Mirror - Vol. 38, No. 10 -November 14, 2012

              THE BTMIRROR
Week of November 14,2012 • Vol. 38, Iss. 10 • The Reflection ofFair field • Independent Student Newspaper of Fairfield University
Marketing strategist imparts wisdom
BY KELSEY GUERIN
VINE EDITOR
"The mind is the ultimate bat-tleground
in all marketing wars."
Although this phrase sounds
like it could belong to a summer
blockbuster, it is actually one of
the driving principles behind
businessman Jack Trout's theo-ries
of strategy in the cutthroat
marketing industry.
On Thursday evening, the
Fairfield Quick Center stage host-ed
the world-renowned strategist
as he presented on his experience
in the marketing to an audience
of over 300 students, faculty and
community members.
To open the event, which was
sponsored by the Fairfield Mar-keting
Club, Dean of the Dolan
School of Business Dr. Donald
Gibson briefly introduced Trout.
The author of 12 acclaimed mar-keting
books, Trout helped found
the essential concepts of differen-tiation
and positioning as well as
marketing warfare, which changed
the landscape of the business and
marketing industries.
Promising to take the audi-ence
"around the business world
in 45 minutes or less," Trout
stressed the importance of global
marketing in the world today.
"Global marketing drives the
world," he said, "and you've got to
figure out what you're selling and
how to sell it."
Using a combination of hu-mor,
statistics and his own experi-ences
working with brands, Trout
gave an overview of the impor-tance
of differentiating and posi-tioning.
He frequendy referenced
the popular pizza chain Papa
John's, with whom he worked
closely and helped to develop the
famous slogan "Better Ingredi-ents.
Better Pizza."
But Trout has also worked on
campaigns much more broad in
scope and far-reaching than Papa
John's. For example, Trout was
brought to Spain as a consultant
for their national tourism board
to help develop the country's
marketing strategy and slogan
"Everything under the sun."
The Obama campaign also
recently consulted Trout, who
contributed ideas such as how to
reach the middle class and market
America overseas. While some of
these ideas ended up in Obama's
speeches and talking points, Trout
was quick to make sure he did not
overstate his involvement in the
campaign. "I was just an outsider
Contributed Photo
Jack Trout, a businessman and marketing success, spoke to Fairfield about his experience in the industry.
saying, 'Here's an idea, you can
use this, and this is how you can
verbalize this,'" he said.
According to Trout, much of
what he does as marketing strat-egist
is playing the role of "cor-porate
gunslinger." He said, "You
have to shoot a few ideas, and
TROUT I PAGE 2
Sandy's threat to power plants overlooked
BY CRYSTAL RODRIGUEZ
STAFF WRITER
Sixteen.
This was the number of nu-clear
plants in Hurricane Sandy's
projected path. Because of this,
three plants were shut down dur-ing
the storm while the other 11
were put on alert. While this may
not mean much to the average
person at first, this potential dan-ger
had serious implications.
Just last year, Japan's Fuku-shima
Plant lost outside power
due to a tsunami.
After a 15-meter surge ofwa-ter,
the backup diesel generators
and cooling system also failed.
But in light of a very large nu-clear
catastrophe, it is humbling
to know the east coast came out
of its biggest tropical storm un-scathed
in regards to nuclear ac-cidents.
Yet some students felt they
were not correctly informed of
this potential danger. Because
most lost power and were con-cerned
with other immediate
storm effects, students failed to
realize how many nuclear plants
were being threatened.
This general lack of aware
ness has to do with what
directly affects people
and their liveli-hood,
according to
DurellSnow'14.
People need to
become more
informed on
issues that
greatly affect
humanity,
and not
just their
personal
situation.
Other
students
agree. The
public
should be
informed about
potential risks, es-pecially
when it sur
rounds something as
serious as a nuclear
power plant, according
to Eric Lynch '14.
The nuclear threat did con-cern
the greater population. The
reaches of a nuclear accident are
not confined to a location but can
spread depending on environ-
^ff @MirrorFairfield
Lisa Tkach/ The Mirror
mental factors, such as wind.
The Nuclear Regulatory
Commission (NRC) emphasized
fairfieldmirror.com
that all the plants have flood
protection above the pre-dicted
storm surge
and took mea-sures
to shut
down plants
if power
disruption
became
too
great
for the
facil-ity,
ac-cord-ing
to a
Bloomberg
article.
Even
though die-sel
generators
backed up the
closed plants, these
generators had failed
in Fukushima a year ago.
Members of the National Acad-emy
of Sciences argued that the
NRC was putting too much at
stake if they depended on the
diesel generators.
After Sandy, the NRC and
their efforts during the storm
have come under close scrutiny.
Members of the Union of Con-cerned
Scientists (UCS) hope
Sandy will serve as a wakeup
call for strengthening protection
from natural disasters and the
reconsideration of using nuclear
power.
In hindsight, the NRC had
plenty of warning about Sandy's
destructive potential. Yet, too
many plants today are vulnerable
to events such as dam failures
that could cause rapid and severe
flooding, according to members
of the UCS.
But just as the NRC is coming
under scrutiny, Fairfield students
are challenging the media. "The
news has become so biased in
what they choose and don't
choose to show," says Snow.
Even with a widespread
threat of nuclear disaster, news
sources focus more on local news.
The nuclear threat is a large issue
but a specific person losing their
home gets more attention, accord-ing
to Victoria Kan-Long '15.
Snow's frustration with the me-dia's
ability to differentiate between
PLANTS! PAGE2
Connect with us online! The Fairfield Mirrorm