Today is the Thanksgiving Holiday in the US. It’s a Public Holiday, that the government has set-aside for the population to Give Thanks … to whomever …
This is a civic holiday more so than it is a religious holiday.
It is also a commercial holiday – lots of Trade activities; lots of Trade Inspirations.
The Trade Inspiration applies to us in the Caribbean. There is one event associated with the American Thanksgiving tradition that gives us pause – as observers and reporters of the America eco-system – that is the Macy’s Thanksgiving Parade. This subject has been detailed in a previous Go Lean Commentary from November 25, 2016; it is appropriate to Encore that now; see below.
This commentary is the 2nd of the 5-part series (2 of 5) from the movement behind the book Go Lean…Caribbean in consideration of the subject “In Defense of Trade“. The focus here is that Trade must be prioritized in the Caribbean region if we want a new economic regime. The other commentaries in the series are cataloged as follows:
- In Defense of Trade: China Realities
- In Defense of Trade: Macy’s Thanksgiving Parade Model – ENCORE
- In Defense of Trade: India BPO’s
- In Defense of Trade: Bilateral Tariffs – No one wins
- In Defense of Trade: Currency Assassins – Real Threat
No doubt, there is the need to grow the Caribbean economy; we need jobs, entrepreneurial opportunities, better educational and healthcare options, a safer homeland and more efficient governmental services. Since trade policies (chattel goods and intellectual property) affect all of these deliveries, we need to pay more than the usual attention to these discussions. Truthfully, we do NOT have a lot of chattel goods in our region; we do not manufacture much; but we can thrive in the intellectual property arena. This is where we need successful role models to show us how we can better exploit the opportunities with trade.
Let’s look-listen-learn from the Macy’s model. See the Encore here:
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Go Lean Commentary – Model of the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade – By The Numbers
“We are giving this for free as a gift to America” – CNBC Newscast: Amy Kule, Executive Producer, 2014 Macy’s Thanksgiving Parade*.
Free?
Hardly! There is nothing free about American Thanksgiving. This is just another example of American Crony-Capitalism. Consider the facts in this VIDEO here of the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade, by the numbers:
VIDEO – Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade by the Numbers – http://www.aol.com/video/channel/news/582e4599134aa15f420ded1a/
Click on the Photo to Play VIDEO
This discussion is promoting the idea of the Caribbean modeling the best-practices of American commerce – there are a lot of economic returns from events. The Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade, in the foregoing, is an event – one of the biggest on the calendar for New York City. So the focus of this commentary is the impact that one event can have on the societal engines of a community: economics, security and governance.
One person – or company – can make a difference.
Notice how this parade is mostly administered by one private company: Macy’s Department Stores.
Reference Title: Macy’s Department Store
Macy’s, originally R. H. Macy & Co., is a department store owned by Macy’s, Inc. It is one of two divisions owned by the company, with the other being Bloomingdale’s. As of January 2014, the Macy’s division operates 789 department store locations in the continental United States, Hawaii, Puerto Rico, and Guam, including the prominent Herald Square flagship location in Midtown Manhattan, New York City.[2]:35
Macy’s has conducted the annual Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade in New York City since 1924 and has sponsored the city’s annual Fourth of July fireworks display since 1976. Macy’s Herald Square is the largest department store in the world. The flagship store covers almost an entire New York City block, features about 1.1 million square feet of retail space, includes additional space for offices and storage, and serves as the endpoint for Macy’s annual Thanksgiving Day parade. It is estimated that the value of Herald Square is under $3 billion to more than $4 billion.[3]
As of 2015, Macy’s is the largest U.S. department store company by retail sales and is the 15th-largest retailer in the United States for 2014 in terms of revenue.[4][5]
Source: Retrieved November 25, 2016 from: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macy%27s
The focus of the book Go Lean…Caribbean is to elevate the Caribbean economic disposition, based on the existing infrastructure and new implementations. So we would want to look-listen-learn from this American model and then apply the lessons here in the Caribbean. Events are integral to the touristic experience; this is why the Go Lean book, serving as a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the technocratic Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU), details so many dimensions of eco-system for events. The book prominently highlights that even small towns can get in on the economic buoyancy of events by detailing the role model of the City of Sturgis (population 6,600) in the US State of South Dakota – Page 191. Their annual event – Sturgis Motorcycle Rally in August – generates about $800 million in community revenues.
Successful management of events is a mission of Go Lean roadmap. The region needs the jobs. These events – think Carnival or Junkanoo in the Bahamas – create permanent and temporary jobs. This is part-and-parcel of the Go Lean/CU prime directives, as identified with the following 3 statements:
- Optimization of the economic engines in order to grow the regional economy to $800 Billion & create 2.2 million overall new jobs; 9,000 jobs are attributed to Events.
- Establishment of a security apparatus to protect the resultant economic engines.
- Improve Caribbean governance to support these engines.
The Go Lean book presented the roadmap to imbrue the Caribbean region with new community ethos, plus new strategies, tactics, implementation and advocacies to improve event-job creation in the region. The following is a sample of these specific details from the book:
| Community Ethos – Deferred Gratification | Page 21 |
| Community Ethos – Economic Principles – People Choose | Page 21 |
| Community Ethos – Economic Principles – People Respond to Incentives in Predictable Ways | Page 21 |
| Community Ethos – Economic Principles – Economic Systems Influence Individual Choices | Page 21 |
| Community Ethos – Economic Principles – The Consequences of Choices Lie in the Future | Page 21 |
| Community Ethos – Governing Principles – Lean Operations | Page 24 |
| Community Ethos – Governing Principles – Cooperatives | Page 25 |
| Community Ethos – Ways to Impact the Future | Page 26 |
| Community Ethos – Ways to Foster Genius – Consider Artists, Musicians and Performers | Page 27 |
| Community Ethos – Ways to Help Entrepreneurship | Page 28 |
| Community Ethos – Ways to Promote Happiness | Page 36 |
| Community Ethos – Ways to Impact the Greater Good | Page 37 |
| Strategy – Vision – Confederate 30 Member-States | Page 45 |
| Strategy – Mission – Celebrate the Music, Sports, Art and Culture of the Caribbean | Page 46 |
| Tactical – Confederating a Permanent Union | Page 63 |
| Tactical – Fostering a Technocracy | Page 64 |
| Tactical – Separation-of-Powers – CU Federal Agencies versus Member-State Governments | Page 71 |
| Implementation – Ways to Pay for Change | Page 101 |
| Implementation – Ways to Deliver | Page 109 |
| Planning – 10 Big Ideas for the Caribbean Region | Page 127 |
| Planning – Ways to Make the Caribbean Better | Page 131 |
| Planning – Lessons from New York City | Page 137 |
| Planning – Lessons from Omaha – College World Series Model | Page 138 |
| Advocacy – Ways to Grow the Economy | Page 151 |
| Advocacy – Ways to Create Jobs | Page 152 |
| Advocacy – Ways to Enhance Tourism | Page 190 |
| Advocacy – Ways to Impact Events | Page 191 |
| Advocacy – Ways to Promote Fairgrounds | Page 192 |
| Advocacy – Ways to Preserve Caribbean Heritage | Page 218 |
| Advocacy – Ways to Improve Sports – Fairgrounds as Sport Venues | Page 229 |
| Advocacy – Ways to Improve the Arts | Page 230 |
| Advocacy – Ways to Promote Music | Page 231 |
The empowerments in the Go Lean book calls for permanent change to ensure that Caribbean people have opportunities; they only want to be able to provide for their families and preserve their unique Caribbean culture.
The Go Lean roadmap offers the technocratic execution of these deliverables. Imagine the expansion of the existing events in the region. Plus, imagine the artistic expressions and entertainment (singers, dancers, musicians, performers, etc.). Just like for the Macy’s Parade in the foregoing, economic gains await. This is the business model of “events”. From the outset, the Go Lean book recognized the significance of events and festivities in the roadmap with these statements in the opening Declaration of Interdependence (Page 12 & 14):
xxi. Whereas the preparation of our labor force can foster opportunities and dictate economic progress for current and future generations, the Federation must … recognize and facilitate excellence in many different fields of endeavor, including sciences, languages, arts, music and sports. This responsibility should be executed without incurring the risks of further human flight, as has been the past history.
xxxii. Whereas the cultural arts and music of the region are germane to the quality of Caribbean life, and the international appreciation of Caribbean life, the Federation must implement the support systems to teach, encourage, incentivize, monetize and promote the related industries for arts and music in domestic and foreign markets. These endeavors will make the Caribbean a better place to live, work and play.
There are many other communities that have flourished in this strategy – business model of fun and festivities – as depicted with the example of the Macy’s Thanksgiving Parade. Success is possible; we need only to look, listen and learn.
Many previous Go Lean blog-commentaries have focused on the business of events. See samples-examples detailed in these previous blogs:
| http://www.goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=9712 | Forging Change: Panem et Circenses |
| http://www.goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=5251 | Post-Mortem of Inaugural Junkanoo Carnival |
| http://www.goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=4879 | Model of a Sports Event: Martinique Surfing |
| http://www.goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=3292 | Model of an Artistic Event: Art Basel Miami |
| http://www.goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=2152 | Model of a Sports Event: Little League World Series |
| http://www.goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=1341 | College World Series Time – Lessons from Omaha |
| http://www.goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=1214 | Landlord of Temporary Stadiums |
| http://www.goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=535 | Event Security: Remembering and learning from Boston |
| http://www.goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=318 | Collegiate Sports in the Caribbean |
Now is the time for all of the Caribbean, the people and governing institutions, to lean-in for the empowerments in the book Go Lean … Caribbean. This is a Big Idea for the region; that of expanding Caribbean events for greater economic throughput. We have the foundations in place already, the many artistic, cultural and sporting events for locals and visitors.
We can employ the strategies, tactics and implementations from models like the Macy’s Thanksgiving Parade to make our Caribbean region a better place to live, work and play. 🙂
Download the book Go Lean … Caribbean – now!
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Appendix * – Source References:
https://youtu.be/61kyIsEBuUA posted Published on Nov 26, 2014; (retrieved November 25, 2016).
Executive producer of the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade, Amy Kule, provides insight to the numbers behind tomorrow’s big parade and reveals some new characters.
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Appendix VIDEO – 7 Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade Facts You Never Knew! – https://youtu.be/zOtWeyh1aRs