 of their favorite Canadian stocks for 2011-12.  The best turnaround, defensive, managed, cash flow generated, dividend stocks are featured.  This list ranks the companies by one year returns and sorts them into large, medium and small market cap categories. It even includes a test to determine your investing IQ!  I won't tell you my score.

 

The National Post's business section, the Financial Post, does listings of the 500 largest companies in Canada.  This publication includes the largest foreign controlled companies, the largest employers, largest subsidiaries, largest crown corporations, and top financial institutions. 

 

 

 

 

 

The Globe and Mail's Report on Business magazine lists The top 1000 companies for the year.  This special issue also includes the 200 biggest private companies, the 100 biggest companies by revenue, 100 biggest companies by market cap, the 50 biggest employers, the 100 biggest companies by return on equity, as well as industry rankings.

 

Check out these lists either on-line or in print at your library branch. 

Read Up On The McCain Family

Wallace McCain, one of the two McCain brothers who founded McCain Foods Limited, had died.  Information about the company and the McCain family has been very much in the media recently because of this event.

If you would like an in-depth look at the McCain family and its stormy history, the Toronto Public Library has a couple of books that you should look at.

Family Ties: The Real Story of the McCain Feud.

A House Divided: The Untold Story of the McCain Family.

Fascinating reading for the long weekend!

 

 

A Rags-to-riches story

After 40 years at the helm of Magna International, Frank Stronach is retiring from his position as Chairman but will remain on as honorary chairman and director.  He joins the list of one of Canada's most well-known and wealthiest entrepreneurs.  Magna currently employs about 96,000 employees in 26 countries, this includes 16,275 in Canada , and  is valued at between $585 million (US) and $730 million. It is the fifth largest auto parts company in the world. Not bad for someone who came to Canada at age 22 with $40 in his pocket! To read more about Mr. Stronach , check out  Wayne Lilley's biography. 

Frank Stronach follows in the footsteps of many other successful Canadian entrepreneurs. I searched the internet to find information about these individuals and found a list that contained the names of some entrepreneurs that  I had no idea were Canadian! If you are curious about other Canadian entrepreneurs that have left their mark both here in Canada and abroad, check out these titles:

 

   

 

Five reasons to look at an industry magazine

Recently I helped a client who had come to our desk looking for print periodicals covering specific industries in Canada.  I was happy to be able to report to him that for most of the industries he was interested in, either North York Central or Toronto Reference Library, had print subscriptions.  These two locations have the largest and longest runs of industry periodicals in the system.

Now why would you want to look at a magazine in print, when so many are available in either databases or have websites with current content?  Here are 5 reasons (in no particular order)

• Advertisements - many publications have business to business opportunities or job ads that you will not see in other sources.
• Directory issues - most of these magazines offer an annual directory that lists company specialties and contact information.  Many times the company breakdowns are more specific than in more traditional directories such as Scotts or Canadian Trade Index.  Expensive to purchase separately, they are usually included in a print subscription.
• Forecasts - want to be ahead of the game? The first or last issue of the year many times has predictions of where the industry will be going in the coming year. 
• Trends - want to track a particular wave of interest in a certain product or see what the next big thing might be?  Or what was popular 5 years ago?  Leaf through an issue.
• Charts and illustrations - unless the article appears as a PDF in a database or online on the website, you will miss out on what are vital pieces of information complementing an article. 

For the electronically minded, the i-Pad is revitalizing the magazine industry, but at what cost to the bottom line for the industry?  Check out this article entitled "The battle for the digital newstand- Tablets offer newspapers and magazines a lifeline. But publishers and tech giants are wrestling over who gets the money" by Susan Krashinsky and Simon Houpt, Globe and Mail, February 26, 2011, page B6.  For interesting blog reading related to this issue, check out the INMA (International Newsmedia Marketing Association) website.