Coffee shop

The video talks about the coffee shop world in UK, since the coffee shop brands took off in the 1990s and people demonstrated their caffeinated delight. This aims to discover how the nation became crazy about coffee, and how the brands compete with each other 

 

According to a research, the first wave of coffee appeared in the early 20th century, the invention of the instant coffee and rise to coffee as a consumer goods to the public market. 

Nowadays, people try to know more about coffee production, makes drink coffee become a pleasant experience rather than a commodity. We can see it that in order to make a perfect cup of coffee drinks, coffee beans way of planting, picking, baking and making has been regarded as important working procedure. 

In UK, there are three main cafes that most popular which are Starbuck, COSTA and NERO. They have their own coffee barista who are skilful to use tools and equipments, in order to produce the most captious coffee connoisseur also accept. For independent cafe, has a skilled barista is the key. And also these skills are the main reasons to barista for the consumer to bring from bean to process a variety of choice.  

Britain’s coffee shop experiences a long history, they provide the space for conversation and consumption. At present, the coffee shop in the UK high street can be seen everywhere and the café now become an important part of city centre, they also be considered to push the economic growth. 

Now, the popularity of coffee illustrates that one of every 5 people patronise café every day, this is because of the rapid expansion of the global chain and other food retailers in the coffee market, such as McDonald’s McCafe, at the same time also there is a significant increase in the number of independent café, coffee market is very large, it is estimated that the number of British stores by 2020 could rise to more than 27,000. 

Until now, except those three coffee shop in the highest flight, but more and more independent café appear in the market,a notable increase in the number of visible professional coffee shop. For example, there are now several well-known boutique coffee shop in the UK like Monmouth, TAP Coffee, Nude,Kaffeine, Coffee Aroma, Prufrock, etc.,their each has own characteristics, tastes. It’s foreseeable that consumers will enjoy real good coffee.  

  

Misconduct of Royal Bank of Scotland

The royal Bank of Scotland used to be a famous Scottish institution, a bank with a prudent reputation. However, in October 2008, less than a ten years after Fred Goodwin replace succeed as chief executive, happens collapse only within few hours. RBS later lost their biggest profit in UK corporate history - 24 billion pounds - which damaged the bank's reputation for financial prudence and Scotland's image as a global financial centre.

This is a national catastrophe for all the people, according to a survey that RBS which force UK on the edge f destruction still have 100 billion pounds of funds “black hole”, cause the huge holes is crime and illegal activities which in the field of “big five” , part includes: improper sales of payment protection and insurance of financial products ; to deceive investors and let them inject 12 billion pounds before the financial crisis in 2008; to manipulate the foreign exchange market whose daily amount of 3 trillion pounds.

Even in the face of the bankruptcy and British government to spend 45.5 billion pounds a year after the rescue, the Royal Bank of Scotland as not been successful transformation, this makes British public disappointed. the British paid a heavy price that they cannot reward from that 45.5 billion bailout money no matter what happens.

Inside the bank, this is chocking because of the illegal action of the government and regulators allowed Bankers. In the context of the allegations, the RBS seems will face huge fines in the next few years. these fines are derived from the results of the financial crisis triggered aeries of changes due to misconduct.

To be Honest, the early years of foreign exchange regulation is very loose so that lead to a lot of inappropriate behavior in the industry, Now these behaviors are slowly dug out and banned, but also because they violate the industry regulators given the "customer first" guidelines, therefore they are fined. now I understand that we learn Business Ethics this module is necessary to remind ourselves in the future work do not do something contrary to morality.  

Lehman Brother‘s failure

By watching the last days of Lehman Brothers, the film is about the “last days of Lehman Brothers” for three days from Friday, September 12 to Sunday, September 14, 2008. The main story is that US treasury Secretary Hank Paulson called several of America’s largest investment bank CEOs to come up with an idea to save Lehman Brothers in three days. While the Lehman Brothers CEO Dick Fuld was dying to try to keep the bank, however, Lehman Brothers was unable to escape the fate of collapse.

Facing the company’s risk in 2007 and 2008, this is really bad enough that Fuld and his flattering colleagues face repeated warnings, but always been blinded by his arrogance eyes. The reason for the outbreak of the crisis is the Wall Street investment bankers every day rash behavior. But we will find it very strange, why the Fed and the Ministry of Finance does not save Lehman Brothers, when Lehman Brothers was in a crisis, due to their company had too much junk assets, no giants wanted to take acquisition, and also Barclays were cancelled because of the UK’s board resolution institution. Investment bank is not owned by the Federal Reserve, Lehman Brothers cannot get the Fed’s direct funds. Although the Fed has provided that, in exceptional circumstances, if there is proof that a bank is unable to find borrowers, the Fed can help the bank register capital, but in advance is the bank to have sufficient assets to mortgage, it is clear that Lehman's garbage assets do not meet this requirement.

On 2008 September 14, Sunday evening, Lehman Brothers filed for bankruptcy, the one who hundred and fifty years of history of Wall Street investment bank collapsed , which is widely regarded as the turning point of financial tsunami in 2008, this is the biggest bankruptcy in US history, caused a great panic and the international monetary market freeze.

In the final, when always conceit of Dick Fuld finally accept the irrevocable reality, makes me think of what ishikawa tetsuya said in “ How I under Caused the credit crunch” : the real victim is not me, but who was not involved in the gamble but ordinary being who not fear suffer.      

Inside Job

The documentary starts with Iceland’s financial crisis, the film invited a lot of celebrities in the financial sector, among them are Wall Street bank executives, Federal Reserve members and other US financial regulators and so on. With an approachable attitude expounds the cause and effect of financial crisis to audience.

From the financial engineering point of view, how the crisis form? The United States before the financial crisis to take a "multiple long" regulatory system, multiple refers to the federal and the states are entitled to financial supervision, financial institution regulatory functions. This kind of specialized division of labor and multiple regulatory mechanisms in the United States has been the object of many countries to follow. The system in liberal dominated American do support the great prosperity in the United States, but there is no denying that the system does make US economic order extremely out of control.

‘inside job’ is put forward under the condition of lack of regulation, greedy Wall Street designed a money encirclement game one by one, and eventually led to the crisis. But greed is not illegal, the nature of capitalism cause Wall Street always be greedy.

The real culprit, it is the separation of powers and responsibilities. Another means the insurance of decision and debt capital providers were divided by Wall Street. Banks determinate whether loans to individuals. And then Wall Street put these debts sold to investment banks. Investment banks resolve the debt, enhance and sold to individual investors.

Second culprit is the issue of pricing mechanism, also refers to the model has assume error. The pricing in the first step would be wrong, in fact, the biggest beneficiaries are those who have no money to buy a house, can loan money to buy a house of the poor, and low interest rates and the society as a whole, the biggest loss are investors in the last. But buyers are all Americans, and investors have a lot other foreign people, so, for the United States, Wall Street did a good thing.

Another thing, the problem of bank executive compensation. Compensation includes salary and bonus and link up with enterprise operating performance. The legislature has no evidence to limit an industry practitioner to pay, because it is based on their high profits. What they should do is limit illegal business behavior, as well as conflicts of interest which could lead to crisis.

Churchill proposed that there no eternal friends, only permanent interests. The words are appropriate in this documentary, everything is in order to maximize the pursuit of personal interest. Finally, there seem be not much significance to say economic problems which stand on the moral side. No matter what human nature is good or evil, when desire swelling should tighten our own heart.

   

KFC’S Future

In modern society that develops with fast speed, everything seems has quick rhythmicity. In UK, fast food is a big business, such as for business man, KFC should be one of the chosen targets of fast food for lunch.

Kentucky Fried Chicken(KFC) is a fast food restaurant chain that specializes in fired chicken and distributed in global with annual turnover of 23 billion business, it’s the world second largest restaurant chain after McDonald’s. KFC aims to spread in every town of UK, such as in Newcastle there is at least one store in city centre and other stores in remote areas. In customer’s eyes, people have different opinion in KFC, some people like it, some people not. In my opinion, like it because tastes of fried chicken make me happy especially with soft drink, on the other side, people dislike it may because unhealthy problem and may affect body weight.

KFC plans to make changes because there is a potential competition among brands, at least in UK food market if they didn’t change they may face to death, therefore, evolving with customer’s expectations is quite important to avoid falling behind.

The video demonstrates that the inspectors could check any stores around UK, he is not satisfied with performance, he seems be restrict and serious-minded when examining which makes me surprised. And then that store quickly under correction, when inspector came back three weeks later, they got 81+ moves up 33 which is much better, it shows that KFC could have the ability to make whole performances better if they earnest working.

A new product called Barbecue Pulled Chicken comes out, the product’s main topic aims to be a health and low calorie idea, it experiences several links and agreed to launch in final. the first trail place is in Scotland, however, the first coming out day seems not good, customers not would like to try the new product in store, even though I met the situation, I will not be easy to try it what is a never known tastes, people have their own habits on prefer products. To my way of thinking, the new product has less promotion to let customers know what it is, it is not enough to see the pictures on posters, customers couldn’t feel the attractiveness to change their mind, so stand on the side of marketing, it should reinforce on propagandize. Luckily, good products deserve to be sole well, once have a try on the barbecue pulled chicken, people will like it, it’s good result for all staffs of KFC and it’s a good future to them.

        

JOHN LEWIS TRADE CRISIS

As we all know, john Lewis is the biggest and most comprehensive shopping mall in UK, with a history of 138 years, during which has great performance. By now, John Lewis has opened 25 branches in whole United Kingdom, and there are 40,000 employees and 500,000 kinds of goods for sale in John Lewis. Their special offer includes fashion, cosmetics, children’s clothes and furniture, which with good quality and give a feeling of ‘home’.

As their employees said about the marketing strategy that the company is not owned by shareholders, it is also to be owned by its staff, therefore, staffs would will be more hard working due to each person has stock in John Lewis, it really arouses the enthusiasm of the staff.

In Europe countries, Christmas is the most important festival to celebrate. During that period of time, three quarters of profits are from Christmas, each shopping mall will exert the utmost effort to propagandize Christmas. Each year, before the Christmas coming, there will a lot of goods need to buy of every family, such as Christmas gifts, new furniture, clothes and so on which all meet the needs of customers. John Lewis conduct great promotion for consumers to confirm the requirements of consumers, but it is ‘never knowingly undersold’ to reduce behind the scenes.

John Lewis as a chain of department stores in Great Britain,its customers belong to the asset class, however, for almost people the prices may not be accepted by them. As a report says there is 11.6% down last year and 5% down budget, in special the home-wares in recession.

In John Lewis, the marketing task is to persuade people to spend all their money and time in the shopping mall. However, the profits seem going down, in order to save the situation. during the Christmas period, face to the competitive market, which can differentiate itself form their competitors. John Lewis will provide campaigns and produce advertisement according to the festivals and the local customs. Such as Christmas advertisement, it usually talks about a touching story which give people with resonance.

In conclusion, as a customer and a student, I like John Lewis quite well, but I well buy their goods depends on my economic ability.

1929 Great Depression

On October 1929, thousands of banks happened terrify dropping that share price plummet on the New York stock exchange. This sharply crash shocked all investors. Investors desired to know what’s going on of their stocks. The big crash seems to make shareholders in the depth of despair.

If consider the basic reasons to cause the 1929 financial crisis, here are scholars who famous for their analysis. 1. Christina Romer, chair of the council of Economic Adviser. She talks about the reasons of economic crisis, after stock disaster, a sharp fall in the number of people of consumer durable goods, for the future uncertainty of panic rise, this strike is devastating the economy.

2. Ben Bernanke, a chair of the Federal Reserve. Present a macro research to observe from the international capital system. He thought that the origin of the depression is involuntary of monetary tightening, in special problem is the gold standard, when the financial tsunami comes out, the lower speed of breaking away from gold standard countries will experience more serious monetary tightening, and then leads to hopeless recovery.

3. Milton Friedman and Anna Schwartz, who in 1976 the journal of the “American Monetary History” won the Noble prize. They think the Federal Reserve have four mistakes: First, in 1929 to raise interest rates leads the economy into recession, the stock market crashed. Second, in 1931 to raise interest rates to avoid stacks against the dollar, but have huge damage on Entity banks. Third, at the end of 1932 to raise interest again, and also result in U.S finance into recession once again. In the end, there is no effect of any lender of last resort.
Stock market is just like a zero-sum game, there are people make money and also people lose money.  Profit growth in the name of the stock market does not bring any productivity growth directly. But the stock market is not production activities, it’s productivity distribution activities, essentially by the optimal allocation can achieve productivity growth.

If in understandable languages, the stock price increase too much, it is crazy that all people who want to buy or has abilities to buy have been buying. One point that big players found there won’t have someone to take over their chips, therefore, happen to coincide to rob finally pouring a little liquidity.

The content of the book 1929 big crash, economic strength and political insight appear negative correlation. Agent of rescue operations has never been paying more attention to for a long time, even though this means to interfere with the orderly life and interests of the eyes. Someone want to do immediate interests but advocating do nothing, even if it means serious problems will happen in the future. This aspect, the threat of capitalism which they are facing to is they clearing know the bad situation, and will continue to deteriorate, however indicate that is basic “health”.