Favorite Headline So Far Today -- May 4, 2015

"McDonald's to simplify structure, focus on customers.

Yup, that's the AP headline. Isn't that "Business 101"? Focus on the customers. But maybe I'm missing something.

But it gets better. The story continues:

McDonald's is restructuring its units into four groups based on the maturity of its presence in the market:

• the flagship U.S. market, 
• established international markets such as Australia and the United Kingdom, 
• high-growth markets such as China and Russia, and, 
• the rest of the world.

Previously, the business was segmented by geography.

Sounds pretty close to geography. 

It's Monday.

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Active rigs: 

	5/4/2015	05/04/2014	05/04/2013	05/04/2012	05/04/2011
Active Rigs	86	185	192	211	177

RBN Energy: how Gulf Coast infrastructure responding to Bakken crude.

The Phillips/Energy Transfer Nederland to St. James project plans a 30-inch diameter pipeline that should be able to carry over 700 Mb/d of light crude. That would be enough capacity to handle DAPL and ETCOP barrels coming out of the Bakken as well as additional crude coming into Nederland from the Permian and from Cushing via the TransCanada Cushing Marketlink pipeline. But more importantly, the pipeline will offer Bakken producers their first opportunity to ship crude direct from North Dakota to refineries in the Louisiana and Mississippi Gulf Coast region by pipeline. As such the new route should offer shippers lower freight costs than existing rail alternatives. The result will likely be the displacement of significant Bakken volumes being shipped to St. James each day by rail.  

This is a very important article. It will be archived at the source, by the source.

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Post Office News From The Bakken

The Washington Post updates postal service in Williston, North Dakota, the heart of the Bakken. Not a pretty picture. They blame poor pay and yet any number of Williston fast food restaurants are thriving. This has little to do with pay and lots to do with bureaucracy.

By the way, while in Williston last week, I saw a residential postal carrier on her regular route delivering mail at 7:30 p.m.