Fortune 500 Companies: You've Been Warned

Last week, members of the Choice offices traded in their usual Financial District backdrop for the varied scenery of fair Brooklyn. This out-of-office experience was prompted by the Prospect Park YMCA as a part of their Young Entrepreneurs program. With the Choice volunteers divvied up and at the ready to listen and offer advice, the participants broke into small groups to brainstorm business ideas and potential proposals. Business plans were volleying to and fro, but finally the intense think session came to a conclusion when the business-minded teens individually pitched to their peers. With such innovative ideas being generated, don’t be surprised if you see one of these future CEOs on the cover of Forbes!

the brainstorming session

the presentations

group shot

Hands-On Relaxation

Far too often, traditional luxury relaxation and innovative modern amenities are mutually exclusive. Not so at Townhouse Spa. Nestled in an actual Midtown West townhouse, which has been beautifully restored, the spa excels in engaging all of one’s senses in a setting of utmost relaxation. While offering all of the services of a traditional spa, such as facials, steam rooms, nail treatments, and waxing, it is their massage treatments that are particularly notable. One of their most sought-after and unique specialty treatments incorporates a Massage Flame candle. As the candle is lit, a warm, scented pool of massage oil gathers in the center and like the candle itself, your stress will simply melt away at first touch. Composed of a soothing blend of shea butter, vitamin E, and the oils of exotic palm kernel, soy, jojoba, and organic coconut, the candle is 100 percent naturally scented using organic aromas and essential oils. So for those seeking a luxurious oasis amid a hectic and hurried city, Townhouse Spa has set out its welcome mat just for you.

Cupid Came Early

Just in time for Valentine’s Day, two Choice staffers were featured in a stylish segment for Monday’s Today Show on NBC. Looking festive in Cupid’s finest, our own Miguel Alves and Annmarie Nitti showcased loungewear themed by the amorous holiday. Meanwhile, hosts Kathie Lee Gifford and Hoda Kotb discussed some current fashion trends that bespoke the look of love which everyone can enjoy this weekend. Here at the Choice offices, we think Miguel and Annmarie outshone the rest in ensembles that even dear Saint Valentine would approve of!

To view the full segment, visit the Today Show online now!

Hats (and Shirts) Off to Cindy!

Over the weekend, Choice rocked a birthday bash for award-winning advertising and branding guru, Cindy Gallop. In keeping with the theme of her lush, avant-garde downtown loft, Choice found the best model waitstaff the city has to offer and per the request of the delighted hostess, emblazoned them with "Property of Cindy Gallop". Without a doubt, this set the tone for a wildly raucous night her 200 guests won't soon forget. Things really started to heat up once the DJ began spinning and Cindy herself opened up an impromptu dance floor. The enthusiastic celebrating was interrupted only to sing the guest of honor "Happy Birthday" over a three foot tall croquembouche, upon which the dancing resumed until the end of the party, with the last guest leaving in the wee hours of the morning.

Now that's how birthdays should be celebrated!

Paint the Town White

Big ideas come in big packages. Or at least that’s the concept behind IdeaPaint, a roll on paint that can transform any hard surface into a dry-erase playground, effectively taking the borders out of whiteboard. In the Choice offices, we used IdeaPaint to supersize the traditional dry-erase surface with the hopes of unleashing a maelstrom of creative thinking. It also serves as an awesome way to organize and record all of the wild ideas and productions that bounce around the Choice offices on a daily basis. As an added bonus, IdeaPaint is much more environmentally-friendly than traditional dry-erase boards, which require energy-gobbling baking and curing procedures, contain hazardus formaldehyde, use more material and fuel to ship, and at the end of their lifespans, end up unwanted in landfills. So whether a table, wall, door, or desk, IdeaPaint is ready to cover it all!

Beat the Blues

Now that the excitement of Christmas and New Year's is over, do you find that your giddiness for the season has been replaced with the wintery blues? Have the frigid fingers of Jack Frost proved to be too much and instead of invigorating, are dragging you down? Simple solution: crack into Choice staffer Cameron Greenlee's debut album, Cameron & the Trenton St. Collaborative. Infused with reggae beats, jazz tempos and topped off with energizing ska riffs, these instrumental tracks will undoubtedly drive the February funk away. Taking the reigns as bandleader, Cameron lends his considerable talents as pianist, keyboardist, percussionist, and arranger and composer on the album. The end result is an amazingly rounded, but never predictable, collection of songs which instantly transports the listener to a warm locale with a tropical breeze. So sit back, close your eyes, and let Lady Winter fade into the background of the bluesy beats.

Released on Naya Records in 2009, Cameron & the Trenton St. Collaborative can be found on iTunes and CD Baby.

Taming the Beast

If you haven’t been on a 10-year-long deep sea voyage or a stakeout in the outer reaches of the Himalayas, then you’ve probably witnessed firsthand the astronomical growth the Internet has experienced in the past decade. With over 240 million unique websites and 1.6 billion people worldwide accessing them, the Internet has morphed into an enormous and unruly beast with endless content choices, not to mention the sheer amount of data swirling around it. So what to do with such of information? Quantify it. And this is just what Quantcast has done. The three-year-old company has managed to harness the raw power that is knowledge by using their team of web analytics experts to measure and organize the Internet’s audiences. By typing a website into their profile engine, users can see a rough markup of any of the top 1 million sites' audience demographic, sites this audience also likes, daily traffic, and site rank, among other information. This online service is revolutionizing the method in which business and media companies target their desired audiences and the way the Internet itself is being viewed. So with Quantcast, maybe the World Wide Web isn’t such a daunting place after all.