Path: bloom-picayune.mit.edu!snorkelwacker.mit.edu!news.media.mit.edu!americast.com!usa-post Newsgroups: usa-today.trends From: usa-post@AmeriCast.Com Organization: American Cybercasting Approved: usa-post@AmeriCast.com Subject: trends Mon, Apr 27 1992 Date: Mon, 27 Apr 92 05:41:46 EDT Message-ID: 04-27 0000 DECISIONLINE: Trends & Marketing USA TODAY Update April 27, 1992 Source: USA TODAY:Gannett National Information Network FEWER TRYING FOR AWARD: Applications for the USA's most prestigious quality prize have slipped this year. Just 90 companies applied for the Malcolm Baldridge National Quality Award, an annual prize created in 1987 by the Commerce Department. That's a drop from 106 applicants last year and 97 in 1990. Among the reasons: More competition. At least 10 states and dozens of companies, have quality awards. APPLICATION IS COSTLY: One reason fewer companies are chasing the Baldridge Quality Awards this year is that it's not cheap, and in this economy some can't spare the money. Large companies must cough up $4,000 to apply, small businesses $1,200. And preparing for it drains a lot of time and energy. Baldridge winner Xerox spent $1 million preparing its application in 1989. COKE MUSCLES IN TO SPORT DRINKS: Coca-Cola is ready to wrestle with Gatorade. The company will introduce its PowerAde sports drink, now sold at soda fountains, in bottles and cans. The drink will arrive next month in four Southern cities and will slowly spread nationally. Coke will put PowerAde at "points of sweat," such as health clubs, as well as in markets. The category is growing. Retail revenues rose 13% last year. GAULTIER IS AT IT AGAIN: Pick a weird fashion trend. Any trend. Chances are Jean-Paul Gaultier kick-started it. He's the designer who gave the world black lacy bustiers, the bike messenger mode and the quirky, gender-bending "femenswear." This fall, takeoffs on Gaultier's dandified redingotes, swallowtail jackets and sexy vests will be worn by style-followers as other designers follow in his far-out footsteps. MORE TRY HEAD START: Head Start has seen more children enroll in each five-year period since its beginning in 1975. The Department of Human Services says the federal pre-school child development program for low-income families will have 622,000 children in 1992, up from 541,000 in 1990 and 452,000 in 1985. The program began with 349,000 in 1975 and by 1980 had increased to 376,000. THROW THE BUMS OUT: Voters are so fed up that growing numbers are ready to dump their own member of Congress, according to a USA TODAY:CNN:Gallup poll. Usually voters criticize Congress, but support their own representative. Only half of voters now think their own member of Congress deserves re-election. That's down from 64% in February. The nationwide poll of 1,004 voters has a 3% margin of error. CRIME STATISTICS ARE UP: Incidents of murder climbed 7% last year, and forcible rape and serious assault rose 3%, according to preliminary 1991 crime statistics released Sunday by the FBI. The total number of crimes reported to police increased 3%, with violent crime showing a 5% rise. Gangs, guns and drugs are responsible for the rise, says Lt. Burton Poe, spokesman for the Fort Worth, Texas, Police Department. MANAGED CARE IS PRAISED: Managed care is being looked to as a key weapon in the fight against soaring health-care costs. The past five years, employers have been shifting to it en masse. Managed care is any health-benefits system combining insurers, doctors and hospitals in a network for cost effectiveness. Enough companies claim success that many think-tanks and politicians now are touting the idea. PYRAMID EMERGES: The USA has increasingly become concerned with eating healthier and are tending toward more grain-centered diets. Tuesday, the USDA will unveil a plan that reflects that with its new pyramid. It's slightly modified from the one that dairy and meat groups had criticized, the Associated Press says. The pyramid emphasizes grains and replaces the wheel with the basic food groups. SHERATON TO OVERHAUL RATES: Car rental companies are busy with a rate war kicked off last week. And ITT Sheraton Monday unveils three discount rates it says will save money for business and leisure travelers. Rack rates, the hotel equivalent of full coach fares, also have been cut up to 20% at most Sheratons. INT'L VISITORS SURPASS U.S.: The number of international overnight visitors to greater Miami has surpassed domestic overnight visitors in the first quarter of 1992, according to the Greater Miami Convention and Visitors Bureau. That's the first time that has happened. Merrett Stierheim of the bureau said Friday it's an "indication of how the visitor industry has come together" to make the area a "mecca." WE'RE FLYING LESS: The average number of miles U.S. airlines fly each day, although up from 1987, declined by 200,000 from 1990 to 1991, according to the Department of Transportation. The average last year was 12.1 million, the first drop after five years of increases. In 1990 the average was 12.3 million. That was up from 10.9 million in 1987; 11.4 million in 1988; and 11.5 million in 1989. Trends & Marketing Editor: Beth Mann. (1-919-855-3491) Making copies of USA TODAY Update (Copyright, 1992) for further distribution violates federal law. This article is copyright 1992 Gannett News Service. Redistribution to other sites is not permitted except by arrangement with American Cybercasting Corporation. For more information, send-email to usa@AmeriCast.COM