Go John Caroll Blue Streaks!

In what was dubbed one of the most exciting and meaningful division III football games this season, the No. 1 Mount Union Purple Raiders narrowly defeated the No. 9 John Carroll Blue Streaks in front of a sell-out crowd of 8,104 at Mount Union Stadium, 42-34.

Both teams came into the game with undefeated records of 9-0, including 8-0 records in Ohio Athletic Conference play. The Blue Streaks and Purple Raiders also came into the game with the first and second ranked defenses in the nation, respectively. While the game didn't turn out to be a defensive showdown, it certainly lived up to the hype.

"Mount played very well, you have to give all the credit to them," said head coach Tom Arth. "I'm proud of our guys, I'm proud of the way they fought, I'm proud of the way they never gave up. They kept believing, but unfortunately we came up just a little bit short and that falls on me."
         
Myers, a Cleveland St. Ignatius alum, finished the game 31-56 with 451 yards, two touchdowns and two interceptions. The junior quarterback also showed tremendous poise throughout the game, yet acknowledged that there is room for improvement from this game.

With the loss, the Blue Streaks will not enter the postseason as OAC Champions, but will likely earn an at-large berth. While players and coaches alike expressed disappointment, they also understand that the road doesn't end here.
         
"I've been telling you guys all year, it's a special group," said Arth. "Nothing has changed. They're still a special group. These guys have hearts like you wouldn't believe. They're confident, they have a lot of believe in themselves … They're going to come back, they're going to bounce back and this game's going to make us stronger. I believe that with my whole heart."

Thomas Edward Arth (b. May 11, 1981), coach and former player, currently the head coach of the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga. He was head football coach at John Carroll University from 2013 to 2016. Arth was QB at Saint Ignatius High School in Cleveland and at John Carroll University, he started for four years at quarterback, and set 18 John Carroll football records.

Brand Audit

Brand Recipe for Success

 

Just as any healthy firm reviews its financial health in terms of value, it is critical to audit your brand. Such an audit will not as well-defined as generally accepted accounting principles (GAAP) or the formal requirements of publicly traded companies. A thorough evaluation of your brand is necessary and requires a close examination of all ingredients. Here’s a recipe:       

Start with a pinch of Strategy - Look at your business, marketing plans, brand positioning, creative briefs (internal and agency) and media plans.

A generous amounts of Research - Positioning, brand asset studies, brand equity measurement (awareness, preference, usage, value, accessibility, relevance, differentiation, vitality, emotional connection, loyalty, associations, personality). Concept testing and customer recall & recognition. Mine big data in social media and inbound marketing for clues. Leverage research to better evaluate strategy. Carefully assess brand asset, equity, positioning research. Include qualitative and quantitative initiatives. This will help you deliver your unique flavor.

Season with external information - External forces will always have an impact on your brand. Review competitors’ press releases, advertising and promotion. Read industry analyst reports. Solicit and learn from customers, business partners, marketing vendor relationships, shareholders, investors, key customer segments/prospects, associations and trade groups.

A dash of Communications - Presentation will help to assure your brand is appetizing. Advertising and promotion materials; brand marketing elements: pricing, packaging, merchandising, distribution, direct marketing, sponsorships, flagship stores, etc.; public relations: press kits, press releases, sales collateral materials, internal communications, business cards, web site, employee training programs, employee orientation, manager training and sales force training.

Just a taste of Internal Ambassadors - Interview corporate officer, marketing employees, sales representatives, customer service personnel, front line customer contacts and general employees. These people are among the most critical brand ambassadors you have.

Human resources - The kitchen needs careful cooks with the ability to function as a team with a shared vision. The utensils of proper alignment might be organization charts, recruiting criteria, competencies/assessments, succession planning, resource allocation, systems/processes. The right people make all the difference in putting it all together.

Make sure you organize and manage all ingredients. You have what you need to assure optimal brand equity. Pay attention to components. They come together (stir, simmer, blend) for optimal value. Repeat as needed.

Amazing Grace

 

Bellefontaine Cemetery visit on November 8, 2013

87,000 souls are part of the legacy of this place in St. Louis and the mosaic it illustrates is a composition of American culture. Senators, Governors, Mayors, Steamboat Captains and Civil War Officers are among those who find their final resting place at Bellefontaine Cemetery, which was founded in 1849. It was the first rural cemetery back in the day. (It now enjoys an endowment of more than $90 Million. So it will be around for a while.)

Richard Lay, Vice President Customer Relations is happy to accommodate our group of docents from the Lauemeier Sculture Park with a guided tour that includes remarkable highlights. We visited the magnificent tomb of Adolphus Busch (which looks more like a cathedral than a burial plot). We visit the monument to General William Clark (of Lewis & Clark fame). The Wainwright Building downtown is an architectural treasure but Bellefontaine has a memorial to Wainwright that also has Louis Sullivan touches. Richard Lay assures us that the Lemp gravesite is not haunted. “Why would ghosts bother with this place? No-one to disturb, here,” he reasons.

Clearly, the story threats that weave their way through such a place are incredible and would indeed create a tapestry of our region and our nation.

 

Laumeier Docent Group at Lemp Tomb (l to r) : Front row, Jeanette Wamser, Tony Vonder Haar, Pamela Dern, Sari Frieden, Clara Coleman, Wes Morgan. Back row - Barb Flunker, Holly Goldfarb, Shelia Hoffmeister, Katy Mike Smaistrla, Maureen Jennings, Jahn Epstein, Ann Bauer, Marie Oberkirsch, Jennie Swanson

 

 

 

NOTES

 

The Wainwright building was commissioned by Ellis Wainwright, a St. Louis brewer and completed in the early 1890s. Wainwright needed office space to manage the St Louis Brewers Association. It was the second major commission for a tall building won by the Adler & Sullivan.

William Clark with Meriwether Lewis, from 1803 to 1806 led expedition across the Louisiana Purchase to the Pacific Ocean, and claimed the Pacific Northwest for the United States. He later served as governor of the Missouri Territory.

Colonel Adolphus Busch was the German-born co-founder of Anheuser-Busch with his father-in-law, Eberhard Anheuser. He died in 1913.

 

 

 

 

 

First: Assume a Can Opener…

Economists are familiar with the phrase assume a can opener. It comes from a joke most economists know by heart (in one version or another). The joke generally goes like this:

A physicist, a chemist and an economist are stranded on an island, with nothing to eat. A can of soup washes ashore.

The physicist says:  Let's smash the can open with a rock.

The chemist says: Let's build a fire and heat the can first.

The economist says: First: assume that we have a can-opener...

The stereotype that many economic models require unrealistic or absurd assumptions in order to obtain results is a harsh criticism and maybe a bad rap on those who are trying to get a handle on why world economies behave the way they do.

Okay, maybe the economists of the world from academia to business haven’t always been right. The fact is economic theory ranges broadly. Furthermore, study can be focused on microeconomics or macroeconomics. Microeconomics is generally the study of individuals and business decisions, macroeconomics looks at higher up country and government decisions.

Microeconomics considers decisions that businesses make regarding the allocation of resources and prices of goods and services. It takes into account taxes and regulations created by governments. Microeconomics focuses on supply-demand and other forces that determine the price levels in an economy (i.e. how a specific company can maximize production and capacity so it can lower prices and better compete).

Macroeconomics on the other hand, is the field of economics that studies the behavior of the economy as a whole and not just on specific companies, but entire industries and economies. This looks at economy-wide phenomena, such as GDP and how it is affected by changes in unemployment, national income, rate of growth, and price levels (i.e. how an increase/decrease in net exports will affect a nation's capital or how GDP would be affected by unemployment rate).

It has to start somewhere. So, I’m glad there are people willing to First: Assume a Can Opener.

Animation with Clay

Inspired by animation production workshops for children, SSD art instructor Dan Broadfield has been encouraging the kids at Neuwoehner High School to create figures, creatures and themes for animated stories. Dan was himself inspired by artist Maya Yonesho. Shown here: two angles on my own piece which I think would be fun to incorporate into an animation piece.

Storybook Forest

A funny memory. Once my mom took us motoring from our home (Lakewood) just West of Cleveland to this place in Western Pennsylvania called Storybook Forest. Four boys (Wes, Greg, Dan and Rob) and our sister Lynn. Our older brother wasn't with us so maybe we were ages 11, 9, 7, 6 and 5 as passengers when a cop pulled us over in Mom's shiny black 1967 Lincoln Continental going 100 miles and hour.* We arrived at Storybook Forest only to discover the place was closed. (Kind of like that National Lampoon vacation to Wally World when John Candy's character said "sorry folks the park's closed, the moose out front should have told ya.") They let us in to look around anyway.

* I was too young and not paying any attention but I think the cop was somewhat forgiving and reduced the ticket to something like 15 mph over the speed limit. My brother Greg may recall as he was always the navigator in the front seat on such trips.

Happy Autumnal Equinox

Today, our celebration of seasonal change is marked by adjusting daylight savings time on alarm clocks, pumpkin flavored lattes and Halloween candy on sale everywhere from convenience stores to the neighborhood grocery. Kind of makes you think doesn’t it? What will they be saying about us in 1,000 years?

The Fall Equinox on September 22, 2013, the halfway point between solstices when the sun crosses the equator and day and night are each about 12 hours long. The nearly equal 12 hours of light and darkness can be attributed to the Earth's lack of an axial tilt on the day of the equinox. (The word equinox is derived from the Latin words aequus, meaning equal, and nox, meaning night.) Just about 10 miles from the Gateway Arch in St. Louis, an ancient  civilization likely celebrated The Fall Equinox. Part of The Cahokia Mounds State Historic Site where the remains of the most sophisticated prehistoric native civilization north of Mexico are preserved. Woodhenge is a reconstruction of what is believed to be where a sun calendar marked the seasonal changes.

According to archaeological finds, the city of Cahokia was inhabited from about A.D. 700 to 1400. At its peak, from A.D. 1050 to 1200, the city covered nearly six square miles and 10,000 to 20,000 people lived here. Over 120 mounds were built over time, and most of the mounds were enlarged several times. Houses were arranged in rows and around open plazas, and vast agricultural fields lay outside the city.

The fate of the prehistoric Cahokians and their city is unknown, but the decline seems to have been gradual, beginning around the 1200s. By A.D. 1400 the site had been abandoned. Exactly where the people went or what tribes they became is yet to be determined.