Media Coverage: December 2003

Media Coverage is a listing of current media placements featuring Smeal College faculty, staff and students. At the end of each month, items are moved into the Archive , accessible via the link at the end of this page.

Investor's Business Daily , 12/30/2003 – Austin Jaffe , the Philip H. Sieg Professor of Business Administration, discusses the growing popularity of condominiums versus single-family homes. Historically, says Jaffe, condos were for families who couldn't afford stand-alone property ( Condos More Popular As Boomers, Kids Seek City Living, No Lawns ).

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette , 12/21/2003 – Mark Dirsmith , professor of accounting, and Robert Koehler , emeritus associate professor of accounting, praise U.S. Steel President John P. Surma, a 1976 Penn State alumnus. Surma, who currently serves on the Smeal College Board of Visitors, recently engineered his company's acquisition of National Steel ( U.S. Steel President Grinding Toward Goal of Making Company More Competitive ).

Christian Science Monitor , 12/17/2003 -- Ralph Oliva , executive director of the Institute for the Study of Business Markets, discusses the emerging trend of retro technology. He cites the work of watch and handbag company Fossil, which realized early on "that for all of the blazing chrome and silver-and-black kinds of things people are seeing, there's a balance of people who want something organic, earth-tone, rounded, and that led him into this retro look, even in his highest-tech stuff ( Techno Blasts From The Past ).

Scripps Howard News Service , 12/12/2003 -- Judy Olian dean of the Smeal College, says in her syndicated newspaper column that a case pitting IBM against employees is making waves in corporate America and may signal the opening round in a new phase of workplace torts ( Occupational Exposure Also Hazardous To Companies ). The column also appeared in the Centre Daily Times .

St. Louis Post-Dispatch , 12/11/2003 -- Fred Hurvitz , instructor of marketing, discusses the practices used by retailers to move merchandise from the shelves. According to Hurvitz, manufacturers often give retailers "mark-down money" to help cover the cost of a clearance sale, thus guaranteeing a retailer a certain profit margin ( Off-Price But On The Money ).

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette , 12/11/2003 -- Fariborz Ghadar , director of the Center for Global Business Studies, addresses the trend of companies that emerge from bankruptcy only to go right back in, saying that "everybody has every incentive to fool themselves. It's a lot easier haggling with each other with a rosy perception of what's going to happen in the future" ( Corporate Recidivists Find A Home In Bankruptcy ).

Wall Street Journal , 12/10/2003 -- Kenneth Lusht , chair of the Department of Insurance and Real Estate, discusses the practice of selling commercial real estate via auctions, which is used quite successfully in other countries. According to Lusht, who has researched auctions in Australia, U.S. real-estate auctions "have a stigma associated with them" because they often involve property being sold off by a distressed seller or as a result of a foreclosure or government seizure ( The Pros And Cons Of Selling At Auction ).

Harrisburg Patriot-News , 12/7/2003 – Jennifer Chang Coupland , assistant professor of marketing, comments on the business relationship between Hershey Creamery and Hershey Food Corporation, two unrelated companies that have had legal battles due to their shared name. To the public “it seems like a brand extension,” says Coupland.  “Hershey Creamery has more to gain from the association with Hershey Foods than Hershey Foods can benefit from any linkage to the creamery” ( Hershey Creamery Plans Century of Growth ).  The article also appeared in the Indiana Gazette (Pennsylvania) and the Montgomery County Record (Pennsylvania). 

Scripps Howard News Service , 12/05/2003 -- Judy Olian , dean of the Smeal College, says in her syndicated newspaper column that there is increasing expression of religion, or more precisely, spirituality, in today's places of work ( Spirituality Is Finding A Place In The Workplace ). The column also appeared in the Centre Daily Times and the Seattle Post-Intelligencer .

Tampa Tribune , 12/4/2003 – Ralph Oliva , professor of marketing and executive director of the Institute of the Study of Business Markets (ISBM), discusses the effects of Tropicana's moving its headquarters from Florida to Chicago.  Oliva calls the relocation “traumatic” ( Bradenton Strained by Tropicana Move ).

The Associated Press , 12/04/2003 -- Andrew Bergstein , instructor of marketing, discusses the planned Lingerie Bowl on Super Bowl Sunday, a pay-per-view event sponsored by DaimlerChrysler that will pit models dressed in lingerie against each other in a tackle football game. He says any criticism will just prompt more people to watch because the game becomes politically incorrect. "If you show 10 women objecting to it on the news, you will have 50 guys who will want to see it" ( Automaker To Sponsor Lingerie Bowl Game ). The article also appeared in the Indiana Gazette (PA), Fort Lauderdale Sun Sentinel , Montgomery County Record (PA), KVIA-TV (TX), Raleigh News (NC), Rocky Mount Telegram (NC), USA Today , Boston Globe , Ocala Star-Banner (FL), Sarasota Herald-Tribune , Times Daily (AL), Yahoo News , Duluth News Tribune (MN), The State (SC), Fort Wayne News Sentinel (IN), Forth Worth Star Telegram , San Luis Obispo Tribune (CA), Macon Telegraph (GA), Monterey County Herald (CA), Miami Herald , Wichita Eagle , Biloxi Sun Herald , Myrtle Beach Sun News (SC), Akron Beacon Journal (OH), Columbus Ledger-Enquirer , Bradenton Herald (FL), and Long Beach Press Telegram (CA).

WPSX-TV / WPSU-FM (Central Pennsylvania), 12/02/2003 -- Judy Olian , dean of the Smeal College, hosts "About Business," a call-in show focused on entrepreneurship. Tony Warren , director of Smeal's Farrell Center for Corporate Innovation and Entrepreneurship, joins Olian as a guest on the show along with Steve Sheetz, chairman of the board of the Altoona-based Sheetz, Inc., and Bill Frezza, general partner at Adams Capital Management.

eWeek , 12/01/2003 -- The Smeal College of Business , is mentioned as one of four business schools around the globe to receive a research award from IBM to create an On-Demand Supply Chain Research Laboratory. The lab joins others at Michigan State, Arizona State, and University College Dublin ( PeopleSoft, IBM Tightening Supply Chain Links ).

All Woman Magazine , Winter 2003 -- Austin Jaffe , the Philip H. Sieg Professor of Business Administration and director of the Institute for Real Estate Studies, says in a Q&A piece that foreclosures are worth a look for house hunters seeking a bargain, but cautioned that "any bidder should be aware that the values of such homes are likely to be cheap for a reason: There is some problem" (Got A Question About Your Finances But Don't Know Who To Ask?).

REPORTERS & EDITORS: For more information, please contact Wyatt DuBois in the Smeal College of Business Media Relations Office at 814-863-3798 or wed112@psu.edu .

Penn State's Smeal College of Business offers highly ranked undergraduate, MBA, executive MBA, Ph.D., and executive education opportunities to more than 5,500 students at all levels. Featuring academic departments of accounting, finance, marketing, insurance and real estate, management, and supply chain and information systems, the college is also home to major research centers such as the Center for Supply Chain Research, the Institute for the Study of Business Markets, the eBusiness Research Center, the Farrell Center for Corporate Innovation and Entrepreneurship, the Center for Global Business Studies, and the Center for the Management of Technological and Organizational Change.

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