The Essential Message Blog

What Have You Done Today To Make You Feel Proud?

It's been almost a week since the Gay Pride parade in Toronto, and after a whole week of celebrations and one big, beautiful parade, I'm still seeing rainbows.

For me, Pride not only represents the importance of LGBT rights, but the importance freedom and acceptance for every one of us, in all our unique and eccentric glory.

“Taking it to the Mattresses:” Making your Company a Household Name

For my partner and I, bed time hasn’t always been a walk in the park. In fact, ‘lights out’ meant a time of invasion, battle, and conquest over prime mattress space, rather than peace, tranquility, and good z’s. However, after many uncomfortable nights taking turns as couch refugees, we decided to resort to more diplomatic measures. Our "treaty of Chanel,” (based on the Coco Chanel’s popular logo of inverted C’s) has put an end to our territorial wars. A little difficult to explain, we now sleep on our sides, back-to-back in the position of Chanel’s inverted C’s – sparing each other our morning breathe, and our imperialistic cruelty. While this may appear as simply one couple’s idiosyncratic behavior, it has much broader implications on the role branding plays in our everyday lives.

If The Shoe Fits...

Today I was thinking about my shoes.

Now, I'm certainly no Carrie Bradshaw, spending hundreds of dollars on Manolo Blahnik's latest creation, but I do have more than one pair. My shoe rack includes pointed-toe kitten heels for professional occasions, a sassy pair of calico-print stilettos I brought back from Paris, runners for all those marathons (read: treadmill jaunts), flip-flops (or 'slip slops,' as my Zimbabwean friends call them), and, of course, my trusty old Cons - the beloved black and white Chuck Taylors that I've been wearing since the 7th grade. (No, not the same pair of course, just the same style.)

What the heck does this have to do with business? Well, I'm glad you asked.