Last April, on a Sunday, we took one of our “nowhere” drives. My husband was quietly driving along a back road. I was occupied in the front passenger seat watching the scenery.
I noticed out of the corner of my eye that my husband was struggling to look out of my window. This frightened me, since his eyes should be on the road in front of him. I asked him what he was looking at out of the windows, and he quietly replied, “Nothing.”
After a few minutes, I looked over at my husband and noticed a tear running down his cheek. I asked him what was wrong. This time he told me, “I was just thinking about Pop and a story he had once told me.” It had something to do with Pop, his friend from childhood, and I wanted to know the story, so I asked him to share it with me.
He said, “When I was 8 years old, Pop and I were out fishing and he told me that the pine trees know when it is Easter.”
I have no idea what he meant by that, so I pressed him for more information.
He continued on… “The pine trees start their new growth in the weeks before Easter because spring is drawing near. If you look at the tops of the pine trees, you will see the yellow shoots. As the days get closer to Easter Sunday, the tallest shoot will branch off and form a cross. By the time Easter Sunday comes around, you will see that most of the pine trees will have small yellow crosses on all of the tallest shoots.”
I turned to look out of the window and I couldn't believe my eyes. It was a week before Easter, and you could see all of the trees with the tall yellow shoots stretching to the sky.
The tallest ones shone in the sunlight like rows of tiny golden crosses. May you find your Easter season filled with beautiful golden crosses!
The power of effective marketing has a long history. In the 19th century, a new product, soap, became available to everyone in England at a low price. Every British soap producer faced fierce competition. Their answer was to focus on promotion-and to come up with attractive visuals, catchy slogans and competitions to increase sales. Yet it can all very easily go wrong.
However clever the advertisement is, a product that nobody wants is not going to sell. In the motor industry there are stories of products that the public simply did not want. In 1957, Ford introduced a new model, Edsel. Following an investment of $400 million, the company sold only 25 percent of the cars they produced and lost $350 million. Perhaps Ford's biggest mistake was to misjudge the demand from the American public. America had just entered an economic recession（衰退）, so the last thing people wanted was a large，expensive car that used a lot of fuel.
On special promotions, companies may underestimate demand and spend a lot more than they budgeted for. A classic case is that of Hoover，a vacuum（真空的）cleaner company，which offered two free air tickets to anyone who bought a vacuum cleaner for more than one hundred pounds. The tickets cost far more than the appliance. Sales increased 30% but the cost of the promotion was massive. The company lost over £40 million and in the end it was put up for sale.
Customers may find a different meaning in publicity than the promoters intended. Names, symbols and even colors are all possible danger areas. Pepsi Cola made an enormous mistake in some regions in changing the color of its vending machines to light blue, a color associated with death.
The message for successful marketing companies is never to make assumptions about your target audience. Otherwise, even creative, memorable promotion can go disastrously wrong!
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Travel is one of the most exciting experiences a human being can have.Imagine how the Italian traveler Marco Polo must have felt when he found himself on Chinese soil, seeing a way of life quite different from what he'd seen before.And how marvelous(了不起的) it must have been to listen to Zhang Qian when he returned to China from his journey through Central Asia and West Asia！His brain must have been packed with everything he'd seen and heard, leading to the founding of the Silk Road.
Some people have traveled all over the world, and travel is a way of life for them.They perhaps know what to expect before they travel.That's why the best travel is the first one.Imagine a person who has always wanted to travel to the United States.Of course, he has probably seen the Statue of Liberty a thousand times on TV, and the White House, and all the other famous sights.But nothing would compare to the thrill of looking out of the cabin window(舷窗) as the plane lands, watching the buildings and streets of the real America come into view.
Although travel is often just for recreation, it's also educational.We may not know that we are getting an education, but we still are.
We're learning every day：new words in a new language, new people, and new ways of life.But this learning takes place in the school of the world, not the classroom.One of the lessons we learn is undoubtedly a moral one.As we get to know foreign places, we come to understand that there are many different ways to live, and that the way we live isn't necessarily the best.The British politician Benjamin Disraeli summed this up well when he said, "Travel teaches toleration."
The Adventures of Amilya Rose: The Lie
By Chavonne D. Stewart, Jasmine Mills, published in 2014
Enter for a chance to win a copy of the book. It is the first book in a surprising series of children's books. That's fun and exciting and teaches kids valuable lessons.
Chester and Gus
By Cammie McGoven, published in 2017
Chester has always wanted to become a service dog. When he fails his certification test, though, it seems that dream might never come true－until a family adopts him to be a companion for their ten-year-old son, Gus. But Gus acts so differently from anyone Chester has ever met. He never wants to pet Chester. Chester's not sure how to help Gus, but he's determined to figure it out and show he's the right dog for the job.
Invisible Emmie
By Terri Libenson, published in 2017
The novel tells the story of two totally different little girls in a class — quiet, shy and artistic Emmie and popular, outgoing, athletic Katie — and how their lives unexpectedly connected one day, when an embarrassing note falls into the wrong hands. Emmie eventually learns to speak up for herself, realizing that being social isn't as impossible as she thought.
Ocean Meets Sky
By Terry Fan, Eric Fan, published in 2018
"Young readers will be attracted." — The Washington Post.
Finn lives by the sea and the sea lives by him. Every time he looks out of his window, it's a constant reminder of the stories that his grandfather told him about the place where the ocean meets the sky. Finn's grandfather has gone but Finn knows the perfect way to honor him. He'll build his own ship and sail out to find this magical place himself! And when he arrives, maybe he'll find something he didn't know he was looking for.
