Well, London-based apparel brand Topshop has come up with a service that will feel like all your Christmas presents have come at once:

“Topshop’s personal shopping team will handpick gift items, based on a buyer’s requirement, and wrap each item individually. If the buyer approves of the selection, the wrapped presents will then be shipped out and arrive at the receiver’s doorsteps on Christmas Day. For a minimum spend of £200, Topshop’s personal shopper service helps shoppers cut precious shopping and decision times, taking the stress out of the festive shopping season.”

I wonder why Topshop aren’t offering this handy service in the USA? Perhaps it’s because they mainly sell through Barney’s Dept. stores over here. They might not currently be able to handle the demand of the American market? I think it would be huge! Because even though shopping concierge services exist here, they are usually considered out-of-reach luxury services. Most people end up spending way over $250 on presents for everyone, so I consider this well within reach of a lot consumers.

Choice Choke™ is about making choices easier. Topshop has demonstrated that they understand the Human Truth of this wave, which is: “I don’t need more choices, I need help choosing.”™ Lets hope other savvy brands are ideating ways to make overwrought consumers lives a little easier this holiday period.

Well I guess I fit the demographic (except for the disposable income part) so I checked Joyus out.
As expected, there were many articles of clothing that I wouldn’t buy unless I was after an “investment piece”, but I have to agree this site is pretty cool. Unlike a lot of smaller fashion sites, they definitely have the clout to attract some of the most respected and interesting designers. This made the video of them describing their collections and highlighting their favorite pieces and why, quite engaging and informative.

The Choice Choke™ wave is about making life easier. We live in a world of “Option Overload” and this is very much the case for women and shopping. Some people see pouring through magazines and keeping up with the various fashion weeks as a hobby, but a lot of us either don’t have the time or interest.
This helps you stay fashion forward without taking a backward step.

The site recruited a popular and savvy fashion blogger Gina Pell from Splendora (which Joyus acquired earlier this year), and she conducts the interviews and keeps them short and easily digestable segments. Then if you see something you like… Bam.. hit the link and buy the item.

The Human Truth™ of Choice Choke™ is “I don’t need more choices; I need help choosing.”™ and this is a prime example of that kind of business model.

Well here’s a cool shoe design that is currently in the prototype stage, and I personally hope it takes off.

“The creation of Israeli industrial designer Daniela Bekerman, ze o ze, which translates as ‘this or that’ in Hebrew, is a plain flat shoe that comes with a range of components that connect at the sole. Modular attachments in varying heel sizes take the ballet slipper to a brogue-inspired lace-up or a Mary Jane kitten-heel pump, meaning shoe lovers get more for their money while also offering a practical solution for travelers who need to pack light but still want a selection of looks”

As a traveler, yes, these would work great for me.  However, I really think a lot of people need some Choice Choke™ in their lives lately.  The Human Truth™ of this wave is:  “I don’t need more choices; I need help choosing.”™
Clever fashion designs like this will continue to grow as people want to do more …with less.

Well if he had checked out this site before he made his purchase he might have just waited for the new version.

Decide.com: “Decide predicts future product releases to help you purchase with no regrets. We make model predictions by matching hundreds of thousands of devices to their model lineages and applying advanced machine learning and text mining algorithms. Price predictions help you pull the trigger with confidence and save money. Our prediction algorithms utilize billions of observed price movements and over 40 distinct factors.”

They turn you into a savvy shopper with their data mining techniques: “Our team uses state-of-the-art machine learning and text mining algorithms on billions of price points across millions of products, blog posts, and articles on the web to enable shoppers to make the best buying decision possible.”

The Choice Choke™ wave is about people who are dealing with OPTION OVERLOAD.  This company has seized on this modern problem with a concept that fits this wave perfectly: “I don’t need more choices, I need help choosing.”

It also features Snake, which in my eyes is a selling point alone.

Words are limited to a maximum of 23 characters (sorry my German friends) and creation of new words is allowed and encouraged.

Appropriately, Wordr has even created their own buzzword to describe their product , monoblogging!

Well, I personally can’t see the point in droning on and on about a service that is based on the idea of using a minimal amount of words to express oneself, so check it out for yourself here.

Mashable is suitably impressed by the whole she-bang saying: “the content is arguably more accessible, applicable, and helpful than typical holiday-themed television segments or shows.”

As someone who has my own YouTube channel to share my personal exploits and videos with my friends and family, the concept of a professionally branded channel has always been a no brainer to me.  It’s kind of like an audiovisual extension on Twitter-style brand/customer communication.  Oh, you’re not on Twitter yet? Ahhh… yeah… Never mind then.

Vague literary references or jokes about “wild boys” aside, this buzzing QSR was first created as

“a mobile food van travelling to different festivals specializing in fries topped with international sauces. After being asked time and again by patrons at festivals, “Where can we get your fries during the week?” We chose to open our first store on the corner of Flinders and Elizabeth Street – right on the doorstep to Melbourne’s CBD.”

Fries are definitely the Lord of the menu.  They only recently added burgers …that are treated like a side option!

“We turn up the expectations:  Finally a fry that was NOT drowned in beef tallow and juiced up with gluten; NOT cooked in the cheapest oil money can buy; NOT smothered in watered down tomato sauce and sitting in a bain-marie since the beginning of time.
100% Vegan and Many Gluten Free options.
It was the beginning of a fast food revolution. The people rejoice!”

Their home-made sauces are all inspired by flavours found across the globe.  My workmates will attest I’m known as “The Condiment Queen” so this is my favourite thing about LOTF.  My personal choice is African (euro-mayo, ketchup, oinions) but sometimes you can’t go past Poutine – the Canadian standard of cheese melted by brown gravy… YUM!!!!

So when it comes to fries in this city there is only one choice… the only question is “what part of the globe do want to dollop on top?”

For those of us in the business industry, we are all well aware of the importance of personal branding and self promotion. We know that social networks can be a valuable way of achieving success, but with the number of social networks out there, knowing which to use and how to manage a few at a time can be exhausting and frustrating. This creates a Choice Choke™ atmosphere, and we realize that we don’t need more choices, just help choosing.

Dan Schawbel, author of Me 2.0: Build a Powerful Brand to Achieve Career Success, addresses the headache of choosing and managing various social networks using web tools and tips via a posting on Mashable.

In his article, Schawbel stresses the importance of continuously updating your profiles through the use of tools that will simplify and help maintain consistency throughout all your profiles, including Tubemogul, Twitterfeed, Gravatar, Ping.fm, and FriendFeed. These tools focus on features such as uploading the same video, maintaining the same avatar, name, and status updates across all your sites.

In a world full of unlimited choices on everything and anything, the internet is no exception. Our choices become even more numerous and overwhelming, leaving us dissatisfied and less willing to participate. Those willing to help us manage the information overload, however, will find a cozy place in amongst consumers across the internet.

Attention all men out there, this website is just for you, but ultimately for your girl. The shopping malls are overcrowded, the internet is overwhelming. We understand that when it comes to shopping for your girl, your mother, your sister, or your daughter, it is tough and almost intimidating. (Believe me, as a woman writing this blog, we know). Jean Vouté Pratt understands too, and found the urgency for help so strong; she founded her business on it. Pratt’s online website GiftGirl.com helps men find the perfect gifts for their female loved ones. Now these already exist out there, and almost every retailer will suggest a gift on its site with tags like, “Ideal for Anniversary!” or “Your Girl will love it!” Such promotion lines are enough to give anyone a headache when trying to decide on anything. And that’s where Gift Girl differs: By removing the myriad of choices out there and asking you two things:

1. What the gift is for.

2. Who the girl is.

It’s that simple. “Tell me about the girl, I’ll tell you what to get her,” quotes Jean Pratt on her homepage. In addition, she’ll let you know exactly where you can purchase the gift as well. If you’re worried about the damage a gift might do to your pocket book, you can choose how much money you’re willing to spend as well. Letting her site do the work of drowning in endless gift ideas, she helps you get the right gifts by filtering through them FOR you. Now that’s remedying a Choice Choke™ otherwise generally known as ‘shopping’.