Impulse Travel

After an intensive month of study, it's time for a break. It's Thanksgiving in America this weekend, which for Columbia Business School students, means a five-day weekend! I'm heading down to 77th St this evening for dinner with a friend and to see the balloons being blown up for tomorrow's parade. Tomorrow I'll head down to 40th St to see the parade, then it's off to Montreal for a couple of days! Full update when I return.

Retrenchment Holiday

Enjoy it while it lasts, my friend.

Distraction

(Personal high score: 284,085)

Adrian Hind - Certified Fast Thinker

Message from Barclays Capital: "Thank you for taking part in our recent recruitment test. We are pleased to advise you that you have reached the necessary benchmarks to be further considered in our recruitment process."

Next step: submit my resume and write a mini-essay outlining why I want to work at Barclays Capital. Then they'll consider whether I'm worthy enough to be invited to their "Assessment Day" on Dec 7th in New York.

All in the name of Market Research

For an upcoming presentation in my Building and Managing Brands subject, I'm working on a brand revival plan for A&W Restaurants. For the uninitiated, A&W are the oldest restaurant chain in America, and they are famous for their Root Beer Float. They're very much a brand for the suburbs - all All-American diner that popularised the concept of car-hop service in the 1950s and 60s. Today, it is the type of place that "your father would probably visit."

As a brand for the suburbs, A&W is nowhere to be seen in Manhattan. In fact, the only A&W Restaurant in the New York City metropolitan area is located at a highway intersection way out on Staten Island.

So, in the name of market research (and a chance to escape the Columbia Business School library), a colleague and I ventured out on a day trip to soak up the A&W experience. After 45 minutes on the subway from Columbia University to South Ferry station, 30 minutes waiting for the Staten Island Ferry, 30 minutes on the Staten Island Ferry (including a "drive by" of the Statue of Liberty"), 25 minutes on the Staten Island Railway to Jefferson Avenue, and finally a five minute walk to Hylan Blvd, we had made it to suburbia, ready for our feast. The exterior of the restaurant was ugly to say the least, and the cars in the parking lot seemed as old as the brand itself. But once we were inside, the whole experience changed. The root beer float was delish, the burger was fresh, and the waitress was very friendly. But how will this brand survive in an era of consolidation? And will they ever be able to attract the interest of Manhattanites?

Stay tuned for our brand revival plan, due to be presented in class on Nov 26th ;-)

12 more Typical MBA days

How to explain my absence for the past 2 weeks: Take the previous blog entry, adjust the end of day to 1:00am, and repeat 12 times.

Typical MBA day

Big day at Columbia today - worked on five of my six subjects over a period of 15 hours! I'm tired ;-(

• 6:30am - 7:30am - wake up call from Stephenie. Caught up on the latest news from Australia, and worked on our plans for travels at the end of the year.
  
• 7:30am - 8:15am - shower, shave, and walk to b-school
  
• 8:15am - 9:45am - Options Markets class (incl. breakfast and catching up on emails)
  
• 10:00am - 11:30am - Introducting to Venturing class
  
• 11:30am - 12:00noon - lunch at Uris deli
  
• 12:00noon - 1:30pm - finish off a case analysis on H-E-B's private label brands for Building and Managing Brands class
  
• 1:30pm - 3:00pm - meeting with my Building and Managing Brands team - planning our approach for a brand revival presentation for A&W Restaurants.
  
• 3:15pm - 6:00pm - Building and Managing Brands class
  
• 6:00pm - 8:00pm - Dinner break - found a great restaurant called Deluxe that serves a decent steak for only $11.95. Not really a break though, since I read an article for my Marketing Plans Workshop class over dinner
  
• 8:00pm - 11:15pm - meeting with my Advanced Corporate Finance team - we're working on designing a suitable capital structure for a management buyout of Cap & Seal, including various forms of debt with covenants.
  
• 11:15pm - 11:30pm - update the blog, then go home to bed. It all starts again at 8:30am tomorrow.
  

Actually, it's not quite a typical day, but as we get towards the end of the term, it definitely starts to resemble the norm.

Victoria Votes

It's been annouced. Victoria is going to the polls on November 30th. It's predicted to be a close one, although it's unlikely that my seat of Prahran (get that spell-checker out, ABC) will go down to the wire. I doubt my postal vote will need to be opened.

New York selected as U.S. Candidate City for 2012 Summer Olympics

nyc2012.com

"COLORADO SPRINGS, Colorado (AP) — New York City turned on its star power, flexed its financial muscle and touted its status as the "world's second home" to beat out San Francisco and become the U.S. candidate for the 2012 Summer Olympics. The New York organizers broke into cheers, tears and shouts as the close vote Saturday was announced and Frank Sinatra's "New York, New York" filled the room."

[source: Associated Press newswire via FoxSports]

I think it would be absolutely fantastic if New York were to host the Olympics - baseball at Yankee Stadium, gymnastics at Madison Square Garden, and the triathlon in Central Park. Who wants to open the betting for what the cost of a ticket to the Opening Ceremony will cost?

Blue Brothers 2002 (a.k.a. the post about the NYC Marathon and a big car pileup in California)

I played the supporter role today, heading down to 1st Ave and 96th to watch the annual New York City Marathon - 30,000 runners selected by lottery from the far reaches of the globe, including my fellow MBS-Columbia exchanger Mark Mudie. In the near-freezing, yet surprising sunny, weather, I joined a small group of Columbia Business School students to support our 20 or so colleagues in the race. Mark has been training for a four hour finish, and I was really hoping to see him as he ran past, but 30,000 people makes for a big crowd, and I didn't find him amongst the sea of people running past our 18-mile mark position.

Heaps of the runners had written their names and country of origin on their shirts. Awesome idea. Adrian yells out "Go Aussie!" or "Go Paul!". Runner looks over, smiles, and raises a clenched victory fist, at this random stranger in the crowd.

There weren't nearly as many people dressed up for the run as you'd expect back in Sydney at the City to Surf, although I was amused to see a couple of guys dressed up as the Blues Brothers in black suits and hats. "Go Jake!" "Go Elwood!"

Here's an impressive "feature" of the race that will impress the IT geeks: each runner wore the obligatory number on their chests, but they also had a small electronic tag on their shoes. At each they passed each mile marker, their progress was recorded, and immediately updated on the official website. Perhaps if I'd had a mobile Internet device with me in the crowd, I would have known with more accuracy when Mark would have been running passed. As it turns out, he actually kept to his planned pace very well, finishing the race with a time of 4:00:53. Well done mate.

And the bit about the car pileup? Check out what happened on the freeway near Long Beach, California this morning. One would think they were filming a scene for the next Blues Brothers movie.

Make your own Bush speech

Ladies and gentlemen ... America stands committed to ... broken treaties ... violent ambitions ... and ... further destruction ... on a massive scale .. <laugh>