Walmarts Working Class

Chief marketer Stephen Quinn was interviewed by Geoff Calvin on the strategies he enforced on the makeover of Wal-mart. In recent quarters, Wal-mart was doing terribly in sales when the economy was at its worst. Individuals lost their jobs which lead to little to no sales at Wal-marts nationwide. Quinn then began to look at the problems behind these inaccurate sales and he came up with; individuals who had little income, due to the recession that hit the economy badly were Wal-Mart majority shoppers, Wal-Mart prices had to change also, and if the prices did not change, Wal-Mart would have soon been out of business in just a couple of years down the road. As Quinn and his marketing and managemnet’s teams work hard on this new makeover, Wal-Mart  main focus were to keep and develop new customers and help them save money and live better. Executives at Wal-Mart guarantee that shopping at Wal-Mart will give their customers the lowest price and top brands than any other retail store. As the economy began to grow after the recent recession, Wal-Mart’s sales began to pick up dramatically and are now the #1 retailer store.Walmart’s location tends to have exceptionally better sales in rural and suburban areas than in large cities areas.Wal-Mart has all kinds of groups shopping at their store, but everyone is there to save money. Indeed Wal-Mart has individuals who are well off in life, but they too want to save money as those who are not so well off in life. As Wal-Mart was creating their makeover, they notice that their rival surrounding stores were creating lower prices than Wal-Mart stores and customers began to respond and start to shop at those stores. Wal-Mart took action, not only did Wal-Mart reduce their prices, but they also made majority of their stores a one stop shop, where customers can shop for groceries, clothing, home furniture items, and much more at a cheaper price. Wal-Mart also introduces the concept called price matching. This concept was basically when a customer brings in a sales paper from another store and compares Wal-Mart and the other store prices. If the other store price were better and lower than Wal-Mart, Wal-Mart would than price match that price and give the customer the price of the lower cost. Quinn and his marketing team target families and individuals who had little income.  They focused on revamping their prices so that those individuals can save their, buy what they want and need, and live a better life. Even before the recession had struck the nation, Walmart’s strategies were still focusing on the working class and/or the middle class. As I was reading this article it shows how Wal-mart operates its business in order to maintain its spot as the#1 retail store in the United States and it also shows how their low cost method is what benefits their customers the most. However, the implications of Walmart’s quality their employment practices may not be up to part to some people, Walmart has still shown tremendous profitability in their market.  http://money.cnn.com/2011/12/14/news/companies/walmart_stephen_quinn_leadership.fortune/index.htm

Question: Even though Walmart target market is the working class, how would you express its conditions of management skills with its workers who work there?

Need a New Heart? Let Me Print One for You

It is amazing to live in a generation where technology is advancing because we get to witness life-changing events right before our eyes. Recently, there has been a substantial amount of conversation about three-dimensional printing and how it will change the future because we will be able to print objects instead of psychically manufacturing them. Lately, scientists have been experimenting on printing out anything they could think of, ranging from things such as adjustable wrenches to human organs. Yes that ‘s right, a human organ. You are probably wondering how that is possible. Well you are not alone because when I first heard about 3D printing, I thought to myself, “How in the world is that possible? I can’t even imagine that.”  Then I heard about how 3-D printing had saved a baby’s life and I thought to myself, “Okay, now this is a joke.” Well, it’s not.

3D Printed Wrench

At six weeks old, a baby boy named Kaiba had stopped breathing because of a rare obstruction in his lungs called bronchial malacia; this is a condition where the cartilage in the walls of the bronchial tubes are weakened. After being revived and taken home, Kaiba’s breathing had failed on him day after day causing his parents to constantly perform CPR on him. With the hopes of Kiaba’s survival diminishing, doctors didn’t know what else to do except perform a medical experimental technique equivalent of a “Hail Mary” pass, 3-D Printing.

3d-printed-gears

I can see 3-D printing becoming a process strategy within the mere future because it will be a production process that meets customer requirements and product specifications within a certain cost. In Kaiba’s case, it already has saved his life. Doctor’s had taken an x-ray of his lungs and transferred the picture to a 3-D printer to successfully duplicate a splint measuring “a few centimeters by eight millimeters.” Specifically, this would be considered a process focus strategy because creating one customized, artificial support to be surgically attached into a human requires the ability to be able to produce in low volume. Because of the low volume, doctors can then focus on producing a high variety of customized products for their customers.

 

Having a high degree of product flexibility and a team of experts to meet your specifications and produce your product sounds like an excellent strategy for any ordinary individual; however, one thing some people might not realize are the costs associated with it all. Creating an object that saved Kiaba’s life is a phenomenal occurrence; however, the bill following the surgery is probably not.

 

Do you think 3-D printing will one day become a Repetitive Focus strategy, or maybe even Product Focus Strategy?

Is this a product that meets and exceeds customer requirements, costs and managerial goals?

What do you think are the long term effects 3D printing has on efficiency, production flexibility and quality?

 

http://www.cnn.com/2013/05/22/health/baby-surgery/index.html?npt=NP1

Boeing, flying high once again?

After 15 months and millions of dollars spent, the Boeing 787 Dreamliner has resumed commercial flights. The groundbreaking jet, introduced in July 2003 was dubbed as the next generation airplane that would revolutionize the way air travel operated. Soon after preliminary flights, major aircraft corporations began to notice technical and mechanical issues that affected the reliability of the jet. These problems resulted in flights being delayed and cancelled. In January, two 787s owned by Japanese airlines experienced burning batteries that would later ground all 787s.

Prior to the grounding, delivered 787s logged a reliability rating of 97.7% (23 delays/cancellations out of 1000 flights). This result was comparable to the long tested and proven 777 that that 787 aims to replace. As technology expands, systems become more intricate and coincide with higher rates of failure. The 787 is an example of new age lithium-ion batteries, electrical systems, and computer systems that alter service requirements. This plane alone requires 10 times more power during startup than traditional Boeing planes, computer and electrical systems to be turned on three hours before each flight, and scheduled maintenance in between each flight.

During this downtime Boeing continuously has been mass producing these airplanes to fill the 800+ orders that have been filed from 50+ customers. By April 2013, 50 planes have been built and delivered to their respective companies. However, this plane does retain more positives than negatives, thus accounting for the 800+ orders. With this new technology, the planes will be able to be serviced in as little as 45 minutes. This will allow for companies to keep their planes in the air instead of on the ground. In addition, new light weight materials have been used and new fuel efficient engines fitted on the wings that allow for longer distance flights without using more fuel.

Aboard the new computer system, Boeing has also included a transmitter that will upload the airplane’s data to a world-wide network managed by Boeing’s facilities near Seattle. This system will track each jet’s information, making it easier for mechanics to fix any issues that may have occurred during a flight. This system will also allow for Boeing to monitor necessary maintenance updates as well as be able to ground any planes that it deems unsafe to fly.

Years behind schedule and plagued with problems, the Boeing 787 did not have a successful start. Boeing executives believe that in the future years to come, this plane will be more reliable than the 777 and project a reliability rating of 99+%. The 787 is a key example of problems during the operations strategy of a company and their ability to overcome difficult situations that result in millions of dollars of losses. At this point the 787 is operational, but if similar problems occur in the future, Boeing may lose potential orders.

With so many problems occurring with the 787, do you believe that its main competitor (Airbus) may be regarded as a safer investment?

What do you believe lies in the future for the 787? Will it continue to experience more problems or will it beat the projected 99+% reliability?

Works Cited
Ostrower, Jon, and Andy Pasztor. “Dreamliner’s Other Issues Draw Attention; Boeing and Airlines Try to Improve More Systems After Fixing Battery Flaws.” Wall Street Journal (Online): n/a. May 20 2013. ProQuest. Web. 22 May 2013.

Grubhub Grabs Profit by the Seams

GrubHub and Seamless have now merged into one company. Last year alone they collectively earned over $870 Million dollars in profit. GrubHub has Chicago origins while Seamless started in New York.  Mike Evans the co-founder of GrubHub and the newly combined companies COO said, “I’m excited about the expanded restaurant network that our diners will be able to use.”

The merge initially has many benefits, but over time there are very important executive decisions to make in order to optimize all dimensions of a quality service. One benefit is that combined they will operate in over 500 cities in the United States. They also decided to keep all 650 full-time employees. The former CEO of GrubHub Matt Maloney will remain CEO while the former CEO of Seamless Jonathan Zabusky will be president.  Both former companies have merged with much smaller organizations in the past. For example in 2011 GrubHub bought Dotmenu which gave them an extra 250,000 menu listings at different restaurants around the nation.

The company still has many decisions to make. One decision the company has yet to make is the name of the new brand. Perception is reality, and they should take very careful consideration of how to name the new brand. They have been heavy competitors in cities like Chicago for many years, and they have both built their own brands into what they are today. GrubHub did have more profit, and therefore it would be advantageous to keep that name over Seamless. Changing the name entirely is also an option. Since there whole process is derived from online use it is unlikely they will create a new name. For example if a family uses GrubHub or Seamless on a nightly basis, they will likely have the URL memorized or saved in their favorites. This means the new company needs to be very transparent and loud with their changes in order to retain the brand loyal consumers from both companies.  I have one recommendation if they decide to change the name of the company, and that is to buy a new website with the company name. Then link both former websites to the new website which on the surface seems like it would satisfice all the consumers. From there the new company needs to internally improve their servicing process.

After the merged company has chosen a conforming brand they should also merge the processes to optimize reliability. They can assume they will have a large impact in the market for online food ordering because separately they held large portions of the market share. It is likely that both former organizations had their own unique processes, but one standardized process would be most financially beneficial.

Do you think the new company should change their name? Or should they use GrubHub or Seamless as the new company name? Do you think they should standardize their processing systems? Overall do you think this merge is beneficial to the owners?

 Sources:

http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/breaking/chi-grubhub-seamless-20130520,0,4610644.story

Is that an ISOlated case of the flu?

Quality management standards seem rare to come across when you look at the health system in Iowa. Specifically their hospitals. Iowa Lutheran is the first hospital in Iowa to achieve their ISO certification.

ISO 9000 standards are well known to American manufacturers as they have used ISO for quality assurance in their products. ISO gives suppliers a peace of mind that what they are receiving, follow international standards in their quality management. That means that a company’s upper management has set up a processes for all steps of their respective system. Six procedures are required by ISO; control of documents, control of quality records, internal audit, nonconforming control, corrective action, preventive action. The organization’s mission is to set standards for goods and services, ensuring efficient processes.

Iowa Lutheran Hospital

 
Iowa Lutheran Hospital

When you look at healthcare and hospitals, quality care is necessary and could be the difference between life and death. Should it be troubling that this is the first hospital in Iowa that follows ISO standards? Not necessarily. Prior to seeking ISO 9000-certification hospitals were granted certification through the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Hospitals (JCAHO). The largest and oldest accrediting organization for healthcare, they set standards for the quality and safety of health care provided to patients.

What could be the implications of switching from a healthcare specific accreditation organization to an international standard organization? Is ISO 9000 a better quality tool overall for healthcare?

According to the article, “Iowa Lutheran has implemented a quality management system that includes review of acute medical, surgical, critical care , rehabilitative, obstetrical, emergency care, laboratory and radiology services.” It is obvious to see that the hospital is striving for excellence in healthcare and providing the patients with the best services, as any hospital should. It seems to me that any hospital would have the best possible standards set in place for all their different systems. Not only does ISO set up certain guidelines, but it also allows for collaboration between members for best practices, and this is an international group. Iowa Lutheran specifically attained 9001:2008 ISO certification. It takes a process-oriented approach. The requirement ensures ‘what’ an  company must do to meet customer needs and expectations. ‘How’ this is done is left up to the company, or in this case, the hospital. Hospitals are a lucrative business in the way they charge for a doctor to visit a patient, to take and x-ray, virtually everything they do. Insurance companies, healthcare systems and providers, and pharmaceutical companies. There are so many systems, guidelines, and protocols to follow. The four sections that make up ISO 9001:2008 would really benefit a hospital and how it is run. The sections include management responsibility, resource management, product and/or service realization, and measurement, analysis and improvement.

The other metropolitan hospital in Des Moines refuses to change to ISO 9000 standards.   How else can ISO 9000 benefit hospitals?

Article: http://www.businessrecord.com/Content/Health—Wellness/Health—Wellness/Article/Iowa-Lutheran-is-first-Iowa-hospital-certified-for-quality-management/174/836/58139

Source: http://www.ada.org/2702.aspx?currentTab=2

McDonald’s goes on a McDiet

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Most people associate McDonalds with the traditional meat and potatoes menu that they started with, the traditional cheeseburger and french fries.  However, in recent times the Oak Brook based chain, with its 68 million daily customers in over 119 countries has expanded their menu to include items that can satisfy all different types of taste buds   By implementing these new items, like the snack wraps, angus burgers, and steak bagels  McDonalds has tried to cover all territories of the fast food market.  They have even offered rib sandwiches and the most recent offering of mighty wings (traditional chicken wings). Since 2007, McDonalds has added over 60 items to their menu.

Lately, however McDonalds has started to eliminate items off of their menu.  Starting with the Angus Burger last month, McDonalds claims that 4 more items will soon be off their menu including the Caesar salads, McSkillet Burritos, Southern Style Biscuits and steak bagels.  This is in an effort to better manage a menu that has grown in the past 7 years.

Because McDonalds is such an excellent example of quality and process management, this article serves as a good example to look at the way the McDonalds handles and controls its processes.  The traditional idea of McDonalds was that it was a company that could do the basics and do them better than anyone else meaning serve traditional Cheeseburgers and fries in a quick, clean, and friendly restaurant and atmosphere better than any of its competitors.  Clearly it has done this as it is the biggest fast food chain in the world and as a matter of necessity for an ever expanding target market, the menu has swollen to a size the original owners would have never thought.

Therein lies obvious potential problems which I believe McDonalds has realized.  By having so many different products, it becomes difficult to effectively offer the same consistent quality of all of these items across the board.  This I believe is because of the numerous different processes each different item must go through before it reaches the consumer.  This ranges from ingredient storage, cooking, preparing, and delivery.  This also can cause process variation in McDonalds training process as the menu becomes harder to master for its employees.  With new items so frequently being added, McDonalds lends itself to a host of possible errors in everyday preparation of these items to its customers.

What McDonalds is doing by reducing its menu items slowly is going back to basics somewhat.  By creating a more manageable menu, McDonalds can better focus on improving on its continued improvement of processes already associated with existing menu items.  By Improving their base menu items, McDonalds should see an increase in customer satisfaction across the multiple countries it occupies.

Do you think that eliminating the numerous menu items listed and more will help McDonalds achieve a higher quality standard for its other items and improve more so on its current operations? How else could this move help McDonalds achieve higher quality across the company.

 

Sources:

Crains ” More food disappearing from McDonalds”

http://www.chicagobusiness.com/article/20130517/BLOGS08/130519794/more-food-disappearing-from-mcdonalds-menu

” WikiPedia McDonalds”

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McDonald’s

Bloomberg New “McDonalds Cutting its Menu”

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/mcdonalds-reduce-menu-bloomberg-reports-101556997.html

Business Insider “McDonalds to Start Cutting Menu Items”

http://www.businessinsider.com/mcdonalds-to-start-cutting-menu-items-2013-5

 

DePaul is a Private University…not on Loop Campus!

When people think of Universities in Chicago, DePaul University is usually one to come to mind, so there’s no doubt that the university would have a few connections with some Chicago-related events, and representatives.  The mayor has donated tons of money to the school, and the university is one of the first to be included in holiday parades that march down Michigan Ave.  But why is DePaul so “plugged” into the city?

DePaul University is split into two campuses; one beautiful, and one that barely passes as a campus.  On any given day, the Loop campus is filled with not only students, but a number of pedestrians, including many loiters.  How does this constant flow of random pedestrians throughout the Loop campus affect the quality of the university?  Furthermore, how does it affect the experience of the students?  The same building that holds the school’s student center, is the same building that holds Chicago’s Water Department, as well as many eateries open to the public, so the pedestrians will always be there.  It seems there should be a set standard on how open a “Private University” should be to the public. 

Students spend tons of money each quarter paying for classes without knowing exactly where there money is going, or how it will benefit them.  Since entering four years ago, I have seen a few improvements on the Lincoln Park campus with the addition of the new library, and a few other buildings.  But what is the University spending to improve the Loop campus?

I have always imagined that DePaul would do something to privatize some part of the campus to make students feel more comfortable, or at least match the quality of the Loop campus with that of the beautiful Lincoln Park campus.  So what does the university do to help the Loop?  Add new dorms for DePaul students only?  Add a 24-hour library that can only be accessed by students? No, and no; the university invested $70 million dollars to build an arena by McCormick Place, open to the public!  Even more shocking, a former Cook County representative has consistently gotten paid $80,000 annually, by DePaul, for representing the university.  Being only a student, I cannot explain the university’s logic in these decisions, but it does make me feel like the system of the school’s budget could use some improvement.

Outside of the very few basketball games that the Blue Demons will have in this arena, it will be open to Chicago events, including Public Schools and Community Colleges.  This is great for Chicago, but how is this a benefit to the students of the university?

Hopefully this big investment will give the Loop campus a higher-quality feel.  Maybe the university wants to keep an open reputation to the city. 

Do you think this was a good investment?  What can the university invest in to improve the quality of the loop campus?  What are some of the standards a Private University campus should have?

Sources: Chicago Sun Times –

http://www.suntimes.com/20134943-761/navy-pier-revamp-depaul-arena-part-of-emanuel-tourism-and-tradeshow-plan.html

http://www.suntimes.com/20155858-761/depauls-man-at-city-hall-not-involved-in-arena-deal-officials-say.html

Rinse, Wash, Repeat and Waste Money

As a society, we are technically getting smarter.  More people are getting a higher education and attaining degrees. Between 1980 and 2011, people who had completed a bachelor’s degree or higher increased from 22 to 32 percent, and people who’d received a master’s degree or higher increased 2 percent from 1995.[1] So why is it that we very rarely think about the quality of our decisions and why we make them?

source: flickr.com

Ever think about  the effect a marketing strategy? For example, for products like shampoo, sales doubled by simply adding one word -“repeat” – to their products’ instructions. One would think this wouldn’t make much of a difference, but it seems that it does to the so many people that bought the product that was no different from before the marketing strategy took effect. That one word increased the rate at which shampoo was being used, thus increasing the rate to which someone needed to go buy a new bottle.  Not only that, but sales of other hair products such as conditioners increased as well since washing hair more than once can dry it out. Back in the 1940’s, it was necessary due to lack of technology and advancements that didn’t allow for shampoos to get rid of the oil in hair with just one wash.[2] However, today it’s changed to where we really only need one wash. Yet we are still buying into this marketing strategy today; it’s become integral to our daily body cleansing customs that we no longer question it.

Along the line of marketing strategies, there are also products that consumers are led into buying because of who endorsed it.

source: stuffpoint.com

Products such as Nike’s Air Jordan, for example, have long been a social fad that people first bought in association to the great basketball legend of Michael Jordan, despite its hefty price tag.  I’m sure they were once good quality basketball shoes, but today people don’t really buy them to play basketball but because of the transcendent quality associated with the name or because they look good. Another example would be the Beats headphones endorsed by Dr. Dre. Although they look good, they really aren’t the best that’s out there for the price. Imagine how much money we’d save or how meaningful our decisions can be if we stop to think about them and actually do research to find their true value. It’s amazing to me how we have the Internet at our fingertips yet we don’t bother to find the information we need, or how some people believe everything they read.

Questions:

What do you think? Is society getting more naive or lazier? Is quality a social fad everyone buys into? How different do you think your life would be if you’d asked more questions?

 


[1] “Education Attainment.” National Center for Education Statistics. <http://nces.ed.gov/fastfacts/display.asp?id=27>.

[2] Goldstein, Lauren. “Lather, Rinse, Repeat: Hygiene Tip or Marketing Ploy?” CNN Money. Oct. 1999. Web. May 12 2013. <http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune_archive/1999/10/11/267035/>.

Audio Innovations-Growth Stage

Rock-It 3.0 OrigAudio

We have learned in our Management 301 class that every product is subject to a life cycle. In its early stage, called introduction, the product is designed, developed with attention to quality, short production and limited models. The next stage is growth, where forecasting is critical, the product goes through competitive improvements, and distribution is enhanced. Then the product goes through maturity, in which standardization takes place. Finally, the product declines, where there is a lower product cost, differentiation decreases and capacity is reduced.

 
There are several products in the market that we can see going through the life cycle, but I have found an interesting article that makes reference to good examples of products on growth stage. They are the OrigAudio products, such as cardboard speakers, headphones and golf-ball-size amplifiers. According to the article in the Chicago Tribune by Ronald White, these OrigAudio products started being developed by Chicago entrepreneurs Jason Lucash and Mike Azymczk. These two marketers got their products in the market and successfully accomplished to be listed as one of the best inventions in 2009 by Times Magazine, just after a short period of time of their introduction (White, Ronald).
During the introduction stage the process design and development were critical, as well as they had short production run. The article mentions that since they are marketers, they don’t know about engineering, so they have been looking for people that can complete their team by helping them to bring their innovating ideas to life. Now, in the growth stage the entrepreneurs have been working on enhancing distribution. One of their most important decisions was moving to California. According to the article, by moving closer to the Pacific, great benefits were acquired by OrigAudio such as; decrease on transportation costs of inputs from China. But mostly, because the region with core surf and skate crowd represents a good market for them, to increase sales. In order to accomplish their goals they have been and will continue hiring more employees. Also they are working in more innovating designs for their speakers, headphones and amplifiers (White, Ronald). Finally, they are forecasting to have $5 million on sales this year, a totally different amount than in 2010, when they had just $700,000 in revenue (White, Ronald). But it makes sense since they had $3.5 million revenue in 2012 .
Some other OrigAudio products in the market, mentioned in Ronald’s article, are:

  • The Fold and Play speakers, which looks like a Chinese restaurant, take out box.
  • The Rock-It, which according to the article, includes a piece of the size of a marshmallow peep candy.

It looks like these entrepreneurs from Chicago are doing a good job in the growing stage of their products, since they are working on the competitive improvements and options.
Do you think they will be able to stretch their products’ life cycle enough for OrigAudio to earn and keep a good place in the market?
What would be your recommendations for these entrepreneurs to maintain their business growing?

Source:

http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/breaking/la-fi-socal-design-20130510,0,5421129.story

A Fake Tiffany Blue Box

Photograph by Timothy A. Clary/AFp via Getty Images

Costco is now selling Tiffany replica rings but at the Costco price and this is causing Tiffany to file a multimillion-dollar trademark suit against Costco.

A women on WeddingBee.com asked her blogger readers about what where their thoughts on jewelry from Costco, most women said that they would not mind a ring from Costco but they would not be entirely for it. Some of the responses included, that they only saw Costco as a grocery store and never thought about buying a ring from there, another response was that she had thought about buying a ring from Costco but was concerned when people would ask where she got the ring.

On a Good Morning America episode a Tiffany diamond and a Costco diamond where both appraised. The $16,600 Tiffany cut was 58% more expensive than its $10,500 value, and the $6,600 Costco ring was 17% under its evaluated value of $8,000. What allows Tiffany to have their prices $6,100 above the evaluated price is what the international recognized blue box means, Quality.

The dimensions of product quality that Tiffany offers are,

Conformance- When you buy an engagement ring at Tiffany’s you buy something that Tiffany has ultimately guaranteed that it   will meet the specifications of your loved one.

Reliability/Durability- Since it is a prestiges company that has spent many years building, you are assured with all the paper work that the ring you buy will have a useful life and a consistency of performance through out it.

Service- Once a ring is purchased, it can be returned for cleaning or resizing at any time.

Response-  The jewelers have face to face interactions with their customers about the different kind of cuts and qualities of diamonds so they choose the best diamond for them.

Aesthetics- Every piece of Tiffany’s is a renowned design and over the years there have been a select number of designers to create exclusive pieces just for Tiffany.

Reputation- Tiffany has spent years building a reputation for themselves, with the help of many stars and the classy Audrey Hepburn endorsement raises not only the price of its jewelry but the reputation of the little blue box.

My parents own a jewelry store and I notice how peoples meaning of quality differ all the time. The one difference I constantly get from customers is the preference from 10kt and 14kt. Many people have had problems in the past with 10kt or have heard stories that created a bad reputation for 10kt. Although I explain to the customers how gold has changed and how 10kt is now a better quality the reputation and the durability of the past remains.

Is $6,000 more worth getting a lifetime of sizing and cleaning?

Or

Is the name Tiffany worth $6,000 more?

Also

If you found a similar ring to Tiffany’s at Costco with the same quality diamonds, would you still purchase the above evaluated Tiffany ring?

 

http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2013-05-06/tiffany-vs-dot-costco-which-diamond-ring-is-better

http://www.tiffany.com/About/TheTiffanyStory/default.aspx#p+1-n+6-cg+-c+-s+-r+-t+-ri+-ni+1-x+-pu+-f+/0