Ryanair CEO Michael O’Leary Protests Brexit in London with Funny Costume

Ryanair CEO Michael O'Leary Protests Brexit in London with Funny Costume

On Jun 23, 2016, the UK voted to leave the EU. The economic and political consequences will be significant and long lasting, and not just for the UK and the EU. The repercussions will be felt everywhere. The key concern for EasyJet and Ryanair, among a number of airlines hypothetically affected, is what will happen if the UK fails to remain part of Europe’s single market in air services when Brexit negotiations accomplish.

Ryanair CEO Michael O'Leary Protests Brexit in London with Funny Costume

A challenge for Ryanair is that its biggest base is in the UK, at London Stansted. Its two busiest UK routes in June this year are Dublin–Stansted and Dublin–London Gatwick.

Ryanair CEO Michael O'Leary Protests Brexit in London with Funny Costume

CEO Michael O’Leary was upfront, opinionated and amusing as ever today at a Bloomberg News conference where he warned that Brexit could lead to contagion. The CEO of one of Europe’s largest airlines said that he would leave that to greater minds than his—referring to his treasury administrators. He warned that the budget airline would be forced to rationalize investment if Britain votes to leave the EU.

Ryanair CEO Michael O'Leary Protests Brexit in London with Funny Costume

Appearing on a platform with British chancellor George Osborne at Stansted Airport, Mr O’Leary spoke that inward investment will be lost to participant EU member states such as Ireland and Germany if Britain votes for Brexit. O’Leary said,

It is this type of large-scale foreign inward investment that is helping to drive the UK economy and job creation. It is exactly this type of investment that will be lost to other competitor EU members if the UK votes to leave the European Union. The single market has enabled Ryanair to lead the low-fare air travel revolution in Europe, as we bring millions of British citizens to Europe each year, and welcome millions of European visitors to Britain, and we are calling on everyone to turn out in large numbers and vote remain.

Ryanair CEO Michael O'Leary Protests Brexit in London with Funny Costume

Brexit may result in Ryanair’s formation of UK subsidiary. Ryanair has reported it may create a new subsidiary to operate UK domestic flights if a “hard Brexit” happens, the company said. Under the worst outcome, the UK would be forced to leave the European open-skies system as it exits the EU, which would thwart Ryanair as a European carrier from remaining to operate routes from London to Belfast, Edinburgh and Glasgow.

Ryanair CEO Michael O'Leary Protests Brexit in London with Funny Costume

It would then need to establish a separate UK company, of which Ryanair would be able to own a maximum of 49.9 percent. If the UK continues part of the open-skies area, the company said it forecasts no change in the ownership structures of Ryanair or UK carriers. Ryanair said airlines have been invited to a round table discussion organized by the government department charged with navigating the UK’s exit from the EU to discuss the impact this will have on their sector.

Ryanair CEO Michael O'Leary Protests Brexit in London with Funny Costume

Ryanair has stepped up warnings that flights between the UK and Europe are jeopardized by Brexit, with the airline’s chief executive Michael O’Leary claiming that the prospect of upsetting aviation was one of the quickest and best ways for the EU27 to “stick it to the British”.

If Britain votes to leave it will be damaging for the UK economy and the European economy for the next two or three years … there’ll be huge uncertainty while Britain tries to negotiate an exit out of a single market and tries to replace that with a whole series of trade deals which they won’t get done … yet staying in is the way forward the British economy is performing fundamentally well at the moment … unemployment is low … the economy’s doing well … it’s one of the most competitive economies in Europe … this is the time to stay in and continue to benefit from European membership not leave now.

We speak as Britain’s largest airline we carry 40 million passengers to and from the UK this year we’re also a large foreign in word investor here in the UK I fly from 2060 British airports I employ more than three thousand pilots, cabin crew, and engineers and I want to keep investing in Britain I want to keep growing the business here in Britain but I can only do that if Britain remains a member of the European Union.

Were they not want to leave not just European Union but also the single market we may not be able to free to fly anymore between the UK and Europe as an Irish airline … now of course the UK is part of the European Union … it’s not part of the euro and the single currency … Ireland of course is there’s lots of criticisms about the future of the euro if it can survive in its current form overall has Ireland benefited from being a part of the single currency can the single currency survive as it is I think overall iron has benefits usually by being a member the single currency I think the single currency will survive because the strongest economy in Europe … Germany is behind the euro and I think they’ll do whatever needs to be done to make sure it does survive but there does need to be more harmonization between the outer relying countries the Greeks, the Italians, the Spanish, and the Irish who have suffered real economic problems in recent years as a result of very low interest rates and … you know property bubbles … but that’s why I a single market needs reform we’ve been very critical of Brussels and over-regulation and I think why this election will bring about more reform in Brussels as long as Britain votes to stay in.

Ryanair CEO Michael O'Leary Protests Brexit in London with Funny Costume

Starbucks and Pop Star Lady Gaga Create ‘Cups of Kindness’ Collection to Support Her ‘Born This Way’ Foundation

Starbucks and Lady Gaga Create Cups of Kindness for Born This Way Foundation

Lady Gaga is notorious for her distinct aesthetic, which can be labelled as a social fantasy that espouses much of Andy Warhol’s Pop Art visualization yet twists it to signify present-day anxieties. Her dynamic quest to produce the memorable and rejoice the mercurial emphasizes the degree to which pop phenomenon has been affected by a period of extraordinary connectivity among consumers and cultural creators.

Lady Gaga’s wide-eyed hope gradually eroded as she became the most famous artist of the last decade.

Starbucks and Lady Gaga Create Cups of Kindness for Born This Way Foundation

Starbucks and Lady Gaga Create Cups of Kindness for Born This Way Foundation

Starbucks and Lady Gaga Create Cups of Kindness for Born This Way Foundation

Starbucks is partnering with Lady Gaga’s Born This Way Foundation to spread a simple message—be kind.

Starting tomorrow (June 13), Starbucks will donate 25 cents from each one of its colorful Cups of Kindness beverages sold at participating Starbucks® stores in the United States and Canada through June 19 to Born This Way Foundation. Funds raised will go toward programs that support youth wellness and empowerment by fostering kindness, improving mental health resources, and creating more positive environments.

“We’re healthier and happier when we live our lives with compassion and our communities are stronger when we treat one another with generosity and respect,” said Lady Gaga. “Born This Way Foundation and I are so excited to partner with Starbucks to help inspire positivity and love through the Cups of Kindness collection.”

The new Starbucks Cups of Kindness collection features four vivid iced beverages hand-picked by Lady Gaga, including the new Matcha Lemonade and Violet Drink. The refreshing, nondairy drinks come in a rainbow of colors and are all under 150 calories for a grande size.

“I adore the entire collection and I instantly fell in love with the Matcha Lemonade,” she said.

Starbucks and Lady Gaga Create Cups of Kindness for Born This Way Foundation

Starbucks and Lady Gaga Create Cups of Kindness for Born This Way Foundation

Born Stefani Germanotta, Lady Gaga is an avant-garde artist who makes the most of her art school background and combines aspects of performance, art, and fashion into a musical style that represents a distinctive multimedia melange philosophy.

Starbucks and Lady Gaga Create Cups of Kindness for Born This Way Foundation

Lady Gaga’s pursuit of a sustaining cultural presence responds to hypermodern pressures through her elaborate performances and dress experimentation, which are deployed to create visual impressions that are essentially tailor-made for the age of viral marketing and produce expectations of ever impressive spectacles. She supplements this approach by attempting to obviously link herself to categories of individual uniqueness.

  • New Matcha Lemonade:  This vibrant green drink is made with finely ground Teavana® matcha green tea, combined with crisp lemonade then shaken with ice to create a refreshingly sweet, delicious drink.
  • New Violet Drink: The sweet blackberries and tart hibiscus of Very Berry Hibiscus Starbucks Refreshers™ Beverage swirl together with creamy coconutmilk and ice, creating a refreshing (and violet-hued) sip.
  • Ombre Pink Drink: A refreshing beverage that combines light, fruity Cool Lime Starbucks Refreshers™ Beverage with cool, creamy coconutmilk and a splash of Teavana® Shaken Iced Passion Tango™ Tea and a lime wheel, for a bright burst of hibiscus notes.
  • Pink Drink: A light and refreshing beverage that features the sweet strawberry flavors of Strawberry Acai Refreshers with accents of passion fruit and acai combined with coconutmilk, and topped with a scoop of strawberries. Included in Cups of Kindness collection in United States only.

Starbucks and Lady Gaga Create Cups of Kindness for Born This Way Foundation

Starbucks and Lady Gaga Create Cups of Kindness for Born This Way Foundation

Starbucks and Lady Gaga Create Cups of Kindness for Born This Way Foundation

Starbucks and Lady Gaga Create Cups of Kindness for Born This Way Foundation

By praising the “monster,” the “freak,” or the “misfit” in multiple expressions—not “fitting in” at school or being gay—Lady Gaga is able to build a sense of sociological connection among fans while the catch-all energy and dynamism of her music works to sustain mass appeal.

“Over the years we’ve admired the amazing work that Lady Gaga has led through Born This Way Foundation,” said Holly Hinton, director of Music and Artist Programming. “We are proud to introduce the Cups of Kindness collection to raise awareness and fund the Foundation’s efforts to spread kindness, support youth and make the world a better place.”

One program that will benefit from the Cups of Kindness initiative is Born This Way Foundation’s Channel Kindness, a platform featuring stories of kindness as documented by young people from around the United States. These youth reporters, ages 16 to 24, have been recruited to identify and document the acts of generosity, compassion, and acceptance that shape communities. 

Starbucks has committed to a minimum $250,000 contribution to the Born This Way Foundation.

Starbucks and Lady Gaga Create Cups of Kindness for Born This Way Foundation

What the world of popular culture has in Lady Gaga is a young, sexy, tradition-busting performer. Her musical influences part from Bowie and Queen, detail the influence of a line of obvious women performers: Madonna, Grace Jones, Spears, Debbie Harry, Gwen Stefani, Christina Aguilera and Kylie Minogue. If one asks the fans of Lady Gaga why she is more charming than other stars, they would be likely to emphasize the individual investment and connection of Lady Gaga herself and thus the mutuality of the relation. What the business world has in Lady Gaga is a new icon of marketing.

Starbucks and Lady Gaga Create Cups of Kindness for Born This Way Foundation

Starbucks and Lady Gaga Create Cups of Kindness for Born This Way Foundation

Lady Gaga will not permit qualified photographers near her when she performs, but she promotes her fans to take pictures and videos and publish them without restrictions on the internet. Even with her hit single, ‘Born This Way’, she appears to agonize less about copyright and more about fan devotion. When a ten-year-old Canadian teenager published her own adaptation of the song online, Lady Gaga watched it, admired it and encouraged the girl to perform with her before a live audience at some point. In ways like these, the star advances her followers over herself.

There is something heroic about the way my fans operate their cameras. So precisely, so intricately and so proudly. Like Kings writing the history of their people, is their prolific nature that both creates and procures what will later be perceived as the kingdom. So the real truth about Lady Gaga fans, my little monsters, lies in this sentiment: They are the Kings. They are the Queens. They write the history of the kingdom and I am something of a devoted Jester.

Starbucks and Lady Gaga Create Cups of Kindness for Born This Way Foundation

Starbucks and Lady Gaga Create Cups of Kindness for Born This Way Foundation

Lady Gaga’s new connection between performance and theory, pop culture and viewpoint is bolstering because it provides a source of sincerity, passion, and action, and a heart for mirroring on a mass produced sophistication that however has Lady Gaga’s genius to replicate bits of itself to itself in a cycle of disapproval that produces something new to say and show.

Credits: Corporate images from Starbucks’media website and Starbucks chalkboard images from Starbucks associates’Reddit posts

Starbucks and Lady Gaga Create Cups of Kindness for Born This Way Foundation

Starbucks and Lady Gaga Create Cups of Kindness for Born This Way Foundation

Southwest Airlines’ Brilliant Marketing

Southwest Airlines' Brilliant Marketing

More than anything, Southwest Airlines deserves credit for its exceptional marketing strategy. For decades, Southwest Airlines has convinced American consumers that it have the lowest fares, which is hardly ever the case. Southwest’s average fares have outpaced the industry by 12% since 2009.

Nevertheless, I hear repeatedly “I need a cheap last minute ticket; I suppose I’ll try Southwest Airlines.” Being able to create that perception among consumers is invaluable.

Southwest Airlines began service in June 1971 with the objective of stimulating demand through low fares and, in forty years, has become the largest domestic airline in the United States. Southwest Airlines used to be cheaper when they first started out but currently many of their flights cost more than the other airlines. Many attentive customers do not consider Southwest Airlines a discount airline anymore.

Southwest Airlines gained a low-cost advantage by flying one aircraft type on a point-to-point network to less congested secondary airports. This enabled the airline to maximize aircraft utilization and employee productivity. It’s simple fare structure allowed customers to purchase and alter their travel plans more easily than with legacy carriers. Another distinctive competitive advantage that Southwest enjoyed for years was a hedged fuel position that was the envy of the industry. Over the last decade, Southwest has lost this particular cost advantage, and has generated results that have more closely mimicked those of legacy carriers.

Southwest Airlines No Longer Low-Cost Airline

Moreover, Southwest is no longer the lowest-cost provider that it used to be, even not including fuel costs, as measured by costs per available seat mile excluding fuel expenses. Competition and surging fuel prices proved that Southwest’s low-cost advantages were merely temporary. Over the years, competitors like Alaska Airlines, Spirit Airlines, Allegiant, and JetBlue have entered the fray and mimicked this strategy.

Over the last decade, three distinctive business models have emerged in the US airline industry: (1) global network airlines, (2) hybrid airlines, and (3) ultra low-cost airlines. Southwest Airlines has purposely avoided identifying itself with a specific strategy. Instead, the airline has chosen to persist amplifying its maverick low-fare image.

Southwest Airlines revealed a modern new look

Southwest Airlines revealed a modern new look and logo on Monday. Gary Kelly, Southwest Airlines CEO said, “our collective heartbeat is stronger and healthier than ever, and that’s because of the warmth, the compassion, and the smiles of our People … The Heart emblazoned on our aircraft, and within our new look, symbolizes our commitment that we’ll remain true to our core values as we set our sights on the future.”

Chinese Car Company Logos That Look Appallingly Familiar

The car industry in China is the largest in the world, as measured by total annual automobile unit production volumes. Since year 2009, the number of automobiles manufactured in China has exceeded that of the European Union and that of the United States and Japan combined.

45% percent of cars produced were BYD, Lifan, Chang’an (Chana), Geely, Chery, Hafei, Jianghuai (JAC), Great Wall and Roewe. The rest were produced by joint ventures of international automotive giants Volkswagen, General Motors, Hyundai, Nissan, Honda, Toyota, Mitsubishi etc. Further, that China car market is expected to grow tenfold through 2030.

Several Chinese car makers have been accused of copying designs of other companies. In addition, to increase sales and build up brand equities, Chinese automakers have rapidly expanded the number of brands they offer and some Chinese automakers have even taken inspiration from internationally-well-known brands. Here are side-by-side comparisons of brand identities—international brands in the left column and the Chinese derivatives in the right column.

Logos of the Acura and Changan Brands

Acura and Changan » Chinese Car Company Logos That Look Appallingly Familiar

Chang’an Automobile Group, based in Chongqing, has quickly grown to become one of the top four Chinese automakers along with Dongfeng, FAW Group, and Shanghai Automotive. It also has joint ventures with Ford, Suzuki, and PSA Peugeot Citroen.

Logos of the Cardillac and Emgrand Brands

Cardillac and Emgrand » Chinese Car Company Logos That Look Appallingly Familiar

Emgrand (literally the “Imperial brand”) is an automobile marque owned by the Chinese automaker Geely. Englon and Gleagle are the other marques owned by Geely, as part of Geely’s strategy of expanding its number of brands to encourage sales and evade a reputation for unreliability and poor quality.

Logos of the Mazda and Haima Brands

Mazda and Haima » Chinese Car Company Logos That Look Appallingly Familiar

Haima is a marque of the FAW Haima Automobile Company based in Hainan. Haima was a joint venture between the government of Hainan and Japanese car manufacturer Mazda. In 2006 FAW Group acquired Mazda’s stake in the joint venture and continues to use Mazda’s technology and an identical branding.

Logos of the Bentley and Riich Brands

Bentley and Riich » Chinese Car Company Logos That Look Appallingly Familiar

Riich is an upscale sub-brand of Chinese automaker Chery. Riich models include microvans, large sedans, a hatchback, a small sedan and a five door wagon. Riich’s logo mimics that of Bentley Motors, the renowned British manufacturer of luxury automobiles, now part of the Volkswagen group.

Logos of the Toyota and Xia Li Brands

Toyota and Xiali » Chinese Car Company Logos That Look Appallingly Familiar

Xia Li vehicles are the Daihatsu Charade and manufactured by FAW Tianjin. FAW group also has a joint venture with between Toyota called the FAW Toyota Motor Co Ltd.

Logos of the Alfa Romeo and Englon Brands

Alfa Romeo and Englon » Chinese Car Company Logos That Look Appallingly Familiar

Englon is also a marque of the Zhejiang Geely Holding Group, which owns manufacturing facilities in Lanzhou (Gansu province,) Xiangtan (Hunan province,) Jinan (Shandong province,) Linhai (Luqiao province,) and Ningbo in (Zhejiang province), and international plants in Indonesia, Sri Lanka, Malaysia, Russia, and Turkey.

Copies

In China, rip-offs of all sorts are common. Yet copying and plagiarism, from paintings to literary work to academic research papers, has a long tradition in China. Traditionally, it is considered a way of learning, and of indicating admiration. Recently there were reports of Chinese building replicas of architecturally significant towns and city sections from around the world.

Postscript

Geely (formally called the Zhejiang Geely Holding Group Co., Ltd) is the Chinese passenger car conglomerate that sells cars under five brand names, viz., Emgrand, Englon, Geely, Gleagle, and Volvo. Geely also owns Volvo Cars: Geely purchased Volvo Cars from the Premier Automotive Group of Ford Motor Company in 2010. Geely is headquartered in the Binjiang District of Hangzhou city.

The Worst Business Decision Ever (Hint: Xerox)

What crosses your mind when you think of an archetype of failing to recognize enormous business opportunities and renouncing innovations?

Xerox: The Worst Business Decision Ever

Xerox PARC, now an independent but wholly-owned subsidiary of Xerox, is celebrated for its pioneering technology inventions. It produced the first computer to use the desktop metaphor and mouse-driven graphical user interface (GUI) to let users interact with computers and software. They failed to capitalize on the huge opportunity. Someone else commercialized a large portion of Xerox’s ideas.

Xerox PARC invented the idea of icons, windows-based interfaces and dialogue boxes, point-and-click interfaces, local area networks, WYSIWYG (what you see is what you get) text editor and many other technological innovations that are at present part of the very underpinning of the personal computer industry. Years later, Xerox’s management even acknowledged, “whole companies have been built on inventions born at PARC.”

Xerox Palo Alto Research Center (PARC)

The fundamental flaw lies in Xerox’s strategy. Xerox’s leadership was preoccupied with determining ways to protect its mainstay, the copier business, from impending competition from Japanese companies. Xerox decided that it was a copier company and let go of the business opportunities in its technological invocations, even if PARC’s innovations had significant potential in the future of nascent personal computer industry. Steve Job’s innovation, the Apple Macintosh, borrowed from the work of PARC and created the first successful commercial computer with a graphical user interface.

The other choice that killed a great business opportunity was the decision by IBM that it was a computer company, not a software company. That made possible the rise of Bill Gates’ Microsoft Corporation, which went on to dominate the world of operating systems and applications software.