So I have more five dollar bills in my wallet these days.

Why? The genesis for this was not having smaller bills on me and as a result costing me more than I hoped when tipping on a recent trip to Chicago. I was staying at a nicer hotel and at almost every turn there was someone to tip. As most ATMs today just give $20 dollar bills, that was all I had. Needless to say it made me look like a really generous guy.

Inflation Hits Gratuity

With the prices of everything going up over the last several years, restaurants have not been immune from this. It is evident in not only the menu prices being higher, but the suggestions for what to tip the wait staff are right up there too. You know those “tipping tables” you see at the bottom of your bill, the ones that list percentages and the dollar amounts to make it “easier” for you to tip? In the past they would likely offer 15% and 20%, and maybe sometimes 25%. These days I am seeing them starting at 18% and sometimes going as high as 30%! That, and more restaurants are automatically adding a tip on parties larger than 4 plus that tipping table too. Clearly restaurant staff are being hit by inflation like the rest of this, and with the overall check being higher, many diners are likely not tipping as they used to.

Thus I started carrying fives on me. Doing so was made easier by my new bank’s ATMs offering $5 bills along with $20 and even $1 bills – it also offers $100 bills as well and, though a popular thing to carry on you in Wisconsin I pass on those, but I digress. It allows me to tip appropriately, as well as not look too cheap by handing someone simply a one-dollar bill.

Making It Real

Carrying more cash on me has been something I have actually been doing for a while. From every expense you make being tracked to ginormous bank statements listing those very transactions to having had a few attempts of hacking of my bank accounts in recent years, by using cash more reduces all of this. Not to mention some merchants are passing along to their customers their credit card fees. Several local gas stations are offering cash prices up to 5 cents off a gallon. With filling up 2 cars every week, this adds up quickly, and I’ll take the reduced cost of anything anywhere I can. Even though the stands at the farmers market take cards and accept payments from mobile apps like Venmo, they are always appreciative to take old-fashioned fiat currency.

Deconstructing Carrying Fives

When it comes to inflation we often feel powerless to merely succumbing to it. By carrying five dollar bills on me it is attempt to counter this wave. Seeing cash actually leaving your wallet makes you think about what you are doing with that money, more than a piece of plastic or QR code ever will. By placing a bill in a tip jar or someone’s hand makes the acknowledgement of gratuity more real. One $5 is easier than fishing a couple of ones from your wallet and makes a little more generous statement without going over the top.

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This is from The Hot Iron, a journal on business and technology by Mike Maddaloni.

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QR Codes • Strategize • Thrive • (1) Comments • Permalink

Processing the virtual sticky notes in my BugMe app on my iPhone that I accumulated with what I learned, here they are…

• So what is that pictured above? It is a large toilet? Or a statue of Jay Leno’s chin? No, it is the start of one of the 4 new sculptures as part of the 1,004 Portraits installation at Chicago’s Millennium Park. The artist who created the Crown Fountain is behind this, as this sculpture and 3 others in a more inconspicuous location are extensions of the original 1,000 portraits that are illuminated on the glass block towers that is the hottest attraction on summer’s hottest days. This giant head will be looking at me for the next year and a half.
• Speaking of the Crown Fountain, they finally aligned the video with the spitting water, so the water looks like it is coming out of the people’s mouths, rather than their lip or moustache as it has been for the last couple of years.
• Like many of you, I have been wondering what Goldie Hawn has been up to the last few years. It turns out she has a foundation, appropriately called The Hawn Foundation, which aims to create programs to help kids learn and grow emotionally stable, all without pharmaceuticals. I haven’t looked into this fully, but I have been following them on Twitter as their goal sounds noble.
• Thank you Chicago Blackhawks for another hard-fought exciting season of hockey. Watching you lose in overtime in the final leading to the Stanley Cup was heartbreaking, but you made it interesting leading up to it.
• The Caribou Coffee shop at 20 Michigan Avenue in Chicago is closing on June 15. Right next door to it is a Starbucks, and next to that a Panera Bread and around the corner from it is another Starbucks. Going the other way is a Caffe Baci where you can get coffee, a Walgreen’s where you can get anything to drink, then next to it a 24 hour Dunkin Donuts, and next to it Toni Patisserie where you can get coffee too. Oh, and around the corner is the Pittsfield Café, which serves a great inexpensive breakfast and, you guessed it, coffee.
• Though I will still be drinking coffee, my warm weather drink has become the margarita – on the rocks with no salt.
• I received an email that the Box Tops Marketplace, where you could earn virtual Box Tops for Education for your favorite school by simply clicking on a store link, is closing as of July 31. With the simplicity of earning points which are essentially affiliate referrals, I am surprised it has been around this long.
• Good luck Jen on your new adventure! We will miss you, and I am sure you will miss us when you’re cashing in all of those frequent flyer miles and sitting in first class.
• When I took my daughter on a play date with her friend to a Chicago White Sox game, her first large sporting event, I was a little sad when I found out the tickets were virtual, a QR code to be scanned from the TicketMaster app. But low and behold, upon scanning them the ticket agent printed an “MLB Fan Pass” which is essence a ticket stub. So now she has something for her scrap book.
• This past week baseball journeyman Don Zimmer died too young at 83 after serving three score and 6 years in the game he loved. I will always remember him as manager of the Boston Red Sox when I was growing up, and with all of the other teams he played or coached for, many people will have their own memories of him. One thing I learned about him was he was the catalyst for baseball introducing batting helmets.
• Is it just me or am I the only person trying to do enterprise mobile app adoption, marketing and promotion?
• Something happened this week when trying to rearrange my work schedule and I said out loud, “great googly moogly” and thought of the infamous Snickers commercial. I have embedded it below or click the above link to watch it on YouTube, and tell me in the comments ot this post if we should try to bring back that phrase!

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This is from The Hot Iron, a journal on business and technology by Mike Maddaloni.

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Announcements • Business • Diversions • QR Codes • Technology • What I Learned • (3) Comments • Permalink

QR codes are not afraid of heights. Despite this, they still tend to be placed in obscure places, and in this place, mere inches from the ground.

The following sign was up for the month of September last year in Chicago’s Millennium Park.

From a distance, you can barely see the QR code at the bottom right of the sign. I saw it, but I digress. Here’s a closer shot of the sign.

I was able to get a closer shot, but I had to squat down to take the picture.

The code did work at the time, but it brings up an error, now several months later.

Where it’s always nice to see a QR code in action, why implement one so poorly? The position so low to the ground makes it less likely to see, let alone scan. If you do scan it, you’d have to squat down or have to bend over in an awkward position. The description accompanying the code could be made much clearer and concise. I also encountered issues scanning the code as the protective clear plastic over the poster caused a reflection and didn’t allow me to quickly scan the code.

How could this have been improved? By simply moving it from the bottom right to the top right would have helped adoption. This would have positioned it at just above waist level, that is for someone like myself just under 6 feet. Making the accompanying text clearer may have helped as well, or simply having it say, “scan here or visit explorechicago.org” would have been all that was needed.

So, would you have even bothered to have scanned a code in such a location? Share that or any other thoughts in the comments of this post.

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This is from The Hot Iron, a journal on business and technology by Mike Maddaloni, Founder and President of Web consulting firm Dunkirk Systems, LLC.

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Build • Mobile Technology • QR Codes • QR Codes In Action • (1) Comments • Permalink

Can QR codes be artistic? Of course, and if you need examples right away check out the QR Arts site. When large corporations use QR codes, many notice. When major corporations do something artistic with QR codes (or anything artistic for that matter) people notice even more. That is, if you recognize it is an artistic QR code.

The accompanying photo is of a bus kiosk ad in Chicago for Time magazine. The familiar red border of Time is clearly visible. It looks like soldiers are walking in a swamp, but they are actually walking in a QR code! The code itself is rotated 180 degrees so all 3 large corner squares are visible, which is a very valid use for them. It is also angled back. Both of these are why I question if to the casual person walking by, will they realize it is a QR code? Upon scanning the QR code, you are taken to a page on Time’s Web site on the topic of war.

What do you think – upon first glance would you think this is a QR code? Your thoughts are welcome in the comments for this post.

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Business • Mobile Technology • QR Codes • QR Codes In Action • Technology • (4) Comments • Permalink

In the past I have said QR codes are a way of tying the offline and online worlds. After seeing the use of a QR code I am writing about today, I am changing that statement to this: QR codes are a nexus between mediums.

Name.com is a great domain name registrar I use personally and for my business (note the link is an affiliate link). They have a clean and intuitive user interface that does not bombard you with upselling options at every click! They also provide outstanding and efficient human support whenever I need it. As part of that service, Name.com have recently launched an app for Android mobile devices, allowing you not only to register new domain names, but backorder domains as well as manage your entire account. They announced this with an email message as pictured below.

In it, there is a QR code. It links to a page on their Web site for the app. The email message is consistent in design with the Web page. The options they include on this Web page, including the ability to download it by SMS (texting to us in the US) and email, as well as a QR code taking you directly to the Android Market.

In this case, the QR code was a bridge between digital mediums – email and the Web. Of course if I read this email on my mobile device I wouldn’t be able to scan it, but as I opened it from within my Thunderbird email client, it worked. An argument can be made whether to link directly to the Android Market from the email rather to a landing page which then links to the Market. This is a great scenario for performing A/B or split testing on the email message, which they may have done anyway. Overall I believe this email from Name.com does a decent job of communicating the value behind the QR code.

What do you think of this QR code use? Would you link directly to the Android Market? Have you or would you use a QR code in an email message? You are welcome to share your thoughts and opinions in the comments of this post.

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Mobile Technology • QR Codes • QR Codes In Action • Strategize • Technology • Web Design • (0) Comments • Permalink