Down-Under Brand UGG on Top

Score for Deckers Outdoor, US company that’s a brand maker, not a shoemaker Move over electronic devices – Uggs was the No. 1 product searched for online on Thanksgiving and Black Friday, according to Experian Marketing Services (as reported here in the Wall Street...

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Sandy Throttles Grey Goose

NJ is cut off from vodka as post-hurricane gasoline shortages persist in NY While New Jersey has ended the rationing of gasoline, in short supply after Hurricane Sandy closed the Port of New York-New Jersey, New York City drivers are still observing an even-odd gas...

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Sales Swell

Coconut water meets US market’s growing thirst for natural, healthy drinks In the US market for nonalcoholic beverages, sales of sugary, fizzy soft drinks  are flat, while consumption of “wellness beverages” is up sharply. (The segment is getting its own trade show,...

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October’s Midknights

Walmart promo caps 13th season of US imports of South African summer citrus Walmart, a top US importer of South African citrus, invited shoppers at 32 stores to enjoy a “Taste of South Africa” with samples of oranges from the world’s second-ranked citrus exporter...

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In Heaven There Is No Beer

That’s why we drink it here – including 27 million barrels of imported brew What better time than October to join in singing the praises of beer? If you do hoist a glass, odds are that you’ll be drinking an import. Last year, according to a new report from Technomic,...

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Cautionary Tale

Customs broker charged with using “in-bond” cover to avoid import duties by Peter Quinter, guest columnist In a criminal complaint unsealed on July 25, 2012, the US Attorney's Office for the Southern District of California in San Diego announced that it had charged...

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No Substitute for Sit-ups

Ab Circle Pro exerciser traded on but didn’t deliver infomercial promises Companies that marketed the Ab Circle Pro in 2009-10 with TV infomercial claims that three minutes on the abdominal exerciser would yield results equivalent to 100 sit-ups have settled a...

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Sweet Slice of Success

US consumers acquire a taste for imported mangoes … Ever mangled a mango? Our own first attempt at slicing and dicing a mango was a fail. But the fact that we tried at all was a sweet success for the National Mango Board, which is on a mission to market the tropical...

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COOL Shrimp? Consumers Shrug

Buyers seem indifferent to country-of-origin labeling, say USDA researchers This is counter-intuitive. The US Department of Agriculture reports that its researchers have been unable to detect any shift in the pattern of consumers’ purchases of shrimp from 1998 through...

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