yellow card for a purple company

at the le meridien business review this noon, the big brown bear of my managing director stepped up onto the hotel function room's stage riser and started churning out numbers related to how much money / how much value we've achieved for the past financial year.


his proud list:

full renovation of retail stores - check. (even though 2 of our branches are still flashing the old birdy logo at the branch entrance)

enhancement of product merchandise and music accessories - check. (even though our competitor has more popular brands than us)

dedicated instructors for the club keyboard course - check. (even though the keyboard lessons were thinly disguised as a sales tactic for clavinovas)

opening of the ydacc (y*m*h* digital audio creative center) giving good support to the commercial audio business - check. (even though it's located in the most unlikely ulu semi-industrial area unbefitting of its digital status)

musical instrument display space inside stores of mass merchandisers - check. (even though space for only the width of 2 portable keyboards were given)

drum teacher's training by y*m*h* music foundation - check. (even though nobody could understand clearly what the japanese trainer was trying to say)

database of 20,000 (!) members holding the y*m*h* music card - check. (even though the guy in charge does nothing much to bank on this database)

reduction of inventory level from $5 mil to $3mil - check. (even though it saves on warehouse costs but customers are complaining why their stock takes ages to arrive)

one-to-one marketing strategy - check. (even though the budget allocated was barely enough to achieve the effective media reach)

investment in IT for long-term growth - check. (even though the company website looks like shit and the in-house system is so user-unfriendly)


my post title says it. period.