Journey Of The International Trade Show Shipment: Fill & Download for Free

Over the last 31 years of my life, I've learned a lot through my experiences.These experiences include:1. Having my articles featured on Forbes, Business Insider, Fortune and Inc.2. Starting two companies and building 4 top 100 apps in different categories3. 10 years in the technology industry at amazing companies like Cisco, VMware, Box and Optimizely4. Writing a book on Amazon that hit #1 in the resumes category with over 40,000 Kindle downloadsAnd today, I'll be sharing with you my top 100 tips on work, life hacks and life lessons.To make it easier to read, I've categorized this into three categories for you:Work tips - #1-34Life hacks - #35-55Life lessons - #56-100Hope it helps you live an epic life!Work tips:1. Say no to 1 hour meetings - "I love 1 hour meetings," said no one ever. 1 hour meetings are often unnecessary. You can usually accomplish in 30 minutes what you thought you needed an hour for. 30 minutes will force you to be concise and on point.2. Do the Steve Jobs walk - Steve Jobs often did some of his most important meetings while going for a walk. I do this all the time. First, doing meetings in conference rooms can feel very stiff. Second, getting people outside of their everyday environment may get them to see things from a new perspective. Third, being physically active during your meeting could help you think more clearly. So open the door, get some fresh air and go for a walk.3. Visualize your success - Imagine 3 groups of basketball players.*The first group would practice shooting free throws 20 minutes a day.*The second group wouldn't practice free throws but would visualize themselves making free throws.*The third group would not practice or visualize at all.The results? There was a significant improvement in the second group. In fact, they were almost as good as the first group.By the way, this is a real experiment that was conducted by Australian Psychologist Alan Richardson.So if you want to get that new jobs, imagine yourself prepping for the interview, nailing it and signing the job offer. Visualize what you want your future to be.4. Listen first before speaking - Seek to understand first. How can you make an intelligent remark on something if you haven't taken the time to observe what's happening first? You have two ears and only one mouth. There's a reason for that.5. Keep your daily to do list small - Instead of writing up a huge to do list every day - focus on completing the 3 more important items every day. This forces you to prioritize your activities to ensure you're getting the best return on your energy and time. Ask this question: "Do I really need to do this today?"6. Set goals - If you don't even know where you're headed, how will you create the plan on how to get there? Set your destination first and then set sail.7. Celebrate progress - The journey to your goal could be a long one. So make sure you take the time to celebrate your progress along the way. Eat a nice dinner. High five your teammates. Strike a gong. Do a fist pump. Yell out from the rooftops. Because success is worth celebrating.8. Figure out your why - It's a such a great question that isn't asked enough. Why does it all matter? Figure out your why and that'll be the fuel for your motivation. Whether it's supporting your family or making an impact on the world, figuring out your why is critical to taking your work to the next level.9. Understand your strengths and amplify those - You'll be naturally talented in certain areas or you'll practice a skill enough to become an expert at it. Focus your energy on amplifying those strengths rather than trying to be mediocre at everything. Better to be an expert at a few things than a mediocre jack of all trades!10. Don't burn bridges - I get it, we all work with jerks at some point in our careers. Who cares? Don't let it get to you. There's no need to say anything bad about them. If anything, try to find humor in it, learn from it and move on. You've got better things to focus on. Like being the most epic version of yourself that you can be.11. View challenges as opportunities - Have you ever spent a long time waiting at the post office to ship something before? I know I have. What if instead of complaining of that process, you created an app that would allow you to request a driver to arrive at your house and to pick up and deliver your shipment for you? If you viewed that challenge as an opportunity, you would have created Shyp, an amazing app that does exactly that.12. Shorten your commute - I used to travel over 3 hours on the freeway for work every day for a few years. I was stressed, tired and exhausted. I also wasted a ton of time sitting in a car. It's absolutely not worth it. Work near where you live. If you can, make it within walking distance. Imagine 3 hours a day working on something you love. Time is precious. Don't waste it on the freeway.13. Test your assumptions - Did you know that A/B testing helped Barack Obama raise $60M by running a simple experiment? This blog post from Optimizely highlights how different tests run on media and buttons made a huge impact on results.At the end of the day, all of us have an opinion at work. The only way to know the answer is to test your assumptions.14. Dip your toes into the water - You never really know until you try. If you never try, you'll always be wondering "what if." So what are you waiting for? Want to explore a new career? Want to learn about a different department? Want to start your own business? Dip your toes into the water. Make it happen.15. Give credit where it's due - People can't stand it when someone takes credit for something they didn't do. Don't be that person. Recognize others when they do an awesome job. It creates trust among teammates and will you further as a company.16. Every person you meet is a potential door opener to a new opportunity - Be nice to people. You never know how you can help each other down the road.17. Make data driven decisions - When in doubt, look at the data. What is it telling you?18. Trust your gut - Data driven decisions aren't quite as helpful when there's little or no data to work with. In those cases, go with your gut.19. Focus on the 80/20 rule - 20% of your clients will usually generate 80% of the return. Focus your energy on the work that matters.20. 10 years test - You're going to run into problems that might seem like disasters. Don't freak out. Instead, use the 10 years test. Will this problem matter in 10 days? In 10 months? In 10 years? Probably not. And if it won't, don't stress about it. It's not worth it.21. Do what you love - Life's short. Do you really want to spend 23.8% of your life working at a job that you hate? Didn't think so. Do what you love.22. Focus on making an impact - Don't do work for the sake of looking busy or only because someone told you to. Think about the impact. And if it's not impactful, have the courage to say so. Challenge yourself to do great work that makes an impact.23. Lead with or without the title - You don't need a big title to make a difference at your company. You can lead by driving a new initiative, coming up with an awesome idea or by coaching and encouraging your teammates to be at their best.24. Build a personal brand - You have a living, breathing brand. Want to build a great brand? Dress the part. Act the part. Live the part.For example, if you want to be perceived as a great content marketer, you've got to act the part. You could write a ton of Quora posts, LinkedIn articles and blog posts on the subject of content marketing. That way, when people have a need for content marketing, they think of you because they've seen 500 of your posts.25. Invest in your LinkedIn profile - Nearly every single recruiter who has reached out to me this year found me on LinkedIn. Think about that for a second.Time's have changed.We used to submit our resume to company websites to find jobs. While it can still work, it's not the most effective way to learn about new job opportunities.Once you submit your resume, it's immediately outdated. LinkedIn, however, is brilliant because people are incentivized to update their profiles constantly. So what ends up happening? Recruiters find most of the best talent on LinkedIn.It's a new age folks. Invest in your LinkedIn profile. I have a ton of tips on this in my book The Resume is Dead (It would take us way too long to highlight in this post).26. Leave your business card at home - Add someone on LinkedIn instead. It's easier to keep in touch with them, reduces your administrative work in loading that person into your contact book and updates on each other are easily viewed. Welcome to the cloud.27. Stay humble - You might be pretty good at what you do, but chances are somebody else in the world does it better. And even if you are the best at it, chances are you aren't good at a million other things. So stay humble. Stay foolish. Stay hungry. And keep learning from others.28. Embrace failure and learn from it - You are going to fail at some point in life. It could be a big event, like getting fired. It could be a small event, like forgetting to do the laundry. It's all relative.The important thing is to recognize that the process for dealing with big or small failures is the same.Acknowledge that it happened. Deal with the situation. Learn from it. Improve yourself. And move on.J.K. Rowling, the author of the Harry Potter series, went from being an unemployed single mother living off unemployment benefits to becoming one of the best selling authors of all time.Failure happens. It's how you deal with it that matters.29. Embrace your champions - Along the way, you will find people that genuinely believe in you and your mission. They will cheer you on. Embrace them. Even if your only champion is your mom.30. Embrace your naysayers - On this same journey, you'll also find people who doubt you every step of the way. Embrace them too. Only this time, use that doubt as your source of motivation. I had 4 managers who ranked me second to last in interviews at a Fortune 100 company. I used that to motivate me when I finally landed a job. I ended up managing the #1 operation in the country. Thanks for the motivation.31. Recognize the importance of transparency - People are more empathetic when they understand why things are happening. When they're left in the dark, it becomes hard to build trust. Be transparent.32. Invest in a standing desk - A study from the Annals of Internal Medicine found that sitting increases our chances of getting a disease or condition that will kill us prematurely. Holy. Moly. Get a standing desk. Now. I did this for two years and felt way more productive.33. Work smart - Why are we doing this? Does it have to be done this way? Is there a better way to do it? How can I get a better return in less time?Keep asking questions like this. Working hard is great. Working smart and hard is a even better. #WinningCombo34. Find mentors who live your desired lifestyle - Want to work 5 hours a week and travel the world? Find people who have create a passive income lifestyle successfully like Pat Flynn, Eric Siu and Benny Hsu and have them be your mentors. While they may not be able to mentor you 1:1, you can have them be a virtual mentor by following their website learnings.Life hacks:35. Freeze your fruits/vegetables - You want to eat healthy but your produce always manages to go bad before you can finish it. So here's what you do instead: right before it goes bad, freeze it! Then you can use it in soups, stews or smoothies in a pinch!36. Cut the cable cord and get Netflix - You still get awesome entertainment and just reduced your monthly bill a ton.37. Clean your home once a month - De-cluttering your living space will de-clutter your mind. Here's a simply way to determine what you keep: Have I used this in the last year? If no, donate it.38. Utilize quick pick me ups - Sometimes you just need something to jump start yourself into a happier mood. Watch a funny Youtube video (Jimmy Fallon's Lip Sync Battles, Ellen Degeneres clips), sing one of your favorite songs outloud or dance like nobody's watching. Life's short. You may as well have some fun.39. Buy a chap stick keychain - Have you lost your chap stick before? I've lost a ton. That's why I bought a chap stick keychain. Problem solved. My lips have never been happier. Smooth like butter.40. Host events - When all is said and done, relationships are what matter. Host an event for your friends, family and loved ones so that you get a chance to spend some quality time together. Want to do it on a budget? Make it a potluck.Want to make it work related? That's awesome too. Trust me, your coworkers want to enjoy life outside of the office too. They may not always remember what you did in the office, but they'll definitely remember the epic get togethers you hosted.41. Invest in an awesome mattress - You spend about 33% of your life sleeping. Why would you skimp on your mattress? Help yourself get the best sleep possible.42. Iron your shirt without an iron - Don't have an iron? Your last resort: hang your clothes in the bathroom while you take a hot shower and then blow it dry with a hair dryer. It works for me all the time!43. Arrive at least 2 hours before your flight take off time - Especially if it's an international flight. Trust me, I've flown to over 50 cities in a year. You don't need the stress.44. Pack food for your flight - You don't have to pay a small fortune to have lunch at the airport anymore. Bring your own sandwich, fruit or snack.45. Wiggle your body during turbulence - I use to hate hitting turbulence. It would make me a nervous wreck. The solution? Wiggle your tush when the turbulence hits. You'll feel less of it. I don't know why this is true, but it works. I've tried it a few times now!46. Charge your phone faster - Switch it into airplane mode and it'll charge faster.47. Get an extra battery pack - Let's face it, we use our phones for almost everything nowadays including directions, finding places to eat, communicating and entertainment just to name a few. When our phones die, we're close to being incapable of doing anything.I'm kidding of course. But life does get harder without a smartphone to help out. So buy an extra battery pack.48. Stay away from processed foods - The more you eat whole, natural foods like vegetables and fruits, the more likely your diet will stay healthy. Stay away from the processed stuff.49. Don't live someone else's life - Learn to build your own values, passions, opinions and personality. You are not anyone else. You're completely unique and awesome in your own way. This is your life. Own it.When I told people I wanted to build a blog focused on motivation called www.ceolifestyle.io - some of them were skeptical.Who cares? It's not their life. It's mine. If I get passionate about motivating other people, I'm going to make it happen. #MakeItSo50. Skip the caffeine - You don't need it. You can make yourself more focused and awake by doing things that are completely natural and free. Here are some quick examples: exercise, meditation, drinking enough water (your frequent bathroom trips will make you alert, trust me) and working on something you're passionate about.51. Slow down - We get it. You want to make a dent in the universe. You want to change the world. You want to create something magical. Slow down. Take a deep breathe. You don't have to react instantly all the time. Sometimes, taking a moment to collect yourself and to think about the situation might drive a better outcome for you. I learned this from a special person I met in Spain and it's improved my quality of life tremendously.52. Color code your keys - My friends taught me this trick. Ever fumble through your keys to try to find the right one, only to try it and realize it's not? There's a fix for that. Color code your keys. For example, our garage door is the yellow key, the green key is for the main public entrance and the red key is for our front door to our apartment unit. You can buy colored key covers on Amazon or use nail polish / paint to make the keys color coded. #problemsolved53. Put a small garbage bin in your car - Notice your car getting messy? Admit it, you've tossed stuff you needed to throw away into the passenger seat before. You don't have to live that kind of life. Get a small garbage bin.54. Hang a tennis ball in your garage - Speaking of cars, have you ever had trouble parking your car in the garage? Seriously, it's not easy to make sure that you parked close enough to the wall so that you car doesn't get crushed by the garage door. Hang a tennis ball in your garage so that you know exactly when to stop moving forward.55. Stuff newspaper in your shoes - It'll remove the moisture and some of the smells it's picked up over time. Okay, I admit it, I haven't tried this one myself but I heard it works.Life tips:56. Learn one new thing a day - This could be one word from a new language, a scientific fact, a life hack or anything else that you're interested in. Over time, learning one new thing a day will shape you into awesomeness.57. Remember people's names - Did you know that a study has shown that if you call people by their name, they usually respond with more energy and engagement? Yup, I ran that study. And my sample size group has been the thousands of people I've worked with over my 11 year career in technology. When you say someone's name, it shows that you care. It shows that you recognize their presence. It shows that you're a nice person. Try it.58. Focus only on the present - Stop regretting the past. Stop worrying about the future. Focus on the present. Focus on the now. Feel the sun on your face. Feel the wind behind on your back. Hear the wind as it blows the tree branches. Dig your toes into the sand. Listen when people talk.If you read a page from the last chapter over and over again you'll never finish the book. So stop thinking about the past. Be in the now.59. Listen to your body - When you're exhausted, don't fight it. Take a nap or sleep. When you feel stressed out, take a break. When you feel sick from eating that 10th donut, well, maybe you shouldn't have done that. Learn to listen to the signals in your body and respond in the right way.60. Learn to let go - Mistakes happen. Don't drill on it. Life isn't perfect. Think of any issues you run into as "speed bumps" - they make the ride a little uncomfortable but you'll get through it.61. Read before sleeping - Don't let the blue light from your computer or phone keep you up at night. You can use F.lux, which is an awesome app that makes the color of your computer's display adapt to the time of day. This way you can use your computer to read an awesome book and learn something new. Or you can go the old fashioned route and buy a hard cover book. Getting into the routine of reading before sleeping will help you wind down the day and learn something new at the same time!62. You are the 5 people you surround yourself with - A few months ago, I ran into what I thought was a disaster for my company. A part of me wanted to shut down the company (It's called Collide). My good friend and co-founder Steve challenged me immediately. He asked what I wanted to achieve in life and why I created the company in the first place. After a long talk, I realized that I wanted to stay the course. Steve helped me understand that my desire to succeed was far greater than my fears. I'm telling you this story because I've learned that surrounding yourself with people that inspire you to be better can completely take your life to new levels.63. Learn to say no - You can't do everything for everyone. Stop spreading yourself thin. Learn to say no. Focus on a few things and be great at those.64. Explore the world - Travel the world. It's a great way to get a fresh perspective on life. Howard Schultz traveled to Europe and feel in love with the coffee shops there. Guess what happened next? He started Starbucks. #GetInspired65. Build your own values - Model yourself after people that you admire. At the end of the day though, you've got to be able to make your own judgment calls. The best way to do this is to decide what your values are. Once you do, write it down and post it on your mirror. It's the foundation of who you are.66. Embrace change - You need to get comfortable with this simple idea: The only thing constant is change. Instead of fearing it, embrace it.67. Clean along the way - Sure, you could let those dishes pile up for a month, but that would be pretty painful to clean up. Along the way, your home would start to smell, fill with fruit flies and generally make it less enjoyable to live in. So don't procrastinate. Clean along the way.68. Silence can be beautiful - You don't always have to fill up silence with words. Sometimes there is beauty in being silent.69. When in doubt, simple respond with "Let me think about that." - Let's face it, we don't always have the right answer. Instead of rushing to answer, tell the person that you need time to think about things further. This shows that you're being thoughtful and also gives you something to respond with.70. Do your most important task first thing in the morning - Your energy will be higher at this moment. It's why I workout first thing in the morning most days.71. Use the "We'll see" method - Even when it seems like something terrible has happened at the moment, there's the possibility that it might lead to something good in the future. So instead of making up your own conclusions about the future, just tell yourself, "We'll see."72. Meditate - You can use apps like Headspace that are free and can help you clear your mind. This is an awesome way to relax your mind and body.73. Realize that most people don't care about you - Sorry, people's lives don't revolve around your universe. Well, the exception might be if you're a celebrity. But in all seriousness, stop worrying about what other people think of you. Most of them don't even really care that much. Instead, focus on being the best possible version of yourself.74. There are a few people in the world that really deeply care about you - Keep those people close to you in life. They're the ones that can make your life amazing. They're the ones that will stick with you through the good and the bad.75. Roll your clothes - When you travel, try rolling your clothes to maximize packing space. I did this and can fit 2.5 weeks of clothes into a carry on now.76. Only you are responsible for your own life - So own it. Take control. You have to figure out what makes you happy. What gets you inspired. What drives you.77. Say something awesome to yourself everyday - Positive reinforcement can help you maintain an upbeat mood even in the worst of times. Treat yourself well.78. Take a deep breath - Didn't that feel awesome? Yeah, try doing that more. You'll feel better.79. Happiness is a state of mind, not a destination - Growing up, I used to tell myself, if only I had this specific thing, I would be happy. After 31 years of living, I can tell you that's not how happiness works. Happiness is a state of mind.My close friend told me that he feels happiness when the sun shines on his face. He almost died when he was in his early twenties. He was saved by a stranger who donated a kidney to him. He's happy that he's alive today.You can find happiness now. It's right in front of you, everywhere you look. It's up to you to open your eyes.80. Remember to have the time of your life - Remember that at the end of the day, no one lives forever. So while you're here, remember to have the time of your life. Laugh, smile and have fun.81. Promise only on what you can deliver - Reliability goes a long way. A ton of people over promise and under deliver. Don't be that person.82. Be fearless - Fear is just a feeling. Learn to take it head on. Have a bias towards action and be fearless.83. Marry your best friend - You want someone who's going to be there with you through the best and worst of times. Someone you can talk to all night or have a completely comfortable silence with. Someone who loves you for who you are84. Be insanely curious - Being curious will help you keep an open mind. By doing so, you'll learn new ideas and help bring passion and excitement in your life. You don't know everything, so learn as much as you can in your life!85. Think about how you can help others - At the end of the day, your legacy will be who you loved, who loved you and how much you helped others.86. Time is your most valuable asset - I had a family friend who spent most of his life saving up every penny to eventually live the life he always wanted. After years of saving, he was involved in a tragic car accident. He never lived the life he dreamed about.Money is valuable. Time is even more valuable.Utilize money to help you find more time.Time with your loved ones.Time with your buddies.Time with your spouse.Time with your kids.There are 525,600 minutes in a year. How do you spend your time?87. Someone else's recipe may not work for you - Just because it worked for someone else means it'll work for you. Learn from others but also realize that everyone's situation is unique.88. Have an idea jar - Whether it's for love, friendships or family, an idea jar is a great way to ensure you have activities to do together. The next time you have an idea for something, put it into the idea jar. Each week, you can pull one from the idea jar and voila, you've got some fun in your hands!89. Act exactly how you feel - Why the poker face? It's unnecessary. If you're upset, act and feel upset. If you're happy, smile. Better to be 100% authentic than to live a lie.90. Smile at people - It makes you happier. It's contagious. It lowers stress and anxiety. It strengthens your immune system. It makes you seem more competent. It makes your look trustworthy. It can even be an effective management technique.And yes, every single of these has been proven by a study. Every. Single. One.By the way, it cost you nothing. That's awesome.91. Simple is good - Stuff has administrative debt. That new car you just got? Maintenance and insurance. Those 10 shopping sites you subscribed to? 100 emails in your inbox you have to go through. Keep life simple. It's easier and more enjoyable.92. Don't get attached to stuff - Once you take care of your basic necessities, like your health, shelter, clothing and food, chances are that stuff won't make you happy. Don't get too attached to it. When we leave this world we can't bring our stuff with us anyway.93. Choose experiences over stuff - What you should value are experiences. A simple dinner with your mother talking about life. A vacation with your spouse to a place you've always wanted to travel. A long talk with friends over a warm fire on a cold winter night. Working late night with your teammates to build a game changing startup. These are the moments you'll remember.94. Don't compare yourself to others - Just focus on being the best possible version of yourself.95. Making something for someone to show that you care - It's easy to buy something for someone. Making something with love, passion and care is much harder. Go the extra mile and make something for the person that you love. Need ideas? Check out Pinterest.96. Love yourself first - Before you fall in love with anyone else, make sure you're in a good place. Learn to love yourself, including all of your awesomeness and your flaws. The more comfortable you are with yourself, the better you can love someone else.97. Your word choice matters - Your words have a lot of power.Version #1: "We have a problem with our project."Version #2: "We have an opportunity to fix things on this project."I feel a lot better hearing version #2. What about you?98. Learn to let go - Sometimes you can't fix things. Let it go. Yup, I wrote this life tip earlier. I'm repeating it because it's that important.99. Everyone has a story - Maybe someone was mean to you today. That sucks. But what if you found out it's because they just learned about a tragedy in their family? It changes everything, doesn't it? Just remember, everyone has their own story to tell.100. Love - When all is said and done, all that you'll really remember are the amazing people you've connected with and helped along the way. Love your friends. Love your family. Love your spouse. Love is all that matters. Love more.I hope this list helps you live the best life possible.What are you waiting for?Go. Start. Now. Because it's never too late to be amazing.Cheers,NelsonKeep in touch with me here.

Since this answer has reach 250 up-votes & is over 28-pages - It's available for purchase on Fail-Harder.com - Average Profit Margin in Apparel Retail & E-Commerce ==> for $10 you can have super-cool pdf to print and read at your leisure. Think about it like buying a beer for good ol' Carroll to chat about e-commerce!-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Let’s get some definitions dialed in prior to launching into a deeper investigation of your question.Background & Overview: This section will give you a quick background how Distributors, Retailers, and Brand Direct E-Commerce work as businesses and their corresponding relationship to the brand who makes the products available for retail.Distributor:A distributor is an entity that engages into a formal business relationship with a brand for the rights to serve as local representation and (most of the time) to be the exclusive purveyor for the brand’s products. In fashion, distributors are generally the international partners lending their relationships, understanding of the intricacies of the local market, and financial resources to effectively capitalize on a brand’s market opportunity. Therefore, distributors are primarily involved in B2B relationships - they purchase a large quantity of goods (a min. # set by the brand in order to grant distributor status pricing discounts) and primarily sell to retailers in the local market. However, distributors are increasingly capitalizing on the e-commerce by managing the local e-commerce presence for the brand in that territory.An example of one of best international distributors in the world for fashion startups is Jack of all Trades (JOAT) Co for Japan. I have worked with JOAT over the years with several companies and one clear value propositions for their organization is Lloyd Seino. Lloyd is a Biz Dev / Brand Manager (as we would call it in the US) and truly has one of the best eye’s for a fledgling brand’s market potential in the crowded Japanese fashion industry. JOAT is also regarded as one of the leading companies for identifying and building a brand into a Japanese powerhouse (as Lloyd has done with dozens of brands).[ Note: You can generally find any brand’s distributor by going to brandxyz.com -> Contact & look for International. This section will have the names of the international companies that distribute the brand’s products. ]In other industries there are domestic local distributors that have regional territories - a two good examples are food and alcohol. Due to the large geography of the US, food was most commonly broken down into regional distribution because of the large number of customers per region and difficulty in coordinating the logistics of food delivery. Let’s take the example of a buddy’s health bar company that he purchase 2009:1. In 2009, Ryan, my buddy, purchased the rights for Southern California to distribute energy bars to local and national chains in that region.2. By purchasing the rights to Southern California, Ryan could purchase the energy bars at a special distributor price3. Ryan could focus on building deep market insight into Southern California, developing great relationships with retailers, and maximizing the effectiveness of his advertising spend in based on what’s going on there (i.e. He could setup a booth at a local music festival to sell his energy bars while the kids are dancing in the perpetual summer sun of Los Angeles - where this festival would fall under the radar of the national marketing goals of this company)Retailer:[ Note: I have written an extremely in-depth analysis of the relationship between Retailers & Brands and how this dichotomy drives retail prices that you see online and in-store - How do designers set prices for dresses and why do dresses often cost more on a designer's website than on purchase through an online retailer? ]This is a vendor, generally within the home market for the brand, who purchases goods at wholesale (about 52 - 55% below what you see at retail for). The retailer issues a purchase order (a legally binding document to purchase X # of goods at Y price to be delivered at a specified time frame) to a brand. The brand takes all of the POs and goes to production for deliveries roughly about 4 - 6 months after the PO was issued. Upon completion the brand ships the goods from their warehouse or factory (depending on the size of the retailer).This is what the stages look like from the Brand’s perspective:The Retailer's job is to focus:Building brand equity with the customer to be a shopping resource.Create a customer experience that derives long term value from investments in customer mindshare (i.e. ‘I think that I am going to stop by Bloomingdale's after work,’ said the proverbial customer)Develop extensive local customer insights that enables the retailer to optimize their merchandising assortment to reflect the local trends, fashion, and personality of a store’s retail presenceUnderstand local advertising mediums & methods to maximize the effectiveness of Advertising dollars based on how local trends (i.e. San Francisco may work extremely well with clever Facebook (product) Posts while West Texas can do well sponsoring a High School Football team)Let’s take a look at how this process looks for a single retail store or a simple model:When we are talking about a major retailer like Nordstrom (company), this model gets a little more complex. Since the retailer has to manage inventory between multiple stores, the retailer will often have a brand’s shipments delivered to their warehouse. At the warehouse, the shipment will be broken down and allocated to each store based on demand forecast. Additionally, you will see that a certain allotment will be held back in the warehouse to cost effectively manage fill-in orders.*This is what the retail logistics / retail distribution process looks like:* The San Jose store runs out of a medium green t-shirt, it’s more cost effective for Nordstrom (company)'s to combine that medium green t-shirt in addition to all the other orders routing through the regional distribution center. This is in contrast to the San Francisco store pulling the out of stock size & shipping the one unit to the San Jose store.E-Commerce:There is little difference fundamental difference between a Retailer & an E-Commerce relationship. Both are responsible for creating an engaging Retail Experience, building defensible customer relationships, gathering customer insights to guide merchandising decisions, and manage demand generation & advertising investments. However they differ in three main ways:Digital Medium: Obviously the biggest difference is the fact that retailers sell products via a website while retailers deal with physical stores.Zero Transportation Costs: Purchasing online is a much easier experience due to the fact that you don’t need to get in a car, drive to the store, fight for parking, deal with sales staff that hates their jobs, wait in a checkout line, and then get home.Deeper Customer Insights: Shopping online enables retailers with much deeper customer insights on purchasing patterns & products at the individual customer level - where brick & mortar retailers must make a concerted effort at checkout to gather billing zip code at checkout.E-Commerce retailers leverage two huge advantages:Massive Population: Obviously the biggest difference is the fact that retailers sell products via internet to the entire country (technically the world, but that’s another whole can of worms) while brick & mortar retailers are limited by the customers geographically in a given store’s territory. As of 2012 there is an estimated 154.6 million people that will purchase something online in 2012.Targeted Demand Generation: If an online retailer have slow moving inventory that you need to sell (commonly referred to as turn), then they can send a target email to your customer base of highly targeted people that have purchased a complimentary product (i.e. a jacket that would go great with that shirt). Alternatively, an online retailer can level the power of Google to increase their keyword spend to drive up their paid position on the brand’s keywords to generate sales.---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Section 2Understanding the Cost Basis---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Brands traditionally employ a “Cost X” model that takes the loaded costs for producing, landing, and fulfilling their goods & services by a multiple - commonly referred to as a Keystone markup. One of the biggest mistakes you can make in pricing is not having an educated idea of what your cost basis will be. If you don’t have an idea - then it’s easy to misprice an item and kill your business because you’re not making enough money on each unit to finance your operating expenses.Keystone Markup is a pricing methodology that multiples the cost basis by a factor of two (sometimes can be up to 5x in the case of jewelry) to dictate the price for next rung in the value chain. Keystone markup arose as the simplest way to universally markup goods across the retailer to a profitable level. Generally speaking, it is logistically impossible to uniquely price each product (from 100s or even 1,000s in a given retail location) to reflect market conditions and retail demographics. The theory being that retailer profitability was more of a function of units sold versus maximizing each product’s price. Subsequently, this approach normalized prices across the marketplace (i.e. everyone is pricing a shirt at $100).What does the costing build look like for a typical brand:Landed Cost: The represents the total cost of paying for the item, shipping to the US, tax & Import Duties, receiving in the warehouse, and getting on the shelves ready to sell.Fulfilled Cost: This is the cost basis that I generally like to always keep in my head because it represents the fully-loaded cost basis of selling an item & gives me a better idea of how much cash I will have at the end of the day.Wholesale Price: The Wholesale Price of a product is the revenue in one channel for the brand, but it’s the cost basis for the retailer who purchased it from the brand. For retailers like Urban Outfitters (retail brand), Finish Line, Journeys, or Amazon.com (product) the Wholesale Price is the baseline inventory cost for them.This is quick graphic to show you how this relationship works:To put this all together into a graphic of a real product with real world pricing, let’s take a look at the pricing of one of the old boots from one of my old brand’s, VÆL Project:---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Section 3Distributor Margin Analysis---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------A distributor is an entity that enters into a legal relationship with a brand to provideThis explanation (obviously) gets more complicated as the company grows - but let’s keep it simple. There are two models than create the pricing landscape (once we know what the distributor is charged product, we can more acutely understand how they charge for it). There are two predominate pricing models:“Cost +” ModelDistributor Price = FOB + x%“Wholesale -” ModelDistributor Price = Wholesale - x%Cost + ModelFOB is the cost to the Brand to produce the good or service. This represents the baseline cost to the brand to produce good and is the starting point for analyzing the revenue model to the brand and thus do Margin analysis. When you are growing a fashion brand, the typical range for the markup % or the “+” in the model is anywhere from 25% - 40%. After working a lot of brands and speaking with loads distributors, you end up starting at FOB + 35% and progressively this % gets smaller as the brand does more business. The logic is as follows:Volume of units to the distributor will be small in the beginning and the brand needs to 35% to boost contribution Margin to OpEx as the burn rate is particularly high for startup brands (you just need a lot of people to do all of the stuff required to build a brand properly).As the brand grows the cost/unit (FOB) is driven down. Therefore, the margin $ value of the contribution margin is driven down also.The realization of scale is good for the brand and good for the distributor so this model incentives the distributor to help grow the brand in the particular country in a responsible manner.The logic is that you demonstrate transparency by showing your Cost Basis in efforts to build a partnership where the distributor & the brand benefit by realizing scale economies. However - BE CAREFUL - if you don’t choose the right partner they can screw you over by virtue of your honesty.Important qualifications about this perspective:1. FOB means that the distributor is responsible for coordinating logistics from FOB Destination (most likely Hong Kong) to their host country. FOB is an old legal term for “Free On Board” meaning that ownership of the product changes once the product is delivered to the shipping carrier - make sure that you get paid T/T Advance (a fancy way of say a “wire”) prior to shipping. If you don’t get paid first, they legally own the goods and have fun trying to collect from a company in Japan or UK.2. Tax, Duty, and Quota is a very tricky art that should be the responsibility of the distributor. Japan has horrendously high tariffs and their Quota system requires intimate understanding of the inner workings of the system along with the experience to account for the screw ups.This is why you want to work closely with your Distributor to figure out the right pricing for the brand for that particular market. This will require the brand to spend time over there and figure out the market (what products are priced where & what’s the market feeling). However, this doesn’t mean that you don’t need a distributor to enter a country - there are an insane amount of factors that require you have someone with relationships to the retailers and their pulse on the culture to nail down properly.Wholesale - ModelThe Wholesale - Model is more common with larger brands like K2 or Patagonia (I reference these two brands specifically because I have worked with them in the past). Elements of the Wholesale - Model:Pricing for the product is indexed to US Wholesale (which is the largest revenue source for most brands) thereby obfuscating the true cost basis (think Apple & COGS).You generally see a range of Wholesale - 30% to start with. As the distributor achieves the performance hurdles of the “distribution agreement” they will realize greater discounts (duh!).If you have the clout to be able to employ this model - you should do it. But most likely you will get beaten up so badly in the beginning that this model is prohibitively challenging for most new brands (anything younger than 3 years).This a real world example of a pair of shoes & the margin from one of my old distributor relationships from VÆL Project.Distributor Revenue & Margin AnalysisMargin from the distributor’s perspective is rather complicated. For small brands, you want to allow the distributor to set pricing - however, you need to make sure that their distribution timeline is both aggressive, yet prudent. You won’t build any “staying power” in a foreign country’s fashion scene if you don’t have clean & controlled distribution. Many of you can relate to Ed Hardy from the early-00s when it was moderately cool - now it is literally trash.Distributors’ negotiate exclusive rights to sell a brand in a country because it creates an exclusive value proposition that ensures the highest possible price that they can charge for this cool “American” Brand. When you have exclusivity you reduce the ability to price check for comparable goods and thereby stronger positioned to be a price setter rather than a price taker (ie empower consumers).In the beginning, you will see that prices are fairly inelastic for cool brands (however, these barriers are falling rather quickly in the globalization of fashion) - pricing models trend on 2.7x to 3.5x Landed Cost.Distributor Pricing Model for Men's Shoes in Japan under Wholesale - ModelCheck - If a standard 2x markup on Wholesale in a foreign country is employed a $100 Shoe US can be as high as $300 in Japan. Remember a 63% duty rate for imported goods from China.This pricing can vary immensely by the deal & by the country - what are the tariffs that the distributor is responsible for? What does the market command? There are brands here that are “meh!” but are gold overseas - this can often float a brand in between fashion cycles.---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Section 4Retail Margin Analysis---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Retail Price: This is the price that the ultimate consumer of the product pays when you purchase a product from Urban Outfitters (retail brand), Bloomingdale's, Finish Line, or Amazon.com (product). This price is also generally “keystone” or Wholesale Distribution Price times 2. For Example:[NOTE: Keystone is the general rule, but certainly Wholesale Price can be 2.1x Landed or Retail could be 2.2x Wholesale. This all depends on the retailers pricing power, brand positioning, and market position to be able to make these tweaks.]For purposes of moving forward, I am going to assume that you understand what Gross Margin is (Gross Profit / Revenue) or the % of each $ of Revenue that drops down to fund OpEx. Let’s run through a quick example, from the Retailer’s Perspective:This is an oversimplified margin analysis. Let’s take it one step further to account for the realities of life. Two items that can be used to better exemplify try margins are the Credit Card Fees (you can push CC fees into OpEx under Bank Fees, but we won’t go there) & Shipping & Fulfillment costing.CC Fees: Credit Card Processing Fees are pretty straight forward as they are a % of Gross Sales that the CC processor charges to the Retailer for use of a CC or Debit Card. They range from roughly 1.65% - 5.4% (for a small retailer processing an American Express (company) or Discover Card - now you know why a lot of bars / convenience stores in SF & NYC don’t accept cards?)*** This may not seem like a big deal, but a 2% reduction in Gross Sales is a BIG Deal. Assume that a retailer sells 1,000 units/week & there are 52 weeks/year.One of the more interesting aspects that you should take into account is the shipping & fulfillment analysis for this margin analysis.Shipping + Credit Card Fees: One of the more interesting aspects that you should take into account is the shipping & fulfillment analysis for this margin analysis.Assumptions:The shipment will be sent FedEx Products and Services Ground from Zone 1 to Zone 5 (CA to NYC) @ a rate of $24/carton or $2/unit (footwear is the unit - shoes take up a lot of space). (Remember this shipment is going directly from the brand’s warehouse to the individual Retail Location)2.0% Credit Card Fee for easy math(Remember this shipment is going directly from the brand’s warehouse to the individual Retail Location)*** This may not seem like a big deal, but a 2% reduction in Gross Sales is a BIG Deal. Assume that a retailer sells 1,000 units/week & there are 52 weeks/year.Shipping truly is an industry of scale economies and this new world of lean inventories requires major retailers (like Nordstrom) to leverage these cost efficiencies by having brand shipments routed to their hub & then ship individual stores (driving costs down by having one bulk shipment to each individual store, of demand forecasted product compositions).Detailed Breakdown of Retail MarginsThis is a breakdown of the components of a simple brick & mortar store structure where the products are purchased from a brand and fulfilled directly to the store.In the example illustrated above, the costs in the ‘Costs of Goods Sold’ section are broken down sequentially as they are incurred in the product’s sales cycle. This is what each component means:Wholesale Price: This is the price for the product paid to the brand for the product (cost to retailer is revenue to the brand). Generally speaking the retail price is about 40 – 50% of the retail price (if we look at this as based on how this looks from the consumer’s point of view). The logic is that the retailer receives this price because they are purchasing in volume – think kind of like buying from Costco except selling for B2B.Inbound Freight / Shipping Fee: This is price to pull together all the items in a retailer’s order, put it all into cartons, and ship it via FedEx or UPS. When working with independent boutiques, the shipping is generally handled by the brand since convenience for the brand outweighs the retailers. However, when it comes to working with majors like Nordstrom or Urban Outfitters they have strict shipping instructions with stiff financial penalties for breaking them. In the case of the major retailers, they are shipping so much volume that it makes sense for them to manage the logistics themselves – which means that this costs becomes more complicated in those cases.Inbound Fee: Once United Parcel Service (company) (UPS) has delivered the product to the store, the shipment needs to be ‘received’, which means unpacking the shipping cartons, checking each item against the shipping manifest, reconciling the shipment with the invoice (to ensure proper payment), and stocking the product in the warehouse, store room, or sales floor for selling. This fee is the same as the receiving charge for a Third-Party Logistics for simplicity sake, but can be calculated by taking the workers monthly salaries who are involved in receiving divided by the time spent receiving and then dividing that number by the # of units.Storage Fee: This is the cost holding the product by the retailer until the product can be sold. Since we are looking at this from the perspective of a Brick and Mortar Retailer, I kicked up the cost to $1.50 because of the much higher costs of retail real estate.Credit Card Fee: This is the fee charged by the credit card company for processing the transaction for the customer.Why no sales tax? We are not including sales tax in this analysis because it’s not a profit contributor. Although the line item appears on a receipt, it is a balance sheet item that increases a special withholding account that you are “supposed” to keep for your customers’ transactions and pay quarterly to the state. Since this is a null transaction where the money goes in and cannot be spent - we don’t include it in this analysis.Active Margin Management:One of the more interesting things that I began to do was implement a proactive management strategy for retail distribution in the US. Generally, a brand let’s it’s sales reps control most of the communication with the people that the brand is selling to. This really didn’t make a whole lot of sense because if I am running the bloody company - I need to actively know how the product is performing at retail for small boutiques. Boutiques are your leading indicator for pricing & sizing (two hugely important aspects).Every two weeks, I would call every independent boutique that I worked with - that was about 117 doors in the US. I focused primarily on the top 30% that I found were the most interesting.After chatting with all of them, I would build maps of what I was seeing. I would hear that a certain product was not performing well in Baton Rouge, LA at $210 retail but was absolutely killing it at $240 retail in Colombus, OH. In addition, retailers would actively express their frustrations with heavy product positions on say Nike Dunks in that same Baton Rouge, LA shop - but the shop in Orlando, FL was drying to get some but http://Nike.net (nike’s wholesale management system wouldn’t hook them up with an allocation).Based on this feedback, I would build full pricing analyses for each of the biggest bell-weather retailers - generally 10 - 12 every 2 weeks (Generally, I did this at night from 12 - 2:30am which is my last conference call of the day 2:30am PST is 5:30pm in China end of work day).In the above example, I would have the Baton Rouge, LA retailer reduce price of $195 from $210 but structure increases in other products to compensate for Margin Reductions. Basically testing price sensitivity to create an optimal margin structure for the retailer.In addition, I would use the credit that I extended Baton Rouge, LA store & the different Orlando, FL (My relationship with them is the only common factor between these two guys and they both owed me $$) and shift Baton Rouge store’s Nike Dunks (that he was long on) and get them to the Orlando guy.What did I gain:Boosted Cash Conversion (If I spent that much time caring about their business, who the hell do you think that they are going to pay first?)Increased Rev/Account (I have multiple touch points with my customer and I gave them something that no one else really could give them - they are of course going to give me a larger merchandise location at their store)Deep market insight ( simply just knew more than anyone else about market dynamics and could apply that knowledge throughout all aspects of the organization - thereby building the human capital endemic to the organization).---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Section 5E-Commerce Margin Analysis---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Now let’s get to the fun part - online retail is near & dear to my heart and this is the part that I really wanted to answer. E-Commerce is an incredible channel because you have the ability to:Create the Retail Environment: Being online means that retailers have the power to design the retail narrative that visually communicates the retailer’s story. Think about it - a brick and mortar retailer will maybe remodel the story once every five to seven years. With an online store - you can dynamically change the homepage, create a new theme for the season, add “sub-shops” for designs/styles, or with a little html & CSS you can tell a totally different story.For a more in-depth version of this story, check out: How Retailers Can Replicate the 'Magic' of the Apple Store... Online (I am really proud of that piece)Tell the Story: Being online provides the retailer with the ability to tell the product’s story to bring the customer in the world of the retailer. Online Retailers can add “looks” to augment the retail experience - the story enables online retailers to tell a story that would be challenging for a brick & mortar. Did the sales associate get busy and forget the brands background? Were they too busy and didn’t get a chance to connect with the customer? Online gives the retailer to tell the story that gives the customer a reason to buy stuff.Deeper Customer Insight: The luxury of E-Commerce is that we have an incredible number of tools to track & analyze user behavior in ways that brick & mortar would only dream of. Although it’s challenging to nail down your e-commerce analytics - it’s extremely powerful to have a detailed customer profile to tweak your merchandising & promotion strategies.Regular Engagement: The era of using Facebook & Twitter to simply promote your products is dead. Modern E-Commerce social strategies involve crafting a narrative that makes your fans want to engage by NOT talking about yourself. For example, a music blog will use a new mix to engage fans & readers & then subsequently sell tickets to the show after they are on the page.This all leads up to the point of analyzing the costs of the costs of E-Commerce and gather some insight on the associated margins of online retailers. We are going to look at the margin for e-commerce from two different perspectives:1. Traditional E-Commerce: A traditional online retailer is a store that purchases products from brands at wholesale and then sells the product to customers at retail. Online retailers that employ this model are Nordstrom, Urban Outfitters, Huckberry, and Tobi. The foundation of this business is based on the retailer choosing selecting the best pieces from brands to put together the right assortment of pieces that will most strongly resonate with their audience. The additional benefit of this model is that the retailer can use Paid Search to bring in new customers searching for the brands they retail – so the popularity of the brands they retail become a source of customer acquisition.2. Brand Direct E-Commerce: This is the uber-popular model championed by Bonobos and Warby Parker that exploded onto the e-commerce landscape in 2011. This model was enabled primarily by the major foundational trends that I outlined in - What is the next wave of innovation in e-commerce after flash sales and private sales? Based on the massive assimilation of Facebook (product) as a daily tool for navigating the web, brands were finally able to gain access to an audience that enabled them to gain a critical mass of fans in order to build a stable customer base. By designing and producing the products themselves, these vertically integrated E-Commerce startups are able to earn significantly more money per item than traditional online retailers (remember in the traditional approach two different companies need to make enough margin to support operations & growth).Traditional E-Commerce Margin AnalysisWe are going to look at this first from the perspective of a ‘typical’ online retailer like Nordstrom (company) or Urban Outfitters (retail brand).We are going to look at this first from the perspective of a ‘typical’ online retailer like Nordstrom (company) or Urban Outfitters (retail brand).This is a breakdown of what each line item expense is:Wholesale Price: This is the price of the product paid by the retailer to the brand for the product – the product is purchased at Wholesale Price which can be thought of as a 50% discount from the retail price in exchange for volume (i.e. 500 units per style).Inbound Warehouse Fee: This is the cost of receiving the goods from the UPS carrier at the warehouse, checking the items against the shipping manifest, and putting them on the warehouse shelves for quick fulfillment. As warehouses adjust to working with more E-Commerce retailers, they are quickly adopting unit pricing for receiving these items. This fee was taken from actual fees that I paid in 2009 for my old bran VÆL Project.Storage Fee: When an item is received, it is not immediately fulfilled to the customer (like is the case for a Private Sale site – when an order is immediately ‘burned & turned’, it is received and immediately packaged for fulfillment to the customer), the product is shelved until an order is placed. This number is calculated by a daily rate multiplied by the average days in inventory or the average of the storage expense divided by the number of items in inventory.Outbound Warehouse Fee: When an order comes in, the items in the order must be picked from the warehouse shelves and packed in shipping cartons (hence the term ‘Pick & Pack’). This fee is usually a per order charge + a fee per unit of the order, which covers the cost of having a person pick the order and the packaging requirements of the order.Outbound Shipping Fee: This is the fee paid to the shipping carrier to transport the item from the retailer’s warehouse to the customer. For purposes of this explanation, we are assuming that the retailer is using U.S. Postal Service Flat Rate boxes that cover nationwide transportation of the product for a set price. The carrier of choice for E-Commerce is usually UPS where something like 6% of the US Gross Domestic Product is moving through their system on any given day.You might be wondering why the costs of shipping & fulfillment must be included in the Cost of Goods Sold - well that’s a good question. Most retailers have to offer free Shipping as a normal course of competing online today. The IRS says that when a promotional expense is a standard practice (i.e. free shipping on all orders) it must be calculated as a Cost of Goods Sold expense. Here is a little graph that shows you the prevalence of free shipping as a norm in online retail:Therefore, when an online retailer utilizes free shipping it must be allocated to COGS.In Financial Modeling: Where can web startups learn about financial modeling that accounts for the important metrics and costs? I take you through the costing build of Customer Acquisition costs. But here is a quick summary:Customer Acquisition Costs: This is the price paid to Google for Paid Search when using this as a demand generation technique. In the summary of this methodology, we said that the value of using the traditional e-commerce model is that you can capture the search traffic from customers looking for a particular brand. For purposes of this analysis we assumed that the most that we would pay for a customer is 7.5% of the retail price:CC Fees: Credit Card Fees are pretty straight forward as they are a % of Gross Sales that the CC processor charges to the Retailer for use of a CC or Debit Card. They range from roughly 1.65% - 5.4% (for a small retailer processing an AMEX or Discover card).Brand Direct E-Commerce Profit Margin AnalysisWith all of the advantages of selling to major e-commerce retailers, you might be wondering why would a brand want to sell consumer direct – the answer is that it is a far more profitable transaction for the brand:As the iPhones (product) integrated itself into the daily lives of the US population and Facebook (product) drove the majority of Americans to interact with the web, e-commerce was primed for explosion. In late-2010, we saw that new startups were bursting onto the scene to change the world.Two of the most significant consumer direct e-commerce startups from the boom cycle are Bonobos & Warby Parker. This e-commerce boom period can pretty much be traced back to the $18.5m investment by Lightspeed Venture Partners (venture capital firm) & Accel (global venture capital firm) in Bonobos in Nov ’10. This is what they saw in the deal:Here are the definitions as to what each term means:First Cost: This is the price paid to the factory in China for the product. This term refers to the final, fully assembled number for the product that will be delivered to the brand at the Port of Hong Kong. First Cost means that ownership of the product changes once the shipper picks up the product so the brand owns the product while it’s on the ocean.Ocean Freight: All of the products will need to be “containerized” – which means put into those big shipping containers in one of 3 sizes: 20’ ft, 40 ft’, or 45ft. If you don’t have enough product to fill a full container, you will work with a freight consolidator that takes your shipment & puts it together with another shipment to make one large shipment that’s more cost effective to transport. Generally, you logistics firm will include insurance, bond, and other fees here.Tax & Duty: The US has an incredibly complex set of taxes called the US Harmonized Tariff Schedule that calculates the tax rate that your products are subject to based on your investment in lobbying. This fee is paid directly to the treasury.Drayage: This is the cost of transporting your shipment from the Port of Los angeles to your warehouse. This fee can be very small if your warehouse is in Los Angeles and you have only a single container. However, if your warehouse is in Massachusetts, like Bonobos, then this will need to be routed by train or semi to the appropriate destination.Warehouses Inbound: These are the costs to receive your shipment at the warehouse, physically count the product, and putting them on the warehouse shelves for quick fulfillment. As warehouses adjust to working with more E-Commerce retailers, they are quickly adopting unit pricing for receiving these items.Storage Fee: This is the cost holding the product by the retailer until the product can be sold.Outbound Shipping Fee: This is the fee paid to the shipping carrier to transport the item from the retailer’s warehouse to the customer. For purposes of this explanation, we are assuming that the retailer is using USPS Flat Rate boxes that cover nationwide transportation of the product for a set price. The carrier of choice for e-commerce is usually UPS where something like 6% of the US GDP is moving through their system on any given day.Customer Acquisition Costs: This is the price paid to Google (company) for Paid Search when using this as a demand generation technique. In the summary of this methodology, we said that the value of using the traditional e-commerce model is that you can capture the search traffic from customers looking for a particular brand. For purposes of this analysis we assumed that the most that we would pay for a customer is 7.5% of the retail price:CC Fees: Credit Card Fees are pretty straight forward as they are a % of Gross Sales that the CC processor charges to the Retailer for use of a CC or Debit Card. They range from roughly 1.65% - 5.4% (for a small retailer processing an AMEX or Discover card).For Google Search Matt Carroll - Google+

August 15, 1947, Delhi IndiaThere are many today in India who seem not to understand the reality of what India was in 1947. There are those who in the many corridors of the Lok Sabah (Parliament), who utter various allegations of how India’s economic growth was hampered by the Nehru family. In other levels of society there are allegations of corruption and robbery of state funds. And, there are even wild allegations of the lack of development under the near 60 years of rule under the dynasty of the House of Nehru. Perhaps some of allegations have somewhat of a basis, but the realities of circumstance are not looked at. It seems that a generation of Indians came about that never valued independence of thought, secular nationalism, and an independent foreign policy. Rather they would have preferred a course of economic development in an imagined course where Western Nations would have invested in India and the economic rise of India would have been a guaranteed outcome. This never was the case and there are concrete reasons why this never would have happened. In fact in even in the future with a completely open economy this will never happen. Many comparisons have been made, but these also fall short if analyzed fairly. There is far more about this period which even today is not being fully looked at. The time has without doubt come to view this period from a perspective of clarity and objectivity. For regardless of, how many people have disdain for this period the era remains one of the most important in Indian National History and it’s effects are still felt by all Indians and people of Indian origin. For me the story begins with actual accounts I know of from my family, events I witnessed and those I have researched over the years.Refugee Camp, Indian side of the BorderWhen on strike of the Mid-Night hour India became an independent nation again. There was little to to celebrate in the cities and villages which made up India. At that hour in my family’s ancestral home in Saharanpur Uttar Pardesh, ancient cannons were fired from a roof top with colored gun gunpowder. But the celebration was short lived. And, the gates of the house had to opened briefly to let people in from the street outside because rioting had broken out and a mob had formed. Thus, for the next several days a group of young people were too scared to make their journey back home. The partition of India had caused a complete collapse in our area as construction, and the flow of food products from West Punjab to Eastern Punjab and Uttar Pardesh had completely halted. There were shortages at first and the complete unavailability of basic things. People were told the situation would improve, but then came trains filled with the dead bodies from Lahore Terminus. And more followed, Hindus and Sikhs trying to escape from newly formed Pakistan never made it alive to the border of India. Violence of kind never seen before erupted in Saharanpur, the small skirmishes which happened on the night of August 15, 1947 were nothing compared to the disaster which would come about a week later.Baba Shib Dayal Bedi as Municipal Commissioner of Saharanpur, the same image was displayed in Saharanpur’s train station until 1969.In the company my Great Grand Father has established in late 1800’s, a large warehouse was filled with construction equipment, on another side of the Company’s Estate lay a brick factory, there were many other assets which had since 1910 sat in the open as Saharanpur had been a safe city. Baba Shib Dayal Bedi had been the Municipal Commissioner, until his death in December, 1941. A very diverse population of Hindus, Sikhs, and Muslims lived together in complete peace. But, on this night looting, arson and killings occurred. Large parts of the company assets were set on fire, and life was forever changed for all who lived through this night. At my Grand Father’s request the gates were opened to house and to warehouses to save people from death in the streets who had no where to hide. Dead bodies lay in the streets and a complete collapse of civil life occurred. Those who had for centuries been neighbors attacked each other in the name of religion. India had been partitioned not just by land but in the very hearts and souls of it’s people.My father who was only about nine years old at the time went to the Gurudwara (Sikh Temple) his Grand Father had built, and our family members called for the end of violence between Hindu, Muslim and Sikh as “Partition was ill conceived, that it could never really happen as there was no place in Northern India where a Hindu, Muslim and Sikh did not live near each other. And there were cases where families were split along religious lines now.” The chaos would die down but it would take months. My father always would tell me of how, many of of those who were most vulnerable without gates and iron doors to close would loose what little they had, as looting and riots continued. The price of freedom from a British Raj of racial oppression came as a trial of fire for many Indians in Punjab and Western Uttar Pardesh, and for those in West Bengal.My Grand Father Baba Prem Nath Bedi, was utterly convinced that the situation was so horrific that India might just break up into provinces. The chronic shortage of food was driving people mad. Though the violence was largely over by the end of October 1947. A new problem now came and this was the refugee crisis. But here a new face of humanism was born, just months after the fires of rioting. For everyone it seemed wanted to help the refugees. Prime Minister Nehru was himself relentlessly touring the refugee camps. India had been attacked by newly formed Pakistan in the Northern most province of Kashmir. An airlift of Indian troops had begun, but people in Punjab and Western Uttar Pardesh were following this story with a great distraction, as they were trying to simply survive partition. Over the next few weeks a miracle would take place in Kashmir as Indian Troops repelled the invasion, but most Indians viewed it as a disaster as more than 1/3 of the province was occupied by Pakistani forces, while British commanders still remained in charge in Karachi.As time progressed and 1947 turned to 1948, a world of difference came. The expected continuation of war in Kashmir did not materialize as the snows melted. Instead Prime Minster Nehru wanted to take the issue to U.N. Many voices in India were vocally against this. But, they did not understand how weak India really was economically at this point. There was only going to be very short period where factories which were in India would be supplied by raw materials which were now in Pakistan. This my Grand Father was very aware of this. As ropes used in large scale projects used components from East Bengal. And during this period he stock piled these materials as he knew supplies would again get interrupted. Prime Minister Nehru was now talking about socialist politics and wanted to nationalize large scale landholding, this affected most of our neighbors and nearly all of our family members and extended family. There were large landholdings in our family since the time of Emperor Akbar 250 years ago. The talk of the nationalization of electric supply companies and transportation was another very great uncertainty and would have direct effect on my family.Prime Minister Nehru promised compensation for this, but this was simply a farce. There never was any real compensation for the industrial holdings my Grand Father would loose in the 1950’s. They were simply taken away, and then run into the ground. The state did not manage these resources better than private ownership. Somethings were disputed and given back. And, looking back it seems a lot of things could have been kept, but like so many at that point, nationalism had swept people away for they saw the dawn of an Independent India and considered themselves so lucky to have what they did, as there were others who had lost everything and were now refugees. And, this was so very true. A much higher goal was present, and this was the survival of millions of people and the ultimate survival of the new nation of India.In 1950, once more the price of food shot up, as trade ceased between India and Pakistan. Partition had resulted in India, having a completely inadequate food supply. The best farm lands had been lost in West Punjab. The loss of Eastern Bengal was created a similar situation for rice production. Prime Minister Nehru desperately was looking for food assistance. The U.S. and Britain refused, and much of this was because, India was closing it’s economy and not allowing it’s territory to be used by foreign powers. Both the U.S. and Britain had sided with Pakistan on the issue of Kashmir and supported a plebiscite in the State without the removal of the Pakistani presence in more than 1/3 of the state. Diplomatic meetings with President Truman, although generating great Photos, were actually very unsuccessful. As the only way to advance the relationship would have been to allow U.S. investment at the ground level in India and foreign military bases in India. Prime Minister Nehru, and most in India’s first cabinet were not willing to do this after 190 years of colonial destruction of the Indian economy.Prime Minister Nehru and Soviet Leader KrushevAfter being turned down for food assistance, Prime Minister Nehru would ask the Indian delegation in Moscow to ask the U.S.S.R. for help. He was nearly certain that they would be turned down. But here a meeting occurred between Stalin the delegation, and before the discussion even progressed to a formal request, Stalin just agreed to send grain. As the meeting was dissected by the Indian side, the conclusion was that Stalin had been waiting for India to come on it’s own. He granted the meeting and personally took part in it. This would be one of three meetings with foreign diplomats that Stalin would grant in eight years of his rule which followed World War II. The following year a large trade show would take place in India, and the Soviet Union would display large amounts of products and weapons. A financial agreement was put in place for exchange of Indian commodities for these advanced products. It has been said over the years that the Soviet Union did not need these Indian products, and that the deal was only put in place not make the Indian side feel completely unable to offer anything.By the mid-1950’s, squadrons of Soviet Mig fighter jets were flying over Indian Airspace. Large scale hydro-electric and heavy industry projects were launched. And, everywhere new schools were being built. An emphasis of education was sweeping through India. Yet even with all of these changes, the living standard of the average Indian was not going up. And, this is where modern day comparisons really fall short. As they do not take into account one very big difference between the reality of India and that of other Asian economies. India had for 190 years been under British Colonial Rule. Industrial know how had vanished in India. Nations like Japan had been destroyed by World War II, they had American assistance to rebuild, access to international markets and they had a skilled work force. They also did not have the burden of defending their nation militarily after World War II. India had none of this.Non-Aligned MovementA new foreign policy was launched by Prime Minister Nehru, and here India adopted the academically but unproven theory of Non-Alignment. The theory called for developing nations to not take sides in the Cold War. India would become a founding member of the movement. Prime Minister Nehru would also make a great effort to engage China, to create an “Asian Century”. He believed that the new age would restore the ties that India and China had during the period known as “The Great Interchange”. During this period which had lasted from 450 B.C. to 1157 A.D. The reality is that this never was going happen, at least not in the early 1950’s. As this period was one of immense challenges for India to overcome with a China which had become Communist and expansionist. At the same time this proposition may have been over come if there had not been outside forces which wanted a breakdown of relations between India and China. Much of how the actual border war began, still remains in shrouded in secrecy. What we can really see is that this war was an intelligence failure on the part of India, and it was a war where India did expect to get the backing of the West which never really came through. Instead the Soviet Union would take a decisive step and go against China and finally break the idea of the Soviet Union and China being one bloc ideologically.Sino-Indian WarAt the same time, Nehru’s main foreign relationship was broken with China. Before this war, India had the most influential developing nation in terms of defining the path the third world was taking. In fact even the terminology of first world, second world and third world had been defined by Prime Minister Nehru. He had objected to the use of the phrase “under developed nation”, as this was a demeaning phrase when applied to India. For India was a developed civilization long before those nations who now sat in judgement of India. For India had been economically been destroyed by colonialism, Under Prime Minister Nehru, India had attempted to rapidly industrialize, create schools, universities and health care. In the early 1960’s Indian food production was also rising, though not completely self sufficient, India had made immense progress since 1947. . For the outside world, it seems the reality of what India would accomplish in the coming decade was not yet recognized.When Prime Minister passed away in 1964, he had led India for 17 years. He had won election after election. For all Indians he was the only Prime Minister they had ever known. He had managed to hold together a impoverished nation, which had been surgically partitioned and left bleeding by the British Empire. Through the greatest human migration in human history, and this after the largest man made famine of the 20th Century known as the Bengal famine, it was the leadership of Prime Minister Nehru which had become the face of independent India. What was certain in 1964, had not been in 1947, this was that India would survive as political entity, and that it would remain a secular democracy.In 1964, Lal Bahadur Shastri was sworn in Prime Minister. His path though respectful of Nehru’s direction was more straight forward and direct. He would state “There comes a time in the life of every nation when it stands at the cross-roads of history and must choose which way to go. But for us there need be no difficulty or hesitation, no looking to right or left. Our way is straight and clear—the building up of a secular mixed-economy democracy at home with freedom and prosperity, and the maintenance of world peace and friendship with select nations.” He lived by example, and he had been a disciple of Mahatma Gandhi, he had worked for the betterment of Low Caste Indians. He would begin by ending the expansion of socialism and create a distinct line of what government entities should be involved in and what not. He aligned India closer to the Soviet Union, and did not hesitate on this. He also began with full speed the development of the Indian Atomic Program. The green light for this program had been reluctantly been given by Prime Minister Nehru after the West had not anything substantial to help India repel Chinese aggression in 1962.Over the next two years Lal Bahadur Shastri led by example. He plowed the field himself at his official residence. He would ask the nation to skip one meal a week. And he said this would be done first by himself and his family. This would become known as Shastri’s Brut (Fast), during this time eateries all over India would shut down on Monday evening. He saw the suffering of children because of India’s in ability to produce milk in the quantities needed. And he began what would become known as the White Revolution. A new government plan was unveiled and cooperation was begun with the Indian Dairy Industry. Prime Minister Shastri spoke of the day when India would once more be able to feed it’s population. Severe food shortages continued, but the attempt at solving them continued.In 1965 a surprise invasion was launched by Pakistan, and a diplomatic campaign of intimidation by China. All of a sudden, China claimed that India was using it’s territory to house weapons. But, the Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri, did not bow down to this pressure. He would fight the war all the way through. Pakistan lost hope of any quick military victory. Though India had tremendous losses in material, the case was the same for Pakistan. And, after the conclusion of the War it became apparent that India had lost the 1962, border war because of lack of strategy not the inability of Indian troops to fight until the very end. In 1966, after signing a cease fire in Tashkent with Pakistan, Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri would pass away under dubious circumstances. Over the years many theories have been presented, and the fact remains that Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri, pushed India into the Atomic Age, and there were many nations who did not want this. But there were very few nations which had the reach necessary to poison to him. The Indian public of 1966 never did accept that their Prime Minister left India energetic as ever, and came home only for cremation. He followed the path of Gandhi to the very end, as he left behind no source of wealth nor accumulated possessions,After much political shuffling Smt. Indira Gandhi would become Prime Minister of India in 1966. Though she had much experience because she had served her father dutifully throughout his 17 years of rule, many believed that she would be a weak and easily influenced Prime Minister. But, this would not be the case at all. She always would fear for her safety as she knew that her policies would make India self-sufficient in every defining economic category in the next decade. She also came with the belief that India could become a great military power once more. Along with this she would bring into India the politics of Nepotism, and create distinct Indian identity which still carries on even today. For she made India a state which no outside nation could control or issue dictates to.The decade of the 1970’s began with many in India and abroad in doubt about India’s economic survival in this decade. For many think tanks in the West it was a certain prediction that India would enter a period of mass starvation by the late 1970’s. And this would be the end of Indian Democracy and the beginning of the population decrease and probable balkanization of the India. These Think Tanks would not just be proven wrong by a small degree by 1980. Prime Minister Indira Gandhi would state “ A nation’s strength ultimately consists of what it can do on it’s own and not what it can borrow from others”. The 1970’s would truly prove this notion and this decade would become Indira Gandhi’s decade.The blood telegram, showed the Nixon Administration knew what was happening in East Pakistan.In 1970 Prime Minister Indira Gandhi proactively began showing the world what Pakistan was doing to it’s Hindu minority and Bengali intellectuals, as a genocide was taking place in East Pakistan. Both the U.S. and England turned a deaf ear to situation and continued to politically and economically support Pakistan. As 1971 came, the Genocide quickened and more refugees flooded into India from East Pakistan. The situation was becoming worse, and in Bangladesh the demands for autonomy from Pakistan were being heard. The Nixon administration rather than stop the genocide in Pakistan instead reacted by asking a newly diplomatically engaged China to open a front with India war broke out between India and Pakistan. It appears that initially China gave the impression that it would do so. After March 1971, the Indian army began creating plans of what a war would look like in East Pakistan. However, the situation on the ground was deteriorating far quicker, and the Pakistani Army was now eliminating entire villages of their Hindu populations. On December 3, 1971, it would be West Pakistan which would attack India, with the belief that they could win a war with India, because of their U.S. supplied radar system and Fighter Jets. At the time, India did not have a true radar system in place, and even in the 1962 Chinese invasion of India, Prime Minister Nehru had desperately asked President Kennedy for this.The Pakistani airstrikes, were successful on that night, but they along with initial troop movements in the Western theater would be their only successes in this two front war. China would never join in, and India would gain air superiority on both fronts. The West would arrange for additional aircraft to be given to Pakistan, these would include F-6’s from Iran and Jordan. But they would not change the outcome of the war. Indian troops, advanced rapidly in East Pakistan. And the Bangladeshi resistance offered intelligence and the best route towards Dacca was chosen. On Decmeber 15, 1971, Dacca was taken by Indian Armed Forces. And the following day, Pakistani forces surrendered, and 93,000 P.O.W.’s were taken in total. The U.S. had sent the seventh fleet and British Royal Navy also was making it’s way towards India. But, in this war, the U.S.S.R. played a large role in containing it’s spread, behind the scenes the Soviet Union told China that if any invasion took place of Indian territory that the Soviet Union would begin a border war of it’s own with China. In the Indian Ocean the Soviet Union surfaced it’s nuclear submarines as a sign that any attack on India would be met by a Soviet response. The Indian victory in 1971, was historically military accomplishment since the Mauryan Dynasty. As India, had shown that it could stand up for the greater good all people of the Indian Sub-Continent. India would return all captured territories and accept the border as it stood on December 2, 1971. The next 10 years would be a period of peace on the borders of India as Pakistan was out of the picture as a military threat. Even today, Pakistan has never been a conventional military threat since 1971.The India that Prime Minister Indira Gandhi took over, was a nation which was not food sufficient. Though progress had been made, India was in a humiliating position where India had to go to the West for food imports. These were used as carrots by the West, the stick was in form of policy changes that it wanted from India. Yet, at the same time there never ending foreign aid for Pakistan from the United States. The Soviet Union on the other hand would assist India but in a very different way. As India did not get direct capital contributions to it’s economy. India since the time of Nehru tried to do everything on it’s own. This was a hard task and India did not waver from it. During the rule of Prime Minister Gandhi this would only become even more important. She believed that India’s situation was greatly hindered because small business was not being given adequate financing by lending institutions. When large banks continued this way, she would nationalize them. The system of State Bank of India branches was created to serve every small community in India. And finally there was a push to finance the small farmers.At the same time the winds of history had once more shifted after nearly 250 years to finally allow the flight of the Golden Sparrow (India). In the beginning the winds were only felt by those who took the time to notice. The planning board of India, realized fist. As food production began to take off, the Green Revolution had come and dignity would be restored to India for the first time since the night of colonialism began on June 23, 1757. All of a sudden the push for Indian products, in the form of mechanized farm equipment was met by seeds which were resistant to pests. Food production climbed, by the early 1970’s India was producing enough food that costly imports ended. Prime Minister Nehru’s massive investments in irrigation and Dams began to pay off. By the mid 1970’s the age of food shortages was quickly forgotten by an entire generation of Indians. For it was India which was after 190 years of deprivation, exporting food for currency. In 1940 while on trial in England, Shahid Udham Singh had stated “I have seen people starving to death on the Streets in India, and people mowed down by machine guns. What democracy does your flag bring?”. In the late 1970’s his words were answered. when the first grain shipments left India for sale abroad. For it was a testament to the memory and sacrifice of every freedom fighter and victim of starvation during India’s age of colonialism.Prime Minister Indira Gandhi and Soviet Leader Breshnev, in 1971, India would sign a 20 year treaty of Friendship with the Soviet Union. This would be continued to the Russian Federation after the collapse of the Soviet Union in December 1991.In 1974, India detonated an Atomic Weapon in the Thar Region. On that day, India entered the Atomic age. Prime Minister Smt. Indira Gandhi tried to down play this event. But, China and the West very much understood what India had accomplished. India could not be threatened in 1974, the way it had been in during the 1971 war. Back in 1966 India’s Atomic Project had received a major setback when Dr. Homi Jahangir Bhabha, was killed along 117 other souls in the crash of Air India flight 101. From the very beginning of the investigation, there were anomalies which occurred which did not add up. The flight left Beirut with one of it’s VOR communication units inoperable. And later “Miscommunications”, were deemed to have been the reason for the flight crashing into Mont Blanc. The end result was a slow down of the Indian Atomic Program. For many decades the crash has been viewed with suspicion in India.Prime Minister Indira Gandhi’s India had in 8 years achieved, what had looked impossible in 1966. India had become the dominant power in South Asia, it became a nation which was soon going to be a food exporter, and the Indian economy was growing. Yet, all of a sudden an old freedom fighter Jayaprakash Narayan, would emerge. He in his native Bihar would begin a campaign alleging, high prices and corruption. Though this action was put down, he simply changed his scope and went national. He called for a “total revolution” and now mixed these demands with showing that Prime Minister Indira Gandhi had committed voter fraud and had been found guilty by the Allahabad Court. Jayaprakash Narayan, called for the immediate resignation of Prime Minister Indira Gandhi and a complete revolution to take place. His idea of revolution was vague at best, he recited poetry in Delhi for 6 hours on one occasion. There seemed to be a greater desire to disrupt the life of the nation, rather than promote positive change. His agitation in Delhi allowed him to address massive crowds. The pattern went on for weeks, and paralyzed India. At the time Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, would state that this was all a plot launched by outside forces to get even for her resounding successes.J.P. Narayan calling for revolution.Prime Minister Gandhi, had known Jayaprakash Narayan, her entire life. As he had been a part of the Independence movement and a friend of the Nehru family. She attempted to negotiate with him, but his only response was that she step down from power. He once more proclaimed “Total Revolution”, and on the midnight of June 25, 1975, Prime Minister Indira Gandhi declared a National State of Emergency. There were mass arrests and J.P. Narayan was detained in Chandigarh, but due to ill health he was released on November 12, 1975.The “Emergency”. stained Prime Minster Indira Gandhi’s image as a leader of a democracy. Though everyone was released who had been arrested in the period which would follow. the perception was largely distorted in India and the outside as to what had led up to this situation. Even today, the period of the emergency is more looked at for it’s reality than it’s origin. A revolution had sprung up and paralyzed the nation, there was outside support for this at some level, this is simply not deniable. The relationship which existed between Prime Minister Indira Gandhi and Jayaprakash Narayan was not a simple one, but it had never been a relationship of enmity. It appears that he held a grudge for not becoming Prime Minister in 1966. But his the way he acted in 1975 seemed to be coordinated with the timing of the ruling in Allahabad Court. The ruling itself and the way in which it was worded also was not clear. As it would have required Prime Minister Indira Gandhi to end her rule and stay out of politics for five years. Yet, the way the ruling was worded it did not even by a long shot directly implicate her. Even if election fraud had occurred, it was not on a scale which would have changed anything significantly as Prime Minister Smt. Indira Gandhi had won that election by popular vote.In 1977, Prime Minister Indira Gandhi would voluntarily end the “Emergency” and call for new elections. The Janta government came to power. They attempted to have a new relationship with the U.S. and President Carter even came to India for a state visit. On the home front the rule of the Janta government was not very successful. Smt. Indira Gandhi and her eldest son Sanjay Gandhi had been arrested. Sanjay Gandhi would be charged in other scandals and would be in and out of jail. But over all the Janta Party, lost control of the economy and a period stagnation resulted. In 1980 Indira Gandhi would come to power in a landslide election. Later the same year she would loose Sanjay Gandhi in a aviation accident. She would begin the last term of her life time and when it would end the congress party of India would also be forever be changed.During this time, her advisers, my Father Baba Dr. Dina Nath Bedi had been one of them, began to advise her that India needed to join the computer age. India had missed the industrial revolution because of colonialism but the new P.C. revolution was more than just hardware. For software needed to be developed. And although in this stage most the profits were being made in Hardware, eventually this would completely shift. To understand this better, she used a major Indian Industrialist, whom my father would then do a joint venture with. This venture was just as much an exploration as business. This truly was only possible because an India which had a noble innocence still existed in those days, where the ideology of lifting people out of poverty still meant something. In these few years, Prime Minister Indira Gandhi would begin the visionary transformation of India from a rural nation which had struggled to feed itself to one which would 15 years later be a world leader in software development and implementation.President Ronald Reagan and Prime Minister Indira Gandhi. A new relationship began with the U.S. in the early 1980’s.During the next four years, inflation would fall in India, and the Soviet Union would become India’s main trading partner. Purchases would be made in Indian Rupees and the expansion of India’s military continued. The economy began to grow again. Pakistan, spread propaganda and largely created a rebellion in Indian Punjab, this would become a source of great turmoil for India. The concept of an independent Punjab, had been planted by the British long ago, as a divide and rule policy. The issue became one of violence in the early 1980’s and bombings and terrorist acts began occurring against Hindus in Punjab. These acts were done in the name of creating a “Khalistan” or independent Punjab. These actions triggered violence which began to increase after 1981. Punjab had been one the most prosperous states in India, and this drastically changed in the 1980′s. The idea of Khalistan never would have worked nor was it viable. As Punjab had been partitioned between Pakistan and India. There simply was no way to undo this and revert back to the Sikh Empire of the early 1800’s. But politics were being played by the Pakistani I.S.I. and their backers. On the other side Prime Minster Indira Gandhi authorized the invasion of the Golden Temple capture Bhindranwala and end his movement, who once had been a political ally. He himself had accusations of several murders on him, and had numerous enemies in Indian Punjab. His arms, ammunition and much of his message came from Pakistan, for he wanted to divide India. This fact should not be ignored as he was not spreading a message of peace. His working with Pakistan did not do honor for the millions of refugees who had left West Punjab barely clinging on to their lives, during partition in 1947.Operation Blue Star, 1984He had now moved himself and his armed followers inside of the Golden Temple. Operation Blue Star, would end in the death of Bhindranwala and many innocent people. Estimates vary between a few hundred to thousands. The Temple Complex was damaged. And make shift repairs were made which created even more anger. Prime Minister Indira Gandhi had believed that this action was being done for national integrity, but it would serve as a creating polarization. Prime Minister Indira Gandhi had miscalculated and would have been better served by trying to end this movement in another way. Her actions would actually end up feeding into the I.S.I’s hand and those who backed them, for India would emerge with a crisis. Both Hindu and Sikh would suffer and loose lives. On October 31, 1984, the phone rang in our house, it was early morning. My father answered and quickly put the phone down. Prime Minister Indira Gandhi had been assassinated. The age of the Prime Minister of India being accessible to the broad spectrum of Indians was over.We can look at the rule of the Original Congress party as really ending this point. The new leaders would come from a generation which had not lived through the freedom movement nor seen the India of the colonial period. For even though Rajiv Gandhi her son would take the helm of the party over, he would not be the force his mother had been. There would be massive riots against Sikhs in India. Thousands would loose their lives. And through the 1980’s he would try to end the rebellion in Punjab. Prime Minster Rajiv Gandhi would preside over the last years of a centrally planned India. His leadership was very different that that of his Mother and Grand Father. The Indian Rupee began to weaken under his leadership and economy began a slow down in expansion. Ultimately the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, would end the controlled economy which was a legacy of India’s first decades of Independence. Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi would try to find balance again for the Indian Congress Party, but his decisions would be of a different sort. Pakistan would become a nuclear state under his watch. It is doubtful that Prime Minister Gandhi would have allowed this. He also became mired in an Indian Military Presence in Sri Lanka, which ended in great expense for India. Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi did not bring the rapid change that was needed to make India open it’s own economy on it’s own terms. He would end his rule because of the Bofer’s scandal. While making a political come back he would be assassinated in 1991.Prime Minister Rajiv GandhiCongress would return to power and Prime Narishima Rao finally, end the centrally planned economy of India. In 1992 India would open it’s economy to the outside world. But, this action was taken in a way which allowed the purchases of Indian assets at a ground level price. And, this liberalization allowed assets which had been taken away from “Privileged Indians”, by the social reforms of the 1950’s and now these assets would be sold to foreign corporations and interests. The examples are numerous and in the long run, the very fact that today India has a manufacturing sector which lags well behind other Asian nations is because of how India was “Liberalized”. The analysis of this only beginning, and great campaigns to “Make in India”, have been launched but have failed to deliver tangible results. For manufacturing as a share of the Indian Economy peaked in 1994, and then began a slide.Today, India runs massive trade deficits with China, because no real supply chains exist for the production Computer equipment, flat panels, circuit boards and processors. But, the Indian economy had reached a level of development than this was completely overwhelmed in 1992, by foriegn direct investment. Only those areas where competitive advantages had been built up managed to increase increase in size. Thus, under the rule of Prime Dr. Minister Manmohan Singh, the Indian economy doubled in size over all. And statistically, India looked like it was making progress on paper. In reality the income disparity between rich and poor once more began to grow. And the distribution of wealth has continued to decline since then. Once more corruption scandals would play a large role in bringing down his rule. Since 2014, the future of the Congress Party has become an issue of great question. The politics of nepotism and lack of the ability to communicate effectively have severely hurt it’s ability to be the force it once was.Brics Nations, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh Center.The Congress Party of India, can be judged many different ways, but Indian Democracy was cemented in place by it. The freedom of the press and judiciary also were planted by this party. And, even what many wish to label as the dictatorial rule of Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, India became a nation free from outside influence because food importation ended, and the Indian Atomic Program became a success. Many people in India and Indians abroad went full circle from resenting the socialist policies of Prime Minister Nehru, to eventually seeing in their own lifetime that hundreds of millions of Indians, finally being able to feed themselves was an achievement beyond any monetary cost. At some point it must be realized that there would have been no industrialized Indian economy to open in 1991, had there not been social and economic reforms brought in by Prime Minister Nehru and Prime Minister Indira Gandhi. Of course the Indian economy should have been opened in the 1980’s. But politically India was tilted to the Soviet Union and there were real reasons for this. What look like easy choices today were not then. History may indeed one day look kindly upon the rule of the Prime Minster Nehru, Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri and Prime Minister Indira Gandhi. For these three Prime Minister’s of India managed to accomplish the task of taking a starving India and deliver it to the Atomic and Space Age in 35 years.The Indian space program which today is one the most successful such programs in the world. An Indian orbiter was successfully launched and reached Mars in 2013–14.Personal Experiences with Baba Dr. Dina Nath BediIndia a History by John KeaysChurchill’s Secret War, by Mahushree Mukherjee