http://makeashorterlink.com/?O69212E26

Hows that?

Edited to remove the looooooong link.

Parnel, I tried removing the long GAM link, but to no avail. Any ideas of how to remove it.
I have MASL bookmarked now http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/wink.gif

Let us know how this works it would be a great mileage run for lots of us! http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif
I have been told that one world has better pricing on RTW tickets.

Well I wouldn't be using regular RTW tickets. These would be "roll your own" consisting of 3 or 4 seperate tickets for each "RTW" or 6 or 8 tickets in total. Delhi figures into the equation.

There would be some outlay of cash, but it would be a small fraction of the cost of a conventional First Class RTW.

You can't delete a posting, but you can edit it: use the icon next to the quote button to edit, then manually remove the link.

Thought I would bring this along to see how things are going for others. The Bank of Canada "average" for 2003 was 1.40 cents but that is obviously sku'ed as the first 3 months were very high.

My distributors still aren't considering lowering their prices and are listing new products using the 1.59% rate to be "consistent" with the current pricing they use.

They were more than happy making a 25% margin (that was better than average for our industry to begin with). They are now making a 36% margin on the same product. That is an increase of over 40% on the same items.

Have any of you who needed to buy American products seen your prices go down at all from Canadian suppliers or has the hype over strong CDN $ being good for Canadian business proven to be more "theoretical" than anything?

Unfortunately the CAD increase hasn't translated into lower prices at least in the grocery stores. Look at produce where most are from California. I haven't noticed cheaper produce even though Canadian wholesalers could now buy the same amount with less money. The middle person is taking advantage of the dollar rise and not passing on the savings to retailers and in turn to consumers.

Same thing with the Mad Cow situation. Farmers are getting paid next to nothing for their cattle http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif but the price we pay for beef at the stores hasn't dropped at all. Consumers and the farmers are getting ripped off big time by the meat packers.

[This message has been edited by Sunny Day (edited Jan 27, 2004).]

Well, in my business, I can tell you the higher Canadian dollar has cost two of 15 jobs -- one in the US and one in Canada -- as I fight to find the cost savings needed to survive. if the dollar declines much further, we will hit the 'inflection point' where it will be cheaper for my companies(and presumably other multinationals which are much larger businesses) to source most of my supplies and services in the US and export back to Canada, definitely not a good thing for the Canadian economy!
Fortunately air/travel costs are not a painful part of the equation, thanks largely to FT and this forum.

Time for you to opean offices in Europe! http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif

Living in St. Petersburg, Russia, the rise in the dollar sure makes my trips back to Canada more affordable. And looking at the Euro I find it bizarre - when the Euro opened and dropped from even with the USD to 92 cents, Brits said the Euro was no good and they would never join such a weak currency. Then when the Euro bumps to 1.25 USD roughly, the Brits say 'oh, the Euro is terrible, we would never adopt that..what would it do to our exports?' So currencies fluctuate, people have to adjust..what else is new?

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On the matter of posting long links - this BBS system allows you to create a hyperlink and shorten the thing to a word or two. From the instructions:
"You can also have true hyperlinks using the [url] code. Just use the following format:

[url=http://www.infopop.com]infopop.com[/url I've found this works better than the third party link shortener. If you forget how, look to the left while you are entering your post and click on "*UBB Code is ON".

I am one of the fortunate ones with the higher C$. I do not do any business accross the line. The only time I cross the border is for a vacation. The higher C$ helps keep our interest rates low, which helps my business.
How much lower can rates go?

There is talk of them dropping at least another .25 on March 2 and possibly as much as .75 over the course of this year if they US doesn't raise theirs.

It's not just Canada that is suffering. Many countries around the world are complaining about the US dollar. The US needs a weak dollar to fend off imports in the hopes they can keep people working in the US.

The US is supposed to be $2.4 Trillion in debt by 2013 (I believe that is the correct year) That number increased from a projected $1.4 Trillion forecasted just last year. These numbers are not just becasue of the war in Iraq despite how much it is costing them.

Seems Bush doesn't mind spending his voters future during his administration http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/frown.gif

[This message has been edited by cattle (edited Jan 28, 2004).]

The cost of the Iraq war is relatively cheap considering the worth of its oil. Combine that with the lucrative contracts to be had by US companies, and you'll see the war will be beneficial in the long run.

For years, Canadian companies have been using the lower dollar as a crutch instead of improving productivity. Unions are partly to blame for this, but maybe things will change if the dollar continues to rise.