Tag Archive for 'Must'

In September 2008, the Forbes 400 List of the richest Americans saw Warren Buffett and his bridge partner Bill Gates swap the number 1 and 2 spots again. But there are two new additions to the top 5, a couple of Sam Walton’s boys, S. Robson and Jim.
There are two other Walton sub-clans: Alice Walton, and the apparent familial holding company, “Christy Walton & family.” That is how it always appears, almost as if the ® sign were accidentally left off. At any rate, if Sam were still alive, with his fortune in one piece and his young’n’s still waiting for their inheritances, he would be as rich as Gates and Buffett combined.
The fact is, 2007 was the first year since 1989 that not a single Walton placed in the Top 10. Now they are almost 50% wealthier than a year ago while so many other gazillionaires are being downgraded to plain old zillionaires and the economy is tanking. It sends a clear message: When the going gets tough, the tough go to Wal-Mart.
Customer as king
Wal-Mart’s down home success, occurring at the same time that those New York sophisticates Stearns and Lehman are getting bailed out or going broke, is a ringing endorsement of several working class principles. The first, of course, is having “the low price, always.” But close on its heels is, “Customer is king.”
While Buffett lost $12 billion and Gates took a beating, the Walton family surged ahead on the strength of, to put it simply, being a little bit country and a little bit rock-and-roll. Hip enough to bring in teens’ all-important entertainment-related brands (from iPods to fashion), the store took early stands against certain magazines and “gangsta” rappers, earning them points from parents.
But the thing that put Wal-Mart over the top? The greeters. Believe it or not, the greeters at the door are second only to “low price,” and way ahead of “quality,” in the internal customer polls conducted by the company for four decades. A key marketing insight gleaned from the polls was that people don’t do business with companies. They do business with other people. Commerce is really quite personal.
Service at every step
We believe in the customer service model. After the great eruption of advertising sophistication (some would say manipulation) in the postwar era, and the rise of The Salesman, many companies took on a new mantra of sorts. “We’re all sales people now,” they would intone. Every clerk, every janitor, every accountant was expected to sing the company’s praises and cultivate business with their relatives, neighbors and PTA-mates.
As they say, that was then and this is now. The fact is, we’re all customer service people now. And we should be. Our customers, in fact, pay our salaries, so it only makes sense to excel on their behalf. From the first contact through a continuing relationship, we have a single overriding concern, which is making sure our customers get all the facts, understand all the features, have a few options and learn enough to set up and operate their new equipment.
It may be a simple Cube duplicator, or we may tailor a duplication/printing system to your precise needs, with any of several kinds of disc printers. Some printers employ the bright and clear inkjet technology, others the rich and smudge-resistant thermal printing that literally “heat bonds” the dyes to the disc surface.
New solutions: cleaner, greener
Then there are the new LightScribe CD/DVD recorders, internal and external, for personal use without the expense of ink of any kind – flip the special disc over after burning your media, and the lasers will “etch” a crisp, monochromatic label. A variety of graphics programs can manipulate typefaces and images for many kinds of unique, artistic “virtual labels.”
These new solutions are not just cleaner, but they’re also greener. Since there is no paper or plastic being printed and pasted, there is no shredding or sticking to foul up the drive. The drive thus lasts longer, and during its long, productive life it will neither drink ink nor eat paper. That’s quite “eco-beneficial,” and a unique selling point. Lightscribe is simple, smart and safe.
And that pretty much describes our attitude right there: We stay up on the latest and greatest so we can offer you the most possible alternatives, and we keep things simple to understand. We help you make the smart moves, and help you navigate the technological territory if it’s new to you. With our expert assistance, you will be safe, the solution will be sound and you will know exactly what is going on. We will not “geek you out” but we will explode the myth that doing your own CD/DVD duplication requires a degree in electronics or engineering.
Stop paying the duplication and replication companies’ bloated prices. Take control of your own media, your own manufacturing, your own distribution, your own QC and your own marketing. If you are spending into four figures for these services, you need to become an owner, not a renter. Ask us any question you have, even about a duplication job you’re doing or a certain piece of equipment. We won’t charge you for advice and we won’t pressure you into a purchase.
After all, we’re all customer service people now.