Throughout the past several months, the Synergy Merchant Services Blog has certainly doled out its fair share of advice to our beloved readers. Just as our fantastic funding specialists do, we take pride in our business practices and hope to share our knowledge and experience with those who work with us.

That being said, we maintain that a merchant cash advance is today's quickest and easiest resource for additional capital to help small and medium-sized businesses all over Canada grow. Even though some clients communicate concerns about participating in this program during the current economic state of the country, we encourage them to think of their company's future today.

Renovating and expanding are excellent ideas during a recession as they will help satisfy customer needs, especially when the economy strengthens. Nevertheless, there are still those business owners who remain steadfast in their beliefs that they must cut costs.

Of course, our merchant cash advances remain very helpful tools. And never do we recommend unwise spending. So we thought we would research some ways you may want to think about cutting costs, even while you are working towards growing your business.

Alvin Jay of EzineArticles.com suggests a number of methods to cut costs for your business. The first is to “diversify your operations”. Provide your employees with more than just one role, says Jay. This allows for duty distribution throughout your company so that you do not have to uneccesarily hire new staff. As he writes, “a small increase in pay for added responsibility beats paying someone an entire pay package.”

Another of Jay's suggestions is to employ technology that is free. Using the internet, of course, is the most common way to make long distance communication effective. Cutting phone costs through the use of such features as Skype or MSN can be very helpful.

A tip that we especially advocate at Synergy is to use recycled paper in your office. In fact, at Synergy, we work diligently to maintain a paperless environment. However, when necessary, we will use both sides of the paper when printing and recycle scrap paper when possible. This, of course, saves money on printer ink and buying new stationary.

Obviously, none of the above advice would be all that beneficial without efficient accounting. According to Jay, “Not many people know that with efficient accounting, hidden costs and unnecessary spending can be rooted out and removed completely from the company. Some companies who finally turn to using professional accounting services have found that they could have saved up to $25, 000 a year on useless expenditure.”

By adopting all of these cost cutting measures, a business owner not only places him or herself in a better position to save money, but more importantly he or she can spend that money in more important places. Especially with the assistance of a merchant cash advance, following such tips can mean the difference between just surviving and truly prospering through and after the recession.

One of the biggest obstacles that our funding specialists are required to get over on a daily basis is assuring our clients that no credit check is necessary to be approved for a merchant cash advance. The majority, if not all, of our customer base has become so used to feeling that there is no possible way to attain extra capital for their businesses without having to suffer a “knock” against their credit score.

The idea of having one's credit negatively impacted simply due to a “check” is still a concept we are not all that clear on. However, the good news is…we don't have to be. Our clients are not subject to a credit check as a merchant cash advance is not borrowed money.

As its namesake suggests, a cash advance literally advances a business owner money that he or she will inevitably make through future credit and debit transactions at their establishment. By advancing business owners their money based on these sales, they are capable of attaining that well-needed cash without the hassle of a credit check.

United Kingdom-based consumer finance journalist Martin Lewis developed his own website, MoneySavingExpert.com in February 2003. On his site, he offers business owners and consumes alike a wealth of advice that sheds a very revealing light on the practice of checking credit to determine one's credit score.

He warns: “Banks pick customers for their own good, NOT yours, so the scoring process is about profit not risk. Of course, risk plays a part, as those unlikely to repay are a threat to profits. Yet even the most solvent may be rejected if they're unlikely to act in a way that'll generate profit for lenders.”

At Synergy Merchant Services, we never hide the fact that a discount fee is charged on top of the cash advance given to our clients. This fee, obviously, is the cost of doing business, but is in no way determined by one's credit score. There is no ulterior motive other than to do business in such a way that BOTH parties profit.

We are more than confident that when our clients utilize their advances to help grow and expand their businesses, greater profits are inevitable. At the same time, it allows for Synergy to remain Canada's leading merchant funding company.

Banks, on the other hand, place themselves higher up on the priority list when considering the benefits of lending money to their customers. According to Lewis, “banks score you based on products they'd like to sell you in future.”

Rest assured that if you have encountered the hassle of credit check when attempting to attain extra capital for your business in the past, this occurrence will not repeat itself should you decide to receive a quote for a merchant cash advance from one of our funding specialists.

Now that's something to check out!

Sure…there are all types of ways that a business owner can improve his or her company. At Synergy Merchant Services, we provide business owners from all over Canada the opportunity to secure that much-needed extra capital in order to help their businesses grow and expand.

Although this is, by no means, a requirement in order to be approved for a merchant cash advance, many of our clients often inform of us of exactly what they have planned for the money they receive. Among the most popular choices to upgrade their businesses is renovations.

Renovating, of course, gives your place of business that updated, fresh and innovative feeling. There is no way to replicate the satisfaction one gets by experiencing something “new”. And especially during today's financial climate, business owners are encouraged to be weary of falling behind in the market place by remaining stale.

We firmly believe that those forward-thinking merchants, who wish to go that extra mile for their customers, are the ones who will continue to succeed for many years to come.

In an online article by Retail Visual Design consultant Linda Cahan, this belief is shown to be well-founded. “Renovations talk to your customers and to your staff,” she writes, “When management chooses to renovate a store it is showing its faith in the future of the store. Both customers and staff are aware that renovations are rarely made to stores about to be closed.”

In addition to solidifying the notion that you are not going out of business, Cahan notes that renovating helps to develop a trust with customers as well as sending a loud and clear message to your competition.

The message, writes Cahan, can be summed up by just about any of the following phrases: “I'm here to stay”, “I'm a player”, “I'm offering my customers more than my competition” and, our favourite – the ever-so confident “Match me!”.

At the end of the day, a newly renovated store communicates an increased sense of product value to a customer base. As Cahan writes, “The perceived quality of a purchase is in direct proportion to the look of a store. People buy down in prices when a stores' energy and appearance is faded, tired and old. Even when maintenance standards are high, people can sense dead energy.”

To Cahan, there is a simple equation that business owners everywhere should master. Very simply, renovations equal better sales.

If there is one industry that is sure to never go out of style, it is the food business. How often does the average person get hungry? Three, four times a day? The point is that as long as there are people, there will be the need for food.

So with this obvious point being made, it may be fair for one to assume that opening and running a restaurant is a surefire way to turn a profit. One may also assume that a restaurant's assured success must mean it is an easy task to obtain a bank loan to help fund the necessities of running the business.

Well, of course, neither is true.

There is a lot of competition in the food industry, and as Tim Berry states in an August 2006 article on Entrepreneur.com, “more people seek advice on launching a restaurant business than any other type of business.”

While Berry's article focuses on advice for entrepreneurs who are looking to open a restaurant, a lot of his tips may come in handy for current restaurant owners all throughout Canada. Not surprisingly, Berry mentions the liklihood of business owners seeking extra capital from a traditional financial institution and is keen on highlighting the pitfalls of doing so.

He writes: “Your borrowing options include commercial bank loans, which require assets you can stake as collateral, and SBA loans, which require less collateral than bank loans but still require you to put up 30 percent of the starting costs to qualify for the guaranteed loan.”

In this short paragraph, Berry unknowingly comments upon the stark contrasts between loans and merchant cash advances. Restaurant owners, who also happen to be clients of Synergy Merchant Services, revel in the fact that no collateral was necessary at all in order to attain the extra capital needed to develop their business. In addition, nothing was required to be “put up” in order to obtain approval for the merchant cash advance.

With it being so difficult to work with banks, especially during today's financial climate, many restaurant owners are finding the merchant cash advance a much more viable option.

Unlike the earlier-made assumptions about the automatic success of restaurants, Berry actually points out the riskiness of the food service industry. An investor, while always a great option if one is able to be secured, is rare in this type of business.

As Berry writes, “In general, restaurants aren't targets for professional investors because they're so risky. The few exceptions include celebrities who back restaurants that capitalize on their names, and well-known chefs and successful restaurant owners opening new venues.”

Are you hungry for that much-needed extra capital to secure the future success of your restaurant? If so, it's time you gave Synergy Merchant Services a call.

With the advent of so many forms of communication technology, the average Canadian can take for granted how easy it is to attain information. A simple jump on to the internet can get a person just about any info necessary on just about any topic. And many of them check out this blog on a daily basis! Good for you.

North Americans, in fact, use the internet so frequently that words like “tweeting” and tasks like “updating your status” are commonplace in today's vocabulary and activities. Numerous pop culture references have poked fun at our new society's obsession with the internet. “The Simpsons”, for example, once had the hairbrained Homer Simpson exclaim that he heard that they “have Internet on computers now!” D'oh.

What we take for granted though, some parts of the world do not yet have access to. Earlier today, groundbreaking news was made with the announcement that the internet is set to undergo changes that will see international domain names and e-mail addresses begin to accept non-Latin script.

As Kelly Olsen of The Associated Press reports today, this week a meeting was held in Seoul, South Korea by The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN ) to discuss this issue. There is now a likely possibility of the Internet finally allowing – after a surprisingly quick four decades – the ability for web addresses to be written “in characters as diverse as Arabic, Korean, Japanese, Greek, Hindi and Cyrillic – in which Russion is written.”

Peter Dengate Thrush, chairman of the ICANN board, believes that approval for this development with be granted as early as this Friday. “This is the biggest change technically to the Internet since it was invented 40 years ago,” he said, “(It is a) fantastically complicated technical feature.”

For those of you who are scratching their heads at the thought of the internet being forty years old already, its roots actually date back to experiments that were conducted at a United States university in 1969. However, as Olsen explains, it wasn't until the early 1990's that the web was used outside of acedemic and research institutions and became available as an information source to the general public.

Perhaps, however, it should come as an even greater surprise that after all this time, the internet only featured Latin characters, disallowing many Asian nations the ability to surf the web using their native dialects.

With Canada currently battling its economic downturn, it is not uncommon to find an unhappy Canadian frustrated with the lack of job opportunities and the onslaught of daily bad news. This is especially true in Ontario which, as reported this week, is experiencing its worst deficit of all time.

Naturally then, the Canadian government is being examined closely to see what it is they will do to right the ship and pull the nation out of its lowly state – both financially and emotionally.

Apparently, Prime Minister Stephen Harper has an idea that is sure to please nearly every Canadian citizen. He would like for Canada to have more NHL hockey teams.

That's right Canada! Now, how could you possibly get mad at the Prime Minister for that?

In a league of 30 teams, including the bankrupt Phoenix Coyotes and the 'do people even know what hockey is there?' Nashville Predators, there are only six franchises representing the Great White North. From west to east, we have the Vancouver Canucks, Calgary Flames, Edmonton Oilers, Montreal Canadiens, Ottawa Senators and of course, (who could forget the only winless team in the league at the moment?), our beloved Toronto Maple Leafs.

At one time, there was also the Winnipeg Jets (who are now the Coyotes) and Quebec Nordiques (now the Colorado Avalanche). Today, at a new conference in Quebec's Beauce region, Harper discussed a plan to bring back the defunct Quebec Nordiques who left in the 1990s.

Harper, who couldn't possibly upset the majority of Canadians with this idea, is a self-admitted big hockey fan. He believes that in addition to Quebec City and Winnipeg, that Hamilton could also support an NHL team.

As The Canadian Press reports, however, Harper “says he wants to avoid being dragged into a political debate.” At present, “Quebec City is in the middle of a municipal election and its incumbent mayor is campaigning on a promise to build a modern arena that could attract an NHL team.”

As the Synergy Merchant Services Blog has discussed before, the province of Ontario has taken quite a hit over the past several months as Canada battles through the recession. Today, headline news was made when it was revealed that Ontario is projected to have a record deficit of $24.7 billion for 2009 and 2010.

As Jonathan Jenkins and Antonella Artuso write on Toronto Sun's website, the deficit now practically doubles the previous record of $12.4 billion which inevitably saw Bob Rae lose his position as Premier of the province.

Finance Minister Dwight Duncan issued a statement about the groundbreaking revelation blaming the bloated deficit figure on a 48.1 per cent drop in corporate tax revenues amounting in a $5.8 billion loss in provincial revenue.

680 News' website revealed some depressing statistics about the financial state of Ontario today. They indicate that the province's “gross domestic product will decline 3.5 per cent this year” and that employment declined by 205,200 jobs in 2009 with jobs in the auto sector down by 25.5 per cent so far this year.

Says Duncan: “Although there are signs of stabilization in the economy, growth in government revenues and employment will lag behind growth in the economy.”

Along with Duncan, Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty insists that health care, education and job creation remain priorities. There is still a plan to go ahead with implementing a full-day kindergarten for four and five year olds in the province.

As well, $650 million has been set aside in the fight against swine flu and there is a plan to merge sales taxes that is expected to reduce tax revenue for the province by $2.3 billion over four years.

But how is this expected to help the average, everyday consumer? NDP critic Michael Prue believes that this will have a negative impact on Ontarians.

“It's all geared in one direction,” said Prue, “not to the consumer, not to the ordinary person, but to people who already make a lot of money. (McGuinty) is going to whack ordinary people.”

Sadly, Ontario has taken quite the “whack” already. Many will likely call for the removal of Dalton McGuinty as head of the province much as they did Bob Rae in the early 90s. It is likely that no one expected the state of Ontario's economy to ever get this bad.

Not long ago, a prominent Toronto-based musician was conducting a seminar on developing small businesses to a youth group at a community centre in his hometown. “Drive and passion are two different things,” he said, unveiling a concept that most were hearing for the first time. “Many say that they are passionate to succeed, but often do not have the drive to accomplish their goals”.

Evidently, loving to do something and working tirelessly to achieve success at it don't always go hand in hand. It's the combination of the two, the artist insisted, that will truly help foster one's success.

Sun Media's PJ Harston, it would seem, tends to agree. In an article released yesterday, Harston echoes the sentiments of the musician by writing that “the natural-born entrepreneur has that inane sense of passion — that feeling that there’s a business to be built and nothing is going to stop it from happening.”

For every dreamer, says Harston, appropriate planning is key if there is an intention of following through and meeting business goals. His belief is that “if you fail to plan, then you plan to fail”. Considering Canada's continuing struggle to climb out of economic hardship, this is an attitude that should be widespread and shared by entrepreneurs all over the country.

Harston offers a number of tips for small business owners to help make their dreams become realities in their chosen marketplaces. The first, and perhaps most obvious, is to ensure that you have enough money to get your business up and running. “Starting out undercapitalized,” he writes, “can start a downward spiral from which you may never emerge.”

Avoid generating a bad cash flow is his second piece of advice. After a business' beginning stages, it is imperative that owners ensure that the incoming cash does not counterbalance expenses and potential overhead costs. Making less money than you're spending, of course, is simply bad for business.

As mentioned earlier, good planning is key. Taking the time to map out an intelligent and realistic business plan that includes marketing ideas and covering financial issues will help turn an idea into a workable concept. Part of this planning, offers Harston, is to incorporate a “competitive edge”. Do your best to come up with something unique to offer your customers. Think intently about standing out from your competitors.

Going that extra mile to ensure your customers become loyal supporters of your business may possibly be the best advice of all. Maintain a focus towards the success of your business and never let go. It's one thing to dream, it's another thing to live out your dream.

For a little over a month, there has been a lot of news about the Canadian dollar creeping up on its American counterpart to match its worth in value. The strenghtening loonie, it seems, is strangely becoming a threat to Canada's economic recovery. As a result, the Bank of Canada has weakened the loonie's worth by two cents today.

Writes Julian Beltrame of The Canadian Press: “In one of the gloomier reports in months, the central bank’s governing council declared that a strong loonie would threaten Canada’s economic recovery, saying its recent rise had already more than offset all the encouraging indicators seen over the summer months.”

Beltrame notes that the bank's belief that the strength in the Canadian dollar may lead to slower growth of the nation's economy has forced it to keep its interest rate at the all-time low of 0.25 per cent. It has been at this rate since spring time.

As of Beltrame's report today, the Canadian dollar stood at 95.35 cents, down 1.8 cents from yesterday. He reveals that economists see this as no surprise considering the expectation of the Bank of Canada to follow Australia's lead in increasing interest rates.

At this point, the bank predicts that the national economy will decrease by 2.4 per cent this year as opposed to the 2.3 per cent forecast a month ago. With no sign of inflation in the near future, it looks as if the Bank of Canada's govenor Mark Carney will maintain the bank's 0.25 per cent interest rate until July 2010.

Says CIBC chief economist Avery Shenfeld: “The delay in returning back to its target rate on inflation would allow a longer period of keeping rates on hold. Financial markets tend to get edgy sitting still, but Carney is a man in no hurry to act.”

Last month, the bank was under the impression that the nation's economic recovery was so promising that it forecast a 1.3 per cent gross domestic product growth in the third quarter and a 3 per cent growth in the fourth. This was at a time, however, that the Canadian dollar was predicted to average 87 cents US through next year.

This month, Carney sees the loonie as a force that will slow down future growth. Before today's drop-off, the loonie was about 10 cents US above the value projected by the bank. It was expected to hit parity and greater by the end of the year.

With all of the talk about the state of the economy throughout this year, it appears as if less focus has been placed on other topics that should be equally important in the lives of all Canadians. One's health should undoubtedly be regarded with high importance. And while eating right can often equate to spending more money, it is imperative to maintain a healthy balance between expenditures and well…your health.

However, CBC News reports today that “almost a quarter of Canadians don't eat any fruits or vegetables on a daily basis, an indication that eating habits have not changed markedly in five years”. Based on a survey conducted on behalf of Dietitians of Canada, it appears as if many Canadians are not taking their health seriously.

CBC News provided some startling statistics on their website. Of the 2,292 adults who took the survey, 23 per cent revealed that they did not eat any fruits or vegetables during their previous day's meals and snacks. 38 per cent said they consumed no milk or milk products either.

Of the four good groups included in Canada's Food Guide – fruits and veggies, grains, milk and milk products and meat and protein alternatives for those who don't remember – the survey found that, for the most part, Canadians rarely consumed enough of each.

Evidently, Canada's food eating habits have not changed much this decade. In 2004, Statistics Canada discovered that a quarter of the calories consumed by Canadians came from unhealthy snacking with chips, pop and chocolate bars topping the charts as the most popular snacks.

Not surprisingly, The Dietitians of Canada survey showed that the majority of respondents blamed time constraints and the inconvenience of preparing food as the reason for missing out on all of the food groups on a daily basis.

Of course, packaged snacks and fast food are often seen as quick fixes for the hunger pangs of Canadians all over the country. Toronto-area dietitian Kathy Furgala suggests some strategies on how begin weaning yourself off of this pattern.

“It doesn't take much more time if you can just do some meal planning,” she said, “You can throw together a really healthy hearty soup in 20 minutes. I just did that. It was a recipe I found in a back-to-school flyer, a soup that had sweet potato, grated Gouda, and the kids loved it.”

“Eliminate the competition,” she continued, “Stock the fridge with food-group food. Find some recipes that you can make in one pot.”

Canadians everywhere should take heed. After all, you'll want to be here when the economy recovers, don't you?

Yesterday morning, the official medals for the 2010 Winter Olympics were unveiled in Vancouver, British Columbia. The gold, silver and bronze medals each feature original West Coast aboriginal designs of an orca and a raven.

As reported by CBC News, these unique medals have the distinction of representing a number of Olympic firsts. Firstly, each medal will incorporate a portion of an image cropped from two larger master works of art by Canadian designer and artist of Komoyue and Tlingit heritage, Corrine Hunt.

Secondly, the medals will not be created using standard circular, flat surfaces. Instead, they will feature “undulating” surfaces that intend to represent the West Coast landscape of mountains, waves and drifting snow.

If you ask this blogger, they look horrible. The warped shape of the medals looks more like an old vinyl record that was left near an overheated radiator for too long. “Ugly” is the first thing that comes to mind when viewing this new and supposedly innovative design.

Canadian industrial designer and architect Omer Arbel takes credit for the 2010 Winter Olympics Medal design. “I've always thought of the Olympic Games as a catalyst for great contemporary design. It's exciting to have arrived at a piece of work that challenges people's expectations of what a medal can be,” he said.

“For me, it was really important that in some way every medal would be completely unique from every other medal; and yet be connected to each other and to Corrine's larger artworks in some profound manner. It's a beautiful idea because it means on a conceptual level you need all the medals together to complete the artworks,” Arbel told CBC News.

The orca, according to Hunt, represents a beautiful creature that lives in the community with a strong tie to native traditions. The reverse side of the medals will carry the official names of the Olympic Games in both English and French as well as the emblems for the name of the sport and event that the medal is awarded within.

While the sentiment behind the design of the 2010 Winter Olympic medals is a noble one, the end result may be met with some criticism. Regardless, it should have no effect on the many athletes from all over the world who will be vying to get these medals placed around their necks this coming February.

At the beginning of 2009, most of Canada's small business owners found themselves in a bind. With the recession taking its grip on the global economy, merchants were suffering through decreasing sales and even fewer opportunities to receive loans from banks.

However, even with both 2009 and the recession not yet being over, it still appears as if now is the best time for starting up a small business. At least that is the case, according to Philip Demont in an article posted today on CBC News' website.

Says Don Bradley III, the executive director and professor of marketing at the Small Business Advancement National Center at the University of Central Arkansas, in Conway, Arkansas: “I think it's the greatest time we've ever had for small companies…A lot of these (business owners) are engaged in a bit of self-pity. They need to start looking around at what people want.”

Believing that the development of new communications services and technologies will allow start-up companies the ability to “carve our their niche”, Bradley insists that new businesses can take advantage of the economy's impending improvement.

Unlike bigger corporations, small businesses tend to sell to a small geographic area and are not generally required to export goods to other countries. As a result, notes Demont, disposable incomes and household net worth are more important factors than gross domestic product or GDP, which is usually the key signifier of economic success.

Demont goes on to reveal that both Canada's household incomes and personal disposable incomes increased in the first half of 2009. The increase is seen as especially significant in comparison to that of the United States. As well, the Canadian economy is expected to experience a growth in the latter half of this year, according to BMO.

“In addition, BMO believes that Canadians' real disposable income will grow 1.1 per cent in the third quarter and 1.0 per cent in the fourth quarter. Some of that economic improvement is already being reflected in how small businesses view the upcoming year,” writes Demont.

Good news is starting to filter through the bad with a bit more consistency as of late. With the economy beginning to strengthen, perhaps now is as good a time as any to begin your small business.

The weather outside is frightful. And that's coming from the perspective of someone working out of Synergy Merchant Services' headquarters in Toronto, Ontario. Living in Toronto, you learn to get used to the October air getting chilly. But weather reports have tonight's temperature hitting the freezing mark of zero degrees celcius!

With tomorrow's weather expected to hit a high of just six degrees, it has become more than obvious that the summer season is long gone. Torontonians can take some solace, however, in knowing that their city remains among the warmest places to be in Canada at this time of year.

A stark contrast to southern Ontario, Alberta and Saskatchewan have already experienced their first post-summer snowfall of the year! As early as September 29th, residents of Manning, Alberta woke up to see the ground covered in snow. An unbelievable nightmare to anyone living in Toronto, such a sight is apparently commonplace for Canadians living in the Prairie provinces.

Perhaps, this is the perfect time of year for Canadians to think about saving money. Of course, with the holiday season approaching ever so quickly, this may be a difficult endeavour. However, the concept of “staying inside” is one that will likely be considered pretty heavily by penny-pinching citizens from all over the country.

For others, staying inside is the last thing on their minds. Winter-lovers relish the icy and snowy weather, eager to begin ice skating, snowboarding or skiing. Especially for Canada's west coast residents who get to enjoy the mountainous regions of the country, winter sports are the ultimate thrill.

There will be no greater thrill, however, than 2010's Winter Olympic Games that will be co-hosted by Vancouver and Whistler, British Columbia. Undoubtedly, people from all over the world will be only too happy to brave the frigid Canadian winter to take in their favourite winter sport and cheer on their countrymen.

Others, of course, including us Torontonians way over on the other side of the country, will only be too happy to watch the Olympics on television, in the comfort of our warm homes.

Is winter your friend or foe? No matter what, it is inevitable that it is on its way. For some Canadians, it is already here.

One of the biggest stories in Canada over the past month or so has been the rise of the Canadian dollar. Slowly creeping up on parity to its U.S. counterpart, the loonie currently sits at 97.2 cents U.S., according to reports from The Canadian Press.

Interestingly though, the idea of a stronger value for the Canadian dollar may pose a problem to the economic recovery of the nation. One reason for this is the idea that Canadian shoppers may be thinking of crossing the border into the United States to do more of their shopping. Especially since the holiday season is approaching, more south-of-the-border shopping would result in a smaller-than-normal boost in sales for local retailers.

In addition, Prime Minister Stephen Harper said today in Vancouver that a strong loonie may make Canadian exports more expensive in foreign markets, creating greater difficulty with competition.

The Canadian dollar, however, has gained strength due to the growing health of the Canadian economy as of late. Our nation's financial climate, says Harper, is stronger than nearly every other industrialized country in the world.

Says the Prime Minister: “As we said before, we're not out of the woods. There are many risks…and obviously the value of the Canadian dollar is a risk to recovery. I don't think it's a risk to choking off the recovery but if it goes up too rapidly it does have difficult effects on our economy.”

It would seem then that Canadians should be encouraged to spend their money at home. To avoid having Canadian retailers suffer as a result of the stronger loonie, it is likely that many of them will be proposing greater bargains during the holiday season to keep consumers from heading south for a shopping excursion.

Mark Beesly, of the Retail Council of Canada spoke to 680News about this issue: “They're all vying for consumers dollars and they'll continue to try to keep those people attracted to Canadian stores.”

The rise in the Canadian loonie is a great one. Reports show that it has risen from a low of 76.33 cents U.S. in March to its current level up over 97 cents U.S. That is a rise of nearly 26 per cent. Some economists are predicting the loonie will be on par with the American dollar as soon as next week.

At this time of year, it is safe to say that there are many things that Canadians are thankful for. Number one on the list, most likely, is the fact that they are not required to go to work today! It's Thanksgiving Day in Canada, a statutory holiday in all provinces and territories except New Brunswick, Prince Edward Island and Nova Scotia, according to Wikipedia.

While the second Monday of every October is recognized as Thanksgiving Day in Canada – as opposed to the fourth Thursday in November in the United States – many Canadians sit down to a hardy Thanksgiving meal on either the Saturday or Sunday of their first fall long weekend. Some Canadians prefer to take the weekend off for a getaway to enjoy the new colours and crisp weather of the new autumn season.

Whatever one does on this weekend, he or she can be thankful for the long-standing traditions of First Nations groups in Canada who celebrated the harvest and gave thanks for their bountiful crops each year hundreds of years ago. Canada's First Nations, which included the Cree, Cherokee and Pueblo organized festivals and ceremonial dances in celebration and thanks many centuries before Europeans arrived in North America.

Martin Frobisher, an explorer who had the Atlantic Ocean's Frobisher Bay named after him, is credited with holding one of the first formal celebrations of Thanksgiving in 1578. Giving thanks for surviving his long journey through the Pacific Ocean, Frobisher held a feast in what eventually became Newfoundland and Labrador.

As the 1600's approached, explorer Samuel de Champlain and his French settlers began holding massive feasts of thanks as well. They eventually formed “The Order of Good Cheer” sharing their food with the First Nations during their celebrations.

Although there were numerous other occasions marking thanksgiving, it did not become a civic holiday in Canada until April 5, 1872 when the Prince of Wales recovered from a serious illness. Starting in 1879, Thanksgiving Day was observed annually with the date of celebration changing each year.

As Wikipedia writes, on January 31, 1957, the Canadian Parliament decreed: “A Day of General Thanksgiving to Almighty God for the bountiful harvest with which Canada has been blessed…to be observed on the 2nd Monday in October.”

So be thankful and enjoy your day Canada!