Kevin Harrington // marketing // blog

It seems every business needs a strap line. Many of these strap lines seem to sit quite naturally with the brand but some really don't.

I spotted this one on the back of a van today, "National Clamps...we care." All I could do was laugh. The thought of wheel clampers caring does seem a bit incongruous.

They have brand synergy! And on their website they follow the "we care" message on. This is alongside the statement, "Failure to pay after the 28 days will result in a County Court Summons and a subsequent appearance. You the driver may not be the registered keeper that doesn't matter as the owner's vehicle committed the trespass and damages are pursued from them." (Incidentally I'm not sure that statement makes sense.)

National Clamps have hit the news before and details are on the BBC website.

Labels: brand, message, National Clamps, strap line, synergy, wheel clampers, wheel clamps

I could not prove the point but I just felt that The Labour Party, New Labour, spent most of their time legislating to get things in the order they wanted. In the world of carrots and sticks this would be the stick.

Then I tripped over a great little quiz about law on the BBC website. One of the questions asked was, "How many Acts of Parliament have been passed since 1801, based on estimates calculated by House of Commons researchers?" The answers is 3,679, but that is only a best guess. Nobody is quite sure.

So, how many have been passed by Labour since it came to power in 1997? The answer is a truly staggering 460. Put another way that is 12% of all legislation since the 1801 Act of Union.

Yes, you can feel the stick now can't you?

Labels: Acts of Parliament, BBC, carrot and stick, Labour, Labour Party, legislation, New Labour, quiz

Yes, it is true, George Wimpey house sales could be a lot quicker if they sent details to potential customers.

I've been trying to get some simple details from George Wimpey since January and it is now 9 March. I've sent more than 4 emails as well.

More details on this story will be here soon.

And here, posted on 6 April 2008, is an update. After posting the three paragraphs above, the business development director for George Wimpey emailed me. In fact he emailed within an hour of posting. I guess he uses Google Alerts to monitor internet mentions of his business. He seemed a nice guy and very genuine. It still took another couple of weeks before any details arrived.

It is interesting how a sincere reply/apology does go a long way to recovering a situation.

Anyway, for those that have asked me, I'm not about to buy one of these houses. They look fine but they are not for me. One reason is garden size. But there are other reasons as well.

Labels: George Wimpey, house sales, sales, service