Have you ever had “Bill Shock”, this is a common monthly experience for many Canadians as the major mobile carriers have the ability to mark up their prices to an unbeleivable level. Recent action by the federal government had begun in order to counteract these ridiculous prices.

It seems as though Telus will be the first to respond to the changes, Telus announced a new contract strategy Tuesday. In this strategy Telus states that it will get rid of the costly termination fees for early cancelation of ones contract. As well Telus states that it will replace the costly data charges those with smartphones receive, a much needed announcement for tons of Telus smartphone users.

In addition to price charges that Telus will change, they announced that by early next year they will start making their phones compatible to be “unlocked” for a small charge, and thus be able to work on any other network.

http://www.financialpost.com/news/Telus+dials+contract+strategy/3902034/story.html

Undoubtably the Ontario auto industry was hit the hardest in the recent recession, in fact much of the Canadian auto industry has been hurting since the middle of the decade. For instance GM had not hired new employees since 2002, however announced Tuesday GM is going to hire three hundred new employees to keep up with the demand for their new line of vehicles. This announcement follows GM recalling 400 workers to help work on the assembly lines.

The new employees will be on the assembly line at the Oshawa plant, where the popular Impala had been made for several years, and the latest version of the Camaro muscle car.

Although this is a step in the right direction GM still has a long way to go in order to be back to their pre-recession as GM`s workforce is still only half the twenty thousand that were employeed in 2005.

http://www.montrealgazette.com/Resurgent+hire+Oshawa+plant/3905931/story.html

We day recently wrapped up in Vancouver following a stop in Toronto and Montreal. We Day, part of Free the Children is a social enterprise headed by Craig and Marc Kielburger, who also founded Free the children.

We Day encourages youth to get involved in the world community and challenges them to make a difference. In the conference, which is usually held in a large venue (rogers arena in Vancouver, for example) where 20,000 enthusiastic high school aged students are treated to presentation in various medium. For example in Vancouver, students were spoken to former vice-president Al Gore and actor Martin Sheen, as well as performed to by Colbie Caillat and the Barenaked Ladies.

Video of Craig Kielburger giving a speech at We Day 2010 in Vancouver

At all of the We Day events various merchandise is sold, such as t-shirt, swearters and poster. With all proceeds from the sales going toward the Free the Children charity.

We Day website:

http://weday.freethechildren.com/

George Weston Ltd. announced Tuesday that they had made a major increase in third quarter earnings, despite flat sales. The Toronto based firm who owns Loblaws said that it nearly doubled earning from $86 million to $184 million from the same quarter last year.

Despite only a 1.1% increase in sales, Weston still increased earnings dramatically. They cite that it is because of lower their operating costs as a major factor.

In my opinion Weston Ltd. is a very good company, since not many companies have the resources availible to lower their operating costs so drastically. This is the sign of a very efficient and resourceful company.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/globe-investor/george-weston-profit-more-than-doubles/article1809997/

When I was given the task of writing about a company or person you consider to be entreprenurial, the first person who came to mind was Sir Richard Branson. He is the CEO of  the Virgin Group, a company he started at the age of 16, which has know has transformed into a massive entity of over 360 different companies.

He begin at the age of sixteen when he first started a magazine called “Student”, and at the age of 20 he began a mail order record company, beginning his foray into the music world. Shortly after he opened his first record store, and in the 80’s Virgin took off; with the creation of Virgin Airways and Virgin records.Since then he has taken the Virgin group in many different fields, and has found success in many of them. Currently Sir Richard Branson is worth an estimated $4 billion.

Richard Branson’s success comes from he many ideal entrepreneurial characteristics, which include his willingness to go for any oppurtunity, with high work ethic, and his drive to succeed.

Microsoft corporation unveiled their last effort to take down their arch rivals apple in the smartphone race. The Windows phone 7 was released last monday to encouraging reviews. There are a total of nine new phones in the lineup, made by manufacturers such as LG, samsung, HTC and dell. The phones come with colourful touch screens with “live tiles” with allow for easy access to email, phone, texts, and other applications, including Xbox live games which should be a huge incentive for the gamer market.

Windows has even recruited die hard Apple fan and British actor Stephen Fry to their side, and even got a praising of the product by the apple enthusiast. Of course the positive reviews and and abilities of the phone are one thing and don’t necessarily prove market success. There is considerable work for microsoft to complete in the way of marketing. They must get the cool factor in the phone in order to take a portion of the market away from Apple. As well they must steer way from their “business” like moniker and become more “fun” like rival Apple in order to connect the the younger market.

http://www.financialpost.com/news/Microsoft+phones+favourable+reaction/3654413/story.html

Loblaws announced Wednesday that it was expanding its cell phone carrier selection by five, in an attempt to combat other traditionally unconventional cell phone retailers. These other retailers include new addition Shoppers Drug Market who recently announced their intention to begin the sales of primarily Rogers communications cell phones in their stores after a successful pilot program in the Ottawa region.  As well The Source, owned by the Bell Canada, cheif rival of Rogers, hold a portion of the alternative retailer market. New additions to Loblaws cell phone line-up include Rogers, and subsiderary Fido. Until now Loblaws has only offered the carriers Bell, Solo moblie and Virgin. This is quite a smart move for Loblaws as Rogers is the largest cell phone provider in Canada and this can only improve revenue for Loblaws. As well it gives Loblaws a sense of neutrality in cell phone retail as The Source is owned by Bell Canada and hold a sense of bias towards Bell phones and plans. This neutrality puts Loblaws on par with other retailers such as Wirelesswave, which hold a higher customer satifaction due to their neutrality and interest on giving the best deal.

http://www.financialpost.com/news/Wireless+wars+spreads+grocery+aisles/3634023/story.html

In a fresh way to attract attention to the Swedish funiture giant, they have adopted a new marketing campaign, Cats. With the help of the renowned British Marketing agency Mother, IKEA has created a new commercial in which one hundred cats are let loose in one of their trademark stores.  The quite entertaining piece which was filmed in the Wembley, London IKEA location comes with the slogan “Happy Inside”. This move on the marketing front is quite smart for IKEA for a number of reasons. First, the cat craze has already been a popular formula to attract attention. With sites such as “lolcatz” and “icanhascheezburger” already showing similar content and drawing in millions of people to their websites, it was only a matter of time before someone copied their winning formula. Also, the format in which the advertisement is being watched is quite important. In addition to being played on television it was immediately posted to youtube where it has garnered millions of hits in a matter of weeks. This format of advertisement will help IKEA in catching in the mind of all ages, as it is a family friendly and enjoyed commercial.

http://business.financialpost.com/2010/09/10/fp-marketing-ikea-and-a-store-full-of-roaming-cats/

Making of the advertisement

Wal-Mart Stores Inc. announced that it was purchasing South Africa’s Massmart Holding’s Ltd. In a deal worth approximately $4.6 billion Wal-Mart is making its first foray into Africa. Massmart is South Africa’s second largest retailer and primarily focuses on food sales. With this deal it will mark Wal-Marts biggest deal since its purchase of UK supermarket chain Adsa for $11 billion.  This move is quite smart on Wal-Marts behalf, as stated in the article they have been slumping in the US market due to the recession. This diversification of markets should help Wal-Mart retain a strong share price. As well this move helps for future moves into the growing market of sub-saharan Africa, which is virtually untapped by western retailers. In addition to this move Wal-Mart also displayed great interest in moving into other foreign markets such as Columbia and Japan. Overall, this move and possible future moves into foreign markets should help Wal-Mart greatly as it will allow for Wal-Mart to weather economic storms much better than their competition.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-09-27/wal-mart-offers-to-buy-south-africa-s-massmart-holdings-for-21-08-a-share.html

http://www.thestar.com/business/article/861311–canadian-tire-chief-shuffles-management-tells-employees-to-shape-up

The article I read is about the changing attitude of Canadian Tire. Currently their business is being beaten by fellow competitors such as Zellers and Walmart. In this article the Canadian Tire CEO Stephen Wetmore is calling on his employee’s for a change in attitude, in the midst of poor numbers and a shake-up in management. This article relates to what we are learning in class because althought Canadian Tire is not adding food to their stock they are trying to make a drastic change. As well this change is necessary to stay in competition with Wal Mart and Zellers.I personally think that this is a smart move in order to rally his employees to improve their work. In the near future, however I do not beleive that this will be enough to sustain their company and a more drastic move will be in order, whether that be adding fresh food to their stock or something else to attract a new customer base.