10/99

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    THE ANTIQUES SOS
    e-JOURNAL

October 1999 Vol 1 Issue #8

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This publication is intended to provide you, the owner or
manager of an antique mall, craft mall or design center
with timely, usable information. We sincerely hope that it
serves this purpose well. Please let us know what articles or
columns would be of interest to you. We welcome qualified
subscribers and will be pleased to provide The Antiques SOS
(tm) e-Journal to them at no charge. Because the cost of
printing and mailing a publication are so great, regular delivery
of the Antiques SOS(tm) e-Journal will be by email only.

(C) Software Gallery, LLC    October 30, 1999

David P. Cunningham, Editor
email: editor@antiques-sos.com
http://www.antiques-sos.com
subscribe by sending an email to:
subscribe_ASOS@antiques-sos.com

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We value every subscriber and respect your privacy. If you
received this publication in error or wish to receive no further
issues, email remove_ASOS@antiques-sos.com. You will be
promptly removed from the list.    NOTE: Our subscriber list is
strictly private and is not made available to others for any reason.

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IN THIS ISSUE.....

1. Is Being Swamped by the Internet Inevitable ?- Part II
2. Marketing Tip -- Marketing to Your Best Customers- Part II
3. Sales Tip -- The Effective Use of Seminars
4. Mall Operations Tip -- Safety in Your Mall - Part II
5. Dave's Soapbox -- Privacy on the Internet
6. Internet Neighborhood
7. Nerd's Corner -- Images for Advertising & Sales
8. A Little Light on Windows -- "Cookies"

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TOPIC OF THE MONTH

Is Being Swamped by the Internet Inevitable ??

by
David P. Cunningham, P.E.
Copyright 1999

Is Being Swamped by the Internet Inevitable - Part II ??

In a Word -- NO !!

This is a continuation of this article, part one of which appeared
in the September 1999 issue of the Antiques SOS e-Journal.

You can remold and develop your "bricks and mortar" antique
or craft mall business to meet the competition of the internet.
And, you can win. As a fixed base "bricks and mortar" business
you have some really significant advantages -- if you exploit
them. Can you stick your head in the sand and hope that the
changes you see about you will simply blow away ? There is
no way that is that going to happen. First, the changes in the
marketplace are not only not going to go away; they are going
to accelerate. Second, if you stick your head in the sand
something else happens. Yes, your butt sticks up in the air and
someone will not hesitate to kick it.

Fixed base "bricks and mortar" antique and craft malls have the
following advantages:

* The customer can see, touch and inspect the merchandise
* The on-line auction business is rife with fraud. Your customer
has immediate recourse
* Listing items for sale takes a significant amount of time. Your
dealers have no need to list anything.
* Bid monitoring can take an inordinate amount of time. Your
dealers have no need to monitor bids.
* Packing and shipping sold merchandise can be expensive and
time consuming. You don't have this expense.
* Auction site fees and commissions can be substantial. You
can offer competitive commissions and fees.
* Returns are common. You can control returns through
examination and policy.
* Collecting for sold merchandise can be difficult. You collect
at the time of sale.
* You have the additional advantage that, if your dealers agree,
you can post items for sale to internet auctions for your dealers
and handle all the details on a fee basis.

These issues appear to present ample opportunity to create a
competitive advantages for a fixed base "bricks and mortar"
operation. They should help you generate increased sales and
improve dealer retention.

As you can imagine, we are very strong proponents of the
appropriate use of technology in antique, collectibles and craft
malls. Because of the nature of our business this has more to
do with supporting both the people side of the business and the
business side of the operations than with the technologies
themselves.

That is the technologies should be usable to make the
customer's experience with your business better and more
pleasant. It should improve the checkout process, make
receipts clearer and more easily understood, allow for quickly
identifying customers and provide them with any available
special benefits. Your dealers should benefit from your use of
technological solutions by providing them with prompt payment,
clear and easily understood settlement sheets and easily
accessible sales information.

You should benefit from the appropriate use of the technologies
you employ by reducing your operating costs, improving
customer service, increasing customer throughput, reducing the
time required to do settlements and serving your dealers better.

The days of "status quo" are gone forever. You will need to
improve your business to meet heightened competition from
"with it" malls and the internet or be eventually be driven out of
business. If your mall is paid for and you have no mortgage, if
you operate primarily with conscripted dealers for floor help,
and if you have the local market to yourself you may be able to
survive for some time.

However, there is simply no question that, in the long range,
neither the old "rent space and hope they come" business model
nor the pure internet business model will survive and prosper.
All truly successful mall business operations will operate based
upon a hybrid business model which incorporates other concepts
and lies somewhere in between. One of our goals is to help you
achieve your goal to build a vibrantly successful business.
We've only just begun.

We can be very certain of several things:

* It won't be your Father's antique or craft mall
* Change will come quickly - direct it to your advantage
* The status quo is gone forever and will not return
* The "Web" changes everything (more this in future articles)
* Technology will not, in and of itself, save you. Only when
applied to business problems in the context of fundamentally
correct frameworks will technology help you. Incorrectly
applied, technology will only make things worse more quickly.
* Antique and craft malls are fundamentally people oriented
businesses -- to a substantial degree greater than ordinary
businesses. Ignore that fact at your peril.
* You have at least two customer groups -- your dealers and
the through the door customers
* The nature of our business requires that it have a human face.
All technology must be oriented toward supporting that
concept and cannot be "in your face".

Copyright Notice: Copyright 1999 David P. Cunningham, P.E.
This article is available upon request by from our web site
http://www.antiques-sos.com by downloading a copy. Or,
we'll email a copy to you upon request.

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MARKETING TIP
(A brief tip for marketing your mall)

Marketing to Your Best Customers - Part II

You should, with skill and determination, be able to establish a
very lucrative high end business much of which takes place in
privacy. Consignment items, in particular, can be sold to top
level "best" customers quietly and with little or no fanfare.
Keep in mind that your customers may not dislike the actual
antiques shopping process but they absolutely do dislike the
associated hassle. Therefore, make dealing with you and your
business as hassle free as possible.

The way to obtain your "best" customer's current and future
business is to work with them one on one, as an individual
while providing other services to select groups of them. One
of the major things your business will depend upon is
information. That is, information you have about your
customer and information have about your merchandise, which
you present to your customer.

When looking for new "best" customers, ask your existing "best"
customers for referrals. Ask for referrals in categories which do
not compete with the customer's interests or which exist at a
different level of sophistication. It certainly never hurts to be
filling up the ranks of your "best" and "sorta best" customers list
with promising candidates.

Never, ever, surrender control of your relationships with your
own "best" customers to anyone else. Never sell or rent your
customer list to others. It will infuriate your "best" customers
causing you great risk of loosing them and it will expose them
to your competition. Talk about handing the burglar the keys
to the safe !! Never provide any information about your
relationship with your "best" customers to anyone for the same
reasons. Any contact with your "best" customers must appear
to have come from you so you remain uppermost in the mind.

Create a privacy policy and very strictly adhere to it. When
you ask for, receive or otherwise obtain information about or
concerning your "best" customers tell them exactly how the
information will be used. Such information should be held in
strict confidence, never provided to anyone else for any reason
and destroyed when it is no longer needed for legitimate
business purposes.

Your goal is to create a long term customer. Now that you have
considered how you are going to do this, its time to implement
your plan. The process is a step by step process and will not
happen over night.

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SALES TIP
(A brief tip on selling more to customers --local
and remote and increasing revenue)

The Effective Use of Seminars

Work within the personality you have established for your mall.
If your mall's orientation is toward "smalls" avoid seminars on
furniture. If your mall's orientation is toward fine porcelains
then you certainly don't want to sponsor seminars concerning
rough antiques. You get the picture, I'm sure.

If you select your seminar provider carefully and he or she is
knowledgeable and worth listening to be prepared to pay a
reasonable fee for the services provided. You certainly don't
want to present someone who doesn't reflect well upon the
quality of your mall.

Offer attendance at your seminar to your best and potential best
qualified customers. We've previously talked about qualified
customers. Qualified customers are those customers who
(a) have an interest in what you are selling (b) know enough
about what you are selling to make a decision to buy and
(c) have the financial resources to purchase what you are
offering.

Seminars are a great way to promote both an interest in what
you are selling and develop the knowledge required to make a
decision to buy. And, your knowledge about the financial
resources of those you have invited is available from many
sources including your customer history records.

Plan a series of related seminars. The potential subjects are
virtually limitless. Choose the general topic based upon your
mall's personality, the availability of qualified speakers and
presenters and the potential attendees' interests. Three
seminars in the series, spaced approximately one month apart,
is just about right. Ideally, the series should end just prior to a
major buying season. Let your dealers know about the seminar
series so they can suggest customers to invite and can stock
appropriate merchandise.

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MALL OPERATIONS TIP
(A brief tip about improving antique
mall operations)

Safety in your mall - Part II

Although somewhat less immediate in priority, many of the
remaining hazards do require prompt and decisive attention.
The difference is that these are things you can do yourself or
have done by a local contractor. Physical hazards such as loose
rugs and carpets, low overheads, poor quality ladders, snow
removal issues, loading docks, elevators, poorly marked exits,
poorly lighted stair ways and aisles and edged weapons are
rather obvious upon astute observation. All can be corrected
or marked in accordance with applicable regulations.

Some electrical hazards can be observed by a competent
observer. Others such as circuit overloads, poor interior wiring
and overloaded distribution boxes require the assistance of a
highly competent electrician. Those easily observed and
correctable electrical hazards include, dealer use of zip cords
and overloaded extension cords, high wattage lamps placed
near combustible materials or used in non compliant fixtures,
or the use of halogen lamps in any dealer supplied fixtures
within several feet of combustible materials.

Make sure that you have enough portable fire extinguishers of
the correct type for your mall and that your fuel fired heating
system is in tip top shape. Similarly, check all of your smoke
detectors and CO monitors, that the batteries are fresh and that
they are in optimal operating condition.

Firearms and firearm safety are a special case. In addition to
presenting a very difficult series of regulatory issues, firearms
can present special dangers and liabilities. If you decide to
permit firearms regulated under current national, state or local
law to be sold in your mall, you have a special obligation to
protect yourself, your dealers and the public. Consult YOUR
ATTORNEY for guidance. By permitting firearms to be sold
you may be incurring liabilities which may prove to be
unacceptable to you. All modern firearms and antique firearms
using cartridges must be checked for the presence of
ammunition and verified as being unloaded. All antique firearms,
as defined by applicable regulation, must be checked to verify
the absence of powder charges and balls in the barrel and the
absence of a fireable cap or powder in the pan. Charges and
balls in barrels of muzzle loading weapons are a
frequently found hazard and can present a very serious threat to
shooters and by standers.

Once you have established you safety program and carried it
out, it is singularly important to follow up and make sure that
it is enforced. Make sure that your dealer contact containg
your rules and that they are enforced. Again, TALK TO
YOUR ATTORNEY. It is far cheaper now than later. DO
NOT allow sloppy dealer housekeeping !! By doing so YOU
are allowing them to put you into a very vulnerable and almost
indefensible legal position.

Let the experts help you with your safety program. Talk to
your insurer ! They may be able to assist you with your loss
prevention issues. Also consider talking to your local fire
department. They also may be able to assist you. There is
usually plenty of good competent help available; the challenge
is finding and using it.

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DAVE'S SOAPBOX
by David P. Cunningham

Privacy on the Internet

We live in a day and age where privacy is hard to come by.
This is especially true on the internet where we are subjected to
ever increasing scrutiny. Vast amounts of data about us, our
interests and our buying habits are collected by marketers and
their minions.

Very unfortunately, few of us have even begun to realize how
much our lives have been laid open to scrutiny. Protecting
ourselves from invasive prying is becoming increasingly more
difficult. As wonderful and full of promise as it is, the internet
holds the prospect of introducing and facilitating even further
intrusions into our privacy. Some of us, at least, view privacy
as an inalienable right. Others couldn't care less. If you are in
the latter camp, go ahead and read something else. However, I
care a great deal about my privacy and have very strong
opinions about maintaining it.

All to willingly we have seceded our privacy to "Big Brother"
and exceedingly nosy corporations. Sometimes we have done
this knowingly and sometimes not. Frequently, we have traded
our privacy for the false and dubious promise of "security" and
sometimes for convenience. In any case, our collective loss of
privacy is severely corrosive to our hard won and virtually
priceless freedom which we so often take for granted.

For example our own government wants the authority to break
into your home and bug your computer. If you think I'm
kidding, read the recently introduced Cyberspace Electronic
Security Act. The goal of CESA is to allow law enforcers to
capture encryption keys and passwords so they can read your
text files if they choose to. This strikes directly at the Bill of
Rights, a cherished and hard won component of our constitution.

Behold the modernized Trojan Horse ! Free cursor software
which changes the cursor into cartoon characters is produced
and distributed by Comet Software. But there's more to it than
that !! Much more !! Each user is seripticiously assigned a
unique identifying serial number which is used to track who is
using the software and what sites they visit. Neat isn't it ?

Then there is Microsoft which recently admitted that
Windows 98 collects information about the user's PC during
the registration process and does so without seeking our
permission. And, there's AOL which loudly promoted its
privacy policy last year and then, suddenly came up with an
"Oh ! By the way !!". The "Oh ! By the way" is we're going
to open up all the private information you gave us and we've
collected unless you go through the whole privacy process
again. Commercial greed wins again !

And so it goes ! Be aware, be cautious about what information
you transmit and act as though everything you do on the
internet is or will soon be public information. It may well be.
We'll be talking more in future articles about these and related
issues and how to minimize your exposure.

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THE STUFF THAT PAYS THE RENT

Antiques SOS (tm), Antiques SOS Lite (tm) and Antiques SOS
Basic (tm) are Software Galley, LLC software products which
serve the Antique Mall trade. Our products are installed in 230
antique malls in 39 states and Canada. Antiques SOS (tm) was
first installed in 1987 and Antiques SOS Lite (tm) was introduced
in 1998 to satisfy a need for computer software for smaller malls.
Antiques SOS Basic (tm) was introduced in 1999 and has been
very well received. All products are fully Year 2000/Y2K
compliant. Please refer to complete information which has been
posted on our Antiques SOS (tm) web site
-- http://www.antiques-sos.com

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INTERNET NEIGHBORHOOD

Cool web sites

http://www.cdt.org

the web site of the The Center of Democracy and Technology
is a superb source for information about civil liberties and
privacy. CDT monitors government actions, legislation and
encryption regulations. Additionally, the organization provides
means to remove your name and associated information from
profiling, marketing and research databases.

http://www.epic.org

the web site of the Electronic Privacy Information Center is an
excellent source of information about the issues surrounding
electronic privacy. News, reports, court decisions, resources
and other significant information is available.

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NERD'S CORNER
(A light approach for non-techies
concerning need to know issues)

Images for Advertising and Sales

Most people have a very strong visual orientation. That is they
respond to images as opposed to written or spoken words.
Virtually all magazines and TV advertising is based upon this
premise, as is in store merchandising. It is also well known that
tasteful merchandise displays, which suggest an in home
visualization or enjoyment to a customer, significantly enhance
sales.

We can't all be department store window dressers, advertising
photographers or shelter magazine creative directors. But, then
again, we don't have to be. Reasonably good images sent to
your "wants" lists, prepared for print advertising on newsprint,
or used for on line auctions can work wonders. The amount
of information conveyed almost instantaneously by a reasonably
good image of an object is phenomenal. Words, no matter how
well crafted, can only supplement an image and never replace it.
This is especially true with objects which have complex forms,
colors or designs.

Today, as never before, such images are increasingly easy to
create, manipulate and work with. The tools available to us are
extraordinarily complex from a technological standpoint but
very user friendly. The images and information generated can
be transmitted around the world at the speed of light to a
waiting customer.

There are a number of ways to successfully create, manipulate
and work with images. The first step is to create the original
image of the object. This can be done by either using an optical
film based camera or a filmless CCD based digital camera.
CCD is shorthand for charge coupled device, a solid state
imaging device which senses the light reflected from, or
generated by a scene and converts it to electrical digital impulses.

The optical film based camera uses a lens to focus the light
arriving at the lens onto a planar film which can generate either
positive or negative images depending upon the type of film
used. That is, after development, you either end up with a
print of the image or a slide. The digital camera produces a
digital image which consists of elements called pixels, the
density of which is determined by the number of light sensitive
junctions in the CCD installed in the camera. This digital image
can be printed, stored, manipulated or transmitted.

The quality of the resulting image is determined by the CCD,
the quality of the camera lens and several other factors,
including the skill of the photographer. There is, however, an
art to taking good pictures no matter what device you use.
Lighting, equipment, backgrounds, composition and technique
all enter the process. Fortunately, for our purposes, a reasonably
good approach, including using a good digital camera, will suffice.

The optical film based process will almost always result in an
image which is superior in quality than that produced by a digital
camera. Clearly, if the desired end result is a high quality image
which can be used by and of itself, or printed as a poster, or
used in a brochure, the optical film based camera is the choice
to make. You can still use these images for other purposes
through the use of various available technologies.

If high quality digital images are required, the prints which
result from the optical film based process can be scanned by
using a scanner of appropriate quality to convert the prints to
digital format. Or, if the quality of the digital images is a
secondary issue, many photo shops, including Wal-Mart and
Kmart will produce a floppy disk of your images, in
conjunction with developing and printing them, for minimal
extra cost. You can also have a high quality CD ROM made
from your optical film based prints. Approximately 100 prints
will fit on a CD ROM produced by Kodak as a consumer
service. These images are in digital format and can be
manipulated and worked with just as any other digital image.

Obviously, generating an image in digital format eliminates the
need for film, developing, printing and scanning. A high quality
digital camera, capable of producing high quality images, can
produce very satisfactory results. These images, too, can be
manipulated and worked with to meet your requirements.

Once images are in digital format, they can be manipulated
using appropriate software. Undesirable effects can be edited
out, minor imperfections corrected, multiple images combined,
special effects created and images prepared for any particular
purpose. The resulting product images can be saved in digital
format on electronic media. Recognize too, that if there is no
need to edit the digital images they can be used as is.

The digital images can be used for whatever purpose they are
intended. That is, they can be used as illustrations on a web
site, for reference, in print ads or for any other purpose. We
will discuss the various technologies used in creating images in
greater detail in future articles.

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A LITTLE LIGHT ON WINDOWS

Cookies

When we talk about "cookies" we are not, unfortunately talking
about edible baked delicacies. No, we are talking about those
small data packets which are placed upon our hard drives.
Some "cookies" are placed for legitimate reasons and others are
placed by nosy web site owners who want to know more about
us and our web use habits.

Although we don't particularly like them, most "cookies" are
reasonably benign and serve useful purposes. Amazon.com
for example, uses "cookies" to keep account information up to
date and manage your site preferences. Some "cookies"
however, blab web use information to third party sites such as
Double Click and Net Gravity, where marketing information is
collected, assembled, analyzed and sold. Other "cookies"
which have sinister purposes have begun to appear and can be
used for destructive purposes.

Some web sites will not allow access unless you permit
"cookies" to be placed. Generally , we avoid the use of theses
sites. However, if the content is of sufficient interest we allow
placement of the "cookies" and simply delete them when we
have finished.

We browse the web with three different browsers; Internet
Explorer 5.1, Netscape 4.61 and Opera 5.0. Each is set to
handle "cookies" in a different way. Opera 5.0, a Norwegian
product, is our browser of choice because it is small, fast and
secure. It is set to reject all "cookies". Our Netscape browser
is set to allow "cookies" which are returned to the originating
site only. Internet Explorer is rigged for operation in situations
where neither Opera 5.0 nor Netscape 4.61 will function properly.

What's not to like about "cookies" ?? First, "cookies" present
privacy issues. Second, "cookies" can consume large amounts
of hard disk space. Third, "cookies" can be part of a
destructive scheme which can seriously affect your computer.
The "cookies" on your hard drive can speak volumes about
your web use habits and broadcast that information to the world.

Further, we don't accept the premise that we owe anyone the
right to invade the hard drive capacity we paid for and maintain.
Its one thing when we know and trust the owner of a web site
sufficiently well to provide them with information of a private
nature. Its another to have a web site operator help them
selves to information which they will use in ways unknown to
me -- and for which I have not given permission.

All major browsers can be configured to reject, accept or
require your approval to accept "cookies". A word of warning !
Requiring acceptance of cookies can make for very tedious
browsing. At Software Gallery, LLC we do not place
"cookies" on any visitors hard drive. In any case we would
never do so without explicit permission. We believe that to do
otherwise is unethical and a violation of your privacy rights.

Our Clean Sweep software is set to allow us to immediately
remove all "cookies" and all internet cache files after our web
session. We like and highly recommend Clean Sweep for this
and other reasons such as removing downloads and installed
programs. "Cookie" monitoring and control software is
available from sites such as http://www.zdnet.com. Some of
the more highly recommended programs for this purpose are
Cookie Pal 1.5 and Cookie Crusher 2.5.

A new, highly effective, product, Freedom, for completely
anonymous web use has been announced by Zero Knowledge,
a Canadian company. Apparently, there is no effective way to
trace users of this product, thus guaranteeing anonymity.
We'll learn more about Freedom and pass along the
information in a future edition.

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Dave Cunningham is one of the principals of Software Gallery,
LLC the developer and owner of Antiques SOS (tm) and
Antiques SOS Lite (tm). He specializes in technical issues
which affect the Software Gallery client base. Dave's special
interests are Year 2000/Y2K issues; e-commerce and its
appropriate use; and time saving aspects of technology. He has
accumulated an assortment of wallpaper from a number of fine
institutions of higher learning as well as The University of Life.
The foregoing qualifies him to issue profound mutterings,
occasionally stumble into solutions to user problems and, when
necessary, cook dinner.

Sue Cunningham is also one of the principals of Software
Gallery, LLC. She's been writing computer software
professionally since 1964 and has been an antiques dealer since
1967. She's a self proclaimed "nerd" who even had "FOXPRO"
on her Pennsylvania license plate.

Software Gallery, LLC is a business venture of The
Cunninghams. Long active in the antiques world as dealers and
in software development, Sue and Dave Cunningham live and
work in Laramie, Wyoming after having been located in
Denver, Pennsylvania for many years.

The Antiques SOS (tm) product line has its own web site at
http://www.antiques-sos.com. More information about
Software Gallery, LLC and its products can be found at
http://www.softwaregallery.com.

To subscribe to The Antiques SOS eJournal email to:
subscribe_ASOS@antiques-sos.com

To unsubscribe email to: remove_ASOS@antiques-sos.com

_________________________________________

(C) 1999 Software Gallery, LLC

We encourage you to forward a copy of this issue (w/ all
copyright notices intact) to as many antique, craft or design
mall owners or managers as you wish. This information may
not be altered, transmitted or transferred; electronically or
otherwise for any other purpose without written permission
from Software Gallery, LLC. All rights reserved.

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