The world around us

So, we’re off for a week starting tomorrow. Not a vacation really, since we are traveling for work, but we will manage to add a bit of fun and sightseeing hopefull, but no relaxation I’m sure. I will be taking a week’s break from doing my research project, but will continue to keep track of things so I don’t fall too far behind when I get back to work, the week after the next.

I was quite dissapointed with our visit to one of the malls that I had heard a lot of good things about. Nirmal Lifestyle Mall was a bit of a let down, especially after I had heard so much about it. As a first time visitor I found it just too disjointed and chaotic, with not enough indoor areas that were temperature controlled. It’s nice to have open piazzas but with the way the weather is here, it’s not really a practical way to attract shoppers. We were there sunday afternoon, and there were barely any people to be seen. Inorbit mall in Malad is buzzing all the times, by comparison.

Ever wonder what all goes behind the making of mailing lists? It’s really not as simple as you think, and there is a lot of work in collecting data, orgainizing, compiling that is required before a cohesive mailing list is formed. One of the leading companies that has been in the business is Martin Worldwide, a Westlake, CA based company that has created ResponseCom, one of the most successful and innovative mail list systems, which combines US Response and US Consumer databases to create a database that has more than 100 demographic and psychograpic options to select from. Mailing lists are serious business to Martin Worldwide and their client list is a veritable who’s who of Fortune 1000 companies.

The Future Group will invest Rs 4,000 crore to expand its stores and reach a topline of Rs 30,000 crore by 2010-11. According to Kishore Biyani, managing director of Pantaloon Retail, “We are increasing the outlets of Big Bazaar from 50 to 100 by next year. We are also adding eight more stores of HomeTown.” Future Group will open 12 Central malls and factory outlets in Gurgaon, Kolkata and Chennai.

So, it’s been a kind of a slow blogging day so far, in fact I just got started for the day just over a couple of hours ago, yes, well when you have more than 2,3,4,5 blogs, that’s not really enough time at all. In fact, it’s kind of becoming a full time job of sorts, most of the time a very enjoyable one though. Just once in a while it becomes a bit overwhelming, when I realize I haven’t updated any of my blogs for several days and I want to be able to post stuff on all of them as soon as possible. It’s actually not a good idea to write on several blogs one after the other, especially if the topics are similar, as one just ends up repeating oneself. To keep things interesting, must space it out a bit.