December 20^th, 2009

The IGLCC website will continue serving as a portal for information and a networking channel for the international LGBT business community.

With the growth of its initiatives like the International Business Equality Index, the International LGBT Business Data Base and Market Studies and Research, the IGLCC dedicates in its new website a place where each of its initiatives can be easily found and explored.

We invite you to visit the new website and to stay in touch with the top news and events for the international LGBT business community.

Aiming to keep you up to date with information regarding important issues we also have created a new Facebook page, have joined Twitter and LinkedIn and created a Skype account.

Our focus remains the same: to advance diversity in business and to promote and defend equality for all members of the LGBT business community.

Visit our new site today!

www.iglcc.org

ACCOR AND IGLCC RENEW THEIR PARTNERSHIP

Accor Hospitality is proud to continue as a founding partner of the International Gay and Lesbian Chamber of Commerce.

According to Steven Eidelberg, Senior Director of Sales for Accor, “Partnering with IGLCC is another way for Accor to support global diversity and inclusion. One of our missions is to focus on corporate diversity practices and to contribute to the improvement of the livelihood of LGBT communities worldwide.”

By supporting IGLCC and other LGBT organizations, Accor is reinforcing its role as a professional travel partner and is continuously striving to find ways of building bridges between the LGBT and non-LGBT business communities in our Hotels & Resorts worldwide.

To celebrate this renewed partnership, Accor is happy to welcome the IGLCC community by offering 8% off at over 1,200 hotels worldwide. To benefit from this special offer, look for the Accor button on the IGLCC and affiliate Chamber websites.

Accor Hospitality represents over 4,000 hotels and more than 500,000 rooms in 90 countries worldwide. As a global hotel leader, our family of more than 15 brands, including Sofitel, Novotel, Mercure among others, are recognized and appreciated around the world for their commitment to quality.

Click here to get 8% off at over 1,200 Accor hotels worldwide

The IGLCC welcomes Mr. Batty and is very pleased to count with his experience and varied expertise as we witness from his impressive biography:

Ken Batty is the Executive Director of Human Resources for Western Europe at the global PC manufacturer Lenovo. This is a position he has held since 2005 when Lenovo, the top PC provider in China, purchased IBM’s PC business around the world. Ken is responsible for 2,000 employees spread across 14 countries, including a large Shared Service Centre in Slovakia. Ken is also the Country Manager of Lenovo in the UK.

Prior to Lenovo’s purchase of the IBM PC business Ken spent 18 years at IBM in a range of sales and marketing positions. He was the European Marketing Manager for IBM’s UNIX products in the late 90s, and immediately prior to moving to Lenovo was assigned to IBM’s European Head Quarters in Paris where he was responsible for PC sales in Europe, Middle East and Africa to small and medium sized businesses.

Ken has been active in GLBT issues since the late 1980s. He was Treasurer of the Manchester based North West Campaign for Lesbian and Gay Equality which was set up to campaign against the UK’s infamous Section 28. He was a founder member of the Albert Kennedy Trust, now a major UK charity, which provides homes and housing advice to young people at risk of being homeless because they were gay or lesbian. At IBM he established and led much of the work in Europe on GLBT issues, including leading the European GLBT taskforce, being European representative on the Global Gay and Lesbian Executive Taskforce, and GLBT representative on the European Diversity Council.

Ken lives in London with his partner, Amene, and in 2009 they celebrated their 25th anniversary. Ken holds a Bachelors Degree from University of Hull in Politics, and also studied at Oxford University.

Transgender officer living his dream -- as a cop and a man
Now, Kerry Bell works to increase understanding between his two worlds: law enforcement and the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) community. ...  Read More  Source: Salt Lake Tribune

Publican Guía de empresas gay friendly en los Estados Unidos
Si una empresa acumula un puntaje perfecto de 100, HRC dice que ofrecen un ambiente de trabajo que apoya la igualdad LGBT. Las empresas con puntuaciones ...   Read More   Source: SentidoG

Corporate America begins to accept LGBT community
In a lecture entitled "The Power of the LGBT Market: Influencing Social Policy through Economic Impact," Mitchell and Nelson spoke about the intent of the ...  Read More   Source: UConn Daily Campus

LGBT Households Remain More Optimistic about Finances
This is a significant increase from March 2009 when 25% of LGBT adults ... and marketing communications firm with special expertise in the LGBT market. ...  Read More  Source: Benzinga - Dover,DE,USA

National Gay & Lesbian Chamber of Commerce and Gay Ad Network Form ...
By working with Gay Ad Network, the estimated 1.4 million LGBT-owned businesses and ... Businesses can outsource the management of their search marketing ...  Read More  Source: Earthtimes (press release) - London, UK

Après le .com ou le .fr, va-t-on surfer sur des sites en .gay?
Un entrepreneur new-yorkais a levé le voile le mois dernier sur son projet de nom de domaine en «.gay» destiné à devenir un levier pour la communauté LGBT ...  Read More  Source: TÊTU

Le Québec se dote d'une politique contre l'homophobie
«Avec sa Politique québécoise de lutte contre l'homophobie, le Québec innove de nouveau en matière de reconnaissance des personnes homosexuelles et LGBT», ...  Read More  Source: BRANCHEZ-VOUS.com

Gays and Lesbians Lead the Way to Economic Recovery - More Likely ...
Thirty-four percent of the survey's LGBT respondents said they expect their ... and marketing communications firm with special expertise in the LGBT market. ...  Read More  Source: Before It's News - Mill Valley, CA, USA

FH Out Front Blog: It's Our Business: A Conversation with Echelon ...
Target marketing has always been the route for many companies as a consequence of an economic downturn. The LGBT community in particular is a very desirable target as they possess a high disposable income and many households do not ...  
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GBT Communities, Poverty and Social Policy
By Craig Young - 29th November 2009 Why is New Zealand's LGBT community so silent when it comes to poverty and homelessness? Social inequality mushroomed in ...  Read More  Source: Gay NZ

NEPAL: País quer ser principal destino gay da zona Quarta-feira, 2 ...
O convite foi feito pelo primeiro e único membro abertamente gay do parlamento, que também é o fundador do movimento LGBT no país. ...  Read More  Source: Portugal Gay

Laurence Bernstein is the managing partner of BC3 Strategies, one of Canada's best known and respected strategic planners.
A graduate of Cornell University, he is a regular contributor to Marketing magazine and has published articles in numerous
business publications.

The past twelve to eighteen months have not been good for most companies in most countries. As a result, companies evaluated every expense, including some “nice to have” investments, such as GLBT marketing. We have noticed an almost total drop off of investment by the public sector in gay and lesbian market development.

Of course this is understandable – it would be imprudent to focus limited energy and resources on underdeveloped markets at a time when major, bread-and-butter markets are plunging. In other words, when the entire platform is burning bring in a fire truck, not a watering can.

This business maxim stands true for most categories – less so, perhaps, for travel because the ROI on business development is disproportionately high within certain layers of the GLBT segment. However, this is undermined by the reality that hotel companies, specifically, are in such trouble that they have had to cut practically every cent of discretionary marketing expenditure.

Two things come to mind:

1. The absence of major players represents an opportunity for smaller players to make their mark for a lesser level of investment. While it may be almost impossible to generate enough marketing noise when other, much larger competitors are active, it is considerably more effective when those competitors are focused on other aspects of their business (such as survival, for instance!). A successful GLBT marketing program may be able, for instance, to generate a  2% across the board increase in gross margin for a large company – hardly sufficient in this environment  to warrant much attention. But that business represents, in absolute dollars, a much higher boost to revenue and margins for a smaller company. And, given the lack of competition, it is comparatively easy to attract, again, at this time.

2. The recession (or whatever you call it) is about to be over. As the economy normalizes, individual spending, especially among people with high disposable income, rises disproportionately fast – for higher income earners, reduction in spending is based on psychological factors and fear, rather than actual economic disruption. Once this fear is lifted, spending rapidly return to normal, boosted by the funds that were, effectively, saved during the recession.

In partnership with the CCGLAR and GNetwork360 the IGLCC invites you to participate in its 3rd Annual Congress in Buenos Aires, Argentina.
For more information:
cesar.maschmann@iglcc.org
pablo@gmaps360.com
gustavo@gmaps360.com

Sexuality/Diversity in the workplace survey launched by GLOBE
Access the survey here
For more information visit GLOBE Website

GLBT-entrepreneurs in the (Vienna) economy.
On the occasion of the election of the chamber of commerce in March, agpro invites representatives of all political parties in Austria to present their programs and initiatives to promote GLBT-businesses in the (Vienna) economy.
For more information: www.agpro.at

The ILGTA Ambassador to Brazil, Clovis Casemiro participated at the event of South America’s largest Bank and one of the 10 largest in the world as a guest to discuss their sustainability project. At the meeting the bank has agreed to have a space for gay people in their project.
For more information visit the online version

Curitiba, Brazil
For more information: http://www.ilgalac.grupodignidade.org.br/

We invite everyone to read about the work of the IGLCC newest Affiliate Member from France, La Féderation nationale de L’Autre Cercle by visiting their activities section on their website.
For more information: http://www.autrecercle.org/

Wirtschaftsweiber & WyberNet, the national associations of lesbian managers and entrepreneurs of Germany and Switzerland have initiated an European online survey about "The L-World in Business".

Access the survey here
For more information: http://sites.google.com/site/thelworldinbusiness/Home

Equality Bill – A fairer future
Guest speaker: Emma Reed (Head of LGB and T policy, Government Equalities Office)
One of the most controversial and talked about Bills in the UK surrounding all the strands of Diversity.

For more information: http://www.gba.org.uk/events.htm

2010 NGLCC Diversity & Leadership in Financial Services Awards
For more information: http://www.nglcc.org/

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