The banking industry is in urgent need of some clever marketing and PR, it seems.

At a time when being part of the banking fraternity arguably carries less cachet than being a member of the Gary Glitter Fan Club, the Casa Business School has revealed that bookings for its banking courses have shown a notable dip, one they put down to “the relentless nastiness about bankers and how horrible they are” according to a report in the business pages of the Daily Telegraph.

Given the way that banks have treated their customers there will now also be a view that money earned from banking is dirty money.

The success of a self employed photographer in winning an out of court settlement of £2000 from British Gas for wasting his time can only encourage others to seek compensation through the courts for big company incompetence.

Barry Payling,59, logged his time and costs of letters and phone calls incurred over two years of British Gas cock-ups, which included incorrect billing, sending in debt-collectors to demand money not owed and writing to offer energy supplies to his mother, who was dead.

British Gas claim that the payment was an act of goodwill and not because they were unwilling to test their liability in court.

Meanwhile the BBC’s blustering and bullying debt-collectors, TV Licensing should be taking note of the above.

This bunch of saddos send threatening letters to people without televisions demanding a licence fee, or written confirmation that no TV is being used. Those who take the second option then get another letter saying that they are probably lying and that detector vans will soon be outside their homes or offices.

The naff and misleading marketing con of sending out a fake editorial with a fake personalised stick-on note is still finding favour.

The latest tosh to hit our desk was the usual advert masquerading as editorial for a “leading authority on entrepreeurial success”, who was flogging his CD’s on the subject. The advert, presented to look as if it had been torn out of a newspaper came in a fake hand-written white envelope and had a fake hand-written stick-on note attached which proclaimed, in this case, “Peter, I saw this and thought of you. This guy is brilliant. Have a look at his website. J” Continue reading →

Ethical Consumer magazine has called for a boycott on tuna sandwiches from Tesco, Boots, Greggs and Subway.

This is on the grounds that the methods used to catch the skipjack tuna used in the products results in the unnecessary deaths of thousands of sharks, endangered Green Sea Turtles and other marine wildlife.

The magazine’s publishers say that of the top five sandwich retailers only Marks and Spencer currently use tuna caught by pole and line, which doesn’t kill other species.

Budget hotel chain Travelodge have complained to the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) that rival budget hotel chain Premier Inn was misleadingly claiming to have a larger bedroom count in London than their own. Premier Inn claim to have 5,500 rooms in the capital while Travelodge say the correct figure is 4,853, against their own 5,092 rooms.

According to trade magazine Caterer and Hotelkeeper Travelodge blotted their copybook with the ASA last year by comparing their room charge of £39 with that of £65 from Express by Holiday Inn, but failing to point out that the Holiday Inn price included a breakfast for up to two people, which theirs did not.

Sad to see that actress Emma Thompson, appearing on an American chat show, chose to amuse her audience by claiming that homosexuals were stoned and flogged on the Isle of Wight, where they also tortured and shot Irish and Scottish visitors.

Clearly talking with mouth engaged before brain Thompson’s comments have annoyed those responsible for marketing the island ,and those who live there, who have described them as “utter nonsense”, “extremely insulting” and indicative of a “warped sense of humour”, which could be Thompson’s choice for her sophisticated American audiences. Continue reading →

Endorsement for the power of cartoon characters in marketing to children comes from researchers at Mahidol University, Bangkok.

They found that four and five-year-olds who regularly watched the cartoon character Popeye eat spinach before vanquishing the evil Bluto and saving Olive Oyl increased their intake of vegetables from two portions a day to four.

A study by Which? Legal Service has found that 10% of holiday travellers have made a complaint about a trip in the last three years. Half of the complainers were unhappy about the outcome.

More than a third of the “cheddar” cheese sold in the UK is imported, claims the British Cheese Board. (BCB)

Consumers who want to ensure their cheddar cheese is at least made in Britain, if not Cheddar, should study the packaging, especially in supermarkets. If it is not labelled as British the odds are it is not, say the BCB, who also reveal that 51% of British consumers prefer to buy British.