The foundation is shifting under the house that Joel Ewanick built at General Motors.
During his tenure as CMO at the country’s second-largest advertiser, Mr. Ewanick built a historic agency structure for Chevrolet — a cooperative owned jointly by rival holding companies Omnicom Group and Interpublic Group of Cos. to service Chevrolet’s massive global creative account.
Goodby, Silverstein & Partners and McCann became partners in the entity, Commonwealth. But 11 months later, the structure seems to be changing pretty drastically.
When Time Warner spins off its magazine unit, the world’s biggest magazine company will become an anomaly: a publicly traded media company consisting entirely of magazines.
Time Inc. titles were once the crown jewels of media, generating nearly a billion in annual operating profit just a decade ago. By 2012 that had fallen to $420 million, a precipitous 25% drop from the year earlier. Despite recent cost cuts, that portfolio — and its infrastructure — was built for an era when ad dollars were plentiful.
Things have changed. “Magazines are still a great experience; they just haven’t been a great business,” said Michael Wolf, CEO of Activate, a consultancy that works with Cond Nast.
“Could we get two McGangBang sandwiches, please?” Two Ad Age reporters ventured into a midtown Manhattan McDonald’s to order this custom item — an unholy meeting between a McChicken and a Big Mac.
While the McDonald’s employee didn’t know exactly what we wanted, he didn’t bat an eye. After asking us to describe the sandwich, he called over a supervisor to code the order in. The cost: $7. In keeping with his willingness to allow customization, he then asked us if we’d like the chicken grilled or crispy.
The McGangBang is just part of a larger trend. Plenty has been written about everything from Starbucks’ superindulgent Double Cream Frappuccino to Burger King’s monstrous Suicide Burger, but why can these fat-tastic foods sidestep regulations requiring their calorie counts be posted?
Once again, in keeping with the spirit of this, the Regulation Issue of Advertising Age, your Media Guy has instituted a whole bunch of new laws, bylaws, bi-laws, in-laws and bi in-laws. For the betterment of media, marketing and mankind.
YOU MUST READ THESE UPDATED TERMS OF SERVICE TO PROCEED: By reading this “ARTICLE,” you irrevocably consent to abide by a “LICENSE AGREEMENT.” License Agreement is between “AUTHOR” (Simon Dumenco) and “READER” (you or your authorized representative, or your authorized representative’s representative or your unauthorized representative’s old college roommate — or James Franco, acting on your behalf, with or without your consent). Subject to the terms and conditions of this License Agreement, Author hereby grants Reader the nonexclusive, worldwide right to skim Article distractedly. In return, Reader grants Author the right to resell Reader’s likeness and/or personal photos to Instagram, which can, in turn, display such content in connection with paid or sponsored content or promotions or James Franco, without any compensation to Reader.
1. Henceforth, the number of Geico commercials that run on Hulu shall be restricted (something less than 18 per hour would be awfully nice) in order to reduce: A) the Geico Gecko’s exposure to solar radiation at nude beaches; B) the risk of the Geico Gecko falling to his death from George Washington’s eye socket at Mount Rushmore; and C) the chances of me losing my freaking mind.
As the implementation date for New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s ban on large sugary beverages draws near, marketers are reacting in many ways.
Dunkin’ Donuts was proactive last week in letting customers know changes are coming as of March 12, when the ban goes into effect. The chain began posting signs and handing out fliers in stores that informed customers they would have to add their own sugar and “flavor swirl” to large and extra-large hot beverages, as well as medium and large iced beverages. Large sizes of hot chocolate and Dunkaccino have been eliminated, while frozen beverages are only available in resized small and medium sizes.
Other marketers were planning changes but not actively promoting them. An employee at a Five Guys restaurant said large cups would disappear by March 12, while McDonald’s will begin asking customers to add their own sugar to coffee. But many at city establishments covered by the ban still seemed confused. In a midtown deli, for example, 32-ounce sweetened teas and 20-ounce sodas were still being stocked on March 7, and an employee wasn’t sure whether that would change in the coming days.
Fat. Salt. Carbs. At some point, all have been fingered as a culprit in America’s poor diet.
But sugar is shaping up to be the next public enemy No. 1.
It’s been the bad guy before, but a fresh batch of initiatives and studies are recasting sugar from its former status as a substance that might decay teeth and add a pound or two to one that contributes to life-threatening diseases. In some cases, it’s even been cited as a toxin poisoning the entire country.
When faced with allegations of false advertising, the goal for most marketers is pretty simple: settle and stay out of court. But that might be harder to do as the Federal Trade Commission begins taking a harder line on deals, requiring new boilerplate language that ad lawyers say could harm the reputation of big brands.
At the same time, class-action attorneys appear to be cherry-picking allegations made by the industry’s self-regulation bodies, potentially adding more risk to marketers partaking in a process that is meant to reduce such harm. The industry has seen “some cases where there were follow-on class actions and we think that is a very troubling trend,” said Lee Peeler, president-CEO of the Advertising Self-Regulatory Council.
Together, the two developments are enough to rattle the nerves of marketers seeking to avoid expensive court cases and consumer backlash to bad PR.
The administration searched staff e-mails to try to root out the source of leaks to the news media in a cheating scandal, and the staff members were not told until months later.
(TrendHunter.com) These kitschy streetwear features range from urban statement tees to kaleidoscopic couture casuals. Embracing an ornate and visually bold aesthetic, these editorials, runway shows and catalogs…
(TrendHunter.com) Arotin Hartounian depicts wonderous interpretations of the Dalai Lama in a contemporary turntable scratching form. In a way, this is in fact quite an appropriate interpretation.
Advertising Agency: BEI Confluence Communications, New Delhi, India
National Creative Director: Anwar Abbas
Art Director / Illustrator: Dheeraj Singh
Copywriter: Ranit Mukherjee
We wanted to make everyday life better with mobile, so we brought in a few surprises to a bus stop. We put up a poster featuring a URL. We waited for people to visit the mobile site. When they pressed the button, the fun began. Watch to see what happens when we created the best bus stop ever.
Advertising Agency: Denizen Company, USA
Producer: Cathleen Fitzgerald
Director of Photography: Abe Martinez
Editor: Tim Dennesen
Music: Percy Grainger
Advertising Agency: barrettSF, San Fransisco, USA
Creative Director / Copywriter: Jamie Barrett
Production Company: biscuit filmworks
Managing Director: Shawn Lacy
Executive Producer: Colleen O?Donnell
Director: Noam Murro
Producer: Jay Veal
Production Supervisor: Jen Berry
Director of Photography: Eric Schmidt
Editorial: Rock Paper Scissors, Stewart Reeves, SpotWelders, Catherine Bull
Music: J. Ralph / The Rumor Mill
O recém lançado álbum do Beck, Song Reader, desencadeia uma série de experimentos do artista, repensando a forma como interagimos com a música.
Em vez de um álbum comum, Song Reader é na verdade um livro com as partituras de suas novas canções. Nenhuma delas foi gravada pelo músico, o que relembra o início da história da música, onde era possível escutá-la somente quando a tocavam ao vivo.
Além de retornar ao passado, o projeto também agrega a internet, ao convidar os fãs ao redor do mundo a enviarem suas versões tocadas das partituras e compartilhá-las no site do álbum.
Seguindo a mesma linha de experimentar a música de diferentes formas, Beck se uniu ao especialista em projetos interativos, Chris Milk, para criar uma performance inovadora de seu cover do David Bowie, ”Sound and Vision”.
Para quem não conhece, Chris Milk foi o criador do palco do show do Arcade Fire no Coachella de 2011, com balões brancos que piscavam de forma interativa e caíam por toda a plateia durante a música “Wake Up”, transformando o festival em uma incrível e enorme pintura de luz.
Para este projeto, Beck 360, foi criada uma performance online e interativa do músico tocando o cover de Bowie ao vivo. Filmada usando câmeras de 360 graus em um palco circular, é possível assistir ao show em diferentes perspectivas, impossíveis de serem atingidas a olho nu.
Essa mudança de olhar pode ser feita tanto com o mouse quanto com os olhos, a partir de uma conexão do usuário com tecnologias de reconhecimento de face via webcam. O resultado é uma performance psicodélica e interativa.
Abaixo, o making of dessa colaboração entre Beck e Chris Milk:
(TrendHunter.com) Miami-based artist Augusto Esquivel designed these incredible fun fair-inspired button sculptures from hanging strips. His latest work has a strong festival theme, which can also be observed through…
SXSW has a unique problem: the bigger it gets, the less it becomes about the film, music, technology or the festival itself and more about the ad agencies, brands and marketing pap that surrounds it.
But there are some SXSW employees who are fighting to redirect attendees’ eyeballs away from the marketing side shows and back to the Austin Convention Center where the “actual” festival is held. Further, festival organizers would like attendees to actually “be” in the convention center and not on their devices.
That’s partly why SXSW brought in New York City artist and educator Otis Kriegel this year. As one of the festival’s several artists-in-residence, its his job to use art to distract attendees from their smartphones and precipitate face-to-face interaction.
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