Adding Company & Brand Structure

Аватар пользователя michael

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It is disussed with the help of the ARTES & LUNITA label,  that we should spend some work in banana companies and their brand structures.

In this example Leonid describes:

  • The company "SoyuzProdContract, SPC" from Russia has got a brand ARTES"
  • The company "Port Internation GmbH" from Germany has got the brands FAIR NANDO, Golden B, Golden BIO and LUNITA

And we are sure, there are many other examples (Chiquita, Dole, ...). This is quite a new focus in collecting banana labels. We know that there are brands and that they are related, but we did not spend much work in gathering all the information about companies, where they are located and their brands. Did someone know that LUNITA are the premium bananas of the same company that also uses FAIR NANDO for fair trade bananas?

Leonid is right, the current solution "CATALOG ENTRY" is too weak. Before we start to solve the question, how we technically implement this stuctures and relations in this catalog, I like to begin, what do you think about this enhancement and would you help in getting it almost complete?

A.) From my point of view, this does belong to our hobby in collecting banana labels. We should know who is behind the labels and how the brands are related. However this is a lot of work having now about 4000 brands in the catalog. It means a lot, lot, lot of research in the internet otherwise we have only a small flick carpet.

B.) I've got feedback from some collectors in UK, EC and CR that the current structure of this huge catalog is not easy to understand and to use. So when we add further information to maintain, than we have the risc that less collectors have fun in adding informations to the catalog. The company & brand discussion must lead in a simple solution.

To be honest, I have enought to do in collecting banana labels, adding new banana labels to this catalog and do some quality control. For me it is enough in adding a discription (text) to a catalog entry when I found some background information about a company or brand. I need not to be an expert about companies in the banana biz.

But I would be happy if someone is an expert of the companies and we have the information in the catalog. I would really love, when more collectors add what they know about the labels to this catalog! I enjoy the work of Leonid and like to read his results. Please, coud I have your feedback? What do you think about to enhance the catalog with company and brand information? Would you support the idea active?

I will help in building up a trechnical solution to store the information about companies, brands and their relation, but it must be someone responsible to get the content.

Well, the suggestion is to

You are absolutly right, Leonid. A WIKI of banana labels should provide information about the brands and companies. And the current structure of the catalog does not allow it to add it in a straight forward way. For example it is not possible to see that Lunita, Fair Nando, Golden B and Golden Bio belongs to the same company. And - up to yesterday - most of us did not know at all that they are  managed in Germany.

Well, the suggestion was to add following information:

  • "Brand: "
  • "Company - brand owner: "
  • "Country of company location: "
  • "Company web-resources: "
  • "Country of banana origin: "

This all could be difficult to add it to the existing construct of a CATALOG ENTRY. Because a catalog entry is just a box with some labels and quite often independend from companies or brands. A catalog entry just contains some labels, we want to display together in one website. So only few catalog entries have got something like "Country of company location" or anything else. It it could be confusing having all the attributes there.

We can start with the existing construct of CATALOG ENTRIES to add information about brands and companies . At each catalog entry is a description field (text) to add any information and some weblinks.

In the last 3 years only Niko (AFC) and me have added information to catalog entries and Leonid had add a some comments about companies which I had copied to the descripiton of the corresponding catalog entry. So when the point is, I've to do nearly all the work to build up the Wiki about banana companies, then it will not work. So let us say, when about 200 to 400 of our 4000 brands have got additional information about companies (10%) provided by other collectors, then I will separate it into a wonderful and easy to use data structure, with company logo, weblinks, the list of all brands, contact address, some other key facts  and corporate structure.

When we have enough information collected, then I do the "nine stitches". Deal?

P.S.: You can find changed catalog entries and the name of the collector who has done the work in this section: http://banana-label-catalog.org/catalog/info

Is the country of origin of a

Is the country of origin of a BEND IT label EC or NO?

What I do know from producing banana labels is, that they are printed in the country where banana is growing to keep the transport cost low and to have the banana labels quite quick at the banana farm. Banana labels from the company BEND IT are most likely not printed in Norway and are shipped to Ecuador. That means, the country of origin of this label is usually not Norway, but no one of us does know it for sure. This uncertain information we do not store in our catalog.

The discussed banana label has got the country of origin of the banana, where the bananna label does stick on. In many cases the country of origin is printed on the label and this information we also add in the description (details) of each label. So the banana label has got the country of origin EC.

To make it clear: When ECUADOR is printed on a label, then the "country of origin" is ECUADOR. When ECUADOR is not printed at label but we have the information from the banana box, where the banana is delivered into the supermared, then also the country of origin is ECUADOR.

Where do we store the information, that BEND IT is a Norwegian company?

The banana label BEND IT is assiged to a catalog entry with the title BEND IT. At this catalog entry are many other BEND IT labels and probably a directory structure with other sets from BEND IT. Only at this catalog entry we do store information about the company BEND IT if we have got additional information. For example the country, where it is located. There is no redundant information about the company at all of the labels in a catalog entry. It does not make sense for me to add at each of the current 51 labels, in which country BEND IT is located. This you do only once, when you describe the catalog entry BEND IT.

So if you like to have information about the company BEND IT, then just click at the catalog entry. There is a descriptionn field and it is possible to add a link to their website. So far, we do not store the country of this company in a separat database field, and the reason is discussed in previous posts.

I will write my answer as

I will write my answer as comments on some of your statements (they will be in quotes) to clarify what I mean

"It is disussed with the help of the ARTES & LUNITA label,  that we should spend some work in banana companies and their brand structures".
I do not call for new and unnecessary work, which will obviously complicate the structure and use of the catalog. I'm talking about errors in the "Catalog". I point to them using arguments from the Internet. You are the author of "Cataloga" and it is your right to correct them or not to correct them.
"…the current solution "CATALOG ENTRY" is too weak…"
I do not agree with you. You have a normal catalog entry, which describes the main characteristics of the label: material, shape, colors, sizes, motif, text, year of issue, country. Everything is OK, but then what do I criticize? I will say immediately: characteristics the "Country" is very vague and generates a lot of mistakes. Let's talk about this below with maximum simplicity and transparency.
"We should know who is behind the labels and how the brands are related. However this is a lot of work having now about 4000 brands in the catalog. It means a lot, lot, lot of research in the internet otherwise we have only a small flick carpet".
I do not agree with you again. A collector does not have to know which company is behind the label and brand. A simple collector will break his head and damage his brains while doing this work. Moreover, nobody needs this work.
But the collector should not, trusting the prestige of the catalog, mistakenly interpret (even partially) what is depicted or written on the sticker, as it is now, when the inscription "country" is mistakenly interpreted.
"But I would be happy if someone is an expert of the companies and we have the information in the catalog."
There is no need to necessarily add information about companies in the "Catalog". This will complicate the "Catalog" and scare off some users. But if you simply add the "Company & Web" field to the "Catalog Entry", the filling of which will be "optional" (ie, fill or ignore), this will be fine.

"To make it clear: When ECUADOR is printed on a label, then the "country of origin" is ECUADOR. When ECUADOR is not printed at label but we have the information from the banana box, where the banana is delivered into the supermared, then also the country of origin is ECUADOR."
Here lies the source of the mistakes: "country of origin!". "Origin" of what?
It does not matter where the labels, boxes and any texts are printed. Not "typography" owner of texts, labels and boxes. And not Ecuador owner of labels, brands and boxes, when the name of this country is indicated on them. The owner of labels, texts, brands, boxes is the company that ordered them.

Ecuador is printed because bananas come from there. And I'll repeat it a thousand times: the inscription on the sticker, on the wrapper, on the label, on the box - "Ecuador, Guatemala, Costa Rica, Panama, Mexico, etc." - means the country of origin of bananas and never means anything else.

But a poorly qualified collector, trusting the prestige of the catalog, thinks that these are the labels of Ecuador, Guatemala, Costa Rica, etc
Therefore, the "Country" or "Country of origin" field in your catalog needs a clear description. In fact, this field means "Country of banana origin", and it should be clearly described in your "Catalog".
As for the companies and portfolio of their brands (I repeat), there is no need to complicate the catalog. It is possible to indicate (if known!) the name of the company and its "website", where the collector will be able to find all the information, if it is interesting to him.
But it can not be said that the label of Ecuador, when it belongs to a German company (eg "brand Lunita"), or a Norwegian company (eg "brand Bendit"), or an Armenian company (eg "brand ArmEc") or a Russian company (eg "brand Artes"), etc. similarly for thousands of companies. This is not right.
However, all this text is only my private opinion. Excuse me if I was too harsh in judgment or not polite enough.

Hi Leonid,

Hi Leonid,

please don't worry about your words in a foreign language. We are all collectors, one family and will help each other as much as we can. Talking in an international community is not easy. For example, when I do mistakes with my poor English my German friends would say: "Fix that, my eyes hurt" our Irish collegues put it that way: "This sentence should be read ...".  So we are all different and learn from each other. No need to worry and I like emotions. We regard ourselves as friends.

So comming back to our collection. It is discussed, there could be a problem and mistake in the meaning of 'country of origin' of a banana label. To be direct: I don't think so. Never ever. When the Suriname is printed at the label, ALL collectors will set the country of origin to Suriname to display the nice little flag below the picture.

Maybe one day, we will add next to our catalog entries - that are alphabetical sorted by brand name - a second structure by company name to assign the related brands:

  • Company AAA
    - Brand 1
    - Brand 2
    - Brand 3
  • Company BBB
    - Brand 4
    - Brand 5

But this we willl do when more collectors like to help in building up this new structure. So far I suggest to add the company information at all catalog entries, even when it is redundant.

Anyway, I enjoyed the discussion and I do not see the need to change something systematically. We are all working quit good. When you like to change the Russian attribute name of this field from 'Страна:' to something else, please let me know.

8-)

As far as I understand is, we

If the labels comes with bananas from EC, we document EC at country of origin. We do not change anything at the current structure of the catalog.

As far as I understand, nobody will type in all the companies, their brands and the place where they are located.