Laura Slatteryperuses the week in business
The Numbers
83 cent
- The cost of a share in Bank of Ireland after the close of the stock market last Monday and the price of Anglo Irish Bank's shares after Tuesday's close. Bank of Ireland shares were trading at a price of €14.67 and Anglo's at €14.40 when the credit crunch hit in August 2007.
$25 billion
- General Motors, Ford and Chrysler have the begging bowl out in Washington and they're looking for more than just coins for the toll booth.
QUOTE OF THE WEEK:
'All of you know that I have always, and will always, bleed purple.'
Internet royalty Jerry Yang tells Yahoo staff he will always remain purple (Yahoo's corporate colour) at heart, despite being forced by shareholder pressure to step down as chief executive of the company he co-founded.
GOOD WEEK
Flight attendants
Cabin crew do more than serve hot paninis and pose for steamy calendars: according to the Irish Air Accident Investigation Unit, a flight attendant found herself in the cockpit hot seat in January, helping to steer a Heathrow-bound passenger flight to safety at Shannon after the co-pilot suffered a mid-air breakdown. The Air Canada attendant, a qualified pilot, was temporarily promoted after the captain ordered his colleague to be handcuffed and dragged from his seat.
Australia
What better tonic could there be for the ailing Australian tourism industry than a €100 million epic movie blockbuster courtesy of Moulin Rouge director Baz Luhrmann (which premiered this week)? Having been hit by a sharp drop in visitors, Tourism Australia is investing A$50 million (€25 million) in an advertising campaign around the film. The country has in the past reaped the benefits of celluloid- based promotion: during the 1980s "shrimp on the barbie" campaign with Crocodile Dundee star Paul Hogan, international visitors doubled.
Taiwanese shoppers
Here's one to badger Brian Cowen about. Shoppers in Taiwan are to be given more than €80 each in redeemable vouchers that will be valid in shops, restaurants and supermarkets next year in a bid to boost consumer confidence and jumpstart the Taiwanese economy.
BAD WEEK
Retailers
In what the Guardiancheerily called a "bloodbath" on the high street, Woolworths is on sale for just £1 (€1.18), Dixons/ Currys owner DSG's market value fell to just 10 days' worth of its own sales, while Marks Spencer and Debenhams announced one-day and three-day "spectaculars" (or "guerrilla sales" as MS boss Stuart Rose used to call them), slashing prices in a valiant/desperate attempt to convince shoppers that a recession is no excuse for ignoring Christmas.
Open-plan offices
If the UK's Royal College of Art has its way, in a few decades' time the ageing workforce will dismiss open-plan offices as a turn-of-the-century fad. In a two-year research project, the architects discovered what most office workers already know: that while facilitating teamwork, open-plan offices neglect the fact that "knowledge work requires intense periods of deep concentration and thinking, often undertaken alone".
Newspapers
The Irish Timesis seeking up to 60 redundancies and Independent News Media is cutting 90 jobs at the London-based Independentand Independent on Sundaytitles, it confirmed this week. Meanwhile, the Financial Timesis losing 60 jobs, Trinity Mirror and Guardian Media Group are shutting editorial offices, and Associated Newspapers is also expected to swing the axe. Recession + housing collapse = lower job and property advertising revenue = losses.
