Archives: Lifestyle

Amory Lovins’ Green Home for a Greener Solution

This post is a reorganized post of Grist’s article, “Amory Lovins’ high-tech home skimps on energy but not on comfort” by Ben Adler.


Owner: Amory Lovins (Physicist | World-renowned energy-efficiency expert | Co-founder of the Rocky Mountain Institute in 1982 with his then-wife L. Hunter Lovins)

Property: A 4,000-square-foot super-efficient, low-carbon, combustion-free home

Location: Nestled up in the mountains 14 miles from Aspen | High elevation around 8,000 feet | Old Snowmass, Colorado, United States

Style: A classic adobe style, indigenous to the Mountain West

Nickname:  “The Banana Farm!” Why? Lovins grows the tropical fruits in its greenhouse!

History: Completed the original structure in 1984 | A high-tech makeover in 2009

Main challenge to build the house: Heating

Solution: 16 inches concrete, locally harvested sandstone Thick Walls

Unintended Benefit: Eliminating the need to build a heating system at all!

7 Other Unique Features:

“Super-windows” with microscopically thin layers of gases such as krypton and xenon that let in light but prevent heat exchange. [Equivalent of 16 layers of glass but using only 2 layers and costs less than 3]

  1. All Renewable Electricity for household use: Massive solar panels for the roof, carport, and grounds alongside the building!
  2. Super-efficient Appliances: Dishwasher (from Swedish company Asko) [Its sensors measure the cleanliness of the water coming out and stop washing when the water is clean, instead of continuing to run for another hour] LED light
  3. Wide Roof  (Lots of natural light during daytime!)
  4. Greenhouse in the middle of the building, between the living area and the office — Tropical fruit in the greenhouse! Bananas, Mangos and Coffee! [These plants consume CO2, release humidity and store heat.]
  5. Pond
  6. Innovative bathroom — [Japanese-style] sink on top of the toilet tank [When you flush the toilet, you can wash your hands in the water that will then refill the tank]
  7. A solar-heated hot tub

Bonus: Looking out at the stunning mountain views from the hot tub

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Time is Love: Miss Cellaneous & A Thrift Store Owner

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Solvil et Titus, a luxury watch brand with roots in Switzerland, is not only regarded as one of the Asia’s favourite brand but also considered a symbol of love and romantic expression. Its success factor in Asia lies in its romantic Time is Love advertising campaigns or its branding strategy.

The video above is one of its famous romantic Time is Love advertising campaigns that are consindered as the classics of Hong Kong’s advertising industry. It is a touching story that is in line with Titus’ Antiquity theme, and its slogan Time is Love. 

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A commercial with a story: A Youthful Summer

Semir, a Chinese clothing brand, came out with two commercials to promote their  S/S 2013 season.
There are two versions: one for female and another for males.

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I think these commercials have three success factors.

  1. Lee Min Ho, a well-known Korean actor, is a brand in himself. Having him in the commercial will attact a lot of fans all over the Asia as well as the world. So the clothing commercial has a huge potential to turn the fans into the customers.
  2. Two languages, Chinese and Korean, are used. Although the target market is more likely to be the Chinese-speakers, the ads can definitely attract the Asian market due to the influence from the increasing popularity of Korean-dramas and Korean-music in Asia.
  3. The “romance” story line is pretty interesting as it tries to define what summer means to people, with the same question “what is summer” on repeats here and there to remind the audience of the idea of the “summer”.

Overall, the commercial is fairly youthful, implying that the target market is most likely to be the younger generations from 13/14 to even late 20s and mid 30s.

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Things that matter to the Yummies: Fashion, Luxury, Workout & Diet

“Taking PRIDE and taking greater CONFIDENCE from maintaining a well-groomed APPEARANCE now defines what it is to be ‘a MAN’ in today’s society” — HSBC

“Men who buy grooming products to boost self-esteem or feel more attractive are now in the majority.” — Mintel researcher

Yummies, according to a HSBC’s research team, refers to young (20-something), urban males who are very much interested in and concerned with personal grooming and health. So what does it mean? It essentially means that many young men are more into looks and styles and that appearance has become a bigger part of who they are or their identity. It also implies that now it is a “NEW norm” for a young smartphone-carrying man to do the followings:

Aaron Taylor Johnson in Plaid Suit

  1. care more about whether Lancom or Clinique is better for his skin
  2. shop frequently at places like Nordstrom, checking out Armani Exchange for shirts and pants, Michael Kors for suits and Gucci for shoes.
  3. pamper himself at a spa
  4. work diligently and persistently on his mind and body by hitting the gym and attending  yoga/meditation (or dance) classes
  5. do groceries at WholeFoods, grabbing kale, avocado, acai berries and quinoa
  6. cook and serve themselves some delicious and yet very healthy meals

Nikolaj Coster-Waldau In a Denim JacketSo what does this new norm or reality REALLY mean? Well, it means more goods and services FOR MEN in terms of an increase in both product breadth and depth.

Guardian reported that according to HSBC, whether it is cosmetics, outdoor sports, fashion or accessories, male purchases have really started to impact overall growth rates.

Also Business Insider mentioned Bain’s report from last year which stated that men account for 40% of the total luxury market and the demand for menswear products keeps on growing.

According to Bloomberg, Michael Kors is hoping to grow its annual menswear revenue to $1 billion, which would amount to almost a sevenfold increase while Coach is close to that goal, having expanded its sales to men from $100 million in 2010 to about $700 million today.

Kendrick Lamar Patterned ShirtMoreover, increasing in popularity are the fashion magazines, websites and blogs exclusively for Men such as GQ, Askmen, Four Pins and Fashionbeans. Men’s love for their appearance has also invaded Youtube where there are workout, skincare and even makeup tutorials.

It seems that young men seem to have an ample amount of time and money to take greater care of themselves and their lives. The reason being, according to Bloomberg, is that a lot of men are marrying later in life these days, freeing up income in their twenties that would otherwise have gone to supporting a family.

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Say NOOOOO to another piece of chips! Or Can you really?

“They taste and smell real but are completely artificial in reality, tricking our bodies.” –Bruce Bradley, a former food industry executive

“Salt, sugar and fat are the three pillars of the processed food industry. The companies’ researches have shown them that when they hit the very perfect amounts of each of those ingredients … they will have us buy more, eat more.” – Michael Moss, New York Times Investigative Report and author of Salt Sugar Fat.

Do our bodies really need salt, sugar and fat — from the snacks?

Can we as consumers make a rational choice on what and how much we consume according to our health situation?

Maybe, we cannot because for most, these products are convenience products but not shopping products.

With so many health problems arising such as obesity, where does the responsibility lie? The companies? The consumers? Or Both?

On one hand, publicly-held and profit-driven processed foods companies hire an army of chemists, physicists, neuroscientists and food scientists 1) to conduct numerous researches finding out how the customers are attracted to food and how they can make their foods (more) attractive to the customers. Considering fullness/satiety as serious enemy, snacks are made to be eaten non-stop until the packet is finished.

The scientists, carrying out a Unilever-funded research study, tested whether people’s perception of a chip was altered by the sound/crunch it made when they bit into it. They found a possible way to control the perception of the potato chips since “[they] were perceived as being both crisper and fresher when … the overall sound level was increased although the consumers are often unaware of the influence of such auditory cues.”

On another hand, I suggest the consumers need to learn how to have an equivalent amount of will power resisting these crunchy, tasty and temporarily-satisfying chips.

Sources: [1] http://www.cbc.ca/news/health/food-cravings-engineered-by-industry-1.1395225

[2] Photo of Miss Vickie’s:  http://www.sld.com/before-and-after-miss-vickies/

[3] Photo of Lay’s: http://www.couponaholic.net/2012/06/new-0-551-lays-potato-chips-0-551-sun-chips-printable-coupons-plus-pepsi-mountain-dew-12-pack-coupons-still-available/

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Celebrities in the Commercials

In marketing and advertising, celebrities play a powerful role in creating and enhancing value(s) to the products. Which celebrity appears in which product commercial tells a lot about which market segment, or focus audience, it is targeting towards.

For example, One Direction and Drew Brees have appeared in a Pepsi commercial, drawing both young female fans and American-football-loving males into liking Pepsi.

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H&M also gets David Backham in its commercial (and also a famous director, Guy Ritchie – Madonna’s ex-husband – to direct). The target audience is most likely to be those in 20s, 30s and perhaps even teens. Most probable is that the majority of them are females.

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There actually are (less costly and yet effective) alternatives to using the celebrities in the commercial. For example, getting unknown amateur actors or those in one’s social circle to act, using some drawings OR just doing a commercial simply focusing on the product’s features. Many commercials do take on these alternatives, save a lot of advertising cost and are successful in garnering attention and gaining popularity with the audience.

And yet, many products companies are very eager in getting celebrities to endorse, promote and advertise their products. Why? 

Primarily, they want to easily capture a great number of followers, fans, of particular celebrities as their target market, assuming that the loyalty to the celebrities extends to an automatic loyalty to the product brand, and thereby gaining some market advantage over their competitors.

Hence, David Beckham keeps appearing in many commercials, “banking $42 million from commercial endorsements from sponsors.” Source: http://www.forbes.com/profile/david-beckham/

So who else is after Beckham. Samsung!

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While Samsung seems to gear Beckham commercial more towards the global market, it also has another commercial with the korean celebrities, aiming mainly for the korean youth market and also perhaps the Asian youth market.

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