Business Jokes — most viewed jokes

A salesman was testifying in his divorce proceedings against his wife. "Please describe," said his attorney, "the incident that first caused you to entertain suspicions as to your wife's fidelity."

"Well, I'm pretty much on the road all week," the man testified. "So naturally when I am home, I'm attentive to the wife." "One Sunday morning," he continued, "we were in the midst of some pretty heavy love-making when the old lady in the apartment next door pounded on the wall and yelled, 'Can't you at least stop all that racket on the weekends?'"

I took some friends out to dinner last week, and I noticed a spoon in the shirt pocket of our waiter as he handed us the menus. It seemed a little odd, but I dismissed it as a random thing. Until our busboy came with water & tableware; he too, sported a spoon in his breast pocket. I looked around the room, and all the waiters, waitresses, busboys, etc. had spoons in their pockets.

When our waiter returned to take our order, I just had to ask, "Why the spoons?"

"Well," he explained, "our parent company recently hired some Andersen Consulting efficiency experts to review all our procedures, and after months of statistical analyses, they concluded that our patrons drop spoons on the floor 73% more often than any other utensil; at a frequency of 3 spoons per hour per workstation. By preparing all our workers for this contingency in advance, we can cut our trips to the kitchen down and save time...nearly 1.5 extra man-hours per shift."

Just as he concluded, a "ch-ching" came from the table behind him, and he quickly replaced a fallen spoon with the one from his pocket. "I'll grab another spoon the next time I'm in the kitchen instead of making a special trip," he proudly explained.

I was impressed. "Thanks. I had to ask."

"No problem," he answered, then he continued to take our orders.

As the members of my dinner party took their turns, my eyes darted back & forth from each person ordering and my menu. That's when, out of the corner of my eye, I spotted a thin, black thread protruding from our waiter's fly. Again, I dismissed it; yet I had to scan the room and, sure enough, there were other waiters & busboys with strings hanging out of their trousers.

My curiosity overrode discretion at this point, so before he could leave I had to ask. "Excuse me, but...uh...why, or what...about that string?"

"Oh, yeah" he began in a quieter tone. "Not many people are that observant. That same efficiency group found we could save time in the Men's room, too."

"How's that?" I asked.

"You see, by tying a string to the end of our, eh. . ., selves, we can pull it out at the urinals literally hands-free and thereby eliminate the need to wash our hands, cutting time spent in the restroom by over 93%!"

"Oh, that makes sense," I said, but then thinking through the process, I asked, "Hey, wait a minute. If the string helps you pull it out, how do you get it back in?"

"Well," he whispered, "I don't know about the other guys; but I use the spoon in my pocket"!

A young executive was leaving the office at 6pm when he found the CEO (Chief Executive Officer) standing in front of a shredder with a piece of paper in hand.

"Listen," said the CEO, "this is important, and my secretary has left. Can you make this thing work?"

"Certainly," said the young executive. He turned the machine on, inserted the paper, and pressed the start button.

"Excellent, excellent!" said the CEO as his paper disappeared inside the machine. "I just need one copy."

Due to the recent merger of AOL and Time Warner, AOL members can soon expect the following changes:

Time Magazine's next "Man Of The Year" issue will feature Steve Case on the cover as the undisputed winner. This of course will strictly be a coincidence.

The standard irritating AOL popups will be replaced by Warner Bros. cartoons. Now, Elmer Fudd will say, "You cwazy wabbit, you've been onwine for 5 minutes and that's way-y-y too long... we're going to boot you off!"

The next time that you hear Bugs Bunny say, "Eh, what's up Doc?" he will be referring to your monthly AOL subscription charge.

Below are fine examples of what happens when marketing translations fail to reach a foreign country in an understandable way.

Coors put its slogan, "Turn it loose," into Spanish, where it was read as "Suffer from diarrhea."

Clairol introduced the "Mist Stick," a curling iron, into German only to find out that "mist" is slang for manure. Not too many people had use for the "manure stick".

Scandinavian vacuum manufacturer Electrolux used the following in an American campaign: Nothing sucks like an Electrolux.

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

When Gerber started selling baby food in Africa, they used the same packaging as in the US, with the beautiful baby on the label. Later they learned that in Africa, companies routinely put pictures on the label of what's inside, since most people can't read English.

An American T-shirt maker in Miami printed shirts for the Spanish market which promoted the Pope's visit. Instead of "I saw the Pope" (el Papa), the shirts read "I saw the potato" (la papa).

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

Pepsi's "Come alive with the Pepsi Generation" translated into "Pepsi brings your ancestors back from the grave," in Chinese.

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."

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."

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

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.

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

How do salespeople traditionally greet each other?
→ "Hi. Nice to meet you. I'm better than you."

An organization is like a tree full of monkeys, all on different limbs at different levels. Some monkeys are climbing up, some down. The monkeys on top look down and see a tree full of smiling faces. The monkeys on the bottom look up and see nothing but assholes.

Ya see, we at Microsoft believe in making computing easier! What could be easier for consumers than having only ONE choice of software?!?

The accountant's prayer: Lord, help me be more relaxed about insignificant details, starting tomorrow at 10.53:16 am, Eastern Daylight Saving Time.

Two shoe salespeople were sent to Africa to open up new markets. Three days after arriving, one salesperson called the office and said, "I'm returning on the next flight. Can't sell shoes here. Everybody goes barefoot."
At the same time the other salesperson sent an email to the factory, telling "The prospects are unlimited. Nobody wears shoes here!"