Penchuk.com

Back on Dec. 3, 2008, I wrote about the importance of an exit strategy. Then again on Dec. 11th, I highlighted Christopher Cox’s comments. Now today, I see this news in the Washington Post (emphasis mine):

House Minority Leader John A. Boehner (R-Ohio) said the [AIG] bonus issue added to his belief that there will be almost no Republican support for any expansion of a bank-bailout program that passed Congress last fall with broad bipartisan support.

“What is the government’s exit strategy from this sweeping involvement in private business?” he asked in a statement, adding that “taxpayers are not receiving an adequate accounting from either the Treasury or the management of the companies that received taxpayer funds. Unfortunately, we have not yet seen such a plan.”

The sooner the US government pulls out its investments in private companies, the better.

In 2002, I got caught up in the craziest of sports, curling.  If you don’t know what it is, just check out this video.  NBC showed parts of Olympic matches and I couldn’t get enough.  I started watching it every chance I got and learned a little bit about the game.  Then once again, the Winter Olympics rolled around in 2006, and curling was once again a staple of my Olympic viewing diet.

Well, this past Friday night I had the opportunity to attend a Learn To Curl session sponsored by the Triangle Curling Club.  A few friends from RegEd and from my hockey team attended with me.  We had a blast and got a good taste of the game.  Our instructor even allowed me to “skip” or be the main strategy player.  It’s such an interesting game and really is like “chess on ice”.  I definitely plan to attend another session and get a little better at the game.

It was very interesting to read about Skittles.com and their interesting experiments with various social media.  They should be applauded for taking a bold step and trying something different.  They certainly got themselves TONS of free press, people talking about them and quite likely, a boost in sales.  So, the experiment was probably a success, right?

I’m not entirely convinced.  Let me give you two reasons. Below is what I saw when I visited the site sometime on Tuesday.  Notice the big pile of crap?  It’s an interesting moniker that the tweeter uses, as well.  Nothing quite says yummy Skittles like a steaming pile of dog poop.

Here’s another screenshot.

Kazybrown writes about the saddest thing he ever saw.  SKITTLES!  Perhaps the whole thing is a joke and he just wanted to be included but this isn’t a great association to make with the brand image of Skittles.

So, we’ve got horrible death from an accident and dog shit.  Let’s go get some Skittles.  When a company gives control of its brand and image to others, especially in this day and age, they’re walking a fine line.  That said, the overwhelming majority of what I saw was positive and most likely, people will ignore the excrement and traffic accident type posts.  There will be positive associations made and that’s an important part of branding.  If more people buy Skittles and continue to do so, this will have made a lot of sense.

This morning Ben and I went to get his haircut.  It was overdue and with Wake County Schools delayed due to the dreaded “black ice” (don’t get me started), we hit the local Great Clips.  Ben was sitting there in the chair and was about 80% of the way done when the stylist asked me a question.  I got up to look at him and we had this exchange.

Daddy:  Wow, Ben.  You look like a new kid.

Ben:  I’m not.

Daddy:  (Laughing.)  I know, but you look like one.

Ben:  I’m the same kid that’s been in the chair the whole time.

The kid makes me laugh sometimes.