January 6, 2007 – stlplace

Reading Time: 2 minutes

Last Updated on January 7, 2007 by stlplace

I first heard about this “affordable luxury” term when I bought my Nissan Altima GLE, with sun roof and leather seat, about 6 years ago. The Nissan salesman told me Altima is an “affordable luxury” car. By that he meant the car has the features I mentioned above, plus alloy wheel (looking good), and the price is affordable (MSRP $22015, I got it for $18789 after $1400 rebate).

In recent years I feel this affordable luxury concept has penetrated the consumer markets very well. Here are just a list of things I think can be applied this flag (I may update this list from time to time).

Youth Apparel: Abercrombie & Fitch, American Eagle Outfitters, Aéropostale, and Urban Outfitters. To be honest, I can not tell too much difference among the “A” stores, but Urban is more for college kids because I felt back to fraternity once I visited store.

Bought A Little Panera Bread PNRA

Reading Time: 2 minutes

Last Updated on January 6, 2007 by stlplace

I bought a little Panera Bread PNRA shares today. I have watched the stock for more than 6 months. This noon I went to the store at St. Charles Rock road as usual, and I saw the biggest crowd. After I ordered food, I can see and hear the associate calling the customer name (when food is ready) about every 20 to 30 seconds. It took me about 15 minutes to get my food, probablly a record for me. But I am not complaining here; I always see a large crowd during lunch hour there and today’s wait helped me make the decision to buy some stocks. I noticed this place is more popular than my old favorite lunch place Fazoli’s and there is reasons behind that: better food; people always want to be in the “crowded restaurant”, whether in China or the United States.

Here is a good introduction of Panera Bread.

Panera Bread Co. St. Louis