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The issue between brand names and the Quebecois de la Langue Francaise was brought into legal action by companies such as Walmart, Best Buy, Gap, Old Navy, Costco, and Guess. As we all know, Quebec and its surrounding cities use French as their main language; and many citizens there would say to adding or changing the company’s brand name with French description/name of store – such as, “Le Magasin Walmart” which means “The Walmart Store”.

According to the material I’ve learned in Commerce 101 class, I agree with Yahel Jarus-Hakak’s comments from his blog – Post #9- Walmart, Costco, among businesses taking Quebec government to court over French signs. He mentioned that “a marketing professor from Concordia university claims that the companies are going through this trouble to protect the look and feel of their logo.” From a business perspective, a logo and a brand name is known as brand recognition. Taking legal actions is a way that the companies use to protect their brand names.

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A change in brand name can decrease the demand and sales made in the future. For example, Adidas is one of the brand that is known to have a fake spelling in Asia – Addidas. The extra “d” that showed in Addidas actually decreased the sales from customers who actually know the brand. Therefore, I support the companies into taking actions to protect their brand names.

Information from: http://www.calgaryherald.com/business/businesses+heading+court+against+Quebec+government+over+French/7567073/story.html

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Out of most of the countries that I’ve been through, Canada’s public transit costs the most to ride in. Prices of public transit fairs were once changed a few years back due to Hostage of Vancouver’s Winter Olympic. This time, they will be rising the price by 10% starting in the coming January – an adult fair will go from $2.25 for one zone to $2.75 for one zone. This percentage of increase is estimated to generate $32 million for the transportation authority.

To many of the transit users in the city, this is very unfair. Going from zone to zone is more expensive than paying for the distance travelled. For example: Going from Richmond Brighouse to Waterfront will cost the same as going from Bridgeport to Marine Drive on the Canada Line. This is what causes many of us to rather drive than take the transit.

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However, problems will be solve soon, since the Compass Card will be introduced soon to citizens. With the Compass Card, many of the transit users will be more willingly to take public transit rather than driving, which may be able to increase TransLink’s long term revenue. The issues with unfair pricing will be solved when Compass Card comes in effect, providing a more fair way of payment.

Information From: http://www.surreyleader.com/news/179203301.html

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/story/2012/11/13/bc-translink-fare-increase.html

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Today in class, we went through a very entertaining, interesting lectures with successful Sauder graduates. We were lucky to have Janice, the founder and the CEO of Energy Aware to come in and share to us her path to success.

Janice graduated from UBC Sauder School of Business in 2006. She majored in Marketing and took a special class called “New Venture Design”. New Venture Design is a 4th year class opened to Engineering and Commerce students. They are put into groups and are expected to design a new product and create a business plan for this product. From this class, she carried away the new technology that she and her group developed – the energy aware product – into her future plan after graduating from university.

Janice mentioned that the challenge into starting the business would be financial issues. Money is always the question to the start of a business. Young ones might say that bank will lend money out. Truth is, why would bank risk their money to invest in someone that is just starting a new business? Janice said that the opportunity to participate in the Business plan competition and winning the competition helped her with the start up cost of the product. Although at the start, she couldn’t pay her first engineer, she offered him a flight to Singapore to present in a Business Plan Competition. I’ve realized that the start of a business will be the biggest challenge if I ever plan to start a business.

Information From: Janice (class guest speaker)