Given Starbucks’ news that it’s closing most of its Australian branches, it was amusing to read Joel Spolsky’s piece on Starbucks and their sales techniques.

I’ve got my own opinions of Starbucks’ product, but I’m not a coffee drinker anyway. Ultimately I think the analysts are right: Starbucks misread the market. Most Australians simply aren’t interested in the bewildering variety of flavours offered to North American customers.

Also an interesting read, in the business pages last Saturday: Aldi’s simple recipe for success. Seems Aldi are doing a bit better with their Australian expansion. But I just love the bit about the two Albrecht brothers deciding to do their own thing, and how they determined where each would trade. They used the standard sibling method:

They got a map of Germany. One of the brothers drew a line and the other had to choose which part of the country he would take.

Dropped through Myer last Sunday (last day of their stocktake sale) to see if they had any nice work shirts or ties on special. I hate clothes shopping, but discounts numb the pain.

Saw a shirt I thought looked all right. Special price: $29.95. Pelaco, okay brand.

Take to counter. Extra super discount: rings up for $12.50.

This time, I win.

That cult show, the one I’ve liked for 30+ years. I think it’s really gone mainstream.

Nice touch the ads being on phone booths, too. Not quite as well done as the Get Smart ones though.

Shopping at an IGA Supermarket near me is a bit like stepping back in time.

The cash registers don’t have the full colour screens like in Coles and Safeway.

But the shelves do have those electronic price tags that were all the rage in the early-noughties at places like K-Mart, before they realised that they end up putting paper signs up to highlight the specials anyway.

What really grabbed me is that IGA stocks products that have disappeared from Coles and Safeway. Like that AGB brand garlic bread I used to buy all the time. Probably not authentic (AGB stands for “Australian Garlic Bread”), but delicious. And the product that seems to come and go in availability: recycled tissues. I’ll take the opportunity to stock up, in case they disappear again.

In Bentleigh, a brand new shiny IGA just opened in the new arcade. The sign on the arcade claims it to be “Bentleigh Shopping Centre” — something of a misnomer, since the whole street could quite reasonably claim that name.

The receipt from the brand new shiny IGA claims it to be “West Bentleigh” — a suburb that doesn’t exist (west of Bentleigh is East Brighton, daaaaahling) and besides, it’s only about 200 metres from the Bentleigh Post Office, and not much further from the railway station. It’s about as central to Bentleigh as you can get.

But the prices and range seemed okay, so if it’s convenient, I’ll shop there again.

Glad it wasn’t me that this happened to. One can understand the frustration which gets people taking flying kicks at the machine, trying to rock it on its base to get the purchase out.

My sister and her family are moving from gentrified East Brighton to the wilds of Cheltenham. They bought a house there on a huge block of land, with a pool in the backyard. They don’t expect to keep the pool (what, in this day and age, and with Waves about 5 minutes’ walk away?) but hopefully we’ll get to have at least one Christmas pool party there.

So they had to sell their little place in East Brighton.

My sister has a lot of experience in marketing, and her husband Adrian had applied his architect’s touch to the renovation. A nice spot in a quiet street in a blue chip suburb, close to the shops and the tram (too far from the train for my liking, but oh well) meant if they played their cards right, it’d be a winner.

So they worked hard. Adrian put lots of finishing touches on the place over the last few weeks. My sister looked closely at the marketing options provided by the real estate agent, and tweaked them, as well as working out an incentive scheme for the agent. If they did well, there’d be a cash bonus. If they did really well, there’d be dinner at the Flower Drum.

I had to chuckle when I saw the ads for the place. Half the furniture had been hidden in the garage to make it look bigger and cleaner; every photo had all the lights blazing away; and despite the pictures being taken during a week of rain, the sky was miraculously blue. It looked terrific — but quite different to the house I knew.

The marketing went ahead. Web (of course), and adverts in selected editions of The Age and the local papers. Three times a week there was frantic cleaning in preparation for the Opens. But by the end, they were fairly happy that their demographic (the people looking for that type of property in that area) had been reached, and there did appear to be genuine interest.

Auction day came last Saturday, and my sister was on tenterhooks. Would people show up? Would they bid? Would it pass in?

I was nearby-ish, having brunch with friends, watching the phone for SMS updates as the auction progressed.

The bids started. The price went up. And up. And up.

At one point one of the bidders stopped bidding and burst into tears.

The price kept climbing.

When all was said and done, it was an outstanding result. Frankly, more than I’d have paid for it. 78% more than it had been bought for — though taking into account the cost of improvements, “only” about 47% profit in about three years.

It shows the value of having the renovation done by an architect and the campaign designed by a marketing expert!

Immediately after the auction, and before signing, the buyer was a little uneasy, and tried to negotiate for a couple of extras to be thrown in. Dishwasher? Yeah okay. That lovely (and expensive) plant in the backyard? No way! (Agent: Sorry, it’s an anniversary present.) What about those bookshelves? Pah, that’s our furniture. We’re taking it with us. (Agent: You know that’s just an Ikea Billy…)

Eventually everyone signed on the dotted line.

The agent was evidently so pleased she put two “Sold” stickers on the board.

And yes, she will get her Flower Drum dinner.

There was some discussion on this recently in the comments, and now it’s become reality: From tomorrow, most Australian credit cards will offer you the choice of using the PIN instead of signing, at most shops. Details on the Pen Or Pin web site.

Wouldn’t surprise me if it had been pushed by those retailers experimenting with self-serve checkouts, but it makes sense anyway, since it probably takes longer to find a pen and sign the slip than it does to enter a PIN, and half the time nobody checks the signature anyway. (Not that this change will fix that problem, since — for now — you’ll still be able to sign.)

I’m a St George Bank customer.

Given the proposed merger, it seems that soon I’ll be a Westpac customer, despite what Westpac management are saying.

During yesterday’s briefing, Ms Kelly was adamant the branch network would be maintained, saying even when a St George branch and a Westpac branch were side by side in the same street, they stay open.

C’mon, get real. It would be irresponsible of any bank’s management to do something like that. And remember what happened to the Bank of Melbourne? Yup, gobbled up by Westpac.

If management is at all competent, inefficient operation on that scale just doesn’t last in a commercial environment.

Amusingly, I went into the St George Collins St branch a month or two back to deposit a cheque. At the time they’d installed a ticket system for getting service with a teller. And had a bloke out the front showing people how to use the ticket machine. (Take a ticket for the desired transaction, wait for your number to be called up.)

The guy was so enthusiastic that he pulled a ticket out of the machine for me as I walked in the door.

But I was depositing a cheque, so I didn’t need a ticket — I’d use the fast deposit envelope and box.

I went off to fill in my envelope, and he was left standing with the extraneous ticket.

Next time I went in there, he was gone.