The Collapse of Western Civilization Begins in Your Dentist’s Chair
Thursday, September 6th, 2012 Posted in Business Behaving Badly, Faith and Life | No Comments »Some of you may like my latest offering for Image -- an homage, if you will, to those noble members of the political, legal, financial, and insurance professions to whom I sometimes refer in the collective as "that bunch of ...
An Apple in time
Friday, August 24th, 2012 Posted in Business Behaving Badly, The Art of Parenting | 3 Comments »Another working road trip. My colleague needs a piece of equipment from the Apple store, which is in a mall. The Apple store is swarming with people, but in less than 30 seconds, a salesman comes alongside to take us ...
Money talks
Monday, November 22nd, 2010 Posted in Business Behaving Badly | No Comments »I'd tell you to sit down before you read this, but perhaps a more appropriate stance is standing, with your hands splayed atop your head like a timid moose. USA Today reports on the millions spent by manufacturers of obtrusive ...
Bad medicine
Monday, November 22nd, 2010 Posted in Business Behaving Badly | No Comments »If you have any interest in the shoddy methodology that informs so much medical research, David Freedman's piece in last month's Atlantic is a must read. An excerpt: "But beyond the headlines, Ioannidis was shocked at the range and reach of ...
Don’t put on that Miley Cyrus pendant just yet
Tuesday, June 1st, 2010 Posted in Business Behaving Badly | 1 Comment »Looks like Miley Cyrus's people have been making their jewelry in China, given its high levels of poisonous cadmium. In a move that doesn't fool anyone but makes them all hate corporations, Cyrus and Wal-Mart, her distributor, are claiming that ...
Do you have a corporate policy against stupidity?
Wednesday, February 17th, 2010 Posted in Business Behaving Badly | 5 Comments »I'm sure there's more to this story of a man and his pregnant wife being kicked off a grounded plane after repeatedly asking for water. Perhaps they grew overly belligerent when arguing with flight attendants who refused their requests with the claim ...
Charity certainly doesn’t begin at a hotel
Monday, January 25th, 2010 Posted in Business Behaving Badly | No Comments »Gary at View from the Wing offers a follow-up on Hilton's stingy points-for-charity scheme. Their defense? Some of our point redemption offers are even worse than this one. Update: Not long after Gary criticized Hilton, they increased the amount they will ...
Charity?
Friday, January 15th, 2010 Posted in Business Behaving Badly | No Comments »Over at View from the Wing, Gary nails Hilton Hotels for offering small cash to Haitian relief in return for big donations of frequent visitor points. In effect Hilton is reducing its obligation for future expenditures (because they have to ...
It all begins with an apple
Tuesday, January 12th, 2010 Posted in Business Behaving Badly, Judo Chops, Policy and Politics | 4 Comments »Ordinarily I'm not a fan of government meddling, but sometimes I am ready for a regulation requiring products made in whole or part in China to be labeled as such. Poisoned toothpaste, animal food, infant formula, building products that rot and ...
Memo to the Nabisco Food Goliath
Saturday, January 2nd, 2010 Posted in Business Behaving Badly, Judo Chops | 5 Comments »Dear Nabisco MegaCorporation, Once upon a time there was a delicious little cracker called Harvest Grain. This cracker didn't ask for much, nothing, really, other than to be crispy and nutritious and delectable in Tony's mouth. Tony and his Harvest Grains ...
Accounting, university-style
Wednesday, January 14th, 2009 Posted in Business Behaving Badly | 2 Comments »Looks like the for-profit University of Phoenix, and its parent company, Apollo Group, are being sued for a bit of financial cleverness. For all the association of Phoenix with "private" education, Apollo gets a whopping three-quarters of its revenue from ...
We’re from Congress, and we’re here to help
Wednesday, January 7th, 2009 Posted in Business Behaving Badly, Policy and Politics | 6 Comments »Let me see if I've got this straight. American mega-companies buy shoddy lead-painted toys and chemically poisonous clothes from China, and market them to our children. We stupidly trust the American mega-companies because we have happy memories of the days ...
A farewell to Quaker
Saturday, January 3rd, 2009 Posted in Business Behaving Badly | 10 Comments »Dear Quaker Oats Megalith, You might recall that I warned you once before about disguising newfangled "quick" foods as the older, take-an-extra-three-minutes-to-cook-it fare. Well, fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, and I hate you double. That's right, I ...
Why People Hate Big Companies
Friday, August 29th, 2008 Posted in Business Behaving Badly | No Comments »You've probably never heard of Blackstreet Capital Partners, a private-equity fund in Maryland that buys underperforming companies and attempts to make them profitable. And you've almost certainly never heard of a company they own, SFCA Inc. But perhaps you've heard ...
Why We Hate IT Companies
Wednesday, August 20th, 2008 Posted in Business Behaving Badly, Irritations | 2 Comments »Dear SanDisk Corporation, I have admired your thumb drives from the beginning. They fit in my pocket. No more inadvertantly inserting a data CD in my truck and wondering if I'd accidentally purchased some kind of post-Modern German techno-punk-death metal fusion music. ...
Boycott Yahoo
Thursday, November 8th, 2007 Posted in Business Behaving Badly | 8 Comments »The CEO of Yahoo got a much-deserved tongue-lashing by Congressional Democrats yesterday, for his company's complicity in the jailing of Chinese dissidents. It's at once fascinating and sickening to see a phalanx of corporate hacks and their attorneys, mumbling coached ...
There’s No “I” in “Team,” But There Is In “Hubris”
Sunday, February 18th, 2007 Posted in Business Behaving Badly, Judo Chops | Comments OffOne of the wickedly enjoyable things Henry Mintzberg does in his Managers Not MBAs is mock the way Harvard Business School case studies and business press accounts portray the chief executive as Superman. This CEO "built a new division from ...
Lying as Business Strategy
Friday, January 5th, 2007 Posted in Business Behaving Badly | Comments OffThose of you who take The Wall Street Journal probably caught Wednesday's story about the efforts of Abbott Laboratories, a pharmaceutical company, to sell more of a very lucrative AIDS drug. The challenge for Abbott was that one of their ...
Merry Chrithmath
Tuesday, December 20th, 2005 Posted in Business Behaving Badly | 6 Comments »Dear Paper Magic Group, an affiliate of CSS Industries, Inc.: I would like to introduce you to the Swiss Miss Corporation. The Swiss have something you should definitely look into for your line of attractive Christmas cards, 80 of which I ...
More Corporate Correspondence
Friday, December 16th, 2005 Posted in Business Behaving Badly | 11 Comments »Dear Frito-Lay Empire, I have long admired your work. Kudos, especially, on the extra-wide Frito corn chip, which really does yield an optimal dipping experience. I wish I could tell you that this letter is only to laud you for your ...
Memo
Friday, December 2nd, 2005 Posted in Business Behaving Badly | 10 Comments »To: Swiss Miss and affiliates, including but not limited to Swiss Watch & Clock LLC, Swiss Cheese Food Products, Swiss Army Knife and Nail Clipper Companies, and Swiss Gold and Cash Laundering Services LLC From: Tony Woodlief Subject: Swiss Miss Pudding Cups First, ...
A Public Letter to the Quaker Oats Company
Wednesday, August 14th, 2002 Posted in Business Behaving Badly, Pure Comedy | 9 Comments »Dear Quaker Oats Company; Thank you for giving me the opportunity to try your new Quaker Quick 1-Minute Oats. As one might expect, they felt in my mouth much the way I imagine elephant snot would feel. Why would anyone deliberately ...
Ode to McDonald’s
Thursday, April 4th, 2002 Posted in Business Behaving Badly, From Blogger, Greatest Hits | Comments OffI took the family to McDonald's for lunch recently. As I sat there watching my son worry a soggy french fry into paste while clutching it in a grubby paw and climbing all over his seat, the seat behind him, ...
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