Posts Tagged ‘company’

365great Day 35: LUSH

laelene Posted in 365great,Tags: , , , , , , , , , , ,
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Learn more about 365great here.

365great challenge day 35: lushI first came across LUSH when I was studying abroad in England. It was love at first smell! I mean, so many of their amazing products look so good you just want to eat them. Plus, they smell lovely and they’re made from natural ingredients. Add to that the fresh and handmade factor and I was totally sold (in theory – I was still to cheap to actually buy anything, much as I wanted). After returning to the US, I sorely regretted not getting that charcoal face soap I’d been eyeing.

A few years later, I was thrilled when they finally opened up shop in the LA area! This time I finally got to use some of their products and it’s always so fun since it feels like something you could just cook up in your own kitchen. Lately I got into solid shampoos and of course, LUSH has those too. I’ve got a lovely bar of that at home that I’ve been using and it’s perfect for travel. LUSH is one of the earlier eco-friendly, socially responsible brands I’d heard of and it still retains a special place in my memories. Their products are pretty great!

Great ideas

laelene Posted in general blog,Tags: , , , , ,
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I’m pretty addicted to learning about great new things, which I’m currently doing as I read through the profiles of Fast Company’s Most Innovative Companies list for 2013. It never ceases to amaze me (and I should hope it never will) the cool things that are becoming realities and even commonplace in our lives. I love that we live in a world with such wonderful ideas. One of my recent favorites, which I wrote about before, is crowd-sourced, crowd-powered community marketplaces. I love how it empowers people to be their own micro-entrepreneurs and removes so many barriers to more traditional ways of doing things.

One in particular that I’ve learned to see in a new light is Airbnb – not only are they allowing anyone to rent out their space to bring in extra revenue, something else that has blossomed from their service is the availability of unique spaces. I mean, how else would you have gotten to stay in a repurposed jet or an igloo or a treehouse? These are the sorts of things that I only would have dreamed of previously, but now are an attainable reality. I find that truly breathtaking.

Another thing that I’m sure most other people are familiar with by now are those wearable bands (and other technology that is meant to monitor your day-to-day movement). There’s a quiet revolution building up in these gadgets, which at once are high-tech and high-fashion. While right now most of the applications are for health-related issues, I see a lot of potential here. So much data can be gathered about each and every one of us, which can be presented to us in meaningful ways: how active were you today? What places did you visit? How much time did you spend here or there, doing this or that? With each of those answers, we are empowered to understand our lives more and make better choices with that information. More lifestyle changes are coming!

Oh, and speaking of a change in how we do things – I’ve discovered Fleksy, which allows you to type without looking. Quite accurately too. How wonderful would it be to walk down the street and not have to look down at your device? To send out messages on your tablet while watching a show or even taking notes while keeping full eye contact with your professor? These are the kinds of things we’re used to with keyboards that give feedback via clicks and physical movement. Now we can do it on a completely flat screen without any feedback while typing! They’ve tested this on blind people with great success and us seeing folk do pretty well with it too. No more pudgy finger syndrome! Gotta love that. Let’s just hope that Apple actually lets them integrate this sort of technology into iOS, which they currently aren’t. AND, I hadn’t realized how intuitively I type with my thumbs without looking! Added bonus: this app makes you feel smarter. 😉

There are so many great things out in the world, constantly changing and upgrading and becoming even more awe-inspiring. Maybe instead of a photo a day blog, I should do a 365 great ideas blog. Then, I can share something I learned every single day (and that would encourage me to actually be consistently seeking new information). I might just have to do that…

DefaultCase: a case of an iPhone case

laelene Posted in general blog,Tags: , , , ,
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Many months ago, I came across this new company called DefaultCase, selling their iPhone cases for 1 cent + $3.99 processing.  For $4 each, it was a steal!  You see, rather than spend marketing budget on making all kinds of ads, they put much of it towards offering these cases for super cheap.  From there, I believe they were counting on word of mouth to get their brand going.

I thought about it for awhile and decided to get one for fun, even though I don’t even like phone covers.  They’re pretty cool, with a perforated design on the iPhone 4 models that allow the signal to get through (it’s even supposed to help with your reception, according to them).  I browsed their selection of colors and settled on a blue one.  One thing I noticed is that there are never any shots of a phone from the front when you look at a case.  I happen to want to know how much the lip may or may not protrude on that side.  Nevertheless, I decided it was cheap enough to be worth trying.  When it came, I was very excited.  They have a quirky sense of humor and included a love letter telling me how much they appreciated me for being an early adopter.  Fun times!

When I couldn’t figure out how to get the case off and cracked it trying, I emailed their customer service because part of their mission is to provide excellent support.  They were kind enough to mail me a new one, plus give me a free one of my choice.  This time I chose white.  Awesome, right?  Well, I was also interested in a purple and an orange one, so I asked about that and they said since they accidentally made some of the pink ones more of a purple color, they could send me one of those.  Orange was yet to be added and when it was, they gave me a sample too.  Talk about a deal!

They came through on their promise of great service and it’s something that more companies should strive towards, no matter what product or service they’re providing.

Quirky

laelene Posted in general blog,Tags: , , ,
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I created a Google group called “Opps Abound” to share all kinds of useful things I come across and today I decided to email about a site called Quirky.com.  It’s a site that allows you to participate in the invention process, whether you want to submit your own idea or just contribute to others.  You get rewarded for participating by getting credit for the amount of contribution you gave towards the development of a product.  That’s called % influence and that percentage determines how much you earn from the sales of the product once it’s finally complete.

It’s pretty cool because consumers can come up with the products they wish existed and tweak the details, from what material it’s made of, to what it’s called, to what features to include and exclude.  Plus, you get some kickback for helping out and how awesome does it feel to look at a product and be able to say, “I helped create that”?  I love that the inventing process has been reinvented here, and is a very crowd-sourced and social process now.

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