Suzanne Ryan's Blog (7)

I have a rule that I can only watch Oprah if I work out at the same time. So I was watching the show & lifting weights early last month when she promoted the free KFC grilled chicken meal. That’s when I–and the rest of the planet–flooded the coupon download site and shut it down for hours. Too many people trying to print out coupons at the same time. That was just the beginning. The free meal offer proved so popular that franchises were running out of grilled chicken for paying customers.… Continue

I'm writing this as much to ask a question as to spout an opinion. I'm ready to be proven wrong. All the specialty food lists I'm on are emailing their Father's Day specials--regardless of whether it's the right target audience or not. In fact I'm betting that most of them hope their list is mostly made up of daughters and wives. Maybe they're right. I don't know who's on their list, do I? One clever company, however, seems to have thought about this too. They've carefully selected items kn… Continue

Ok…ouch…I’ve banged my head against the wall one too many times over this. I need to talk about it. Basically… …there’s a ton of information out there on how businesses can market themselves better. Everything from driving qualified traffic to websites to distributing press releases. When it comes to do-it-yourself marketing, the Internet’s got it covered. Not quite the same story when it comes to taking your marketing to the next level—i.e., working with a marketing pro to position yoursel… Continue

There’s something I noticed on some specialty food websites that I thought might be interesting to talk about. It’s the use of long, academic articles (often written by a passionate business owner) to give some background & history about their products. For example, the history of fish farming, the introduction of yams into North America, or analysis of French & Spanish olive oils. I think they have the right idea, on one level. Sometimes consumers want more information—and the more t… Continue

I've been reading all sorts of reports about how the specialty food industry is continuing to climb in the recession. Some even say the downturn has boosted gourmet food consumption. I breathed a sigh of relief when I heard that. After all--the specialty food sector is my bread & butter. Yet the news didn't come as a surprise. America's palate is becoming more refined. If we have to cut out restaurants and culinary travel vacations...darn it--we're going to make up for it somewhere else!… Continue

For 3 years now I’ve been growing purple asparagus at my organic community garden plot. The minute I saw it in the catalog I knew this was my kind of asparagus. It‘s tender & sweet –and you can eat it raw. I’ve never seen purple asparagus in stores—not even at roadside stands. Given the pricey-ness of regular asparagus in supermarkets, I’d imagine the rarer purple strain would cost twice as much. So I really prize my purple asparagus. Well, ok…maybe this year I took it for granted. I conf… Continue

I like to compare notes with friends and colleagues about how we use the Internet. Turns out what I thought were ingenious & idiosyncratic methods for finding product reviews is pretty much what everybody is doing For example, Amazon customer reviews & Ripoff Report are staples for me. I've even been known to type in the word scam or bogus next to a company's name in a Google search. That's my way of doing a criminal background check. :-) All joking aside--I'm apparently not alone in t… Continue