Electricity Costs Can Cripple Your Business!

By Gavin J. King

Saving money on essential overheads such as energy has always been an important issue for business, no more so than now! The current climate has created an environment where customers are coming to the market to review their business electricity and gas costs. When considering your company's position with its current supplier there is some important questions that have to be asked. Are we getting the best possible rates for our business electricity and business gas or could we do better? Is there a single contract we could modify that will help us? Do we have to deal direct or can we find an intermediary who can negotiate better?

The first important step is to go directly to your current provider and simply request a reduction in charges. Many utility companies will tell you that you can get a certain rate but remember it does not mean anything until you can sign it on paper. Finally, you want to be aware of the length of contract and other important terms before signing.

As always, you should be aware of your own contractual limitations in terms of time frames. What good does that do? Do everything you can to avoid having your present provider rolling your into a new contract unaware. An alarming amount of commercial energy providers will simply start you on your next contract with them and point to your permission with the payment they received!

There are many invaluable resources online including websites which will provide a free estimate for your business. Sometimes larger companies will bill themselves as one of their subsidiaries so do not fall for that ploy. If you can avoid falling for that one, then you stand a great chance to reduce your business energy costs.

These companies are often paid a fee or commission by the major corporations but because they manage so many smaller independent businesses they are able to negotiate excellent rates without passing any additional costs onto you the consumer. This helps the smaller providers out by allowing them to gather commissions and the larger ones benefit from the reduced marketing costs.

Some of these companies have tailored themselves as consumer champions of the business energy market, believing that everyone should be entitled to clear, trustworthy and impartial advice about their business energy bills. A solid commercial energy provider should also have an energetic and cooperative service department that quickly answers all of your questions and work hard for you when you need them.

About the Author:

The author enjoys writing articles on texas electricity provider & electricity providers chicago. Click on the links above for more info! This and other unique content '' articles are available with free reprint rights.

Quick Tips For Choosing Your Table Lamps

By Danny Ricks

Table lamps are almost seen any corner in both home and office yet it is often taken for granted for varied reasons. People should have a much passionate perspective for this kind of lighting fixture. This is simply because of the fact that these lamps are not just mere lighting fixtures but also magical decorative pieces able to transform a simple room to an elegant place for everyone to adore. It is therefore necessary to choose only the best of this kind of lamps for both home and office.

Despite being neglected for many varied reasons, these kinds of lamps which now come in many varied designs and styles. These lighting fixtures are often neglected for some reason. Most often it is only acknowledge when the need arise or never at all. But this should never be the case.

Table lamps also serve as perfect decorative stuff other that the lighting a particular area in the room. Can you imagine your study table without this kind of lamp? These lamps may be taken for granted most of the time but in its real sense these lamps on your table, be it in your bedroom or in your office, sure do have a lot of thing to do other than giving off that needed illumination.

Without this little lamp those places will be as dull as you can imagine. Those places around the house become will only become more dramatic or stylish if there stood a lamp that would perfectly complement with the other decors around it. You may also try to see not having it on the side table in your bedroom or even in the living room.

If you wish to add some drama to certain areas in the house and office, different designs and styles of these lamps will surely be of great help. There are now many designs to choose from. You will never run out of good ideas in trying to enhance your interior decors with these kinds of lighting fixture.

You only need to widen your horizon as you also broaden your imagination in trying to create a fantastic area in your home and office using these kinds of lamps. Before you will actually be able to materialize a particular concept, you have to take some essential things in consideration when choosing to have the perfect table lamps you need to have. The design and the kind of material for which it is being made is just among the many you need to look into.

Before having to purchase these lamps try to check the other decorative pieces in certain area where you shall place these lamps. Make sure the design as well as the material of which it is made should properly complement with the other decorative stuffs in that place as well as the ambiance of the whole area you wish to come up with. It should all means be in perfect harmony so to speak.

Aside from having to consider the design and style of these lamps you should also take a close look at its price. You do not need to go beyond your budget just to ensure having the right design and style of these lamps to transform a simple room into a place of elegance for everyone to behold. It is therefore advised that you need to have the elegant yet inexpensive pieces of table lamps.

About the Author:

Lamps are a unique type of lighting that you can add to the furnishings of your home. Its very intricate design usually adds glamour and elegance to the ambiance of one's home. Or you can try tiffany lamps.

Social And Eco Gifts Showing You Are Different

By Betty Smyth

It takes a slightly bit more energy and time but it's worth it to give eco-friendly or social corporate gifts instead of the popular run-of-the-mill-drain-the-environment corporate gifts that are the commercial gift fodder for numerous companies.

When you're rewarding hardworking employees and respected clients with environmentally friendly or socially friendly corporate gifts, you are also encouraging a green lifestyle that shows your business cares about our earth and the less advantaged people so more will naturally treasure the gift.

Of course the best type of eco gift is one where you do not in fact give anything! There are umpteen such gift options now available such as Buy1GIVE1, Kiva and Change The Present.

When you use eco-friendly corporate gifts it is always important to consider your receiver. You'll want to choose a gift that represents the gratitude you feel. Whether its for saying thank you for staying in the office late to meet tight deadlines or running that extra mile to close a sales deal, your team members dedicated their valuable time to the improve your business. So the extra effort needed to create a special eco-gift or social gift is fitting considering the reason why you want to give the gift in the first place.

More and more customers and employees value something that gives twice. They experience the greatest gift in knowing that a child, the environment, a school or other impressive causes have benefited because of them.

Several years ago no one would have thought that giving to a charity cause in the name of one of your customers or staff would be considered a meaningful gift. Well thankfully times have changed! Customers are seeking beyond material commodities these days and are wanting for new meaning in their work and life. Eco and Social gifts can be amazing presents.

Change the Present is a charity organisation that allows you to transform our world while giving to others. Just Google them to find out more.

Buy1GIVE1 is a special Singapore based organization that allows you as a business to give every time you sell something. This sensational concept of what they call transaction based giving is SO powerful when you know that you can share the joy of giving with your customers and staff - everyone can be involved. Again Google them to find them under Buy1GIVE1 or B1G1.

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Visit us for conventional Corporate Gifts but if you want an another socially centered gift visit Buy1GIVE1. Get a totally unique version of this article from our article submission service

Wedding Supplies: For Making The Special Day Memorable

By Danny Ricks

As soon as a wedding is decided; the plans to buy different things are also made. Many purchases are there which are needed to be done. And one of the most important is wedding supplies. People usually start researching for the best wedding supplies they can get. So it is very important to keep in mind some things while choosing wedding supplies like gown color, theme party in wedding and numerous things that are needed before and after the wedding.

It is the dream of all the people in this world to make their wedding day a special and memorable one. It should not only be memorable for bride and groom but also for the guests attending the wedding. So it is their responsibility to finalize all the things that are to be used for wedding. But do not think that they have to take rounds of market regularly to buy the things. They just have to finalize the things that are purchased and say yes and no on it. Their role is to just pass the things of fail it.

But bride and groom have to take the major responsibility to purchase gifts for some special guests. They choose a special gift for their friends and family and the flower girl and the ring bearer. These entire things are done by both bride and groom for getting a perfect one.

Wedding supplies can also be bought by consulting the wedding planner. These wedding planners help both bride and groom to choose gifts for their guests and their special friends. They understand the taste of bride and groom and then offer them different choices from which they can decide. You can also take the help of wedding boutiques. These boutiques are famous for designing wedding dresses for bride and groom but now a days they have started a new business of selling other wedding supplies. It is not available in all the wedding boutiques but in selected one.

Wedding supplies are also available on internet and also on very low cost. Low cost does not mean that the quality is also low. But there are discounts available on internet. All you have to do is just search for these sites on Google and you will get a pool of wedding supplies. Also you do not have to roam around in busy markets to search for some products. You can get everything on your door steps.

It is advised that you check some things while shopping for a wedding day. First of all what most people forget is the shipping and handling charges of the items that are purchased. Make sure that you add it as it can be a black spot on your planned budget.

Also confirm in written about the deadlines of the supplies. These supplies include decoration items, reception items and many other supplies. Confirm all the delivery dates. All these choices are made by bride and groom collectively.

All the supplies are first checked by the bride and groom and then confirmed or final placement. All things are planned with each other so that there is no diversion in the planned budget. This is the perfect way to plan a perfect wedding.

About the Author:

Weddings are such joyous occasion that every bride and groom will prepare its necessary details. One aspect which they will include is personalized matchbooks that will be useful for the wedding. You can check out online stores for these items depending on your wedding theme. Or you can try groomsmen gifts.

Corporate Gifts Grow Business

By Alexander Smith

Clients-company associations play a decisive role in defining the progress of any company. Companies, which can impress, satisfy and retain their customer base will always be able to survive the rough times. Corporate gifts are an excellent way of maintaining good relationship with your clients. They are an inexpensive way of keeping your client happy, and hence they are appropriate for bad economic times also.

The fate of any business is controlled by the power to retain and build great relationships with their customers as well as attract new clients. In bumpy economic times you need the business from your clients more than ever. You may not be resourceful to secure new business easily but if you have taken care of your customers in the past they will stick with you even when times are tough. To ensure that your clients always know that you treasure them giving them appropriate gifts will invariably plant great seeds for the future. Giving is always the first step to receiving and not the other way around

A corporate gift should be wisely chosen keeping the receiver in mind, as in case the gift does not appeal to the receiver, the purpose of giving a gift would be defeated. Corporate gifts could be distributed for the promotion of a new product or service launch or given on festive occasions such as New Year to show clients recognition and effort to maintain a lasting relationship.

The gifts could vary from coffee mugs, showpieces to even a bottle of exquisite wine. The company's logo may be imprinted on the product to remind the customer of it the moment he or she uses the item.

The gifts must be of good quality or else the strategy will backfire. A substandard gift will only be an exercise in futility as it won't be able to convey the gratitude that the company wants to communicate to its clients. In times like these when companies are facing economic problems and are looking out for cost effective solutions, it is better to avoid making a poor impression on your clients.

Keeping the ongoing economic situation in mind, corporate gifts have proved themselves to be a dependable marketing tool. If used intelligently, they can enable a business keep customer relationships alive through the turmoil of recession.

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Discover more about a leading Corporate Gift Printing Specialist Company and see their unique collections of Corporate Gifts items. This and other unique content '' articles are available with free reprint rights.

A Pen As A Corporate Gift

By Cherry Soto

Pens are small & fairly cheap. In respect to using them as gifts, they are well utilized. They don't get thrown until they have been fully used. Depending on usage, they usually have a life span of one or two months.. Because of this versatility they are a perfect gift.

Pen manufacturers would agree that the most common ink colour these days is black ballpoint. For advertising exposure purposes, the black ballpoint pen has the best dollar for dollar advertising and market exposure value. Your clients can be constantly reminded of your company every day when you add your branding or unique company features to the pen.

Black ballpoint pens are the most preferred amongst sales people and office workers but blue is next in line in popularity. If you are a party-hire company or childrens wear business you may consider some more interesting colors such as pink or orange but you may lose out a little on usability. After all you are giving a very practical gift so it may be better to stick with blue of black ink.

Imagination is the only limit when it comes to the outside appearance of a pen. As long as the pen is still usable practically as a pen, you would still achieve your exposure goals regardless of its appearance.

On the pen's body, you should first focus on company information you want to add, before considering the design of the body next. If you do not do this you may end up choosing a physical design that you cannot add the information you want which would defeat the original purpose.

Quality looking pens will be used by more people than cheap looking ones, so do not go too cheap when it comes to the body of the pen. Don't use cheap pen interiors either. A lot of us has thrown away a pen in frustration because a pen does not work when we tried using it. If a person gets this experience from your pens, they can associate it easily with your company. They will end with a bad impression of your brand.

Good corporate gift suppliers should be able to not only purchase the pens you want in the bulks you need, but also be able to consult you on some of the pen body design and quality aspects that we have covered.

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Discover how Pen can raise your marketing today. See us to get some great Corporate Giftideas. Get a totally unique version of this article from our article submission service

Buyer Beware: Green Energy

By Robert Holdsworth

Buyer Beware - Using Power Factor Correction and Transient Voltage Surge Suppression to Reduce Energy Costs.

Today's energy conscious climate has motivated many to do what they can to become more efficient and conserve energy and money. Unfortunately this same climate has prompted others to take advantage of unsuspecting consumers' wishes to save energy and reduce expenses.

Companies that tout power factor improvement (kVAR correction) and transient voltage suppression are a good example of this bad trend. Lately we are seeing more and more of these companies cropping up and feel it is time to set the record straight.

First, transient voltage surge suppression (TVSS) plays a valuable role in improving power quality to protect sensitive equipment inside a facility. However, TVSS does not save energy. TVSS's are only active a tiny fraction of a second to protect against voltage surges which only last for less than a millisecond. To actually reduce energy consumption the TVSS would need to actually cut power consumption for an extended period of time which is not what they are designed to do. Again, TVSS is important to protect sensitive electrical equipment but buyers should avoid vendors promising, or even guaranteeing, that they will reduce energy consumption.

Now what about vendors who claim that improving power factor will save 15% or 20% or 30% of energy consumption and corresponding cost? This one is a little trickier.

For residential applications, power factor does nothing to save energy because the typical home already has an average power factor of about 0.97 which is almost the perfect power factor of 1 or unity. In addition, the device (called a capacitor) is placed at the main circuit breaker. According to IEEE 5.5.3.3 capacitors must be situated at or near the respective inductive loads to reduce power system losses by reducing heat and distribution losses known as I2R losses.

So what about commercial and industrial facilities using power factor correction to reduce energy costs? It is perfectly appropriate for a company that is incurring penalties or a kVA billing structure from the utility company to improve the facility's overall power factor by employing a capacitor bank at the main service entrance or individual capacitors at or near the respective motor loads. Doing so will eliminate the power factor penalties and/or reduce the kVA demand charges on the utility bill which can save significant money and provide a significant ROI on the investment.

But what about power factor correction reducing kWh consumption? IEEE also tells us that I2R losses only account for 2 to 5% of the total load in a facility. Simple math tells us that it would be against the laws of physics to get the 15% to 30% energy reduction claimed by some vendors. Think about it. Even if your facility had 5% distribution losses and you could correct 100% of the problem via power factor correction at every load (which can't be done) you would still only save 5% at the most. No where near the claims of some capacitor vendors and manufacturers.

All that said, power factor correction when done properly will eliminate utility penalties and kVA demand charges, improve facility power quality, increase electrical system capacity, and save a little energy when applied to the appropriate motor loads.

So make an investment in transient voltage surge suppression and power factor correction when appropriate and necessary. But caveat emptor!

About the Author:

Save Money On Your Company's Energy Bill, visit Energy Edge Technologies site for strategies on saving a tremendous amount of capital on your Corporate Energy Bill or call 888-729-5722 Ext. 100.

Gifts Are Great - Market Your Business The Easy Way

By Don Wong

While personal gift-giving to those close to you is an age old practice, not many are aware of the tradition of offering corporate gifts. The rising business practice of giving special gifts to clients is not as well known to people as the gifts given to loved ones. Business gifts are very extraordinary in that they grow customer and brand loyalty often for a very small price. After all everyone loves to receive a gift.

Corporate gifts are normally costly items and they do not carry any company logo or brand name, as they are not meant for marketing or promotion. However, at times corporations also give employees and prospective customers promotional items such as pen drives, pens, key-chains and stationery items that are marked with the business logo.

While giving a corporate gift, it is critical to keep in mind the interests of the individual to whom the gift is being given, and to tailor it accordingly. Firms typically like to present personalised and high worth gifts to their key customers, but to their workforce they normally distribute a moderately expensive, but useful gift.

The effect of the corporate gift on the rapport with a client or an employee depends on how valuable the person believes the gift to be. Before giving a corporate gift, you should consult with your legal department regarding any constraints that may have been imposed by law on this act.

Planning for corporate gifts involves figuring out the expenditure, arriving at the number of items, and finding out good deals available in the market for a mass purchase. When it come to purchasing gifts for important customers, preparation may not be critical, but for gifts to be given to employees it is necessary. It is important to make sure that there are sufficient gifts to express your thankfulness to every deserving employee.

To sum it up, giving corporate gifts is an intelligent business practice, that will help you develop a closer and healthier association with both your employees and your clients. To sum up, the pass time of gifting gifts to your team members and clients is a great option for building and growing stronger relationships. Everyone always loves a gift.

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Learn how Corporate Gifts can enhance your marketing now. Visit us to have some essential Corporate Giftideas.