Archive for October, 2008

How much are you willing to pay for convenience? It may already be costing you more than you know at the grocery store. A savvy consumer advocate has shown WFAA how buying liquids in bigger volume can save big bucks.

Bottled water may be the biggest waste. A bottle of Aquafina goes for a $1.39 and a 24-pack for $8.99. For the same $8.99, your family can purchase eight Ozarka gallons of water, or receive 1,024 ounces.

That’s almost triple the volume, at the same price. Individual bottles are more convenient but it really does cost more.

Soda is almost the same. A dozen bottles, or about 144 ounces costs $4. Or for $3.76 you can receive the same brand, 268 ounces, almost a 100 percent increase.

So are you really willing to pay twice as much for the convenience of having a smaller bottle?

How about orange juice? Decades ago, frozen concentrate was common. Now, many families buy the juice ready to pour. 96 ounces of Minute Maid orange juice is regularly priced at $6.26. For the same cost of $6, you can purchase three of [frozen concentrates] and make it yourself and receive 192 ounces.

Almost 100 extra ounces of juice at the same price if you mix it yourself.

That’s a savings of almost $30 on three items alone, if you buy in a little bit bigger volume and forgo a little convenience.

For the first time ever, Salvation Army officers say they will roll out a “cashless” Red Kettle project in North Texas.

“People just don’t carry cash anymore and we need to keep up with the times,” said Pat Patey, a Salvation Army spokesman.

At least a dozen of the familiar Red Kettle coin collection sites in the Dallas area will have small credit card scanners, allowing donors to swipe and give instead of digging for coins and cash.

If successful in the Dallas area, the pilot program will soon go nationwide.

The Red Kettle campaign kicks off November 14 in Dallas with Mayor Tom Leppert to drop the first dollar in a Salvation Army kettle.

If you are procrastinating and not taking advantage of early voting, then this is an easy way of finding out exactly where you need to be on November 4.

Just visit: http://www.maps.google.com/vote and enter your street address and zip and voila — you’re good to go.

Thanks to Patrick, one of our readers, we have another fun video showing the Guiness World Record breaking beach ball fun in downtown Dallas this past Sunday.

Click here to see the action.

Every Tuesday, hips are swinging, feet are pivoting, and class members are shouting, laughing and spinning to Latin beats. They aren’t on a dance floor at a night club, they are on the aerobics floor at the Verandah Club at the Hilton Anatole. For one exhilarating hour of caloric-burning, heart-racing, muscle-pumping, body-energizing, awe-inspiring movements, class members are burning 500 calories with Zumba!

Zumba is a combination of Latin salsa, cardio workout and interval moves. It is the hottest dance fitness craze and, according to many sources, the most fun workout program around. Participants dance and laugh their way to fitness.

As a Zumba Instructor, Brandi Farris, is trained in the basic steps of salsa, merengue, cumbia, samba and more. “Brandi, who is highly regarded around town, puts her own ‘twist’ on Zumba. It’s Zumba meets MTV dance party,” explains Cara Young, Verandah Club Manager.

According to Zumba.com, Zumba was created when Celebrity fitness trainer, “Beto” Perez, stumbled upon the concept of Latin inspired fitness in his native country of Colombia (South America) in the mid 1990’s. One day, he walked into his class and realized that he had forgotten his aerobics music, and his only option was to grab whatever tapes he had in his car. Beto’s tapes were comprised of the songs that he loved, the traditional Latin salsa and merengue music with which he had been raised. In 1999, after his success in Colombia, Beto brought Zumba to the United States, where he was approached by entrepreneurs Alberto Perlman and Alberto Aghion to create a global company based on the Zumba fitness philosophy. The three young entrepreneurs then set a goal to offer Zumba classes all over the world.

Zumba is offered every Tuesday at 5:30 p.m. at the Verandah Club located at the Hilton Anatole Hotel at 2201 Stemmons Freeway, Dallas, Texas 75207. The class is included with a Verandah Club membership or non-members can purchase a day pass for $16 plus tax.

About the Verandah Club
Verandah Club, is the Hilton Anatole’s newly renovated 80,000-square foot private fitness club, located in the hotel’s beautiful 7-acre park. The Verandah facilities were designed by Precor, the official workout equipment of Hilton Hotels. The $340,000 worth of new equipment includes cardio machines all equipped with LCD TV monitors with clear cable access as well as Icarian strength training equipment. In the updated strength training room, guests also have the option of a complete line of free weight equipment. The Club also features the only Kinesis Movement Training Area in Dallas, combining the benefits of Pilates, Yoga, Core, and extremity strength training with full-movement resistant weights. The Club is open weekdays 5:30 a.m. – 9:30 p.m. Weekends 7 a.m. – 8 p.m. Corporate memberships are available. More information can be found at www.verandahclub.com or by calling Membership Director Rick Dunnaway at 214.761.7855.

Originally posted on WFAA.com by Monika Diaz

Two strangers were brought together by a leap of faith and one piece of property that was among 200 North Texas homes up for auction at the Dallas Convention Center.

While the misfortune of others lured hundreds of bargain hunters to the foreclosure auction, Tracy said she came to find closure. The mother took her seat among a sea of investors and strangers to say goodbye to her Pottsboro home, which is located just west of Denison.

“It means so much to all of us,” she said of her home that she lost to foreclosure. “It’s not just a house.”

At the fast-paced and energetic event, Tracy’s tears did not go unnoticed.

“She was crying and I asked her what she was upset about,” said Marilyn Mock, of Rockwall.

When Tracy’s home, “Number 73,” came up for auction, Mock raised her hand and bid. With no picture of the property in the auction book, Mock had only Tracy’s word on the home’s worth.

“I just kept asking her is it worth it? She said yes, and then it went again,” Mock said.

Bid after bid, Mock kept raising her hand.

“The next thing you know, she tells me she is doing this for me and then she had it,” Tracy said.

It was a second chance given to Tracy by a stranger.

Mock paid less than $30,000 for the property and said she plans to meet with Tracy in the next few weeks to work out the details.

“I have to look it up on the map,” Mock said of Pottsboro.

Despite the risk, Mock said it was a simple decision.

“People need to help each other and that’s all there is to it,” Mock said humbly of her choice.

“She knows how much she has blessed my life,” Tracy said. “Nobody’s ever done anything like that for me before, and I hope that I can repay the favor.”

Everything’s bigger in Texas and that goes for a beach ball that was dropped on Elm Street and bounced around downtown Dallas on Sunday.

It was all part of Carnival Cruise Lines‘ attempt to break a record for the world’s largest beach ball.

According to Guiness the ball needed to be at least 10 meters in diameter and had to be made of real beach ball material.

It took several adults to get the ball moving down Elm Street.

Not only did Carnival succeed in getting into the Guinness Book of World Records, the company got a commercial and free TV time out of it.

Guiness World Record Beach Ball in Dallas