December 6th, 2011

Ten Stocking Stuffer Ideas

English: Saint Nicholas & Sinterklaas Deutsch:...

Today, many people across Europe are celebrating St. Nicholas Day.

Saint Nicholas was a real 4th Century Greek Saint (originally spelled Nikolaus – which looks and sounds like Santa Claus!) who was renowned for secretly giving gifts and placing coins in the shoes of the needy. The tradition of Saint Nicholas Day is still observed all across Europe, from France to Bulgaria. Even some cities in the United States that have large populations of German descent celebrate the day. The primary tradition today is that children receive gifts in their shoes, like coins and apples, which is very similar to what many of us do in a Christmas stocking!

Which reminded me of the fact that not only do I need to finish my holiday shopping, but I need to start getting things for stocking stuffers. This is the first year we will be doing it as a family since my son is old enough now and it seems worth the effort. I just bought some stockings from PotteryBarn (on sale, free shipping and free monograming!) Yes, I even got one for the dogs. Now for the stuff.

My favorite place to go is the Dollar Store, Christmas Tree Shops or its equivalent. There are some great things like tissue, body lotion, toothbrushes, and other little trinkets that you stumble upon. My other favorite place is CVS (Walgreens and Rite Aid are great too!) Check out their respective circulars and coupons. You can get some great deals.

But if you are looking for fun, fabulous and fresh – here are some top ideas for stocking stuffers with links to some products you may want to scoop up:

  • Pretty Polish – There are so many gorgeous shades. Be bold and pick up a fun color like this set from Sephora.
  • Note Cards or Journal – Find an elegant print to inspire the written word, like these note cards from PoshPeacock.
  • Festive Earrings – Think handmade, recycled glass, like these from Etsy.
  • Fun Socks – Like the ones from Little Missmatched.
  • Bath Salts – Pampering products are always in style. Make it yourself for a homemade touch.
  • Magazines – Fashion, fitness, food – you name it. Just fit the style of the recipient.
  • ‘App’ Gift Card – Small dollar amounts work since many smartphone apps are less than a buck.
  • Fun Bracelet – Like this one made from guitar strings.
  • A Lump of Coal – Just make sure it is a playful take, like this gum.
  • A Portable Game – For impromptu fun, like these little word teasers.
  • Luxuriously Functional Lotion – You want them to use it! Like the eco-friendly packaging, cruelty-free, healing creams from the Carmex brand! Hands down my favorite practical lotion for dry skin.

Hopefully these ideas inspire you! But as part of the Charlene Chronicles 12 Days of Holiday Giveaways, I want to help you get started on your stocking stuffing. I’m giving away a bag full of stocking-stuffer-goodies. It is a grab bag of stuff that you can dig through to keep or use to stuff those stockings. No promises on what is in there (though I can guarantee you’ll get a Carmex gift set cause it rocks, and a pair of Little Missmatched socks), but mums the word on the other goody fabulousness! It’s fun to have the anticipation to see what it is in it, right? But the bag contains at least $50 worth of retail items. Just leave a comment to enter – how fun!

Congrats to Jen for winning the Giveaway!

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Disclosure: I received no compensation for this post.

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November 10th, 2011

McDonald’s Social Media Magic

Sign outside McDonald's Plaza, one of the four...

Image via Wikipedia

Every business deals with poor customer service. The larger the company, the more customer service snafus occur. It is the nature of the beast, or the business if you will. Yet, how the company handles it, especially in today’s realm of social media, is where the company can shine or fail.

McDonalds is one of the largest companies out there. With over 32,000 franchise locations, 400,000+ employees and 62 million customers a day, there is significant number of point-to-point contacts with those customers on a daily basis.

I admit I rarely go to McDonalds. Not out of disregard for the company or the food, but solely for the fact that I am at home more often than. This one day, however, I found myself traveling with a toddler that fell preemptively fell sleep. An unfortunate timing: he had a full belly of yogurt and crackers, but my stomach was rumbling. Especially since it had been a long morning, and we had been on the road for 3 hours.

A drive-thru was my only option and I knew there was a McDonalds nearby. After waiting in the drive-thru line for over 15 minutes (couldn’t get out of the car due to said sleeping toddler) I quickly scanned the (confusing) menu with the tiny print on the billboard as I attempt to communicate my desires through the little black box.

As I drove up to the pay window, I asked the employee about the pricing of my meal since I thought the price was $4 and not $8. After several rounds of “I don’t know” why the price is different, he finally gave me an answer (value meal vs. single items). However, he made it clear that he did not like my questions and proceeded to snap my change in my hand, slam the little window, and stomp (literally) to an office and (based on the hand gestures), complain to someone about me. While I get that all the time from many blog haters, I was in shock. I was hungry, I barely come here and I get an employee that is off his rocker. As I drove to the food window, I asked that employee to please get a manager as I could not get out of the car. Someone came over and I mentioned what had occurred. She handed me a free burger card as an apology.

As I drove off shaking my head, I reached into the McDonald’s bag to placate myself with fries as least. As I bit into a cold fry, I tweeted.

Within hours, I had two McDonalds social media representatives tweet me back saying how sorry they were about my experience. “Wow”, I thought. Someone was listening. Someone cared that I had a bad experience and cold fries. They wanted to know what happened and when I told them, they passed the details to the restaurant general manager: to improve, to learn and to prevent. They also sent some free coupons for a future visit.

In the few months since the incident, I have not been able to stop thinking about the fast social media response and the forwarding of the information to the restaurant in question. A winning combination that other organizations should make note of in their social media strategy. Furthermore, it is not just the “poor service” response plan that amazed me. All companies with a social media presence should be scanning Facebook and Twitter for questions too because it is never good to hear stories of no response when a consumer asks a question of a brand. Both levels of engagement (crisis management and proactive management) build positive customer relations and customer loyalty.

Next time I have a sleeping toddler in the backseat and a craving for fries, I know where I am going. What about you? Tell me about a positive customer service experience you had, and one person will receive a handful of McDonalds free product coupons valued over $10.

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Rules: (Gotta have them)

Leave a comment about this post; US entrants welcome. Include your name and email in the appropriate fields so I can contact you if you win. (Including just first name or first name + last initial is OK!). For your safety, please do not put your email in the actual comment. Anonymous or SPAM-like comments will be discarded. Entry period closes at 11:59PM ET, Monday, November 14, 2011.
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One lucky winner (drawn randomly via “And the Winner is” WordPress plugin) will receive the coupons. No substitutions and the winner will be notified directly via e-mail who has roughly 48 hours to respond and claim their prize. They then will be listed back at this post using first name only. A minimum of 5 people must enter in order for the Giveaway to occur. Winner must comply with all rules mentioned here, or a new winner will be selected. Charlene Chronicles has the final decision on the winner and is not responsible for wrong email addresses or notification being tagged as spam. Full legal disclosures can be found here.
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Image used with permission. I received no compensation for this post. I sincerely appreciate the Mc-Awesomeness of McD_EasternMA and Amanda_McD, as well as the great Alison at their Boston-based PR company. The coupons I received I am giving away to one of you.

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October 17th, 2011

Party Pooper

So last Saturday I found myself in Rhode Island with a booked hotel room in an expensive hotel for our belated anniversary, a perplexed husband, a mom who drove 90 minutes to stay overnight at our house to watch our 23 month old, and a staff at the StillWater Spa in Newport, RI wondering what the hell I was talking about.

You see, we had driven 2 hours to the Spa Week/Stillwater Spa Pink Martini Night on October 15th. The issue? It was on October 7th. A week before.

I left with tears and feeling like it was my fault. But how could it be? How could I have gotten the date so wrong?

Here is the story.

I had gotten the heads up on the event on the Spa Week Blog. As a Hot Spa Mom, there is a list of us on the Spa Week Blog. I thought nothing of the post being outdated since it is constantly getting new Hot Spa Moms added and the opening paragraph of the post listed the correct week for the Fall Spa Week festivities.

Hot Spa Moms

As you can see from the bottom of the image above, it had listed a great blogger as being a host of the Pink Martini Night Party. So I clicked on that link. This is the post the link took me to….

Slide1

So there was nothing that gave me pause that anything was amiss. I clicked on an active blog post that took me to another blog post where, on its face, nothing would indicate it was an old post for an old party.

However, when I was standing in aforenamed Stillwater Spa, they informed me the post was from 2010 and that I should have noticed the small box on top of the page.

Slide2

Yet, why does that matter (even if one did notice the teeny box at top on a page with tons of ads and a huge hot pink invitation image competing with it.) The link from the Hot Spa Moms took me here. Furthermore, that Hot Spa Moms page even had a 2010 date, but it is an active post, so why would I think this post would be any different. (Especially since the “invitation image” didn’t have the year on it?)

Slide1

It turns out there was another post, posted on October 5th, 2011 about the October 7th, 2011 Pink Martini Night Party. However, I had called on September 20th to register for the October 15th party according to my phone records. Everyone following me here? How could I have registered for such party if there was no post until a couple of days before. How is it as a Hot Spa Mom that I am not getting notice of these events? Even when I called to register, there was no notice from the staff of an incorrect date on my part.

I even tweeted to the Spa Week corporate account the day before the supposed party.

Spa Week Tweet

As of the time and date of this post, I still haven’t gotten a return tweet saying “Huh?” Or anything like that.

So thanks to the wonderful Hyatt in Newport, they refunded us the room. We called my Mom and drove the two hours back to Massachusetts. Around 9pm that night, we had a bowl of cereal and went to bed. Not the night I was expecting and out $8 in tolls and a $50 tank of gas.

But here are my Social Media tips that any company or business should consider when they have a company blog.

 

  • Constantly check your links. Even as a small blogger I do that. There are great WordPress plugins like ReDirect and Broken Link Checker to help.
  • Spend one day a month reviewing posts. I go through my small blog once a month and clean up old or irrelevant posts, like event listings or old giveaways. One can delete them altogether or make them revert back to draft form for updating later. It is easy to do ‘en-mass’ in WordPress too.
  • Update the post date. If you are updating a post, update the post date. In WordPress, it is easy to do. Just above the “Update” button on an existing post, you see the option to change the date of the post. More often than not, it is a good thing for SEO since it makes your post more relevant for the bots to find. And prevents confusion like my post above shows.
  • Have an active Twitter account. If you are a company or run your own business, always be checking your account, even on the weekends or at night because a lot of people tweet about events, issues or activities and you want to be able to respond in a timely manner to head off any problems early on.

All in all, should I have known? Do you have other tips? Do you think someone as SpaWeek should be accountable? Should Stillwater Spa have handled it better? Let me know your thoughts. (Because I am still weepy over it.)

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October 10th, 2011

Spa Week 2011

Young women getting facial maskSpa Week® Fall 2011, presented by Carefree® and in partnership with Allure Magazine, runs through October 16th. Spa Week’s founding mission: make the spa lifestyle accessible to ALL.

To that end, 800 spas and wellness facilities across North America are participating, offering 2-3 of their top spa services for just $50 a piece (normally $75-$500). Massages, facials, scrubs, wraps, peels, mani-pedis, highlights, hair cuts, blowouts, acupuncture, fitness class packages, eyelash extensions, Botox… the options are endless! Browse all the $50 treatments, and create a spa adventure in your city! So see if there are some spots still available in your neck of the woods.

Don’t think you’ll find something?

When it comes to Spa Week, there’s something for every man, woman (and even child). Whether you want to go green, organic, luxe, or need childcare, there is a spa out there, with $50 treatments during Spa Week, that will have you pampered to perfection (and with money still in your pocket.)

FOR THE BUSY MOM: No babysitter? No problem! Enjoy 2 hours of free Childcare while you get pampered during your $50 Spa Week appointment (choose massage, facial or mani/pedi/deep hydrating treatment) at LifeSpa. There are 78 Spa Week locations: Minnesota, Texas, Arizona, Colorado, Kansas, Nebraska, Utah, Illinois, Ohio, Missouri, Indiana, New York, Florida, Georgia, North Carolina, Maryland, Tennessee, Virginia, and New Jersey.

FOR THOSE WITH CHRONIC PAIN: Spa Week seeks pamper you into your most relaxed state, but there are specific treatments – both ancient and modern – that specifically target pain. Dating back thousands of years, Acupuncture, Cupping and Gua Sha will “poke,” “suck” and “scrape” away pain. (Try at Village Wellness Project in NYC, Cinnabar Acupuncture or Forat Acupuncture & Chinese Medicine in LA, to name a few). At In Touch Wellness in Arizona, they’ll “zap” away pain with their tech-y new laser therapy for pain relief.

FOR THE FITNESS BUFF: Get fit during Spa Week with a 5-Pack of Mind Body Classes at the prestigious exhale mindbodyspa. Transform your body with your choice of 5 of exhale’s Award Winning Core Fusion and Yoga Classes. Spa Week locations throughout NYC, LA, Palm Beach, Miami, Chicago, Atlanta, and Dallas (Also: look out for private Pilates and personal training sessions at other participating facilities across the country)

FOR THE MANLY MAN: Men account for 31% of spa goers in America, and did you know men have 15% more oily skin than women? Man up and get that massage or facial – even if they’re not specified a “men’s” treatment, men are still more than welcome to enjoy! Clarins is one of the pioneering men’s skincare movements, and one of their 2 treatments is the CLARINS Mens Facial. Spa Week locations in California, Illinois, Florida, New York, Virginia and Massachusetts.

FOR ANYONE DEFYING GRAVITY: There are a ton of anti-aging facials and treatments being offered during Spa Week, but there is one in particular, simply called “Skin Tightening” worth checking out at American Laser Skincare, and it is normally $528. Stimulating healthy collagen, the skin tightening process firms sagging skin and fills in wrinkles at your jaw line, eye area, mouth and cheeks. Skin tightening actually jumpstarts organic cell growth, making your skin look and act more like the way it might… on the moon. American Laser Skincare has 26 Spa Week locations in New York, Chicago and California.

FOR THE SEASONED SPA-GOER: Spa Week partners with some of the nation’s most prestigious spa and wellness brands each season. To name a few on our Fall 2011 roster: The Standard Miami, Four Seasons Resorts in Houston and Scottsdale, Golden Door in Carefree, AZ, Kohler Waters Spa in Wisconsin, Chuan Body & Soul at the Langham in Boston, Pelican Hill Resort & Spa in Newport Beach, CA, and also completely bare and Red Door Spas locations nationwide.

FOR THE TREE-HUGGER: Did you know that all treatments listed on Spaweek.com in green are green-friendly picks for eco-chic spa-goers? In addition to those, check out all the famously eco-friendly Aveda spas participating. Also, Natural Body with locations throughout Georgia, Florida, Kansas, Tennessee, and North Carolina, is a leader in the green spa movement, literally paving the way with floors made of recycled school bus tires.

Browse all the decadent $50 spa treatments on spaweek.com. Time is running out!

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September 29th, 2011

Fun to Eat Fruit

Whether is is just getting your kids to eat apples or you need that perfect gift for a teacher, check out Fun to Eat Fruit from a family owned company in New Hampshire.

Fun to Eat Fruit

Fun to Eat Fruit™ are apples, pears, nectarines and plums that are eco-friendly (prewashed with no stickers) and grown and produced in the United States that are totally tubular, as they are shipped in tall plastic tubs that keeps the fruit fresh and unbruised. Yet, what makes Fun to Eat Fruit™ ‘fun’, are the safe-to-eat ink images on the fruit; think hearts, stars, smiley faces, and more. They have featured images each month, though you can always inquire about your favorites. (I love the cancer awareness ribbon).

Most kids will turn their noses up at an apple, but it is hard to do when it has a smiley face on it. Makes it cool for school too, but it can be a fun way to advertise or show school spirit. Even a clever way to say Happy Birthday or Thank You. You can have custom images (think business logos too) on a variety of fruit using the safe-to-eat ink approved by the FDA and certified kosher.

You need to purchase fruit in multiples of 4’s (one tube, Tube 1x, contains 4 pieces of fruit and the minimum order is two tubes), so it is enough fruit for the whole week for one child. The two tubes cost $12, which more than what you can find at the grocery store. Yet, if you are looking for a fun party favor, fabulous gift or are desperate for a fruit eating child, then take a look at what they have to offer.

 

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September 12th, 2011

Become

It has been many years since Title IX, but as a little girl that (attempted) to play sports prior to that ground breaking initiative, I know first hand the difference that it has made for girls, young women and women in school leagues, state leagues, college or professional levels. Gatorade knows that too.

Even though it has been 40 years this upcoming May, we still need to show our continued support and Gatorade is calling upon women & Moms, like us, to pledge their support to young female athletes in their quest to BECOME {amazing, great, strong, smart, powerful, inspirational….}. As Moms, it is often on the sidelines or in the mini-van saddle. Wiping tears, bandaging boo-boos or celebrating a victory. We help them BECOME in our small ways, but here is another way.

For every online click at www.Gatordate.com/Moms, Gatorade will donate one dollar up to $10,000 to the Women’s Sports Foundation (just click “take the pledge now” on the main Gatorade Moms page). Simply read the pledge, click to commit (free! don’t have to receive mail/emails) and Gatorade will donate a dollar in support of girls’ and women’s sports.

The donation will help ensure there are opportunities for all children who want to get physically active, get involved in competitive athletics and get in the game. So for a minute of your time, let’s support girl and women athletes, as well as Gatorade that’s encouraging them to succeed. We both would love you to support this cause, so Gatorade has donated an autographed soccer ball from Brandi Chastain!

 

Brandi is a professional American soccer defender and midfielder who plays for the team California Storm of Women’s Premier Soccer League and is a former member of the United States women’s national soccer team. She is best known for her game-winning penalty shootout kick against China in the 1999 FIFA Women’s World Cup final and her sports bra-baring celebration afterwards. (Loved that moment!)

To date, there are less than 1000 pledges and we need to get to 10,000 so please pledge and spread the word!

Congrats to Kate H. for winning the autographed soccer ball!

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Image used with permission and I received an autographed ball for my post.

 

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June 29th, 2011

Government Ban of Drop Side Baby Cribs

relax babyThe Federal Government has officially banned the manufacture, sale and resale of baby cribs with drop-down sides. While the Consumer Product Safety Commission said in December 2010 it was banning the cribs with drop-down sides, the new rules went into effect yesterday for all manufacturers, retailers, daycare providers, consumers, etc. Safety standards for cribs have not been officially updated in almost 30 years despite the growing evidence of drop-crib safety issues over the past decade.

However, the Consumer Product Safety Commission has given short-term crib rental companies and daycare providers/child care centers until Dec. 28, 2012, to comply with the new mandatory standards for baby cribs to give them time to update their inventories. So if you are traveling, or looking into daycare options, you may want to inquire about the type of crib your baby will be using.

What this means for you is that it is illegal for you to sell on online (like on Craigslist) or sell (like at a yard sale) any old drop-sided cribs. Donating is not permissible either. You can only recycle or dispose as trash. You may want to call your local town’s department of public works to determine how to handle the disposal.

Other parts of the new federal standards include not allowing immobilizers and repair kits, wood slats must be made of stronger woods to prevent breakage, crib hardware must have anti-loosening devices to keep it from coming loose or falling off, mattress supports must be more durable, and safety testing be more rigorous.

These new standards mean that the United States now has the strictest standards for crib safety in the world.

If you see any cribs that do not meet the new standards being sold in stores, online or at rummage or garage sales, contact the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission at 800-638-2772 or your local Attorney General’s Office.

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Image Credit: By Janineomg at Flickr: Creative Commons.

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