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L.a. Economy Relies on Aerospace and Oil

The mere mention of Los Angeles is enough to make most of us think of the city’s wonderful climate, movie stars and the Hollywood sign. Many forget that Los Angeles is a business and manufacturing powerhouse, too. In fact, the city’s bustling economy, which is built on international trade, music, television and the movies, aerospace, technology, oil, fashion and tourism, makes the City of the Angels the biggest manufacturing center in the United States.

One of the best ways to zero in on the industrial sectors that make the Los Angeles economy so powerful is to look more closely at the five Fortune 500 corporations that make Los Angeles their home Listed in alphabetical order according to the business sector they represent, these corporations are Northrop Grumman (aerospace), Occidental Petroleum (energy), Health Net (health care), KB Home (home building) and Reliance Steel & Aluminum (metals).

Here’s a synopsis of each of these five corporations:

Founded in 1927 in Denver, Colorado, aerospace and defense contractor Northrop Grumman now calls Los Angeles its home base. With estimated annual revenues of 30 billion dollars and more than 120,000 employees worldwide, Northrop Grumman is the third biggest U.S. defense contractor and the number one maker of naval vessels for the U.S. Navy. Northrop Grumman’s Corporate Headquarters are located at 1840 Century Park East, Los Angeles, California.

Nicknamed «OXY» after its trading symbol on the New York Stock Exchange, Occidental Petroleum is America’s fourth largest oil and gas company. Headquartered at 10889 Wilshire Boulevard, Los Angeles, California, OXY employs about 9000 workers at locations in the United States, the Middle East, North Africa and South America. Occidental Petroleum is the biggest Texas oil producer and also California’s number one producer of natural gas.

Health Net, Inc., provides HMO, POS, PPO and other managed health care solutions to almost seven million customers in all 50 states. Health Net, which is formally based in Woodland Hills, one of many districts within the city of Los Angeles, came under national scrutiny in 2007 when a California woman sued the company, claiming it had wrongly discontinued her care during chemotherapy. As of this writing, the case is still pending in the courts.

Originally launched in 1957 as Kaufman & Broad, KB Homes is one of America’s biggest homebuilders. KB Homes erected homes for some 37,000 American families in 2005, the last year for which this kind of data was available. Based in Los Angeles, KB Homes has four main divisions within the United States: West Coast (California), Southwest (Arizona, Nevada and New Mexico), Central (Colorado, Illinois, Indiana, Louisiana and Texas) and Southeast (Florida, Georgia, Maryland, North Carolina, South Carolina and Virginia). KB Homes’ Corporate Headquarters are located at 10990 Wilshire Boulevard, Los Angeles, California.

A hometown success story, Reliance Steel & Aluminum was established in 1939 at Los Angeles, where it originally manufactured steel reinforcing bar. Today, the company sells a complete line of over 60,000 metal products at over 180 locations in the United States, Belgium, Canada, China and South Korea. Still true to its roots, Reliance directs its global operations from its Corporate Headquarters at 350 South Grand Avenue, Suite 5100, Los Angeles, California.

Contact the Los Angeles Area Chamber of Commerce at 350 South Bixel Street, Los Angeles, California, for more information about the Los Angeles economy.

How To Select The Perfect Team To Create Perfect Motion Graphics

Few video production companies can claim to have a wealth of in-house motion graphics talent right at their fingertips. The graphic designer should offer the latest in motion graphics technology. Their team of motion graphics artists should be experts in the most advanced graphics software, meaning you get the latest technology, with top creative designers, in the most efficient time possible. They should pride themselves on offering the most advanced motion graphics, no matter what the budget.

Special Effect Motion Graphics

The post-production team should able to create the most advanced graphics to fit any situation. If you can imagine it happening, it should happen. Therefore, you should hire an experienced motion graphic designers to create that WOW effect.

3D Motion Graphics

The designer should also know how to make affordable 3d animations. If you pay any attention to the weekend box office, you know that the hottest thing in Hollywood is 3D animated movies. And judging from the numbers, your customer base knows this too. But something they do not know — it does not take the budget of Shrek for you to incorporate this groundbreaking form of entertainment into your own commercial, website, logo, corporate video, or advertisement.

3D Commercial Production

Their staff should be experienced enough to create an immersing experience of animation to help showcase your product or business. They should be able to create a fully animated commercial product in a unique creative environment, to a fully animated backdrop that you or an actor can discuss the product in front of. They should lead the way in creating virtual worlds that are unlike anything ever seen in commercial video production.

Online Graphics Production

With the proliferation of broadband technology on the Internet, they should know to apply motion graphics to your web site or advertising. A new, cutting-edge look will provide a dynamic new feel to any website.

Hottest Vending Machine Home Based Businesses

A few years back, I worked retail at a paper store. Needless to say, there were many days on which hours would go by without anyone coming in under the extreme duress of needing to purchase a ream of paper. And right between the register and the door was a full-size soda machine and a small candy machine that had m&m’s, Runts, and roasted almonds. I can’t even tell you how many times I emptied that almond canister, popping in quarter after quarter after quarter in pursuit of that savory, salted goodness. And I wasn’t alone; everyone and their business partner managed daily to scrounge up 25 cents in spare pocket change and push it into that coin slot.

Oh, almonds-now I want some again. But that wasn’t my point in telling my silly story; my point is that candy vending is an amazingly profitable business, precisely because the average American can’t avoid dropping a quarter into a machine for a tasty treat-after all, it’s just a quarter. And though a quarter doesn’t sound like much, when all the quarters are added up, some reports estimate that the average vending machine distributorship makes a little over $70 an hour, which is no small wage at all. But before everyone goes racing out to start dropping off vending machines around town, it’s important to choose your vending franchisor wisely. Here are what we would consider the big, trustworthy names in the industry.

Truth be told, most vending franchises are pretty similar, which doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out: machine, candy, and owner pretty much sum up what any vending outfit looks like. Still, there are some that carry an added punch that makes them worthy of a little extra attention. Uturn Vending is one such business, set apart from everyone else by their machines, which are some of the best in the industry. More interesting than the average vending machine, these «money machines»-as the company likes to call them-pivot around a central post, making 8 compartments available where a stationary machine would only have 4. And aside from the increased choices, the machines are some of the most sturdy available.

The machine, though, isn’t the whole story to a successful vending home based business. Of as much importance is the actual stock; what kind of candy do you have? If what your equipment is sporting is a knock-off brand of gumball or-heaven help us-something healthy, no one in their right mind is going to give you their hard-earned quarters. That is why Vendstar also makes the list as one hot vending commodity, providing only brand-name, recognizable treats. Although, there is something to be said for selling a new product as well. All of us like trying something novel-as long as it’s good-and few candies are more novel than the newest creation sold by American Vending Systems work at home franchisees: Buzz Bites. Though I will admit that it sounds like something you’d find at a bar, it’s really much more benign than that. It’s a tasty chocolate chew with a caffeine equivalence of a cup of coffee, and who doesn’t want one of those?

Not all vending machines sell food products, though. In fact, there are three great business opportunities in the vending market that specialize in not selling food, but rather selling everything from DVDs to lobsters-yes, seriously. If what you want is something original in your machines, one of these is for you.

First, the DVDs. The concept has made a huge splash in Europe, but it is just starting out in the US, and that idea is the automated DVD vending kiosk. DVDNow is leading the way in this country, renting out movies without the use of employees or storefronts, which keeps prices drastically lower for both owner and customer. And on the way home from renting a video, the consumer in question could very well stop off at a local supermarket parking lot to visit someone else’s Polar Ice Express franchise, which is prefect because the shopper doesn’t even have to leave her vehicle to use the machine. The ease of use for her is only beaten by the ease of ownership for the franchisee, who merely has to run periodic clean-ups, refill the ice bags occasionally, and keep up relations with the owner of the establishment he is renting parking space from. And finally, if this particular lady is feeling especially culinary, she may want to stop and get some lobster from a Love Maine Lobster Claw vending machine inside the grocery store. I’m not sure how many people actually manage to snag a lobster from the tank, but this machine makes money like no other, off of sheer oddity, because there is nowhere else that a person can actually work to grab their lobster of choice from the tank with the use of a small crane. They all may seem a little out of the ordinary in terms of the classic concept of vending, but DVDNow, Polar Ice Express, and The Love Maine Lobster Claw are all completely legit and well worth the investment of your investigational time.

All in all, there is a lot to be said for vending business opportunities. Kids always manage to get their parents to drop that quarter into the machine, hungry employees will always sacrifice a quarter to tide themselves over until lunch, and the rest of us appreciate the ease of getting a DVD without the trouble of human contact; as a culture, we cannot stay away from either candy machines or other kinds of vending machines. Anyone smart enough to get in on the business can certainly make a pretty penny. All they have to do is choose the right company to go with.

How to Take an Idea and Turn it Into Tangible Merchandise

From Product Creation to Selling: How to Take an Idea and Turn It Into Tangible Merchandise

If you take a look at every product you’ve ever used or heard about, you’re actually looking at the manifestation of an idea. Once upon a time, it was an idea that spawned its creation from mobile phones to video games to sneakers, even the food we eat and the movies we watch. Some of the biggest and most respected companies today began their business by creating and then selling an idea that later became a product. That little seed of genius that floats around in your head may just be your ticket to fortune, fame and a dream come true. Here’s how:

Creating the product

There are several ways you can create a product. One is to create it from an original idea, another to rehash an idea that’s already there and modify it and still another is to find the market first and then create an idea that will either meet a need or create one.

Design your product

You could keep your product as an idea in your head but it’s best if you put it down on paper. This will help give you a different perspective on how you want it to be. Ask yourself questions: What will your product be? What will be its purpose or value? What will it look like? Will its design compete with what’s already out on the market or will it affect its marketability?

Don’t underestimate design. According to Apple’s Steve Jobs, it’s so much more than just veneer; it’s actually interior decor. That means it is integral to the identity and function of the product itself. For the latest iMac model, for example, Jobs fought not to have a fan installed on the equipment. This resulted to a more intensive engineering design but a far more superior machine in terms of thermal management.

Research the market

Having a product is one thing while having a market to sell it to is another. Determine who will buy your product. Is there a real market for it out there? Will it sell easily or will it have to rely heavily on a lot of promotions and advertising?

If you don’t have a clear idea what your product will be, it will help if you look at the industry you’re interested in and see if there is a need that you can fill.

Selling the product

The very first thing you should consider when selling your product is strategy. There is so much more to selling a product you have created than just pushing it at someone. Look at your product from all angles and determine how it will compete.

Decide on your product sales route

How and where you will sell your product will affect your pricing and even its production and handling. Will you be selling it exclusively online or offline as well? Will you be using an affiliate program or direct retail? If you use an affiliate program, will your pricing cover for the commissions? If you will be selling in bulk, can you give discounts off the original price? Can the selling method sustain your business and help it grow?

Set your pricing

The next concern you should have when selling your product is pricing. Pricing has been the downfall of many would-be entrepreneurs and even more established ones, so if you’re not careful, it could ruin your chances of success.

Make pricing part of your strategy. Determine the cost of production including overhead expenses and then put a reasonable markup on the product. Pricing should cover everything from the creation of the product to its sales. It should also be priced in a way that makes it attractive and yet promote its value at the same time.

Supply and demand

Another consideration is supply and demand. How long you will be selling your product will depend on how long you can continue producing it. Where will the materials be sourced and are there factors that will affect how the product will be produced in the future? Is there real demand for the product or do you have to create it?

If your product has been created as a result of another product or to accessorize and supplement it, do you foresee any modifications that might adversely affect your product sales? If you sell customized leather casings for iPods, for example, you could face some serious production concerns once it changes its size or design in a major way.

Your competitors

When selling your product, you need to keep your eye on your competitors. What they sell, how they sell it, to whom they sell it and for how much will greatly impact your business.

Promoting your product

Now that you have created your product, it’s time to begin promoting your product in order to sell it. What type of advertising do you need for the product and where will you advertise? Decide whether building a website is enough or if you need to tap other more traditional methods of promotion. You will have to review your advertising efforts from time to time to determine if it benefits your business or takes away from it unnecessarily.

How To Pick A PC Satellite TV Vendor

PC satellite TV is coming of age! There was a time when the only choices we had for media content were television, cable, and radio. Well, that is no longer the case. With the advent of high-tech software and faster Internet connections, we can now enjoy PC satellite TV from anywhere in the world. The only requirements are that we have the proper software installed, a reliable computer, and a fast Internet connection.

Many people assume that PC satellite TV requires big, bulky dishes that are nailed to the rooftops. This is not true. It is also not true that you need additional hardware or additional cards for your computer. In fact, all you really need is the proper software and this can be found from many online suppliers.

However, before you sign up with a supplier make sure you do some research first. You will want to know exactly what the total cost will be for the service. Some vendors will want some type of monthly fee in order to use their software. Do not fall for that. There are vendors that offer high quality software for a single, one-time fee, and those are the ones you should be shopping with.

You also want to get a sense of how much content you will be able to access. Some vendors offer literally thousands of channels for you to view at no additional charge.

If you love sports, make sure the vendor that you are considering offers the sports access that you will want. PC satellite TV that offers great sports and plenty of them is a huge benefit in that you will not have to go through the pay-per-view scheme anymore. You will be able to watch most of the big games and events for no additional charges. This can often lead to savings that actually pay for the membership fee with the vendor and then some!

But you also want to know about other content as well. What about movies and news? Does the vendor you are looking at offer access to children’s programming? Do they offer access to major channels such as HBO, Discovery, or the National Geographic Channel? Do they offer international channels from several countries or do they limit themselves to only a few? All of these are important questions.

By doing a little research you can find the vendor that best suits your needs. A good place to begin is with the people at PCTV. This is a branch of the well-known company, http://Pacific-Servers.com, and PCTV is currently offering a membership package that cannot be beat. The software is top-of-the-line and the service is fantastic. Best of all, prices are extremely affordable. In addition, PCTV offers some wonderful bonus gifts for those who sign up. Visit http://www.pctv.pacific-servers.com to learn more.