Roast Chicken Recipes

Chicken Casserole Recipes

Chicken Salad Recipes

Chicken Pasta Recipes

Honey Chicken Recipes

Lemon Chicken Recipe

Chicken is such a versatile meat, loved by most people around the world.  Over time, I hope to add more chicken recipes and cooking tips to these sites.  Watch this space!

Targeting women customers, property maintenance and building service in the UK called A Woman’s Touch is offering plumbing, decorating, tiling, plastering, electrical work and carpentry services carried out by a team of female tradespeople who are highly qualified, reliable and courteous.

By women carrying out the work, the need for safety and respect for other peoples’ property is met.

Founded by Kerrie Keeling, she decided to move from the corporate banking world to start up her own company. A Woman’s Touch is now turning over GBP 1.2 million and is ready to be franchised. This company is certainly shaking things up a bit by taking on an industry that is traditionally a predominantly male profession.

This is a good business opportunity either as a start up or to partner with A Woman’s Touch to franchise the organization in other countries.

Watch the video about “A Woman’s Touch” below. The image link will take you to another website which the video will play a QuickTime movie. You will need the QuickTime media player to be able to view this.

Started in the couple’s dining room, Eco Insulation keeps houses warm in winter, cool in summer and reduces noise and dampness in the home. It is a product that overall helps fight global warming as it assists in reducing the amount of energy required to warm or cool a house.

Eco Insulation has supplied insulation to more than 12,000 homes in New Zealand, including 7000 Housing New Zealand units, saving many millions of kilowatt hours of energy.

These wool-based insulation products are for both home and commercial buildings using excess fibre from the manufacture of woolen carpets.

Launched in the late 1990’s, the business struggled for the first 2 years which forced Mr Sweeney back into teaching until sales picked up. However, Eco Insulation is booming and has recently moved into new premises to accommodate growing staff and product. It’s pricing is quite competitive since it purchases the excess wool fibre from carpet manufacturers.

Mr Sweeney says “wool is a natural insulator, non-toxic, sustainable, recyclable and draws moisture from living spaces.” The idea was born when the Sweeneys were blowing loose wool fibre into lofts to form a bed of insulation above the ceiling of a spare room. They realized this approach was not suitable and that is when Mr Sweeney approached a textile manufacturer with the idea of turning loose wool fibres into thick thermal blankets.

Eco Insulation sells its product both in New Zealand and internationally. This is a great opportunity for international businesses who wish to partner with Eco Insulation or resell their products. Since sustainable environmentally friendly products are part of a growth industry, Eco Insulation is an excellent product to consider.

To be meaningful, you should measure customers’ perceptions formally. This means you must have a process for asking, recording responses, and modifying the way your company goes about its business.

Some businesses make the mistake of waiting until the end of the year to ask their customers how satisfied they are. Don’t forget that your customers’ needs are constantly changing, and your competitors are not standing still. If you wait until the end of the year it could be too late.
However, a word of warning. Care should be taken when evaluating customer satisfaction surveys. Meeting your customers’ requirements may satisfy them, but satisfaction does not equate to customer loyalty. If a customer would be happier with another product, then they will switch.

Finding Out Directly From Customers…

So how do you find out what your customers value and whether they are satisfied? You must get the information directly from your current or potential customers – what they like, what they don’t like and the degree of importance your customers attach to the customer requirements listed above.

Discover how well you currently satisfy your customers’ requirements and how well your competition satisfies your customer requirements. No amount of discussing with professionals, friends or colleagues will ever replace the information from a real customer.

The main ways you can get this information are:

Ask Them
When you are dealing with existing or potential customers, strike up a conversation with them and informally ask them. Ring them and ask some questions over the phone. Or, if you can, watch what they do and how they use your products and services.

Questionnaire
You could distribute questionnaires that ask some key questions and encourage customers to fill them out.

Focus Groups
Gather a number of your customers together, sit them down and discuss a range of issues relevant to your business.

Research
Good information can often be obtained by reading newspapers and magazines, scanning the internet, contacting industry associations, or even commissioning specific reports from researchers.

Launched in January 2007 Wild Bunch offers a premium range of made to order 100% organic juices that are presented in eye-catching designed bottles. They target bars, restaurants, healthcare centers, spas and beauty therapy clinics, and home and office clients.

WildBunch state on their website that their juice product is “farmed environmentally without the use of chemical herbicides, pesticides and fertilizers and with organic certification.”

Some of the organic vegetable and fruit recipes include Eazy Peazy (Carrots, Peas and Parsnips), Rootine Check (Beetroot, Carrots, Parsnips), Red Dragon (Dragon Fruit, Beetroot), Pineapple Zinger (Pineapple, Ginger) and more.

Each 250ml bottle ranges from $10 to $20 of which they are requesting from particular customer segments to pay a monthly subscription or minimum order. The monthly subscription for home or office is $255.

With a growth in a health conscious and environmental sustainability movement across the world, Wild Bunch has created a product and brand that is successful.

Who are my customers?

• How do you know what customers value in your product or service now and in future?
• Are you sure your customers are satisfied?
• How do you help your customers and deal with their concerns and complaints?
• Are you doing enough to maintain your customer relationships?
• Do you know if you are gaining or losing market share?

Information is key to understanding what will attract customers to your business and the best information will come from your potential (or current) customers. Be prepared to invest some time, effort and money in identifying and reaching your potential customers.

Use your business planning process and research to help you identify what/who/where your target market is.

Your customers may be in a specific geographical location, part of a particular sector, interested in a particular activity (e.g. adventure tourists), active at a particular time (e.g. seasonal products or services), or have the ability to spend the amount you want to charge for an activity/service.

Reaching your customers can be achieved in a range of ways – like your website – and links to it from other relevant websites, word-of-mouth, and advertising (flyers, brochures, information pamphlets and direct mail, telephone canvassing, exhibitions, sponsoring local events, television/magazine/radio/newspaper advertisements, etc). You must choose your media carefully and direct your promotion at the area you can, or intend to, supply.

Once you have identified and reached your customers, you need to consider what practical steps you will take to keep these customers.

If you don’t mind sharing with others, then all this is within your reach through websites such as Yours2Share.com and HalfShare.com where a matchmaking service is provided to people who would like to participate in fractional ownership or renting of property. It enables the benefit of ownership but at a much lower cost.

One of the major benefits of ownership, especially with ownership of property, investors gains capital gains growth and an opportunity to generate rental income.

Similar to an online dating service, buyers are matched based on their interests, tastes, backgrounds and hobbies. The sites also enable potential co-owners to meet one another in person, by phone or online.

So how do these types of sites make money?

• Real estate people find new ways of selling property under their existing industry revenue models and the co-owner match maker service is free of charge
• Non-realestate companies could offer a membership service for a small monthly or annual fee.
• Alternatively, the service could be provided for free and funded through advertising.

An opportunity exists to create similar fractional ownership or renting match making services in other regions around the world.

Continuity and succession planning is all about picking who will take on your responsibilities and having them ready to take over when you want to leave or do something different.

Unless a responsible action plan for continuity or succession is considered now, your business has a greater chance of failing:

• If you become ill or have to leave suddenly the business will deteriorate unless key employees, partners or directors know how to carry on.
• If you are unable to continue in business, your immediate family could be left without income or the business might be unsaleable.

You need to think early on about who is to take on your responsibilities, and they should gain a gradual increase in decision-making.  The person taking over must have the mutual commitment of you and your staff, which can take some time (months or years) to build up.

You might think about:

• Training an employee in the skills required
• Training a son, daughter or other relative in the skills required
• Bringing in a partner.

You should be prepared to return to the planning process at regular intervals.  For example, every month you should monitor your monthly performance in consultation with your staff, and if needed, make adjustments to your resources, budgets and plan of action.

In addition, at least once a year you should take time out to review not only your goals, but also your overall aims and purpose.  Ask yourself the following questions:

• Are my overall aims what I still want?
• Are my actions and goals working?
• Can I change my plan to reach my aims in a better way?

Tefal has recently invented a new technology called the Tefal ActiFry that makes reduced fat, home style chips, at about 3% of the fat of regular fries. Its new fry cooker uses fans and motions to coat 4 potatoes in approximately 1 tablespoon of oil.

Although the ActiFry has been developed as a home market product, there is an opportunity to use similar technology to provide a healthier version of the chip to the public through fish and chip shops. It appears that the ActiFry technology could become a franchisable opportunity for this segment of the take-away industry. A business opportunity still to be developed.

Watch the Tefal ActiFry promotional video.

To learn more about the components of buying a traditional fish and chip shop, click here.