Friday, February 18, 2011

Wal-Mart To Expand To South Africa

In a bold but smart move to stay ahead of competitors, Wal-Mart, the world's bigger department store chain, is seeking to buy Massmart - a major retailer with 263 stores in South Africa and 25 stores in other sub-Saharan African countries including Mozambique, Swaziland and Namibia. Massmart owns chain stores such as Game and Macro.

Seeking to capitalize on Africa's economic growth, Wal-Mart has reportedly made an offer of $4.1 billion to buy 51 percent of the company, which will remain listed on the country’s stock exchange. If successful, Wal-Mart would become the first major international retailer to enter the South Africa market.

Wednesday, February 16, 2011

How To Get Business Credit Cards, Loans, and Lines

I've blogged about this organization before, but I've decided to mention them again as their free service can be very helpful to entrepreneurs in a down economy.

The National Institute of Business Credit is a non-profit organization and virtual educational resource that is using their web site at BusinessCredit.org to educate entrepreneurs about business credit. The web site offers free valuable guidance on how to qualify and apply for business loans, business credit cards, and business lines of credit. The first of its kind, the web site acts as an indispensable guide to both aspiring and established business owners.

Monday, February 14, 2011

Dr. Dre, Ludacris, and the HD Headphone Market

Billions of people worldwide listen to music every single day, and as of the past 5 years, many are listening through their iPods or other MP3 players. This has created an entirely new mainstream market of high-quality headphones. Previously, such headphones were only sold and marketed to people who worked and recorded in studios. Now, they are being marketed to anyone who loves music - specifically hip-hop music.

Several companies have emerged to take advantage of this lucrative market, and are selling high definition, high performance, studio quality headphones. A few have even paid big bucks to get major celebrities to endorse and co-brand them.

Tuesday, February 1, 2011

The Black Biz Hookup: Discounted Group Buying From Black-Owned Retailers

Following in the footsteps of Groupon and LivingSocial, a new group buying web site called the Black Biz Hookup has launched with merchant offerings of "Daily Deals" from local Black-owned businesses in major cities.

Instead of using call centers to get a backlog, the company has used a grassroots approach to signing up merchants similar to what Plum District implemented working the "Soccer Mom" referral circuit. They have a group of affiliates around the country acting as advocates for the website and signing up the business owners who grasp the concept.