How to cure jetlag and make a billion dollars.

Those great moments of clarity when the timing, idea, product and marketing seem to distill upon your mind like spring dew are few and far between. When they happen, drop everything and start writing! Next don’t lose your notes! When Howard Schultz jumped on a plane to go see who was behind a little coffee shop called Starbucks, he had no idea what he would find. He sold house wares, what did he know about coffee! He was dying to know how two coffee shops in Seattle could outsell the entire Macy’s account of a special coffee machine.

I am sure he had no idea that he would one day sit on top of the largest coffee franchise in the world some day. His gut told him, I smell the smoke; I need to go see how big this fire is.

In 1982 Dietrich Mateschitz found himself in steamy Thailand nursing a major jetlag. Asia is full of little shops with strange potions in even stranger bottles. He probably jumped out of a tuk-tuk at the first site of a store that looked remotely close to a pharmacy and somehow communicated his German clock has not reset to Bangkok yet. Maybe he was watching a kick boxing fight and noticed two Red Bull logos on all the shorts and banners and thought, “why am I watching this, I should be sleeping, and what is up with those Red Bulls?’

The details are unclear, but he knocked back a can and BANG, the big idea hit him.

Dietrich was the Marketing Director for a German toothpaste company and licensing and marketing was already in his blood. His big idea, let’s license this drink, change it to western taste buds, soup up the branding and see how much we can make selling to truck drivers, travelers anyone who needed a quick boost.

Do you think in 1982 he could see himself on the Forbes 400 2008 biggest swingers in the world list?

#260 all self made! Check out his photo. Like a good race horse, boxer, actor…Billionaires and future billionaires have a certain look, the vibe.

http://www.forbes.com/lists/2008/10/billionaires08_Dietrich-Mateschitz_DGAD.html

No this is not a lesson on how to start a billionaire face franchise. Our friend Dietrich however, followed a proven formula to get fabulously rich and here is the lesson we can learn from him.

Step #1 Do something, anything.

Move around, travel, read, talk to people, do something for someone without any expectation of a return. That creates the ingredients. Great ideas are like good soup. You throw in a lot of great stuff but you need to let it simmer, it takes a while. Killer home runs start with fresh ingredients.

Step #2 Keep an open mind.

What does a marketing guy at a tooth paste company know about creating a global beverage empire? Ask Howard Schultz the same thing about coffee. Ask Ray Kroc when he was selling milkshake machines door to door, did he ever think he would control the biggest hamburger franchise in the world. They all had a common winning trait. A fertile open child like mind to anything new and creative. When you hear negative people that never offer a better solution, just tune them out and eliminate them from your social circles if possible. Anyone can criticize, but without offering a better solution, they are just a pain in the butt and they will never help you get to billionaire row.

Step#3 Play the long game.

With a massive 70% market share for energy drinks you would think that it was ok to kick back. Dietrich has what all billionaires have, vision. They can see 4 or 5 moves ahead. A brilliant move he made was to link Red Bull with sports early in the game.

Great marketing is a mile deep and an inch wide

While every beverage company was playing the short game brewing up new caffeine in a can ideas glutting the market, Dietrich was busy buying up sports franchises. Investing today's earnings on yesterday's business worked great during the industrial production phase 100+ years ago. Today old thinkers will always get crushed by nimble visionaries who take today's cashflow and invest in future businesses. When the competition comes, the winners have already moved the brand to a new and larger stage, leaving the copy cats holding a bag of thin margin, profit sucking vampires.

Step #4 “Don’t get safe, get creative.

The natural tendency when we are ahead is to protect the lead. Yea that worked for Memphis Monday night for the big game right? You are up by three points with 20 seconds left. Foul the guy! Don’t let him go down and drain a three, force him to a one on one! I know fouling when you are ahead and time is running out might seem counter intuitive but going against the grain, fading the herd is often the winning idea. Safe in marketing is a fast track to the poor house. Safe might work in the short run but it is a guaranteed loser in the long run. History is full of dead safe companies you have never heard of.

Additional articles:

“Why most advertising and investment ideas are wrong.”

http://franchisewhale.com/2007/12/why-most-advertising-and-investment.html

“Who knew cavemen could sell insurance.”

http://franchisewhale.com/2007/12/who-knew-cavemen-could-sell-insurance.html

OK, hit the road, keep an open mind, think five chess moves ahead and get creative! When you get on the 400 list, please thank the Whale, I know I will.

Mickey slings some paint

I was in Home Depot with my little girl; she is 4 and very active. She is really into coloring, painting anything artsy. She goes right for the paint swatch samples every time. Tonight she came back with a handful of samples and they oddly had the sample color in the shape of Mickey ears on each one.

I asked my little girl, why did you pick that one? She did not say I like green, she said, “this is Mickey’s paint.” Squares are just too square for a four year old. If you want to sell anything to kids, print it on Mickey ears! I wondered, if the first movie Mickey showed up in, “Steam Boat Willie” had Donald Duck on the boat instead of a mouse, would we all recognize the image of a duck head instead of mouse ears for Disney? Donald has always played the understudy to that energetic mouse. Was it just a late, duck start or fate that made the mouse the icon for Disney? Anyway, back to Home Depot.

I turned the swatch over and it said, “Disney color by BEHR.” Next I went out to the Disney site and found an incredible selection of colors with catchy Disney names. What kid would not want Donald orange, Princess Bouquet pink or Tinker Bell green? Typically a licensing deal like this would be in the 6-8% range of gross sales for the Licensor (Disney) for BEHR to use the Disney name. They also brought Home Depot into the mix to have a retail exclusive with their 2,100 stores.

http://disney.go.com/disneyhome/disneypaints.html

I love this kind of deal, very smart licensing idea by Disney. Take something that old Walt would never even dream of getting into. Cut a deal where they use the name to create an entirely new use for the brand without you ever manufacturing a thing. Make the licensing deal in a category that drives additional brand loyalty as it is used. Once you go Princess Bouquet on the walls, you probably will go the sheets, lamps, toys…I am sure Home Depot also cut BEHR a good deal to keep it off the shelves of Lowes.

Those ears have some real power.

• What is the main thing people identify with your brand?
• What other cross over categories can your big idea jump to?
  
• Does your franchise have cross brand appeal locked up waiting to be licensed out?
  

Donald Trump licensing seems to take the position that all categories have a "Trump" player in any crowded field. He puts his name on a lot of average stuff and it does not seem to tarnish the upscale image of the Trump name. Maybe we tend to be a little too pious when it comes to the use of our brand names and we could learn a lot from the Donald, the man, not the duck.

What does your logo say?

A powerful logo can really have a magical effect on a business. It might be the most important and overlooked piece in the brand building puzzle for a start up because that is really all you have in the beginning. If you are thinking global with your big idea, the image component can be a real image make or breaker. With a strong image, your logo can be memorable regardless of the language.

Apple is a great example. It says what it is, without opening its mouth! Imagery translates into any language. It did not happen the first try however.

If it does not come out perfect, don’t get married to the concept because of cost or ego.

Apple has had three major revisions over the years to its logo. The first was the “Newton under a tree” bit. Yikes!



Designed partially by Steve Jobs, it gave us mortals comfort that God does not let one guy have a monopoly on all the talents. Steve stick with world domination of our eardrums, logo design is not your thing. Maybe the karmic flop of the Apple Newton PDA was a sign beyond the grave from Isaac he was ticked off with the new Newton-free logo. Put into context, look at the computer the logo was trying to sell.



That version was replaced by the rainbow Apple.




Then the monochrome.



Leaving Newton in the trash bin, the remaining two logos have very powerful branding punch. I personally like the rainbow version and find the new sleek logo a little cold.

The Colonel has been through several changes over the years himself. In 2006, they decided to bring the focus back to him. Are you old enough to remember the Colonel when he was sporting a cigar in their logo? Not sure if the idea of linking a wing with cancer or having the Colonel snub out in your mashed potatoes made them drop the stogies. He definitely knows how to get buzz for a new image.

-From the KFC’s PR page. November 14th 2006.

LOUISVILLE, KY - KFC Corporation (a division of YUM! Brands, Inc. NYSE:YUM) today became the world's first brand visible from outer space by unveiling a record-breaking 87,500 square feet, updated Colonel Sanders logo in the Area 51 desert. The event marks the official debut of a massive global re-image campaign that will contemporize 14,000-plus KFC restaurants in over 80 countries over the next few years.

I love this release! Space is always futuristic, it creates some free buzz by being so remarkable and I like the new Colonel. Look close. They gave him more of a Donald Trump comb over, lost the double chin and put an apron on him. No more walking around with a cane just waving. With the makeover he is back in the kitchen as the billionaire-southern -chicken-cook’in-genius!

I have found the recipe to a winning logo, you really only need three ingredients.

Get a fresh perspective:

Nike’s famous swoosh came out of the young mind of an intern hired by Phil Knight In 1971. The initial $35 concept went on to become the most recognized logo in sports and probably the top 10 worldwide.

Keep it simple:

Google

Make it remarkable:

NBC’s peacock is timeless. Coca Cola and Target are right to the point. Those “Franchise Whale people” have one that is hard to forget (Sorry). For your homework assignment, jump out to:

http://www.listphile.com/Fortune_500_Logos

Make a note of which Fortune 500 logos really jump out at you and why. Don’t lose your notes! Before you start designing, your notes represent billions of dollars of very smart people’s logo brainpower. It might save you some time and money when you decide to take over the world with one simple logo.

What the X is going on!

Is it just me or has the letter X hired the most aggressive publicist on the planet!? Xbox, X-Men, X Games, The FX Channel, XM Radio….Where did all the X’s come from?

Growing up it was always the branded cereal against brand X. Brand X was the boring white label house brand that got its butt kicked on a frequent continual basis. Something always tasted better compared to Brand X. Not anymore, X has become its own brand and, the tastiest franchise off the shelves.

X is sexy. Like some alphabet peep show, tempting you to just put more money in the slot, and I will invite 2 more of my X friends on stage and the three of us will really make your eyes pop out! It has firmly attached itself to Gen-X with a lineup of X branded products.

X might be past its prime however. I saw Jaguar put out a new generation X-Type model that ran on diesel! Ouch! It was confirmed that they are targeting Gen-X when the Global Marketing Director CJ O’Donnell says the X-Type is built to “reach new customers and retain existing owners and improved value-for-money across the range.” Ok great, but diesel! That’s a stretch. Make it young or make it old guys you can’t have it both ways and still be credible in the same model. That is riding the double yellow line too close. What’s next “X-Depends” in a 12 pack for the worn out bladder crowd to help you remember your wonder years!

Is X a fad or does it have legs? I believe once the Gen- X’ers trade their Scion for a walker and Xbox for shuffle board, I think X will have long run its course and will be back slumming the shelves as brand X.

Play-N-Trade CEO Roger Lloyd podcast

Roger Lloyd discusses with Franchise Whale what it takes to harness a great idea and propel the business forward . "Find your drive and listen to your customers." Listen as we see why Entrepreneur Magazine has just ranked Play-N-Trade "Top 10 new franchisees for 2008" a jump of 40 spots from their 2007 ranking.

Opening a new store every other day now, 2008 looks to be a massive year for the "try before you buy" niche retailer. We had the Founder Ron Simpson on last week, now listen as Roger moves the business forward and gives some great tips for entrepreneurs looking to achieve their potential.

www.playntrade.com

Grab the podcast:

Ron Simpson Founder of Play-N-Trade podcast

I connected with Ron Simpson, the Founder of Play-N-Trade and he was kind enough to share his entrepreneurial vision of a customer centric business that pioneered "try before you buy" in the video gamer world. Listen why Entrepreneur Magazine just ranked them #9 on the "Top 10 new franchisees for 2008."

This guy is really passionate about tearing down the corporate firewalls that separate the customer from the product. We are going to have him back on in the future to pick his brain on customer service and deep dive entrepreneurship. Invest the 7 minutes and listen in as Ron brings some clarity to a cloudy corporate world long on policies and short on customer common sense.

Grab the podcast here.

I love a parade

What can we learn about business by watching a parade? How to turn a dirty street into a cash cow that’s what! Step one, invite people to sit on the side of the road. Step two, ask other people to walk in the street. The franchise concept you are selling? The people on the side, look at the people walking in the street. The people walking, wave at the people sitting on the side. Then brand it so people feel they need to pay you rent just to walk and wave at the people sitting. Start the music! Next, license the trademarks, TV rights, and memorabilia. Stop! I am not in the parade business am I?

If they can make a dirty street in small town USA print money, I know you have something far more valuable to market. Is your business missing the parade?

Last night I went to the Zoo lights with my family. I live in Phoenix and the winter is the best time to go to the Zoo. After I walked around for an hour it dawned on me, any Zoo that is closing down today has nothing to do with what they tell you, “Oh the high cost of animal care, poor donor base, high overhead…” It has nothing to do with the animals at all or the donors. It has everything to do with this simple concept. All business is the show business! My 10 and 12 year old boys get an earful about business wherever we go. I can’t help it, I think it, dream it, talk about it, it is not something I do, it is who I am, I’m sick, there I said it. I think they actually believe the Zoo trip was just a smoke screen to another branding lesson, without the whiteboards.

Each year, 265,000 out of the 1.4 million annual visitors, see the Zoo lights at the Phoenix Zoo over 46 nights. This has nothing to do with their “main attraction”, the animals. The only animals I saw were 20 flamingos and a large mechanical giraffe that talked to the kids and made a crowd of 200 at a time pause for 15 minutes. Nice bit guys by the way, the longer you are in the park, the more you want to eat. More stops, more revenues. Note to management, add more talking animals. The real kicker is in the numbers. They did those numbers only open 4 hours each night versus 9 hours during their regular calendar. That means on an operating hour, trade weighted basis, 20% of their annual revenues are generated using only 7.5% of their operating hours to create that revenue. Sorry to spreadsheet on your parade, but the next time you are singing the blues about your flat sales, try juicing your franchise by creating a crowd around what you already have.

Who knew cavemen could sell insurance?

Imagine having a caveman in your living room every Monday night and another billion or two for Warren Buffet who acquired GEICO several years ago. If the executives at ABC have anything to say, both will become a reality very soon.

The quirky commercials of the caveman GEICO series are tops for me. The PC Mac ads would be number one and the GEICO caveman would be a close second, both have a very powerful method at work underlying the psychology that makes people want to buy more of your stuff. That method is the hook. Think of looking at a chocolate cupcake with the letters scrawled in white icing, “Got Milk?” Great stuff! Many ad agencies write great copy and catchy phrases but they forget the most important thing, “Will this sell more product?” It seems as if they are more interested in receiving an award from their advertising peers and securing their careers with their agency than selling more products for their clients.

Not the case with the caveman series, very effective. The writer and creator of the series is Joe Lawson formerly with the Martin Agency, now making his move on Hollywood. I knew I liked the guy when I saw his commercials but I loved the guy when I read a quote from him being brutally honest about the advertising business in general. I quote from Joe as he had a chat with the Banterist shortly after creating the series.

“The most important thing is to avoid big industry functions. That way you're not reminded of the transitory nature of goodness in advertising. Every once in a while, if you are lucky, you catch the tail of an opportunity and put something on TV that doesn't annoy people, but most of the time 99% of us are producing crap.”

Well said, but why a caveman? That’s easy, literally it’s all in the hook presented in a way that does not annoy you. You can get commercials that entertain, but if they do not start with a hook, they will leave their clients with flat revenues while the agency fills up their trophy case with yet another creativity award.

If I asked you what type of beer would you drink at the beach? I bet Corona came to your mind. At the risk of upsetting some beer heretics, I don’t think any beer tastes more “beach like.” I am a non drinker so I could be wrong but I don’t know what the beach tastes like, do you? Anyone could have grabbed that spot but Corona chose to draw a line in the sand and say “This is our real estate, we own the beach.” I love their spots because they create an experience that transcends price and reason. It is difficult not to think of Corona when you have an idyllic summer beach day or if you want to be transported to the paradise while stuck in a dark bar at the end of a strip mall. The hook is the beach scene attached to Corona, like “Got Milk” to the cupcake or a milk mustache to a celebrities lip. “If I drink milk maybe I will look like Cindy Crawford too!”

The hook with the caveman is “It’s so easy even a caveman can do it.” To test the effectiveness of a hook, ask a 10 year old what is the BEST car insurance company and don’t be surprised that the “it’s easy” ads have even spilled over to the “best insurance” in their minds. When you can create generational shifts in buying patterns by using the right hook, it can be the most valuable time you will ever spend before branding what you do.

So what about the pilot for ABC? It sounds like it will be Seinfeld with hair. Cavemen will be filmed dealing with everyday issues living in Atlanta. GEICO, a unit of Berkshire Hathaway Inc., will have no creative control but will receive a royalty payment for the use of the character.

"We sell car insurance; we don't make TV shows," says Ted Ward, GEICO’s vice president of marketing. Ted please!!! Don’t go stuffed shirt on us now, we know you are dancing around in your caveman jammies laughing hysterically that you are the guy that actually approved Lawson’s wacky idea. If the caveman makes it past a pilot and actually gets picked up for 13 weeks we will have GEICO on the brain for the next 20 years. Good bye Aflac, I hated that duck anyway, what was the hook, Gilbert Gottfried in feathers? He is hard to take as a human, as a duck it just makes me want to eat more chicken, not call the 800 number.

What’s your hook? Before you start off down the long branding road, decide what differentiates you from your competition. What is the competitive advantage you bring that nobody else does? If you cannot think of one, maybe you should consider a different path in life. If you can come up with a few, how do you convey that edge to the market? Start with a hook. A hook promotes your franchise while you sleep, what could be better than that?

Interview with Dirck Schou CEO HF Coors

Entrepreneurs and Franchisers free prize inside! I had the pleasure of interviewing Dirck this week. This 10 minute Podcast is priceless if you are a USA based manufacturer that is struggling to maintain your niche.

Listen as Dirck takes you every step of the way from entering the market, buying out an 80 year old competitor and growing a "Made in the USA" brand by being "fast, flexible and customer oriented".

If you are also a retailer who needs customized kitchenware, HF Coors is the largest manufacturer in the West providing fast, customized solutions for fortune 500 clients and small retailers as well.

Click here to visit HF Coors

All formats supported for the Podcast, pick the way you want to hear this great interview.

Click here to listen to interview

Click here to get podcast


Click here to get free podcast from iTunes

Click here to get RSS of the Podcast



Readers and listeners we can repay Dirck for his generosity with his time and help your fellow business builders by sending them the link to this blog. They do not teach what you will hear in business school, this is real life first hand business building at it's finest, going against the outsourcing trend and moving the market up. I love it! Share the love!

Enjoy!

* iTunes subscribers. We are listed under "CEO interview HF Coors" Don't forget to subscribe and we will deliver new CEO interviews of Big Ideas like HF Coors, right to your iPod every time you plug in as we get them.

Victoria’s Secret they want to keep hidden

Sorry no pictures on this one readers. You can just imagine a woman dressed in $1 worth of material that is prepared, branded and marketed to make you believe that your girlfriend or wife will actually be a super model if she wears it. That is the magic of this brand that did 5 billion last year in gross sales in 2006, that’s a lot of panties! Imagine a small idea started by a Stanford grad to make it easier for men to buy lingerie, 30 years later we have one of the most well known brands in the world.

We are unabashed bulls on outsourcing, America was founded on outsourcing. The Crown’s factory was a young hungry colony across the Atlantic. Almost all of the apparel market was shifted to American manufacturers at one point. I am sure many British manufacturers, politicians and members of the media brought up the appalling conditions and loss of jobs the Yanks were taking away from the motherland, sound familiar? Short memories are easy marks for protectionist that like to throw the good and bad into the same pot.

The ugly side of outsourcing came to light last week that is no longer Victoria’s Secret. The National Labor Committee last week put out a report on a factory in Jordan that was pretty harsh. The report disclosed their contractor paid the workers .04 cents to sew a bikini in 3.5 minutes that retails for $14 just for the bottoms.

We are big fans of outsourcing but of course under humane conditions. How they verified the conditions at the factory were never clear in their article so we leave the judgment up to you.

Link to report

http://www.nlcnet.org/article.php?id=490

The same day the National Labor Committee report was released Suzanne Kapner of Fortune magazine reported that, Limited Brands insiders are treating themselves to an early holiday present in the form of $20.6 million in company stock purchases, a bullish sign for the struggling owner of the Victoria's Secret and Bath & Body Works retail chains.

Nine insiders, including CEO Les Wexner, have purchased $7.6 million of stock in the last three trading days, and plan to buy $13 million more during the next week, according to regulatory filings.

The insider buying is unusual for the Columbus, Ohio-based company. Directors and executives have not tended to be big purchasers of Limited stock in recent years. Buying now, at a time when the company's stock is trading near its 52-week-low, is a vote of confidence in Limited's future prospects, analysts said.

"The last time we remember an insider stepping up to the plate was in 2002, when director David Kollat [bought $2.5 million shares]," wrote Todd Slater of Lazard Capital Markets in a research note to investors Wednesday. "This time around, we are witnessing a much stronger vote of confidence."

With sales per square foot close to the top dog Costco they are betting that putting athletic wear in 30 of its test stores this past fall will keep the mojo rolling.

Sales per square foot:

Costco $918

Victoria’s Secret $731

Wal-Mart $438

Nordstrom’s $369

Licensing Tip: Got a fashion idea? It’s just cloth, trade the brand up and enjoy a fat profit and don’t forget to do your homework on where you outsource your labor.

Air Taxi or Sky Bus which would you fly?

If you are short on time, my absolute favorite way to get to the big apple from Phoenix is JetBlue. You can red eye a 7:30 am arrival and have a cheap, comfortable (For cattle class) ride into the city. Recently I was stuck on the tarmac at JFK. That is not the airport you want to be at in the rain, major delays. In 2002 JetBlue crashed the airline price fixing party and was awarded 75 slots at JFK and turned a sleepy airport into a money maker. Was JFK the right size airport to pull off the impossible? Do yourself a big favor, put down the remote, get a copy of Blue Streak inside Jetblue and prepare for a fantastic crash course in startup reality, vision and guts. Depending on which version you read, JetBlue raised 128-175 Million (The largest raise ever) to launch the airline. Who could ever slow down the brash upstart? The rain, sleet and snow that’s who.

The winter of 2006-07 was not kind to Jetblue or David Neelman (Former CEO and Founder) JFK is a rough place to hub when the weather turns.

In steps Skybus. In May of 2007 Bill Diffenderffer launched a new airline with the largest raise ever, 160 million. Again, depends what article you read. Skybus has everything I like, great name, $10 airfares, catchy marketing, kiosks only, no agents or 800 numbers, all simple self service and a major underscore major, strategic difference that capitalizes on all the missteps of canceled flights last winter for JetBlue. They seem to have taken a few sheets out of the JetBlue play book but added an old school double wing formation in common sense that I believe will score big. Quote from a recent Popular Science interview with the CEO.

“Q: You fly into obscure little airports, such as Pease International in New Hampshire. What's the advantage?
A: Efficiency. If an airplane is not in the air flying in a straight line to its destination, it is costing money. The average taxi time of an airplane at JFK is 30 minutes. The average taxi time at our airports is 10 minutes. If a rainstorm hits JFK for a half hour, you've got a two-hour backup—at ours, you wait out the half hour and then you take off. It's much easier to recover from a bad-weather event when there are never more than five airplanes on the ground.”

Starting an airline in 2007 using 10 year old cost modeling for delay impact pricing would be like using 1935 population and life expectancy models to fund our 2007 retirement plans, who would be dumb enough to do that! Can we actually learn something from the social security bust to pick future winners in aviation? The modeling fork in the road that leads to either the penthouse or the outhouse is only a mouse click away. Imagine all the old airlines that are built on old time delay costing models. Opportunity?

The FAA made a rough calculation of the annual costs of delays can be made by multiplying the number of passengers affected by the additional wait by the value of their time. In 1995, travelers took approximately 390 million trips on U.S. airlines. The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) and the airlines recommended arriving at the airport thirty minutes earlier than normal because of the security measures implemented in July. The FAA, in its calculations, uses a value-of-time estimate of $48 an hour for business travelers and $42 an hour for non-business travelers in 1995 dollars. This yields an estimate of $9 billion per year in delay costs.

And that is just the opportunity costs for the passengers; imagine the fixed and variable cost for the airlines!

Skybus, just a catchy name or an entirely new way to build an airline? Time makes fools of us all, but I suspect a missed opportunity is waiting to accost the entrepreneur caught sleeping as a huge shift is about to occur. Leave the 160 Million dollar crap shoots to someone else willing to bet the pass line. Big returns with lower risk will reward those in the future who make moves in and around the airports that the Skybus builders will embrace to save time.

One more for the road. The money men at Morgan Stanley held out a 20 million dollar carrot and forced the management of JetBlue to ditch its original name which was “Taxi” just before the IPO. Skybus, must just be another coincidence right?

To buy the JetBlue book

To read the entire Skybus article