Last night I attended the annual <a href="http://fashionsnightout.com/" target="_blank">Fashion's Night Out</a> (FNO) event in New York City; having now observed the hoopla from swanky 5th Avenue to the very hipster Lower East Site of Manhattan, I'm beginning to feel like a veteran fashioinista. Fashion's Night out was conceptualized by Anna Wintour of <a href="http://www.vogue.com/" target="_blank">Vogue</a> fame (infamy?), and the underlying mission of this multi-city coordinated event is to jump start retail activity by attracting consumers into stores just before the holiday shopping season launches. <img class="alignright size-full wp-image-5883" src="http://luminositymarketing.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2011/09/fno.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="263" /> Lackluster sales effects resulting from Fashion's Night Out have been widely discussed, with analysis of previous years' sales data indicating more bark than bite when it comes to generating transactions. <a href="http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2010/09/11/fashions-night-out-did-shoppers-spend-a-dime.html" target="_blank">The Daily Beast estimates</a> that costs for hosting an event during FNO begin at $20k, and that is for a "basic" event. You can imagine how those costs skyrocket for more elaborate events. So is it worth it for retailers? <a href="http://luminositymarketing.com/blog/?p=5880">[...]</a>

I’m a gal who doesn’t eat to live—al contraire, I live to eat. Naturally, I love to throw a good party as this affords a totally acceptable reason to feed my obsession. Among my friends, I’m well known for experimenting with new recipes within my preferred culinary category of tapas/hors d’oeuvres. So you can imagine my delight when I was invited to the launch party for a new content partnership between Rachael Ray and online publisher eHow. [...]