A driving force in marketing

First-time visitors to the office of Prantalay Marketing chief executive Anurat Khokasai tend to jump because it looks like he’s about to run them over with a car. Then they realise that it’s only the front of a car and it’s quite stationary.
Anurat’s desk is the front end of a 1996 Jaguar Zephyr. Sitting at the desk puts him in the Jag’s driver’s seat. Guests can sit elsewhere on other chunks of the car.
With a background in engineering and a penchant for sleek vehicles, Anurat picked a Jaguar because it evokes the fast jungle cat that’s a good swimmer and can kill its prey with a single powerful bite. “Their character and abilities are in line with marketing work,” he chuckles.
Anurat doesn’t deny that feng shui had something to do with his choice of “furniture”, but says his main criterion was “not boring”. “I work six days a week and it’s good to have something this decorative so that I enjoy sticking around.”
It’s a great conversation piece, of course, but it does tend to slow down business transactions. His guests inevitably demand to take some pictures. And then, like him, they just want to stick around.

Look-alikes
The bad news is that, in their rush to break a story, the media can screw things up. The good news is that their blunders might be more interesting than the story.
When long-ailing former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher died on Monday, Channel 5 matched its report to a photo of American actress Meryl Streep. To be fair, Streep did give an uncanny portrayal of Thatcher in the movie “The Iron Lady”.
That was bad news, but the good news was that Taiwan’s Cti Cable news swiftly out-gaffed the Thais by accompanying its report with video of Queen Elizabeth II. To be fair, Elizabeth is sometimes cheekily referred to as “Maj” (for Her Majesty) and Thatcher as Maggie.
“We will improve,” Channel 5 promised later on Facebook.