Gas Price Rant #11 caffeinated panic sets in · Thursday April 24, 2008 by colin newell
What happens when you have to make the choice; food or gas?
It seems that coffee hungry Californians have made of their minds – much to the chagrin of coffee giant Starbucks
Java junkies looking for that last legal rap on the cortex are counting pennies by sipping less expensive coffee drinks, home-brewing or eschewing the brown elixir entirely. The turning tide is effecting everyone from the mom-and-pop java joints all the way up to Starbucks, which reported Wednesday that it expected lower second-quarter profit and full-year earnings. The economy not its prices appear to be the culprit.
Faced with deciding between a 99 cent of black coffee from the 7-11 and a 4 dollar latte from the Green Machine has never been easier – or so it would appear.
Starbucks is also facing down the Ronald McDonald brand of gourmet Joe which threatens to shake up the specialty market entirely.
Unconfirmed reports have Starbucks C.E.O. Howard Shultz uttering: “Cannot sleep… Clowns might kill me…”
Now I know what he means.
“The current economic climate is the weakest in our company’s history,” said Howard Schultz, Starbucks Corp.‘s chief executive. The company said it was being hit especially hard in California and Florida, which make up nearly one-third of its U.S. retail revenue.
No surprise considering that California and Florida residents would give up coffee, their spouse or certain vestigial appendages before getting out of their SUV’s.
There are exceptions mind you. I will take my coffee before the car thank you very much. I mean, I cannot drive if I am asleep.
I am running pretty lean anyway. I brew specialty coffee in my lab at the University that I work at. I bake all my own muffins from scratch… so my monthly treat budget is pretty low.
So. To those with this tough choice to make, I salute you… by raise a steaming hot mug of Organic Ethiopian Sidamo brewed at exactly 196 degrees (F) into a thermal glass carafe! Cheers!
Thanks to Jeanie Sepin for the inspiration and research that went into this blog
If they say so · Wednesday April 23, 2008 by colin newell
Sometimes you don’t.
Of course… if you are missing details in your visual environment, you will never know will you?
Click on Chemainus Coffee Shop photo at left for full-size
The funny thing about the eye and the human brain… and how they are connected is this:
Your brain fills in the gaps on things your eyes miss. Kind of a fuzzy logic thing.
An example: A colleague of mine spends a lot of time shooting nature photos – and I am always staggered by the quality of the images he gets – because we are using similar technology.
Except that when I take a really close look at his work I start to see the same flaws I see in my digital shots.
Keep in mind that I am a film guy from way back. And despite our advances in technology, even the best full-frame digital dSLR’s are only a baby step ahead of most 99 dollar 35mm point and shoots for their overall quality.
Like the human brain, 35MM (and medium-format) films gather a tremendous amount of information – with little or no need for fuzzy logic or post-processing to get the most out of the image.
And love or hate the technology, it has brought the art and science of photography to just about everyone.
But for me, I still keep my Pentax 35mm loaded up with film… and a venerable Rolleiflex twin-lens from 1965… well, it is freshly serviced and ready to roll if and when I need a crystal clear look into my visual environment.
Gas Price Rant #10 Asteroid run run run · Monday April 21, 2008 by colin newell
From time to time you run into something so concise… so truthful… so simply scary… as to leave you breathless. This brief from the Tom Dispatch pretty much sums up that experience.
Read it. Take the 15 minutes. Drink a coffee.
And gasp along with me.
Warning: Your gas pains may become more acute with this material.
Solution: Ride a bus, car pool, bike or walk – and the discomfort will pass.
The Conversation Series - Part one - food on the table · Sunday April 20, 2008 by colin newell
In a continuing series on food, at home and abroad, we talk to the food and drink celebrities of Victoria B.C. Canada.
Mark Engels, owner-partner and baker of Bubby Roses Bakery in Victoria is angry and frustrated… but in a good way.
Because when you own one of a handful of good bakeries in a city of over 200,000 hungry souls, every little thing you do can make a big difference.
Like keeping good food on your neighbors table and in their pantry…
And according to Mark… It’s challenging.
“Let’s put it this way… we are often at the mercy of a finicky and misinformed media…” Mark quips.
“Media”, I query? “What does the media have to do with this?”
Judging by Mark’s reaction, I have just tossed a cinder into the black powder box.
“I was on the radio this week…” Mark volunteers…
“And…?”, I cower behind a big bowl of Vegetarian Chili in one very crowded Bubby Rose bakery.
“CFAX… with Joe Easingwood and the gang… with a variety of the cities bakers… and we were talking about the scene, you know… prices, the challenges, inflation… and someone asks me about Butter Tarts… Butter tarts no less. Yea, we make them…” I introject.
“Butter tarts?”, you are losing me quickly Mark.
Mark continued unabated, “And one of the media types in the studio blurts out… Thrifty’s makes Butter Tarts you know!“
Ah. The penny drops. Hard. On my foot. Damn ten pound penny.
Thrifty Foods is one of the many appendages of the Sobey Food empire… and
Thrifty Foods is in many local corporate partnership – strategic alliances… the media behemoth that owns CFAX is one of them.
Hence the cheesy product placement.
What leads to our point. When you are a teeny-weeny independent baker trying to put food on tables and stay in business, the last thing you need are media dork-sticks dropping product placement bombs in the middle of, what was up to that point, a meaningful conversation on being the little guy trying to serve the community while those much bigger players on the block are trying to squash you.
As the bakery continues to hum louder, the stinging irony is not lost on either of us.
According to Mark, we shouldn’t write off the little guy yet. Without small bakeries, like Bubby Roses, Victoria residents could well be unwrapping their goodies just shipped in from Ontario, or worse… the U.S. of A
And right now and as of late, bakeries all over the place are feeling the pinch of higher prices… significantly higher prices on staples like flour, rice and vegetable oils… etc.
And the other scary point is – if we in food rich Canada are feeling the sting of inflation, Mark and I can only imagine what life is like in the developing nations.
Scary thoughts indeed.
In a continuing series on the food scene here and out there, we will talk to the little pieces in the puzzle – the players that keep the food on your table.
Head over to Part Two in this series.
