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Business & Economics, Database Highlights & Trials

Happy Valentine’s with Euromonitor Passport!

Welcome to Spring Semester, business researchers!

We’re less than one week away from Valentine’s Day, and I thought it was a good time to share some interesting Valentine’s-themed nuggets of note our vendor has shared with us that will (hopefully) help you to fall in love with one of our favorite market research databases: Euromonitor Passport GMID!

First, the Dashboards in Euromonitor Passport GMID reveal that the US is the largest market in the world for chocolate confectionery.  Good news for chocolate lovers, but growth in this market has declined since 2009.

 

Secondly, Mars is the dominant player in the confectionery market after overtaking The Hershey Company in 2008 (I’m excited to see Lindt and Ferrero on this list, personally).

And finally, if jewelry is more your style this Valentine’s Day, new data available for Passport Industrial reveals that Tiffany’s is the largest producer of jewelry in the US.

Continue Reading

February 8, 2012 by
Political Science, Uncategorized

Deborah Tannen coming to St. Thomas

I love Deborah Tannen and she’s coming to UST. I have heard her speak; she’s an excellent speaker. And her writing is even better. St. Thomas Libraries have many of her books. I have copies of my own. Her analysis of the way men and women communicate and the way different parts of the country speak, just delights me. It all makes sense AND is backed up with data.  When New Yorkers trample all over your sentence, or you wait not too patiently for non-interrupters to finish their sentences, or your female boss gives you direction that you assume is a suggestion not a directive, the why all becomes clear in her books.

She will be speaking for the third annual Public Discourse Lecture, hosted by the College of Arts and Sciences and its Board of Advisors.

 The event will be at O’Shaughnessy Educational Center Auditorium Thursday, February 16, 2012 – Thursday, February 16, 2012 from 7:30 PM – 9:00 PM.  It’s free and open to the public.
February 6, 2012 by
Database Highlights & Trials, Political Science, Uncategorized

CIAO : What’s New, What’s Old, What’s Unique

ciao[columbia international affairs online] has unique content that every political scientist should love.

Unfortunately, most of it is not indexed by Summon because most of  it is not journal articles so you have to go into the database itself. It includes books! Well, really book chapters – seldom is the whole book included; some of the included journals are also just abstracts.  Sigh. Wait, wait that’s the bad news! The good news is there are case studies, working papers that are unique and there are ready-made course packs – faculty member are you seeing this?  In partnership with the Economist it has current videos, too.  The atlas has information you might find elsewhere in bits and pieces, but in ciao, it’s all in there (like Ragu) – politics AND economy AND organized for easy access. It includes analysis, background, structure and outlook for both the politics and the economy for each country. With handy maps that allow you to click on the country you care about.  Let me know what you think about ciao.

January 31, 2012 by
Political Science

Mountain of Books

Guy Laramee Book CarvingCool new art form. If you ever wondered what to do with your old books (and the library has told you we don’t want them) and you have talent, these should give you ideas.

You might notice how the book titles and the designs often match.

January 31, 2012 by
Business & Economics, Libraries, News & Events, Uncategorized

It’s baaaack: The PNC Christmas Price Index!

CPI

Did you know?  Each holiday season, your favorite UST business librarians anxiously await the release of one of our favorite traditions:the PNC “Christmas Price Index!”

The PNC CPI tracks how much it would cost to buy each of the 78 gifts in “The Twelve Days of Christmas.”  PNC has been doing this every year since 1984, so they really know their stuff.   For those of you who aren’t some of my amazing Finance students, this CPI is a play on the “Consumer Price Index,” which tracks the changes in price of goods and services like housing, clothing, food, and transportation that reflect American consumers’ spending habits.

PNC makes a fun website every year depicting their CPI and allowing us to discover the costs of each individual gift; this year we get to hop aboard the “Index Express” railway.  As we travel through “Fluctuation Farm,” “Inflation Station,” “Index Falls,” and “Percentage Peak” to hear how the golden rings, partridges in pear trees, ladies dancing, and more are faring in the markets.

CPI Express

And the results? The 2011 CPI increased by 3.5% over last year – to (drummers drumming please):

$24,263.18

The largest increases were for the poultry this year: the Two Turtle Doves (25%) the Partridge in the Pear Tree (14.2%), the Swans-a-Swimming (12.5%), and Geese-a-Laying (8%).  The Four Calling Birds were left out of this trend, with a 13.3% decrease. Four French Hens remained constant at $150, as did the price of Ladies Dancing ($6,294.03) and Lords-a-Leaping ($4766.70), although the dancers did get a large salary increase last year.  And, as some of you who follow the markets might predict, the cost of everyone’s perennial favorite, Five Golden Rings, is at $645 – a decrease of 0.8% from last year.

cpigraphic

If you do a Summon search on the Twelve Days of Christmas, there are nearly 73,000 items – which is an increase of over 325% from last year!  Included are thousands of books, videos, music, and more to help get you in a holiday spirit (and perhaps help you out of finals doldrums?) from some our favorite authors and artists.  Check them out!

Happy Holidays!

December 8, 2011 by
Business & Economics, New Materials

New Books!

Business librarians have been busily buying new books!

That’s certainly a tongue-twister, if I ever heard one.  The results are some great brain gymnastics, as well.

Here are a few recent arrivals:

Book Cover

The Accountant’s Guide to the Universe: Heaven and Hell by the Numbers

Dilbert meets Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy in this hilariously quirky book  about God “outsourcing Heaven and Hell” to an accounting firm.  A quick and fun read –  by the end, you’ll be amazed how much you’ve learned about finance and accounting.

Fixing the Game : Bubbles, Crashes, and what Capitalism can Learn from the NFL

What better way to learn than combining your favorite Sunday afternoon activity with your study of corporate management?  Author Roger Martin discusses how and what corporate leaders can learn from the NFL’s success, including everything from finance to customer loyalty.

Brand Champions: How Superheroes Bring Brands to Life

This is chock-full of great case studies showcasing the individuals within organizations who nurture and sustain brands, bringing them to lifethrough their everyday, superhero performances.

World 3.0 : Global Prosperity and How to Achieve It

“In World 3.0, Pankaj Ghemawat provides a fresh look at cross-border integration and its implications. He demonstrates why integration and regulation must be seen as complementary. And he offers great recommendations that should inspire all stakeholders in times of major global challenges. A must-read.”
–Pascal Lamy, Director-General of the World Trade Organization (WTO).

Interested in seeing more?  A list of this month’s newest business books is always available on the library homepage, or you can subscribe to it as an RSS feed.

Purchase recommendations are always welcome, as well – simply fill out this form!

October 8, 2011 by
Business & Economics, Database Highlights & Trials

TRIAL – Three Additional Collections in Emerald Management 175

The UST libraries have subscribed to Emerald Management 175 for over five years because of the access it provides to scholarly full text management and international management journal articles. Now for a limited time UST is putting on trial other collections in Emerald previously unavailable in our current subscription.

To search the additional collections, go to the main Emerald search page and conduct a keyword search.  From the results you may choose to look at all of the results or limit the hits within an individual collections.

emerald2

Emerald’s Business, Management and Economics eBook Series Collection
This collection contains over 400 volumes across multiple business and economic topics such as Management Science, Business Strategy and Organization Studies with new titles added regularly. The interface allows users to search through entire books or books on the chapter level. Many books and chapters are written from authors world-wide to ensure a global perspective.

Emerald Social Sciences eBook Series Collection
The Emerald Social Sciences eBook Series Collection extends the current Emerald business portfolio with high-profile international authorship and high quality cross-disciplinary research with over 240 volumes from over 35 book series titles in the fields of politics, psychology, sociology, health care and education.

Emerging Markets Case Studies Collection
Emerald Emerging Markets Case Studies is a new online collection of peer-reviewed case studies focusing on business decision making and management development throughout key global emerging markets written by case writers working in developing economies that offer local perspectives.

The trials end 11/5/11. Please get any comments or questions to Andrea Koeppe at arhudson@stthomas.edu.

October 6, 2011 by
Business & Economics, Database Highlights & Trials

TRIAL – AdData Reference

addatareference

Attention marketing researchers! Our trial for AdData Reference is live starting today.

AdData Reference provides facts, figures and insights into the 10,000+ leading brand advertisers in the U.S. It details each brand’s ad spending for the past 5 years, identifies target markets, relationships to parent companies, the brand’s different ad agencies, plus full contact information for key personnel. To log in, use your St Thomas email address to create an account.

Trial ends Oct. 31

Please send comments to Laura Hansen

September 29, 2011 by
Business & Economics, Charles J. Keffer Library, Database Highlights & Trials

Finding SWOT Analyses

swot-analysis-imageBusiness students often ask how to find SWOT (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, Threats) analyses of companies.   

SWOTs are very useful tools.  According to the  The Blackwell Encyclopedia of Management:

An acronym of strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats, SWOT analysis provides a simple but powerful tool for evaluating the strategic position of the firm. It is especially useful for senior executives undertaking a fundamental reappraisal of a business, in that it permits a free thinking environment, unencumbered by the constraints often imposed by a finance driven budgetary planning system

Did you know UST Libraries currently have two sources for ready-made SWOT analyses?

(you can also find both of these databases in our libraries’ A-Z list of Databases)

The SWOT analyses are always part of a company report.  Find them by searching for a company by name and clicking the “company report” radio button within Business Source Premier.

Find them by searching for your company within the “Companies” field.  Remember, most companies in Global OneSource are large, publicly traded corporations. Once you’ve identified your company among the search results (yours will usually be the one headquartered in the US, with a US stock listing), click on its name to open up a company profile.  There will be a menu on the left-hand side with a  link to the Strengths/Weaknesses analysis

refusa intl SWOT itself

Can’t find a SWOT?  Don’t panic.

A SWOT analysis is not difficult to make.   First grab a SWOT from Reference USA International (using the process outlined above), to use as a template.  Use Proquest Newsstand Complete, Mergent, and Business Source Premier to retrieve press releases and media articles on a company and its executives for the past twelve months.  (Focus on CEO, Chairman, and CFO interviews, new product releases, earnings releases, and stock analyst opinions on the industry or company.)    Within Business Source Premier, also look for a Datamonitor company profile.  If the company is public, go to their website or to Mergent Online–usually the “investors” or “company information” sections–to find the company’s SEC 10-K, 10-Q, and 14-A filings.

Using the information you’ve found, it should be fairly easy to make your own SWOT analysis of any company, public or private. 

(Look familiar?  This is a repost of a blog post we made in June of 2011.  The interfaces have changed a bit, so we decided it was time for an update.  If you already knew this, please pat yourself on the back for being a database guru!)

September 21, 2011 by
Business & Economics

Now I know why those birds are always so angry

Not only do they have to deal with smug and noisy pigs all day, but now they are being blamed for costing businesses over a billion dollars in lost wages because so many people fling them about while at work. I was immune to this craze for a very long time and therefore had a fleeting sense of superiority until I finally tried my hand at the game and because as addicted as everyone else.   However I know that I can curtail my new habit at least while I am at work.  And so now if you will excuse me I have a Facebook status to update.

September 15, 2011 by