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Taymor agrees Spider-Man pay deal

AndrewF — Thu, 23 Feb 2012 08:04:01 +0000

Producers of Spider-Man: Turn off the Dark have agreed to pay sacked director Julie Taymor hundreds of thousands of dollars in royalties.

She sued them after she was fired from the Broadway musical in March, claiming she was not compensated for her work.

The dismissal came after delays, injuries to the cast and poor reviews.

She will be paid an estimated $10,000 (Â£6,300) a week in director royalties from the start of previews in November 2010 until the end of its Broadway run.

Currently, there are no plans for the production, which features music by U2's Bono and The Edge, to come to an end.

The settlement does not affect separate court actions over Ms Taymor's role as a creator of the musical and co-author of its book, in which she and the show's producers have sued each other.

"The litigation between us is over," said Karen Azenberg, president of the Stage Directors and Choreographers Society (SDC) union, which represented Ms Taymor.

"We are hopeful that any remaining issues between the producer and Ms Taymor regarding her role as author can also be resolved to the satisfaction of all."

The show's producers, Michael Cohl and Jeremiah Harris, of 8 Legged Productions, said: "We are very happy to have reached an amicable compromise with the SDC that will allow us all to move on.

"Now we can focus our energies on providing an amazing entertainment experience for our audience who have come to see the show in record numbers and made it a tremendous hit."

Producers had hoped they would only have to give Ms Taymor royalties for the period from November 2010 to March 2011, instead of paying her for the duration of the show's run.

However, a compensation package with Ms Taymor – who won a Tony Award for The Lion King – has now been agreed for any subsequent productions or tours of the show outside New York.

This week's settlement also grants Taymor separate "collaborator" royalties for November 2010 to March 2011.

She has agreed to defer payment until the Broadway show recoups the $75m (Â£47.4m) outlay, which makes it the most expensive production in Broadway history.

The producers also withdrew claims that Ms Taymor had breached her contract as director.

Elaborate stunts in the show, which had more than 180 preview performances, led to cast members being injured. Early reviews were resoundingly negative.

Producers Mr Cohl and Mr Harris criticised Ms Taymor for failing to follow "the original, family friendly Spider-Man story" saying she had instead "insisted on developing a dark, disjointed and hallucinogenic musical involving suicide, sex and death".

After Ms Taymor's departure, Philip William McKinley, director of The Boy From Oz, starring Hugh Jackman, was brought in to helm the musical.

The reworked show, which opened on 14 June, routinely takes more than $1.3m (Â£820,000) each week

At the end of December, it broke the record for the highest single-week takings of any show in Broadway history.

It took $2.9m (Â£1.8m) over nine performances at its Foxwoods Theater home, according to The Broadway League.

Depois de um ano ruim, salários em Wall Street sofrem grandes cortes

AndrewF — Thu, 23 Feb 2012 05:04:01 +0000

Por LIZ RAPPAPORT e COLIN BARR

Um ano terrível para o mercado tem forçado Wall Street a reavaliar seus salários.

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Bloomberg News

À medida que os bancos se preparam para a temporada de divulgação de resultados do quarto trimestre e tomam decisões sobre o pagamento de bônus para 2011, é provável que a remuneração total seja a mais baixa desde 2008, quando a crise financeira destruiu algumas empresas e deixou muitos dos sobreviventes nas mãos do governo.

Muitos dos cerca de 400 sócios do Goldman Sachs Group Inc. esperam que a remuneração de 2011 seja pelo menos a metade da recebida no ano anterior, segundo pessoas a par da situação. Alguns empregados da mesa de operações de renda fixa em Nova York terão um corte de 60% no salários, com alguns até ficando sem bônus, disseram as pessoas.

Os bônus dos banqueiros de investimento e operadores do Morgan Stanley devem cair de 30% a 40% em relação aos do ano passado, disseram as pessoas familiarizadas com a situação.

Depois de meses de preocupação em Wall Street, os cortes nos salários ocorrem num momento em que as corretoras se preparam para divulgar os resultados do quarto trimestre — e pagar os bônus de 2011. Foi um ano ruim por causa de uma queda na receita operacional, poucas fusões e aquisições, nova regulamentação e falta de confiança na economia mundial. Entre os outros fatores que contribuíram para reduzir os salários do setor estão a queda nas cotações e a indignação do público que culminou no movimento Ocupe Wall Street, que montou um acampamento de protesto no centro financeiro de Nova York.

Executivos de algumas firmas financeiras preveem mudanças de longo prazo por causa das transformações econômicas e de regulamentação, que devem limitar a rentabilidade. “As empresas realmente precisam entender que acabou a festa de antigamente”, disse Rose Marie Orens, sócia sênior da Compensation Advisory Partners, uma firma de Nova York que presta serviço a comitês salariais de conselhos de empresas abertas.

O pagamento de 2011 para o sócio médio do Goldman, incluindo salário e bônus, provavelmente ficará na faixa de US$ 3 milhões a US$ 6,5 milhões, segundo pessoas a par da questão. Em anos melhores, o pagamento foi pelo menos o dobro, disseram as pessoas.

Em muitos casos, os cortes salariais de Wall Street ocorrerão principalmente no topo da hierarquia, onde se paga os maiores bônus. As firmas financeiras concorriam agressivamente antes da crise financeira para atrair e cultivar os novos talentos.

O resultado dos cortes atuais é que alguns empregados de médio escalão dos bancos de investimentos podem ganhar mais que seus superintendentes e chefes executivos este ano, disseram pessoas a par da questão.

Wall Street sempre cortou os salários em tempo de vacas magras, mas a concorrência pelos operadores e banqueiros de investimento mais talentosos impedia as firmas de impor grandes mudanças. Mas depois da crise financeira, algumas firmas diminuíram os bônus e aumentaram o salário básico por causa da pressão política. As autoridades argumentaram que a dependência exagerada nos bônus estimulou a aceitação de riscos excessivos.

O setor também está pagando seus pecados com várias demissões em massa. Duas dezenas de bancos e corretoras globais anunciaram planos no segundo semestre do ano passado de demitir um total de mais de 103.000 pessoas.

No momento, as firmas estão sendo obrigadas a usar fatias maiores da receita para pagar os empregados. Uma análise do The Wall Street Journal sobre os resultados de firmas do setor e estimativas de analistas sobre 34 empresas de capital aberto calculam que elas preveem gastar 36% da receita com salários e benefícios, 33% a mais que 2010.

UK budget surplus at four-year high as revenues exceed target

AndrewF — Thu, 23 Feb 2012 02:04:01 +0000

London: Britain posted the biggest budget surplus in four years in January, putting Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne on course to undershoot his full-year deficit target.

Revenue exceeded spending by £7.75 billion ($12.3 billion), compared with a surplus of £5.2 billion a year earlier, the Office for National Statistics said yesterday in London.

The median of 10 forecasts in a Bloomberg News survey was £6.3 billion. January is the biggest tax-collection month of the year.

Osborne is refusing to bow to pressure from opposition politicians to relax his fiscal squeeze to promote growth when he presents his budget next month.

Article continues below

Moody’s Investors Service said last week while the UK’s Aaa rating was at risk from the crisis in Europe, the government’s commitment to deficit reduction supported the top grade.

"If the euro area doesn’t blow up and propel the world back into recession the probability is quite high that the government will stick to its fiscal plans," said Ross Walker, an economist at Royal Bank of Scotland Group in London.

"It makes sense for them to maintain the Aaa rating and market confidence on the debt."

Greek deal

Greece won a second bailout overnight after European governments wrung concessions from private investors as part of a debt swap and tapped into European Central Bank profits to prevent the nation defaulting.

Bondholders’ response to the swap and parliamentary approvals in some European countries loom as risks to the deal.

In the UK, receipts rose 2.8 per cent in January from a year earlier, while spending increased three per cent. The government receives a fifth of all taxes on company profits and gets final payments of income tax for the previous fiscal year.

In the first 10 months of the fiscal year, the deficit narrowed to £93.5 billion from £109.1 billion a year earlier. Government revenue increased 4.7 per cent and spending grew 1.6 per cent. It raises the possibility that borrowing in the fiscal year through March will come in below the £127 billion forecast by the Office for Budget Responsibility in November, giving Osborne limited leeway to offer growth-inducing tax incentives in the budget, said Chris Williamson, chief economist at Markit.

Credible plan

"Our credible deficit plan is working and bringing government borrowing down: so far this year it is £16 billion lower than in the same period last year," the Treasury said in an e-mailed statement yesterday.

"It is the deficit plan, and its successful implementation, that is keeping interest rates at record lows for families and businesses and helping to support the recovery."

The pound was trading at $1.5816 in mid-morning, down 0.2 per cent on the day. The benchmark 10-year government bond yield was little changed at 2.22 per cent.

The surplus including government support for banks was £10.7 billion. National debt was £989 billion in January, falling below the £1 trillion mark reached in December. As a percentage of gross domestic product, the debt was 63 per cent.

There was a public-sector cash surplus of £16.8 billion, compared with economists’ forecast for £24.7 billion.

The statistics office said the sale of Northern Rock to Virgin Money moved the bank outside the public sector on January 1 and added £653 million to Britain’s national debt.

This is because a capital transfer of £1.4 billion to Northern Rock in 2009 was treated as a "temporary effect" and not included in national debt until the sale to Virgin for £747 million.

The statistics office said the sale includes some deferred payments that over time will reduce the impact on the national debt.

Calls to lower sales tax

The government is aiming to rid Britain of a budget deficit equal to 9 per cent of gross domestic product by 2017.

Its £147 billion austerity programme will cost more than 700,000 government jobs, and critics say it is undermining growth.

Ed Balls, who speaks for the opposition Labour Party on economic matters, on Sunday called for officials to lower sales tax to aid the economy.

The Institute for Fiscal Studies said February 1 lower borrowing could give Osborne room to safely implement a "significant" fiscal stimulus to support growth.

Reality check

Economy likely to shrink

Government data to be published on Friday will probably confirm the economy shrank 0.2 per cent in the fourth quarter, according to the median estimate of 36 economists in a Bloomberg News survey. The IFS forecasts 0.3 per cent growth this year, less than half the 0.7 per cent forecast by the independent Office for Budget Responsibility in November.

Moody’s placed Britain’s Aaa rating on negative outlook on February 13, saying the "weaker macroeconomic environment" will "challenge the government’s efforts to place its debt burden on a downward trajectory over the coming years." Osborne, who said the move was a "reality check," will present his budget to Parliament in London on March 21.

There are "rising challenges in achieving debt reduction within the timeframe that has been laid out by the government, not least the possible impact of any future cutbacks on short-term growth," Moody’s said in a statement.

Still "the rating agency believes that the UK government’s response to negative developments late last year indicates its commitment to restoring a sustainable debt position."

— Bloomberg

Furniture for a Young Nation

AndrewF — Wed, 22 Feb 2012 23:04:01 +0000

By BARRYMORE LAURENCE SCHERER

New York

In the annals of American furniture before and after the Revolutionary War, the list of core names is brief and overwhelmingly English: Thomas Chippendale, the brothers Adam, Thomas Sheraton and George Hepplewhite are the designers whose work exerted the greatest influence on the American scene. But this pantheon also includes an American, the Scottish-born Duncan Phyfe (1770-1854), the young nation’s most celebrated and original cabinetmaker.

Phyfe and his design legacy represent the glory years of America’s post-Revolution expansion. And during the half-century of Phyfe’s career, New York City was at the center of that growth. This opulent and multifaceted oeuvre is the focus of the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s exhibition “Duncan Phyfe, Master Cabinetmaker.” Curated by Peter M. Kenny and Michael K. Brown, who are co-authors, with scholars Frances F. Bretter and Matthew A. Thurlow, of an exhibition catalog that is one of the handsomest in recent memory, the show is the first Phyfe retrospective in 90 years. And it offers a sumptuous visual cornucopia. Nearly 100 works from private and public collections—including pieces still owned by Phyfe’s descendants—document the craftsman’s mastery of evolving styles from Federal to Grecian to pillar-and-scroll Classical. Before retiring, Phyfe even put a reluctant toe into the Romantic atmosphere of Gothic revival and ebullient French rococo.

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The Metropolitan Museum of Art

A card table dated 1815-20.

Duncan Phyfe: Master Cabinetmaker in New York

Metropolitan Museum of Art

Through May 6

(Travels to the Museum Of Fine Arts Houston June 24)

The World of Duncan Phyfe: The Arts of New York, 1800-1847

Hirschl & Adler

Through Feb. 17

That the Met has not only assembled so many card tables, pier tables, worktables, sofas, chairs, mirrors and cabinet pieces but vividly placed them in their historical context is a curatorial triumph. For instance, a selection of pieces made for the wealthy New Yorkers Robert and Susan Donaldson is displayed with their portraits. Susan Donaldson is portrayed with her harp and one of a pair of Phyfe window seats. The actual pair of seats and the harp are displayed nearby. One of those seats bears Phyfe’s own label, dated July 4, 1826—not only the 50th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence, but the day on which both Thomas Jefferson and John Adams died and the composer Stephen Foster was born.

In addition, there are a number of surviving invoices for specific objects, as well as such related documents as Phyfe’s own surprisingly crude design sketches. By matching these with objects whose history is known, the exhibition and book strive to codify Phyfe’s evolving design traits to help scholars distinguish between the many unsigned Phyfe works and those by his imitators.

There is also Phyfe’s own chest of woodcarving tools, its beautifully veneered interior worthy of cabinetry for a front parlor, the elegantly beveled handle of each tool worn to mellow smoothness by years of use. The chest and its contents are effectively brought to life by a video of Phyfe’s workshop techniques, including veneering, carving and gilding.

The Metropolitan Museum of Art

A scroll-back armchair from 1807.

Classical proportion, balance and symmetry are Phyfe hallmarks. The delicate floral and cornucopia motifs carved on the crest rails of his earlier Federal period sofas and side chairs recall the work of the great woodcarver Samuel McIntyre of Salem, Mass. In Phyfe’s lyre-back chairs, the lyre features a key-ended tuning pin on the right side and a peg-shaped end on the left, suggesting an authentic musical instrument rather than a mere design motif.

Increasing pomp and opulence distinguish Phyfe’s work from 1815 to 1825, which features richly figured mahogany, kingwood, rosewood, white and colored marble, brass inlay, lavish gilding and finely cast mounts of ormolu (gilt metal). Stern-faced caryatids with gilded wings support card tables, above legs carved as muscular lions’ paws; gilded acanthus leaves curl around the pillars of center tables and sideboards. Several pieces by Phyfe are displayed near similar works by his chief rival, the French émigré Charles-Honoré Lannuier (1779-1819), possibly the only New York maker who could equal Phyfe’s finesse at carving and design. The exhibition shows these two artists dueling with ideas like fencing masters, influencing and sometimes even copying one another. Their competition prompted each to feats of virtuosity: On several tables made when the demand for exotic rosewood trumped Honduras mahogany, carved elements of solid mahogany are paint-grained to mimic rosewood. Only Lannuier’s premature death cut the tournament short.

In an age that lived precariously on credit, Phyfe always paid cash for his materials, laying in sufficient quantities of mahogany timber—known as “Phyfe logs”—to allow the sawed lumber to season far longer than was usual. Thus his tables rarely show cracks and loosened miter joints resulting from wood shrinkage over time. And as ornamentation grew more restrained in the later 1820s, Phyfe concentrated on the glories of large expanses of matched veneers. A notably restrained tilt-top center table is a masterpiece of veneering, the exquisite flame-grained figuration of the circular top achieved with a “book-matched” series of wedge-shaped veneer sections meticulously sliced from a single root crotch of a mahogany tree. This emphasis on veneer over carving characterizes much of Phyfe’s later output, and the inclusion of such veneered pieces as an imposing Grecian bedstead and monumental cheval mirror made in 1841 for an important South Carolina client also underscores Phyfe’s great popularity in the antebellum South.

Meanwhile, one of the lenders to the exhibition, Hirschl & Adler Galleries, has mounted a complementary show, “The World of Duncan Phyfe,” that features pieces lent by private collectors as well as works in the gallery’s own inventory. It was curated by two of the gallery’s principals, Elizabeth and Stuart Feld, who have written their own excellent catalog. The choice furniture is arranged among paintings, girandole mirrors, lamps, porcelain and silver that would once have been prized by the carriage trade knocking on Phyfe’s showroom door.

Because many pieces of so-called American Empire furniture were mass-produced by later, lesser makers than Phyfe and Lannuier, interest in collecting American Classical furnishings has been at a low ebb for several decades. As these refreshing shows reacquaint us with the dignified, sculptural beauty of the finest examples, they may help to reawaken delight in this important period of American design.

Mr. Scherer writes about the fine arts and music for the Journal.

Wanted: Specially Designed Tools For Pediatric Surgery

AndrewF — Wed, 22 Feb 2012 20:04:01 +0000

Story By: by Amy Standen

Surgeons often need specially designed tools to operate on small children.

One tool doesn’t fit all when it comes to surgery.

Pediatric surgeons know this all too well when it’s time to operate on a baby. Some infants are born prematurely. Others have congenital defects â some part of their internal anatomy that just didn’t develop the way it was supposed to.

In other words, plumbing problems. That’s what Dr. Sanjeev Dutta, a pediatric surgeon at Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital in Palo Alto, Calif., calls it. His job is to fix exactly these kinds of problems.

Often times, the instruments he uses when he does these surgeries weren’t built for tiny babies. They were made for adults. “So we sort of struggle with instruments that were never designed for the type of patient that we’re operating on, and we adapt,” he says.

The issue here isn’t really safety, he says. Most of these surgeries are, by now, pretty routine. But pediatric surgeons have to improvise in ways other surgeons don’t. Physically, sometimes it’s pretty awkward.

“Really, I have to stand a foot-and-a-half away from the patient in order to just do the operation, because the instrument is so big,” he says.

Partly because of problems like these, pediatric surgeons have a reputation as mavericks particularly good at improvising. Take Dr. Mike Harrison, at the University of California at San Francisco. He’s known as the father of fetal surgery, working on the smallest patients of all â those still in the womb. Twenty years ago, when the field was just getting started, he says his team had to make almost everything from scratch.

“We had to make all the tools and devices that allowed the fetal surgery â that is the stuff on the mom and the uterus,” he says. “All that stuff we had to make up, because the tools were ten times too big.”

Harrison describes this era â the 1970s and early ’80s â as a sort of golden age of pediatric surgery. A time when you could rig up a new tool, run your own tests on animal models, if necessary, and then bring it into the operating room.

That’s not possible today, though. In the late 1970s, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration began regulating surgical devices, much the same way it regulates drugs. It now can take a decade or longer to get a device through the regulatory process â longer for pediatrics.

Along with the fact that these procedures are rare, it’s had a chilling effect on manufacturers, according to Harrison. “The market is too small to justify the research and development for new devices,” he says. “That’s the fundamental problem.”

So in 2007, in an effort to help spur innovation in pediatrics, Congress set aside a small pot of money â about $3 million for each two-year cycle, split among several different teams. The idea is to bring together doctors and engineers to work on problems in pediatric surgery. Harrison said that traditionally, these can seem like two very different worlds.

Dutta has paired up with an engineer named Pablo Garcia. Garcia works at a non-profit research institute called SRI International, in Menlo Park, Calif. In 2009, he and Dutta received $500,000 from the FDA to fund their collaboration.

Right now, they are standing around a table in Garcia’s engineering lab, rifling through a pile of metal gadgets, or prototypes. Dutta pulls out a tool from one of their very early projects. It’s a favorite of his. It has a plastic grip, like what you’d hold on a paint roller, attached to a thin metal tube with a tiny clamp at the end. The tool designed to treat a condition called esophageal atresia.

“The esophagus, which is the swallowing tube which goes down to the stomach, has a gap in it,” he says. “The child is born with a gap in that tube and so therefore can’t eat.” So Dutta and Garcia’s tool is designed to make surgery on this problem a lot easier, and much less invasive.

But it could be years before this device ever makes it into the operating room. Dutta and Garcia’s grant from the FDA has run out. They hope private philanthropy will sponsor their device to the point where a manufacturer might see the profit in making it.

Kuwait profile

AndrewF — Wed, 22 Feb 2012 17:04:01 +0000

Kuwait is a small, oil-rich country nestling at the top of the Gulf, flanked by large or powerful neighbours – Saudi Arabia to the south, Iraq to the north and Iran to the east.

Twelve years later, Kuwait played host to another massive military presence as thousands of soldiers massed on the Iraqi border for the US-led campaign in 2003 to disarm and oust the Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein. It remains an important transit route for forces and civilians moving in and out of Iraq.

Kuwait was the first Arab country in the Gulf to have an elected parliament. Moves to change the male-dominated political structure culminated in the granting of full political rights to women in 2005.

In 1999 the country's then ruler, Sheikh Jaber al-Ahmad al-Sabah, issued a decree giving women full political rights, but the move was narrowly defeated in the National Assembly.

In May 2005 parliament gave women the right to vote and stand as candidates in elections for the 50-seat National Assembly.

More generally, the growing assertiveness of parliament has led to frequent confrontations with the government. Between 2007-9, three cabinets resigned in as many years amid disputes with the National Assembly.

Kuwait has faced a recent spate of militant violence. Security forces have clashed with Islamist militants, some of whom are alleged to have links with Al-Qaeda. The authorities say extremist groups have plotted attacks on Western targets.

Moody’s rebaja la calificación de la deuda de seis países de la euro zona

AndrewF — Wed, 22 Feb 2012 14:04:01 +0000

Por DREW FITZGERALD

Moody’s Investors Service rebajó el lunes las calificaciones de deuda de seis países europeos y advirtió que sus calificaciones máximas para Austria, Francia y Reino Unido podrían estar en riesgo.

La firma rebajó la calificación de deuda de Italia en un escaño a “A3″, lo que corresponde a cuatro escaños sobre el territorio de grado especulativo, y mantuvo la perspectiva Negativa para la tercera mayor economía de la eurozona.

Las calificaciones de España, Malta, Portugal y Eslovenia también se rebajaron en un escaño y mantuvieron sus perspectivas Negativas, indicó Moody’s.

Las perspectivas de Austria, Francia y Reino Unido pasaron a Negativas.

La medida de Moody’s sigue medidas similares tomadas el mes pasado por Standard & Poor’s y Fitch Ratings donde se rebajaron las calificaciones de varios países de una sola vez. Al igual que S&P y Fitch, Moody’s citó las preocupaciones por la actual crisis de deuda, la manera en la que está siendo manejada y el impacto sobre varias economías de la región como causal de las rebajas. Moody’s mencionó además la fragilidad de los mercados financieros en Europa y las posibilidades de futuros problemas en el sistema debido a la crisis.

Moody’s rebajó el lunes las calificaciones de deuda de Italia, Malta, Portugal, Eslovaquia, Eslovenia y España. Las calificaciones de los seis países fueron rebajadas el mes pasado por S&P. En tanto, Fitch rebajó el mes pasado las calificaciones de deuda de Italia, Eslovenia y España.

Si bien Moody’s fue el último en tomar medidas, fue el más severo con Portugal y España. La rebaja de Moody’s a la deuda de Portugal lleva la calificación de deuda del país más hacia territorio chatarra, con “Ba3″, tres escaños por debajo del grado de inversión.

Donde Moody’s sí se diferenció de las medidas recientes tomadas por otras calificadoras fue al modificar la perspectiva para Reino Unido. Moody’s señaló el lunes que los recientes acontecimientos señalan débiles prospectos macroeconómicos para Europa, lo que hace más difícil para los países implementar medidas de austeridad para reducir su deuda.

Hoffenheim, Mainz play out a draw

AndrewF — Wed, 22 Feb 2012 11:04:01 +0000

Berlin: Hoffenheim’s new coach Markus Babbel was unable to mark his home debut with a win on Friday as Mainz came from behind to earn a 1-1 draw in the Bundesliga.

The home side went ahead in the ninth minute when the unfortunate Nikolce Noveski deflected Boris Vukcevic’s cross into his own net for his sixth ever own goal — a Bundesliga joint record. Noveski also scored an own goal when Mainz hosted Hoffenheim earlier this season.

Mohammad Zidan scored in the third consecutive game following his winter transfer from Borussia Dortmund when the Hoffenheim defence left him completely free to volley in Radoslav Zabavnik’s cross in the 29th minute.

Both mid-table sides found it hard to control the ball or dictate play in a scrappy second half.

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In With the New Franchisees

AndrewF — Wed, 22 Feb 2012 08:10:31 +0000

By JONNELLE MARTE

(Corrections & Amplifications:)

There’s a youth movement brewing in the franchising world.

The Journal Report

See the complete Small Business report.

Usually, franchisers don’t want to gamble on young entrepreneurs—they prefer seasoned managers who have built up lots of savings to plow into the venture. Now a host of companies are rethinking that logic. They’re aggressively recruiting twentysomethings through franchise brokers, marketing themselves in youth-friendly venues like Facebook, and in some cases offering financial lures to get young people on board—such as deep discounts on franchise fees, which many beginners can’t afford.

A Foot in the Door

Why the big change? For one thing, many boomer franchisees are retiring, leaving room for newcomers. And many franchisers say that today’s crop of twentysomethings are much better prepared to run a business than earlier generations of youngsters, since more colleges are offering strong training in entrepreneurship.

Then there’s attitude. “Sometimes the younger people have more drive and are willing to put in more time and maybe are hungrier than a corporate person who has other commitments,” says Patty Meyer, a senior consultant for Toronto-based MatchPoint Franchise Consulting Network, which helps companies recruit franchisees. “Younger people are able to get things moving faster in some cases.”

As baby boomers retire, franchisers are aggressively recruiting a much younger crowd like 23-year-old Nicholas Hernandez. If he hits his sales targets, he’ll get a break on the fee for opening a franchise. WSJ’s Jonnelle Marte reports.

Of course, in these tough times, franchisers are offering lots of people discounts to get them to buy into the business, not just twentysomethings. But many franchisers and brokers say they’re making a particular effort to bring in young people. Several franchise companies, for instance, say they have joined the Veterans Transition Franchise Initiative, known as VetFran, in order to attract young veterans. The program, created by The International Franchise Association and promoted by the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, the nonprofit Veterans Corporation and the U.S. Small Business Administration, aims to help veterans of all ages by giving them a discount off initial franchise fees of member companies—usually between 10% and 15%.

Other companies are using different incentives to get twentysomethings on board. Consider Valpak Direct Marketing Systems Inc., a direct-mailing company in Largo, Fla., owned by a subsidiary of Cox Enterprises Inc. Last year, Valpak created the Entrepreneurship Award Program in an effort to recruit young people who could open new franchises or take over existing ones as owners prepare to retire. The potential franchisees sign on with the company as salespeople, and if they hit certain goals they get a discount on their franchise fee. Along the way, they get to know the business and the company gets a sense of how they perform.

One hopeful is Nicholas Hernandez. At 23, he has already opened—and closed down—his first start-up, a music-promotion company. He wants to run a franchise, but for now, short on cash and experience, he’s a salesman.

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Jenna Przybylowski

Valpak sales rep Nicholas Hernandez (right) and his boss, Bobby Coco. If Mr. Hernandez hits sales targets, he’ll get a break on the fee for opening a franchise, thanks to a Valpak program for young entrepreneurs.

If he brings in $1.1 million in three years—the average sales raked in by the top third of the company’s performers over the past three years—Mr. Hernandez becomes eligible for one of three things: $50,000 toward the fees for one of Valpak’s dormant territories, which start around $43,000 but range higher as the market size increases; $10,000 toward the franchise fee of an International Franchise Association member company; or $10,000 toward an M.B.A. or other advanced degree.

“Quite frankly, sharp people coming out of school have choices, and so we’re trying to give them a reason to at least consider us,” says Joe Bourdow, president of Valpak, which has about 170 franchises in the U.S. and Canada. He started the program after visiting colleges and finding himself impressed by the students he met.

Hunting for Talent

Another company aggressively looking for young people is WSI, an Internet-marketing franchiser with 1,500 franchisees in 87 countries. In 2007, the company launched the Young Entrepreneur Scholarship Program, which awards franchises—minus the initial fee—to people between 21 and 31 years old. Candidates must propose a business plan for how they would run the franchise and are also judged on their community involvement, education and personality.

Company executives say they need tech-savvy franchisees who can help the company stay on top of the latest technology. “If we can help capture some of the young talent and bring them to WSI franchising, then we’re really meeting the needs…of bringing in the innovation needed to develop the business,” says Maribel Guiste, vice president of franchise operations for WSI.

So far, only one WSI scholarship has been awarded—in Latin America—but the company plans to select two recipients in North America by the end of September. Overall, 13% of the Toronto-based company’s franchisees are younger than 30, up from 2% in 2006.

Other companies aren’t offering inducements but are still pushing heavily to land young entrepreneurs. For instance, many companies are telling their franchise brokers to pursue the demographic. David Omholt, a franchise broker in Plano, Texas, says about a third of the 200 companies he works with have stopped giving age ranges for their target franchisee and are changing their marketing materials to minimize jargon and depict franchisees of all ages. “It’s quite a departure from the traditional mentality of who to recruit and how to recruit for new franchisees,” says Mr. Omholt.

Rich Wilson, chief operating officer of CertaPro Painters, an Oaks, Pa., painting franchiser with over 300 locations in the U.S. and Canada, had a similar chat with his franchise brokers earlier this year. Mr. Wilson also joined VetFran, in an effort to recruit young veterans who may have saved some money while they were deployed. “We have people [ages] 25, 26 and 30 coming in and earning better numbers than our more mature franchisees,” says Mr. Wilson, adding that about 15% of the franchisees CertaPro recruited recently are younger than 35, up from 10% six years ago.

A Risky Bet?

Still, this new focus on youth carries some risks, particularly when incentive programs are involved. Some franchise consultants warn that these programs might attract franchisees who don’t fight as hard because they’re not investing as much of their own money or who might not have the finances to cover regular business expenses.

“The real risk is that you end up bringing on a marginal franchisee that is going to cost you more and return less,” says Mark Siebert, chief executive officer of iFranchise Group Inc., a franchise-consulting company based in Homewood, Ill.

Some experts worry that a younger person buying a franchise might have a hard time hiring, managing and firing employees—difficult tasks for even seasoned businesspeople. But some of these programs, like Valpak’s, address that issue by allowing for a test run of sorts, where the candidate and company get to know each other.

At Valpak, Mr. Hernandez sits down once a week with his boss and mentor, Bobby Coco, to decide what neighborhoods to target and what companies to follow up with. Mr. Coco also shares what he’s learned in 35 years of running Valpak franchises. How to meet press deadlines and set realistic goals. How to approach potential clients. How to convert that burning desire into success.

Mr. Hernandez, who graduated last year from William Paterson University in Wayne, N.J., says the structure and financial help the program offers make his entrepreneurship goals much more achievable.

“Having to deal with my own business and having to set up my own reputation, my own brand name—it’s very difficult,” he says.

Mr. Coco says programs like this were unheard of when he opened his first franchise at age 21—a move he could afford only because he convinced the owner at the time to give him a payment plan. “We really weren’t handed the opportunity; we had to stick it out ourselves,” he says. “We’re at least giving them the opportunity, but they still have to earn it.”

Corrections & Amplifications:

The International Franchise Association created, and runs, the Veterans Transition Franchise Initiative, which aims to help veterans start franchises. An earlier version of this article incorrectly stated that VetFran was created by the Department of Veterans Affairs, the nonprofit Veterans Corporation and the Small Business Administration, which promote the program.

–Ms. Marte is a staff reporter of The Wall Street Journal in South Brunswick, N.J. She can be reached at jonnelle.marte@wsj.com.

Austerity measure for Greeks means dismantling of social services system

AndrewF — Wed, 22 Feb 2012 05:10:31 +0000

LOS ANGELES, CA (Catholic Online) – In a last ditch attempt to secure an additional bailout loan of 130 billion dollars from the the International Monetary Found, the European Central Bank and the European Commission, Greece has agreed to the austerity plan in an attempt to escape bankruptcy.

The latest phase of the plan included cutting 150,000 public sector jobs, overturning existing labor laws, slashing pensions and reducing monthly minimum wages by 20 percent. Workers under 25 years of age have been asked to take a 30 percent salary cut.

Parliament ushered in the fresh “bout of austerity” on February 12 after increasing violence across the city. Mobs of newly impoverished Greeks took to the streets, setting Athens ablaze.

“Greece was a country with universal healthcare. Now, many of the people who show up in public hospitals can’t even afford the five-euro general admission fee introduced two years ago. Ten percent of patients don’t even have insurance,” Meropi Andriopoulou, a medical officer involved in the national health system since 1989 says.

“Spending your days in a public hospital (highlights the degree of) social exclusion. Our healthcare system has collapsed and there is no political will to get it back on track,” she added.

Having taken a salary decrease of over one thousand euro herself, Andriopoulou, a mother of two, decided to join “Doctors of the World.” The group of medical officers provides free treatment, medical supplies and foodstuffs to people lacking social insurance.

“You can’t imagine that this kind of social exclusion exists until you show up there,” Andriopoulou says. “Moreover, I was surprised to see that most volunteers were unemployed doctors or people under serious financial hardships themselves.”

“Like many of them, I don’t believe in philanthropy, I believe that poverty is a social issue, not the result of bad fate. I have spent over two decades working for the National Healthcare System, which I believe has been the victim of clientele-ism and political interests. The only response to it is a political one,” she added.

The rapidly increasing numbers of homeless people sleeping around central Athens proves that austerity measures have struck segments of the population especially hard.

Published by: Catholic Online (www.catholic.org)