d_r........
Think the actual number was somewhere betw.
$800 thous and $1 mill. The exact number is in one
of the 10q's or 10k's
This was the cost for designing, production,
distribution, and follow thru on the materials
describing the program.
Prior fund raising programs done by Lifetime Learning
had 30% participation rates. Tsig.com
obviously (big understatement) didn't come
any where near to LifeTime's standards.
The program flopped.
Was the money spent to "fool" shareholders?
Or did the company through both
ambivalence and incompetence not allow for the
program to succeed while spending too much money on it...
funded through the sale of shares?
Much of the ambivalence had to do with whether
or not there were going to be distributorships.
A lot of money was also spent putting together
distibutor brochures.
If there were distributors that carried the materials
into schools and orchestrated the fund raisers for
a percent cut, and if distributorships didn't
cost a lot of money, then the program may have been both
less expensive and more effective.
But whether RG's incompetence or greed interceded with
the distributorships costing too much, and not willing to
profit share with distributors was never ever
actually resolved.
Now, to make any margins on cd sales, the key was
generating enough volume to get the cd's at lower costs.
This never occurred. Even if this did occur,
one finally has to ask whether CD sales alone
could generate sufficient revenues on slim margins
with or without cards.
Two or three years later in hindsight the answer is "no".
Everything is easier in hindsight. (But when you do travel
back in time, and see some one else moving forward
through time, avoid eye contact). LOL.
I imagine most brochure packages describing
the LifeTime Learning program ended up on the
wrong school administrator's desk and then were
eventually filed in the circular "cabinet" possibly
never even being read.
Thus the program was just mass mailed, w/o explanation,
without follow up and without organization for
implementation.
Thus it failed. Purposely? Purposely to fool?
I'd have to give RG the benefit of the doubt on this
one, I think RG just didn't have a clue how to carry
through the program and in doing this also surrounded
himself with people who either also didn't have a clue
or simply didn't want to do the program while
taking the company in another direction.
Thus giving RG the benefit of the doubt, I'd conclude
he had neither leadership or management skills while being
rudderless, ambivalent and incompetent...before
being purposely negligent.
Though his only real skill was being a sales person
to sign "deals" to promote with his PT Barnum like
abilities while never learning to keep his mouth shut
(his loose lips which sunk ships), which in turn allowed
others to sell shares.....anticpating events allowing
for the pump and dump cycles.
Anyway that's my take on this history as
I Monday morning quarterback.
z |
