Thursday, October 07, 1999

Meanwhile, back at the ranch. Bargains and Celebs?


Actually, it was more like "meanwhile, out at the other ranches," for while I was entertaining my guests on Wednesday, so were many other companies with their respective parties. I sent Anne Yoakam Ellsworth out to attended a few and her report follows:
 
From Anne Yoakam Ellsworth, VP, Children's Progress, Inc.
After leaving "Cocktails with Courtney" -- reluctantly as always -- I went to the JP Davis event: a cocktail buffet featuring the original Singapore Sling. For the recipe, visit contactsingapore.com.

Besides getting the recipe for the drink I was introduced to on the QE2 years ago, the most important website I discovered was bargainclothing.com. These days even the most traditional offices are allowing casual attire, and everyone I know needs to shop for new clothes. Bargainclothing does not carry closeouts. They pass their savings in overhead onto the consumer.

Now, onto more serious topics: what seemed to be cool, new, or at least improved were Filtering, Audio-visual, Foreign Language, E-commerce (flat rate) and the first Internet Mutual Fund.

Two players in filtering: surfCONTROL.com and Websense.com. Websense offers products to schools, and gave out cool beanie babies as party favors. Audio-visual: Logitech featured a little desktop still camera among their wares. Creative Labs has a new pocket-sized camera and audio recorder. Languageware.net provides the international translation solution.

Signio.com offers flat rate e-commerce payment. MetaMarkets.com was there, not as a vendor, but as a guest, and told me about their first Internet Mutual Fund. The number of kiosks at this event was somewhat overwhelming, but provided easy access to company representatives.

Next party--SAR in the renovated Altman building. An impressive setting for a "scene" of the black turtleneck crowd. I Visited with Scott Friedman of MS&L Global Technology, who served as IBM's mouthpiece. He mentioned that some "Hollywood types" hired by IBM were there, but I had no luck finding any "celebs."