Archive for December, 2011
I heard a radio spot last week from Western Union (WU) regarding singing telegrams. The first thought I had was – Western Union? Is that company still even around? A little research divulged that not only is Western Union still around, in 2010 the total revenue was $1.3 billion. If you are wondering, WU has not delivered any telegraphs since 2006.
Back in 1851 in Rochester, NY what today is Western Union was created as unified telegraph system called the New York and Mississippi Valley Printing Telegraph Company. That company competed with New York and & Western Union Telegraph company – which was purchased out of bankruptcy by Ezra Cornell (yes that Cornell). By 1855 the two companies merged into the Western Union Telegraph Company which operated in much the same way until 2006.
In 2006 Western Union announced that it would discontinue all telegram and commercial messaging services. However telegram services continued in the United States via iTelegram and other companies none of which I have ever heard of.
Yet Western Union still exists today primarily as a company that allows users to send and receive funds to others, pay bills or to purchase gift cards. Western Union also has a mobile money transfer service where a sender goes to a Western Union office and presents funds (plus fees) for either a ‘Next Day’ or ‘Money in Minutes’ service.
Personally I have never used Western Union for a telegram, money transfer or any other service. If you visit their website http://westernunion.com they note that Western Union is ‘connecting families around the world’. And that ‘Western Union helps you provide for your loved ones almost anywhere in the world. Whether it’s for education, healthcare or groceries, we offer Consumer-to-Consumer Money-Transfer Services to get resources to members of your family quickly.’
A publicly traded stock (WU on the NYSE is trading at under $ 18.00/share), just yesterday Western Union announced that it had its Expanded Payment Suite with Western Union Small Business Payments Targeting Small to Medium Sized Businesses although there were no other specifics. In fact, Western Union has a number of branded payment services that are offered through a network of ‘approximately 485,000 agent locations in 200 countries and territories’. In 2010, The Western Union Company completed 214 million consumer-to-consumer transactions worldwide, moving $76 billion of principal between consumers, and 405 million business payments.
On December 1st WU restarted its singing telegram business http://wu-singingtelegram.com now executed as your own personal mashup duet with a choice of famous singers. At the moment it is free but it is slated to cost $ 2 or $ 3 beginning in January.
I think Western Union may offer an object lesson in morphing a dying business and finding ways to not only keep it relevant, but have it thrive. Agree or disagree?
My reaction was – who knew? Did you?
Last night as we traveled back from the airport I was hungry and decided to order a small pizza. There’s a place www.PlanetPizza.com that makes good pizza near to our house. On their website they always have coupons for discounts and we use them nearly every time we go there. However on the road without a printer we were unable to print one out and get a discount on whatever might have been available. Unfortunately Planet Pizza like most local retailers does not allow you to show the coupon on your mobile device in order to use a coupon to get a discount.
Small portable printers have been around for several years. Of course what might be considered small and portable are adjectives that are best viewed through the eyes of the people that will use them. If you’ve rented a car anytime in the last few years you are probably familiar with the car rental company’s ability to print out your receipt on the spot. The devices they use to process the transaction are held in their hand and the printer often clipped on a belt. The print quality is acceptable but nothing great. This is the kind of device that would be practical for people to carry around in a car or even a briefcase.
When I started looking around for a small portable personal printer I was surprised to find there were not many reasonable options. The products were either too large, too expensive or both. Just to be clear I am looking for something small that could be held in one hand, and something that would cost under $ 75.00. A website www.planon.com advertises that it offers their PrintStik product as ‘The World’s Smallest Mobile Printer’. And small it is but it also costs $ 199.00. So far I have been unable to find anything that meets my small criteria at any price close to $ 75.00.
The other thing to keep in mind is the ultimate obsolescence of portable printers. After all with mobile communication sharing using things like NFC (near field communications) on the horizon it should not be too long before the need to print out a coupon is non-existent. It’s already happening with airline boarding passes and the trend is clear that ink on paper is fast becoming a relic.
Do you have any thoughts on using a miniature portable printer? Would you use one if it were affordable and available?
I am not exactly certain when the implementation of supplemental airline fees such as bags, seat choices and food came to be standard operating procedure. I believe it was the food first, and then the bags and now seat choices. One thing is certain, supplemental fees have become paramount airline profitability and are not going away ever.
The United States is the undisputed champion when it comes to implementing fees for just about everything on airlines. It appears to me that now if you want the lowest cost seat on the plane it will be in the middle, in the back (probably last row) and the likelihood of finding space in the overhead bin for carry-on luggage nearly zero. Of course the airline then will be happy to check the bag for you – something that they are not yet charging for but I am betting they will eventually. Spirit Airlines even tried to charge $ 45 to use the overhead bin a couple of years ago.
As many people know there are even ‘opportunities’ to change your position in getting on the plane – an express lane option that gets you on the plane with the ‘Elite’ status and first-class passengers. This can secure your place in an overhead bin. As I now only take carry-on it is of particular significance to me personally, (I recently returned from 2 weeks in China and only took carry-on – you can do it too folks) but I am determined to not pay the airlines ANY additional fees to board the plane sooner.
Movies, food, internet access, legroom – there seem to be unlimited opportunities for the airlines to make that $ 150 or $ 200 one way fare increase by $ 25% or more. What’s more the additional fees are pure profit – they go straight to the bottom line.
The worst thing is that there is nothing people can do about it. The airlines have not yet begun to charge for pillows and blankets but you can bet they have discussed those ideas. Changing a flight has resulted in additional fees for several years, but now even if you are stand-by for an open seat airlines are beginning to charge a fee.
What’s left? Well my associate and I were joking about charging for bathroom access on planes. And then it was not so funny since what’s to stop them? Once price for #1 and another for #2? It seems to me that if a fee can be imagined it’s not far from being implemented.
Air travel today in the U.S. (and don’t think the rest of the world isn’t taking notes) is nothing more than a flying bus in the air.
Do you have any other odd airline fees that you’ve been charged?