HALLOWEEN ART EXHIBITION!
3 weeks ago
Thursday, 31 October 2013
Wednesday, 30 October 2013
Free Saucepans for Pots of Money
Isn't this kinda obvious? There's no such thing as a free lunch ...
Reference
Wellcome's 'free' saucepan set may require you to spend HK$115,200 (SCMP; paywall)
Reference
Wellcome's 'free' saucepan set may require you to spend HK$115,200 (SCMP; paywall)
To earn enough stamps for all seven saucepans on offer, Wellcome customers must spend up to HK$115,200. Time for honesty, blogger says
PUBLISHED : Sunday, 27 October, 2013, 5:30am
Simon Parry
Wellcome saucepans offers are not so free. Photo: SCMP
They're smart and shiny, stylish, glass-lidded, they look as if they'd add a measure of practical panache to any Hong Kong kitchen … and best of all, they're free.
There's a catch, of course: what shoppers might not realise about the German-branded set of seven "free" saucepans Wellcome is offering in its latest promotion is that they will need to spend up to HK$115,200 at the store to get their hands on the set.
Collecting enough "Happy Stamps" - handed out at the rate of one for every HK$60 spent - to get the smallest of the pans will cost a customer HK$10,800 at the checkout at regular times. The biggest will cost HK$22,800.
What's more, while they are advertised in fliers handed out to shoppers as being "German Woll Stainless Steel Kitchenware Collection" and carry the Woll brand, small print on the same leaflets reveals the saucepans are actually made in China, apparently under licence.
Customer Jo Dehaney highlighted the cost of the "free" saucepans in her Sai Kung Living blog after standing in a long queue at her local branch of Wellcome with time for a spot of mental arithmetic.
"I thought 'Oh good - free pans'," she wrote later on her blog. "I started thinking about which ones I would find most useful, but the queue was long, and I was bored, and before long I started calculating how much these fine German, made-in-China cookware pieces were really going to cost me. The results were staggering."
The smallest saucepan, a 16cm 1.5-litre casserole pot, which the promotional leaflets say has a "standard price" of HK$1,280, costs 210 Happy Stamps - equivalent to grocery spending of HK$12,600 at regular times.
The biggest, a 24cm 7.9-litre stockpot, which has a standard price of HK$1,980, costs 380 Happy Stamps - for which a shopper would have to spend HK$22,800.
To get the whole set of seven saucepans - valued by the Wellcome leaflets at HK$10,360 - a customer would need to collect 1,920 Happy Stamps which, at HK$60 per stamp, would cost HK$115,200 in shopping.
Double stamps are given out for spends of HK$350 or more at weekends and extra stamps are given for "bonus buy" items, so a canny customer who times their visits and always spends over HK$350 could bring down the total cost to HK$57,600 or less.
But Dehaney argued that it was at the very least cheeky of Wellcome to describe the items as free.
"They use words like 'happy' and 'free', but it's nonsense," she said. "The stamps aren't particularly happy and the saucepans most definitely aren't free.
"I think they should just try being honest with their customers instead of coming out with gimmicks like this. People are already realising that it's better to go to small shops. The prices in supermarkets in Hong Kong are just too high."
Wellcome, owned by the Dairy Farm Group, declined to give an interview to the Sunday Morning Post about the promotion and instead issued a statement in response to questions from the newspaper through the public relations firm GolinHarris. The statement said: "We are … committed in ensuring that customers have sufficient information to make informed decisions about their purchases by providing sufficient product information via multiple channels such as newspapers and electronic media."
Tuesday, 29 October 2013
1281 HKSAR Name of the Day
Yannie Soo Oi-yan (Dr), specialist in neurology, Prince of Wales Hospital, Hong Kong
see Yammie Lam 0925 HKSAR name of the Day
see Yammie Lam 0925 HKSAR name of the Day
About Novel HKSAR Names
Name Category: Creation; Substitution
Sunday, 27 October 2013
1280 HKSAR Name of the Day
Edison Tam Hin-yan, Sai Kung, Hong Kong (SCMP letters 9 November 2011)
see 0578 and 0375 HKSAR Names of the Day
see 0578 and 0375 HKSAR Names of the Day
About Novel HKSAR Names
Name Category: Rare
Friday, 25 October 2013
Wednesday, 23 October 2013
1278 HKSAR Name of the Day
Violet Chong, Sheung Wan, Hong Kong (SCMP letters 17 October 2011)
About Novel HKSAR Names
Name Category: Rare
Monday, 21 October 2013
1277 HKSAR Name of the Day
Pensi Lam, Tsuen Wan, Hong Kong (SCMP letters 11 October 2011)
Translocation! (swap around “i” and “s” and you get Penis ! How about a female novel name called Vagian ?)
Translocation! (swap around “i” and “s” and you get Penis ! How about a female novel name called Vagian ?)
About Novel HKSAR Names
Name Category: Creation
Saturday, 19 October 2013
1276 HKSAR Name of the Day
Dicken Ng, brother of missing schoolgirl Janet Ng Chun-yee apparently found dead on Victoria Peak (September 2013), Hong Kong
About Novel HKSAR Names
Name Category: Creation
Reference
Body found on Victoria Peak maybe missing schoolgirl (SCMP; paywall)
Monday, 09 September, 2013 [Updated: 7:58AM]
Danny Mok danny.mok@scmp.com
A body found yesterday near a walking trail at The Peak is believed to be that of missing schoolgirl Janet Ng Chun-yee, who disappeared last Sunday.
Janet Ng Chun-yeeThe discovery was made by firefighters at about 3pm on a hill off the Governor's Walk, which skirts around Victoria Peak Garden. Police believe the girl died a few days ago.
The rescue crew had been searching for 16-year-old Janet, who was last seen at a restaurant on Yee Wo Street in Causeway Bay on the afternoon of September 1.
She had been dining with friends from St Clare's Girls' School, the elite school she attended. She asked them to join her on a trip to The Peak but they declined, so she went alone.
Police said the height and clothing of the body matched the description of Janet. Nothing suspicious was found, nor was there a suicide note.
However, Janet had sent several instant messages via WhatsApp to her classmates on September 1 at about 2.30pm saying she was "on the way to hell", and "I will die today".
One of her classmates replied: "You want to kill yourself just because the school has been [painted] pink. You are really silly."
Another friend said: "You could just leave the school. Do you really need to die?"
Janet replied: "Forget it. You guys don't understand this."
Later, at about 6pm, Janet sent a photograph to her brother Dicken Ng, taken near Victoria Peak Garden, with the message: "Super beautiful Victoria Peak Garden".
That was the last message she sent before she apparently switched her phone off.
Janet's family reported her missing on September 2.
Police and the Civil Aid Service searched the area and other places where Janet went.
Lucia Lau Fung-yi, the principal of St Clare's, said last week that Janet was a lively and cheerful girl and there was no sign that she would try to commit suicide.
This article appeared in the South China Morning Post print edition as Body found on Peak maybe missing schoolgirl
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