Stansted airport group makes more money from car parks and shops than it does from aircraft fees.
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At any one time, Starbucks has about $1.8 billion loaded on to customers’ gift cards or its app. If Starbucks was a bank and you treated the gift cards as deposits, it would be in the top 10% of banks in the United States.
Foreign companies struggle in China because their jobs don’t always fit into the traditional notions of stable careers. So Starbucks found a creative solution to keep employees’ families happy, hosting “Partner Family Forums” in the cities of Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou and Chengdu, with over 1,000 families attending.
The Starbucks mobile ordering feature became so popular that baristas were unable to cope with the demand, wait times were longer, and the company reported that a ‘mid-teens percent’ of mobile orders went uncompleted. In short, it worsened the problem it was set up to solve.
In 2012, Starbucks baristas started to write the name of the customer on the side of their cups. Yes, a bit of extra hassle. But a more personal and memorable experience in return.
The Pratfall Effect states that people can demonstrate honesty by acknowledging a weakness. Stella applied this principle in 1982, before it had a name, with the iconic ‘Reassuringly Expensive’ campaign.
In 1972, Steve Jobs’ curiosity compelled him to take a calligraphy class at college, despite knowing it wouldn’t count towards his final degree. But this knowledge helped him create the Apple Mac’s slick, user-friendly typography – an integral part of its mass-market appeal.
According to the most commercially successful director of all time, “I always like to think of the audience when I am directing. Because I am the audience.”
When a company first releases shares, investors are unlikely to have much additional diagnostic information about the company’s performance. It turns out that NYSE companies with easy to pronounce names – i.e. more familiar to us – perform better than those whose names are hard to pronounce.
In Canada, cannabis sales are legal but retailers can’t display related products in advertising. So cannabis chain Stok’d created an ad campaign based around the neighbouring businesses of its stores that featured not-so-subtle nods to its address. “If you’re looking for the dopest nails in town, she says, you should visit NuNail beauty spa.” In store sales increased by 8% after the campaign was aired.
After Stranger Things featured Kate Bush’s song “Running Up That Hill,” she saw an immediate spike in listenership. Not only that, three years later listenership still remains elevated following this initial uptick.
Fitness app Strava has inadvertently become a platform for artistic expression. Strava Art has become a global movement, ever since users realised they could use the GPS tracking line to create unique drawings.
Streetlights reduce nighttime crime by 36% and reduce “serious offending” by 4%. This is roughly the same reduction in crime you would expect from a 10% increase in policing.
Employees of Stripe, the payments giant, initially needed to convince tech accelerators to use their platform. Rather than sending them an email, they’d sit and help them install the software of their apps in person.
The outstanding predictor of longevity isn’t diet or exercise – it’s patchy birth records. Introducing proper records in the late 19th century reduced by more than two-thirds the number of babies who would eventually seem to reach the age of 110. That suggests that, until recently, seven out of 10 apparent supercentenarians were, in fact, younger than claimed.