Happiness Express, a toy company, was started in 1989 by Joseph Sutton and Isaac Sutton. The company took off quickly and was able to gain a share of the very competitive toy manufacturing market. In the first year of operation they earned a few thousand dollars in sales, but by their fifth year they had total revenues of more than $40 million. The business model for the company was designed to identify the latest children’s characters that would be most marketable in the United States. They accomplished this by relying on market research that would identify children’s areas of interest in new media. Happiness Express relied primarily on this research and through this research developed their motto, “In Kids We Trust.” Once the brothers had determined which media characters would become popular with children, they purchased the merchandise-licensing rights for these characters from the various studios and publishing companies. Happiness Express could then use these merchandising rights to manufacture the character’s figurines, shoelaces, toothbrushes, stuffed animals and an array of “back-to-school” items. After the products were manufactured, the brothers would then market these products to FAO Schwartz, Kmart, Target, Toys “R” Us, and Wal-Mart.
Happiness Express began their operations by purchasing the licensing rights to “The Little Mermaid” and “Barney”. The success of these lines made it possible for the company to firmly establish itself in the toy market. In July 1994, Happiness Express went public with an initial offering of $10 per share, and within a few months the company stock price had doubled. In 1995, Happiness Express was named the “#1 Hot Growth Company” by Business Week.
In 1994, the “Barney” merchandise ac...
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... been prevalent in the audit review included large amounts of receivables in the final month of the fiscal year 1995. The accounts of West Coast Liquidators and Wow Wee International Ltd. showed large credit sales in the final days of 1995. This was unusual for both of these accounts and Cooper & Lybrand should have taken steps to verify these sales beyond just a confirmation letter. If a confirmation cannot be acquired, then the audit team needs to review prior transactions that the company has had made with that particular customer to see if the large sales are regular or irregular. Because of Cooper & Lybrand’s deficiency in conducting a proper audit, insider trading information was provided to outside individuals who could profit from the deception. Cooper & Lybrand are liable for the damages to Happiness Express’s shareholders because of their ineffectiveness.
As a partner in the public accounting firm of Deloitte & Touche. LLP. James, in this case, was responsible for this violation. First, James was no on the basis of full inspection of the subsequent discovery existing at the date of the auditor 's report. Second, he did not detect and address problems regarding Ligand Pharmaceuticals ' exclusion of certain types of returns from the evaluation of future returns. Last but not least, he did not adequately perceive the reasonableness of Ligand’s estimates of future product
Overview of the Case: The Securities and Exchange Commission claims Mark D. Begelman misused proprietary information regarding the merger of Bluegreen Corporation with BFC Financial Corporation. Mr. Begelman allegedly learned of the acquisition through a network of professional connections known as the World Presidents’ Organization (Maglich). Members of this organization freely share non-public business information with other members in confidence; however, Mr. Begelman allegedly did not abide by the organization’s mandate of secrecy and leveraged private information into a lucrative security transaction. As stated in the summary of the case by the SEC, “Mark D. Begelman, a member of the World Presidents’ Organization (“WPO”), abused his relationship of trust and confidence and misappropriated material, non-public information he obtained from a fellow WPO member about the pending merger. It was the specific written policy of the WPO that matters of a confidential nature were to be kept confidential (Securities and Exchange Commission). Mr. Begelman maintained a relationship with a fellow WPO member, an insider with BFC Financial, who provided access to non-public information regarding the merger. Mr. Begelman used this information to purchase 25,000 shares of Bluegreen stock prior to the announcement of the acquisition. After the merger was made official and disclosed to the street, Mr. Begelman sold his stake for a net gain of $14,949. He maintained ownership of Bluegreen securities for fifteen days (Gehrke-White).
Welcome to the wonderful world of Disney: where your fantasy and dreams come to life. Disney was an idea created by the man himself, Walt Disney. He wanted to create a world where dreams can come true, which has cultivated a culture of disney fans over the web, on the television, on the radio, and in Disney parks. Additionally, Disney is such a widespread company that almost any Disney product can be found around the world. The movies, shows, even the children books created by Disney are well known. Books such as Understanding Disney written by Janet Wasko addresses the Disney company and the concept of happiness that it provides its many fans around the world. The culture of Disney is made from the happiness it brings people, but when the
Build-A-Bear Workshop was an American toy retailer, which was founded by Maxine Clark in 1996 in St. Louis, Missouri. Build-A-Bear Workshop main served teddy beard and other stuffed animals, and accessories for teddy bears and other stuffed animals. According to professor Eisner, Korn, Baugher, and graduate student Vojtkova (2011), “Build-A-Bear Workshop was founded 13 years ago on a simple but powerful idea: to create a successful company with heart” (p. C259). In order to differentiate itself from other toy producers, Build-A-Bear Workshop served customers with interactive experience by “allowing its customers to make, personalize and customize stuffed animals od their choosing” (p. C262). As professor Eisner et al. (2011) concluded, “the company (Build-A-Bear) differentiated itself from the competition with marketing initiatives that facilitated stronger connections with its customers” (p. C262) In addition, Build-A-Bear Workshop exercised its focus strategy by narrowing its product lines. Build-A-Bear Workshop earned a big success in the past decades.
In the case study of Pacific Acceptance Case, they established 10 principles and one of it was that whenever an auditor feels some suspicious activities, which may be because of some irregularities and which indicates towards some fraud, the auditor must take some action (Gay & Simnett 2010, p. 156). In our case study there was no action taken by the auditor even though they came to know that impulse was going through liquidity problems which was due reduction in inventory turnover and debtor turnover.
In 2010, he authored a book called Delivering Happiness: A Path to Profits, Passion, and Purpose, wherein he details the various business lessons he’s learned throughout his life starting from his lemonade stand and pizza business leading up to Link Exchange, Zappos, and the rest. He shows that using happiness as a framework can garner you p...
Toy World, Inc is a manufacturer of plastic toys for children, founded in 1973 by David Dunton. In the past, the company's production schedules had always been highly seasonal, reflecting the seasonality of sales. Jack McClintock, president and part owner of this company, is considering a proposal to adopt level monthly production for the coming year.
Disney’s long-run success is mainly due to creating value through diversification. Their corporate strategies (primarily under CEO Eisner) include three dimensions: horizontal and geographic expansion as well as vertical integration. Disney is a prime example of how to achieve long-run success through the choices of business, the choice of how many activities to undertake, the choice of how many businesses to be in, the choice of how to manage a portfolio of businesses and the choice of how to create synergies between those businesses (3, p.191-221). All these choices and decisions are made through Disney’s corporate strategies and enabled them to reach long-term success. One will discuss Disney’s long-run success through a general approach. Eisner’s turnaround of the company and his specific implications/strategies will be examined in detail in part II. Disney could reach long-run success mainly through the creation of value due to diversification and the management and fostering of creativity, brand image and synergies between businesses (1, p.11-14).
The word happiness comes from the word happy, which means to feel or show pleasure or contentment. In the novel, “The Joy Luck Club”, two daughters of the mothers in Joy Luck Club begin to compete with each other. Waverly Jong, is a child chess prodigy. June Woo, struggles to master the piano. The rivalry reflects values of success and worth depicted in the novel, “The Joy Luck Club”. In this novel, happiness does not truly come from the word happy.
will happen. They say that after happiness is sadness, but after the rain there’s a rainbow right? How
From a small community area within the suburbs of Chicago to the hills of California, Walter Elias Disney’s journey through life is considered to be, at least by myself, an incredibly inspirational story. Walt Disney was the epitome of an innovator during the era that he was alive for. His determination and resiliency to follow his dreams were never stopped as he created one of the most successful corporations in the world today. His lasting legacy has shaped The Walt Disney Company’s business strategies for the present and ongoing future. In terms of revenue The Walt Disney Company, otherwise known as Disney, is currently considered the second largest media firm in the world, only to be behind Comcast (“Global 2000”). It is my goal to break down Walt Disney’s story towards becoming the influential leader that he will always be remembered as. After touching up on his background story, I want to walk you through the very beginnings of the Disney Company all the way to the end of Walt’s life. The story will begin where all he had was a small cartoon named Oswald the Lucky Rabbit and finish with Walt’s latest and greatest accomplishment, Mary Poppins. I will illustrate the difficult times and successful times throughout his almost 50 year reign within the media business. Notice how I only relate to Walt Disney’s life as a story; I do this because I firmly believe that his life was the greatest story of them all. He has brought so much joy to families with his revolutionary ideas and willingness to take risks because he wanted to share his imagination with the world. The story of Walt Disney’s life truly was a dream come true.
Contrary to belief, genuine happiness is very rarely found at the bottom of a shopping basket or on the leather seats of a brand new car. Often we hear the cliché saying “Money can’t buy happiness” but this is in fact true. Whilst the elation and delight brought from finally owning a wanted item is extraordinary, you must remind yourself that your happiness should not become dependant upon your ownership of this item. Being happy is not something you can purchase from a shop or car dealership, it is the way you take on life. Unfortunately, happiness does not have its own aisle at shops and never will.
product. Animated characters, catch phrases, and toys are used to lure a child to the product.
Firstly, McDonald’s paid attention to the children in every country. They have built “happy land” for them and offered the “happy meals” with innovative toys to them. Since children is one of the biggest consumer groups to McDonald’s, and they have created a place with “happiness” culture to attract the children. It is a successful decision that building a business by focusing on the children since it can encourage the whole family to come to McDonald’s.McDonald’s is not only selling the happy meal to the children, but also selling American culture to them, it is a proper strategy to build the brand loyalty from th...
I never really thought the expression, “money can’t buy happiness”, was true. As an infant, just by observing the people around me, I observed when they would obtain money and a huge grin would spread across their face, the corners of their smile spreading from ear to ear. Whenever I would see that grin and a person’s face light up at the sight of a crisp, green bill it would make me believe that I had proved the famous expression wrong. Now that I’ve grown up and matured, my idea of that expression has changed. As of now, I am able to reflect on life more and look deeper into things and particularly into people more than I was able to do years ago. My ideas about this expression changed the most though because of the money situation my family had stumbled upon because of the failing economy. I remember being younger when the economy was doing well and waking up to twenty gifts for each of my three sisters and I. We used to believe that all of those presents, brought in because of money of course, were the best part of waking up on Christmas. Of course all of those toys and material items would make a child happy; however looking back it would only make them happy if it was given to them by somebody who bought it for them with love.