Business Jokes — best jokes

Scorcher Murphy was selling his house, and put the matter in an agent's hands. The agent wrote up a sales blurb for the house that made wonderful reading. After Murphy read it, he turned to the agent and asked, "Have I got all ye say there?" The agent said, "Certainly ye have... Why d'ye ask?" Replied Murphy, "Cancel the sale...'tis too good to part with."

Where do frogs keep their money?
→ In a river bank!

A little old lady went to the grocery store & put the most expensive cat food in her basket. She then went to the check out counter where she told the check out girl, "Nothing but the best for my little kitten."

The girl at the cash register said, "I'm sorry, but we can't sell you cat food without proof that you have a cat. A lot of old people buy cat food to eat, & the management wants proof that you are buying the cat food for your cat."

The little old lady went home, picked up her cat & brought it back to the store. They sold her the cat food.

The next day, the old lady went to the store & bought 12 of the most expensive dog cookies - one for each day of Christmas. The cashier this time demanded proof that she now had a dog, claiming that old people sometimes eat dog food.

Frustrated, she went home, came back & brought in her dog. She was then given the dog cookies.

The next day, she brought in a box with a hole in the lid. The little old lady asked the cashier to stick her finger in the hole. The cashier said, "No - you might have a snake in there." The little old lady assured her that there was nothing in the box that would bite her.

So, the cashier put her finger into the box & pulled it out & told the little old lady, "That smells like crap." The little old lady grinned from ear to ear, "Now, my dear, can I please buy 3 rolls of toilet paper?"

A boy was bagging groceries at a supermarket. One day the store installed a machine for squeezing fresh orange juice.

Intrigued, the young man asked if he could be allowed to work the machine, but his request was denied.

Said the store manager, "Sorry, kid, but baggers can't be juicers."

A young man asked an old rich man how he made his money.

The old guy fingered his worsted wool vest and said, "Well, son, it was 1932. The depth of the Great Depression. I was down to my last nickel."

"I invested that nickel in an apple. I spent the entire day polishing the apple and, at the end of the day, I sold the apple for ten cents."

"The next morning, I invested those ten cents in two apples. I spent the entire day polishing them and sold them at 5:00 pm for 20 cents. I continued this system for a month, by the end of which I'd accumulated a fortune of $1.37."

"Then my wife's father died and left us two million dollars."

Cracking an international market is a goal of most growing corporations. It shouldn't be that hard, yet even the big multi-nationals run into trouble because of language and cultural differences. For example, observe the following examples below.

The name Coca-Cola in China was first rendered as Ke-kou-ke-la. Unfortunately, the Coke company did not discover until after thousands of signs had been printed that the phrase means "bite the wax tadpole" or "female horse stuffed with wax" depending on the dialect. Coke then researched 40,000 Chinese characters and found a close phonetic equivalent, "ko-kou-ko-le," which can be loosely translated as "happiness in the mouth."

In Taiwan, the translation of the Pepsi slogan "Come alive with the Pepsi Generation" came out as "Pepsi will bring your ancestors back from the dead."

Also in Chinese, the Kentucky Fried Chicken slogan "finger-lickin' good" came out as "eat your fingers off."

The American slogan for Salem cigarettes, "Salem - Feeling Free," got translated in the Japanese market into "When smoking Salem, you feel so refreshed that your mind seems to be free and empty."

When General Motors introduced the Chevy Nova in South America, it was apparently unaware that "no va" means "it won't go." After the company figured out why it wasn't selling any cars, it renamed the car in its Spanish markets to the Caribe.

When Parker Pen marketed a ballpoint pen in Mexico, its ads were supposed to say "It won't leak in your pocket and embarrass you." However, the company mistakenly thought the spanish word "embarazar" meant embarrass. Instead the ads said that "It wont leak in your pocket and make you pregnant."

An American t-shirt maker in Miami printed shirts for the spanish market which promoted the Pope's visit. Instead of the desired "I Saw the Pope" in Spanish, the shirts proclaimed "I Saw the Potato."

Colgate introduced a toothpaste in France called Cue, the name of a notorious porno magazine.

In Italy, a campaign for Schweppes Tonic Water translated the name into Schweppes Toilet Water.

The Committee for the Reduction of Redundancy and the Antiproliferation of Repetition has decided not to meet until they have their first meeting and thus will not be meeting until the first time.

Their Pre-meeting Statement wanted to make this clear before they had their first meeting, so that it would not be unor confusing.

So their first meeting will actually be their first meeting and they will not have a meeting before the first meeting.

This should avoid having people show up for their first meeting before it is held, since to do so would be confusing to those who did so and this is what they want to avoid by reducing the confusion and lessening the repetition.

This guy runs home and bursts in yelling, "Pack your bags honey, I just won the lottery!"

She says, "Oh wonderful! Should I pack for the beach or the mountains?"

He replies, "I don't care...

Just get the f**k out!"

Do you know what happens if you don't pay your exorcist?
→ You get repossessed!

Mr. Greenberg was an illiterate immigrant, but he worked hard, saved his pennies, and started a small business. It did well, and soon he had enough money to send for the wife and children. The work kept him very busy, so he never had time to learn to write, but the bank was happy to do business with him, even though his signature consisted of two X's.

He prospered, he opened more stores, the kids were transferred to private schools, the family moved into a fancy house (with one staircase going nowhere just for show)...you get the idea. One day his banker, Mr. Smith, asked him to drop by.

"So vat's the problem?" Greenberg asked, a bit anxiously.

Smith waved a bunch of checks at him. "Perhaps nothing," he said, "but I wanted to be on the safe side. These recent checks of yours are all signed with 3 X's, but your signature of record has just 2."

Greenberg looked embarrassed. "I'm sorry about making trouble," he said, "but my vife said that since I'm now such a high class rich guy, I should have a middle name!"