Powerful Writing Tips

Free resource materials to help you communicate more effectively are now available on my website:

Plain Language Tips – for business writing that is easy to read and easy to understand

Dynamic Tables and Graphs – to help you communicate with numbers

Effective PowerPoint Presentations – to visually enhance your public speaking

Resumes – a series of articles to help you prepare a killer resume

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Shopping in Alicante, Spain

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Mercado Central Markets in Spain are all very centrally located in the downtown core, and the one in Alicante is HUGE! Upstairs is meat (plus cheese and eggs), while downstairs one wing is devoted to fish while another wing is devoted to fruit and vegetables. Flowers are outside on the main patio. I was particularly impressed by the booths selling heaps of eggs of different kinds and sizes. The fruit and vegetable displays are all artistically arranged with overflowing piles of so many different varieties. I loved the purple-and-white-striped eggplant, the knobbly green-and-red Raff tomatoes and itched to try some of the many different kinds of mushrooms and fresh cheeses. Bakeries No wonder I like Spain – the Spanish obviously love sweets just as much as I do. And of course croissants don’t have calories if you’re on holidays! Mireia, from MandarinaBlue Travel Experiences , recommended two bakeries that were close to my hotel. The tiny Croissanteria on Calle Poeta Qui...
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Saskatoon's Persian Store

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Mulberries, Pomegranate Sauce, Dried Lemons, Kashk and Doogh From the outside, it looks like an old-fashioned corner convenience store. But step inside, and you quickly realize that you’ve discovered a Middle Eastern treasure trove. The Persian Store at 223 – 25th Street West is operated by Mahyar Behnami, who has been in Saskatoon for two years. The store serves an Iranian/Persian community of approximately 500 people, but it’s an opportunity for all of us to try new things. Mrs. Behnami kindly gave me a tour of the store and explained how the different dishes and ingredients would be served in Iran. Canned Goods There is a large assortment of ready-made, canned dishes. (The stews are always served over rice that is dry, not sticky.) Ghormeh sabzi is often considered the Iranian national dish. It contains herbs, dried lemon, onion and red beans – you can add your own meat. The herbs usually include parsley, leeks/green onions, cilantro, spinach and fenugreek, and the...
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Camino: Fair Trade, Organic Chocolate and Sweets

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In 1999, three young Ottawa entrepreneurs decided to set up a new business. They had worked overseas and were concerned about the ways in which conventional businesses exploited farmers in many countries around the world. They wanted to provide Canadian consumers with an organic, fairly traded alternative. Because they had chosen to work with producer co-operatives, they established themselves as a worker co-operative, and La Siembra Co-operative was born with the launch of Canada’s first Fair Trade, organic hot chocolate – Cocoa Camino . Getting Started La Siembra’s first year in business was pretty crazy. They were able to source cocoa and sugar for the hot chocolate from two co-operatives in Costa Rica, so they had the raw ingredients. They also had a market as right from the start they were able to supply natural health stores via distributors. But the hot chocolate was being packed in a church basement by volunteers, and they used bicycles to deliver the product to Canada...
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Wild Fire Bakery, Victoria, British Columbia

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Delicious Food that is Good for You and Good for the Earth Wild Fire Bakery’s cheerful exterior is matched by its warm, welcoming interior. There are a few wooden tables and chairs at the front, while a baker is mixing large quantities of bread dough at the back. Two large brick ovens dominate the left hand side of the store. As you would expect from an organic bakery, there is a choice of substantial loaves of bread – everything from rye and multigrain to apricot-anise and garlic-cheddar. But the display cases in front may surprise you. There is a decadent chocolate cake decorated with chocolate flakes and tiny yellow flowers, chocolate mousse shaped like mice with playful chocolate tails, and lemon tarts topped with a mountain of meringue. There is an astonishing assortment of muffins – blueberry ginger, banana hazelnut, carrot millet – and cookies – lavender shortbread, orange hazelnut biscotti, fig and oat. You’ll want to sit down with a cup of tea or coffee before trying to d...
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Alley Kat Brewing, Edmonton

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small is beautiful - and profitable I ventured deep into Edmonton’s south industrial area to find the home of Alley Kat beers. Alley Kat was founded in 1995 and is the longest-running microbrewery in Edmonton. Their first beer, Aprikat, remains their most popular and reminded me of a fruit cooler. They add apricot extract to the conditioning tanks, and it is sweet with lots of fruit flavour. They also make Alley Kat Amber brown ale, Charlie Flint’s organic lager and Full Moon pale ale (double the hops – oof!) on an ongoing basis. Alley Kat produces approximately one million bottles of beer annually. They sell primarily to Alberta as well as a little to Saskatchewan, but they also send 300-400 kegs of Full Moon to a bar in Seoul, Korea, each month. An Edmonton teacher working in Seoul recommended the beer. The Korean bar owner came to Edmonton, tried the beer and liked it, and now stocks it in his bar. Small = Flexible This example illustrates how flexible small businesses can be....
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