I saw on the side of an Iceland lorry the statement: “We were the first supermarket to stop selling GM food.”
So what? Others have stopped selling GM foods. And, this all presupposes that GM food is bad in the first place.
For a brand that is predominantly price led the lorry’s message stuck out. At the time of writing their website is leading on 75p freezer essentials and planning a party for £1 a person.
Comments?
It is rather nice when an insurance company exceeds expectations.
Plaudits to Direct Line who recently dealt with and settled our burglary claim with no fuss or bother. From my experience they are head and shoulders above their competitors.
Don’t get burgled, but if you do, cross your fingers your household insurers are as good as Direct Line.
We make all sorts of assumptions about communication media for different age groups. Recent examples that help me keep a broad focus:
1. Charlie, my 6 year old son, not only now uses Outlook for his personal email account he is also sending me messsages with images embedded. The one on the left arrived the other day.
2. My mother, who has enjoyed free bus travel for some while now (to people outside of the UK: that means she is over 65), sends me texts littered with text speak. You know the type of thing, cu l8r and similar abbreviations.
3. I actually found someone in their late teens that doesn’t use Facebook/Twitter/MySpace. I am sure he is not alone.
The lesson to me was useful: don’t make assumptions. I’m sure I’ll need reminding of this again very soon!
Sodexo has unveiled a product that enables employees to select their own rewards up-front, ensuring that the incentives are tailored to fit each member of the workforce.
Called Performance Suite, the product converts objectives set by the employer for the employee into targets that, if met, will result in their pre-selected reward being awarded.
Employees will be able to choose from multi-option shopping vouchers, try-before-you-buy gifts, such as perfume, and up to 3,000 products, including digital cameras, handbags and jewellery, all featured in a catalogue. Employers will set higher objectives for the more expensive prizes that are selected.
The points-based scheme allows employees to check their ongoing performance online. They will also receive regular updates via their preferred method of communication, including email, text, newsletter or fax.
Employers will be able to monitor employees’ progress online and even calculate the return on investment that they will get from running the scheme.
Kevin Harrington, research and development director at Sodexo, said: “We have a calculator so that employers can calculate how much extra business a scheme will deliver and work out whether it would be profitable to deliver.”
The product forms part of a new service for HR personnel called SayMotivation that encompasses all the motivation services available from Sodexo, including SayShopping multi-option vouchers and Vivaboxes.
Published 1 September 2008 in Employee Benefits magazine.