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    The Great Gordino Newsletter - Issue 352 - Mon 6th Feb 2006
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    Archive Issues online at - gordonbryan.com/archive

    Hi There,

    I hope Monday finds you well.

    I've been reminded this week about a saying I heard not too
    long ago, that seemed a good one to me.
    It comes from the world of quality control, and it's this -
    Say what you do, and do what you say.

    I tweaked it to this -
    Say what you mean, and mean what you say.

    They are similar in a lot of ways, but also ever so slightly
    different.

    I thought of them this week when I encountered one of my favourite
    bugbears, bad marketing.
    I was doing my grocery shopping, (and by the way, anyone who says
    the supermarket is the best place to meet single women obviously
    hasn't been to *my* local lately), and as I got halfway round,
    I noticed that I had a huge amount of healthy fruit and veg.
    'Hmm,' I thought to myself, 'I can balance all this healthy stuff
    with a huge box of doughnuts for halftime of the SuperBowl.'

    I pushed my trolley with a little extra gusto towards the doughnut
    aisle, only to be met with a huge 'Out Of Stock' sign, just below
    the 'Special Offer on Doughnuts' sign.
    You can bet your bottom dollar that once the sale is over, that
    particular shelf will be heaving again with doughnuts.

    I'd already had a similar experience earlier in the week.

    I was looking for a camcorder for my show, The Great Gordino's
    Fame Game.
    I saw one on special offer, and even better, if I bought it online,
    I could save an extra £20!
    I clicked the button, only to met by that familiar notice,
    'Out Of Stock'.
    I emailed the company, I'm not sure if I should mention the name
    in case that's not fair on Dixons, and got an email back saying
    that they had no plans to order any more.

    'Are you telling me that your company is offering this product at
    2 prices, with the cheaper one out of stock? How does that work?'
    I persisted.

    They then told me to go into a store and mention the online deal,
    and the manager might, 'at his discretion', give me the discount.
    Oooh, how very generous.

    Of course when I did go in, the manager told me he was not authorised
    to give that discount.

    So now, instead of giving them my money to buy a camcorder at the
    original sale price, thanks to their misleading advertising, guess
    where I *won't* be buying any camcorder!

    Say what you do, and do what you say.
    Say what you mean, and mean what you say.

    As it happens, I now need to look for a new fridge freezer, as mine
    has finally bitten the dust.
    It's gone to wherever fridges go when they shuffle off the mortal coil
    - the morgue maybe?
    What's the betting I find one at a sale price that's actually in stock?

    This week sees the start of a new series of Brat Camp here in the UK.
    Unruly teenagers are sent off to 'boot camp', where tantrums don't work,
    and slowly begin to respect themselves and others.
    It says something that for the 7 places available, there were 3000
    parents applying.

    What it says loudly is a reflection on our schooling system here, which
    is reflected in another returning series, Rock School.

    Gene Simmons, mutli-millionaire with the band Kiss, is at a school in a
    quiet English county, trying to put a band together from the kids.
    The trouble is that the kids have no self respect, and think they know it all.

    Slowly Gene is working them round to realising what it means to work as a
    team, and to think better of yourself, and no doubt by the end of the series
    there will be much hugging and crying.

    In my view, it shouldn't take a show like this for kids at school to discover
    these things, they should be being taught it anyway!
    It's a point I wrote about in my book, the chapter being called
    'The One Lesson You Weren't Taught At School.'
    There's a link to the book below.

    I love following my passions, and try my hardest to get others to do the same,
    it's one of the reasons I'm fast approaching 3 years of writing this newsletter.
    It would help if we were given this kind of advice at school, but by jimminy,
    it's never too late to teach ourselves as adults!

    Ok, that's it for now, and remember...
    Say what you do, and do what you say.
    Say what you mean. and mean what you say.

    Have a good week.

    'Til Next Time,
    Health and Happiness,
    Gordon
    email me at gordon@gordonbryan.com - you'll have to copy and paste
    thanks to the idiot online spammers!



    
    Get my book here!


    

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