Rita Ferro, president of advertising sales and partnerships at The Walt Disney Company, says the media giant is getting ready to start preproduction across all of its properties, which includes ABC, ESPN, National Geographic, Freeform and Hulu, to ensure a new slate of programs is ready by fall. “We are excited about where we are…
Welcome to First Things First, Adweek’s daily resource for marketers. We’ll be publishing the content to First Things First on Adweek.com each morning (like this post), but if you prefer that it come straight to your inbox, you can sign up for the email here. After 131 Years, PepsiCo Is Dropping Aunt Jemima Spurred by…
PepsiCo said it will drop the image of Aunt Jemima and rebrand the line of pancake mix and syrup that has borne the name since 1889. The parent of Quaker Oats Company, which has owned the brand since 1926, did not specify what the new name will be or what the updated packaging will look…
Spotify Wednesday added video ads to Ad Studio, its self-serve ad platform, in Canada, the U.K. and the U.S. The update is also available to select advertisers in test markets that Spotify added to Ad Studio in April. The streaming platform said Ad Studio, which is available in 22 markets across the globe, enables advertisers…
The change lets Facebook play both sides of the debate about political advertising on social media.
LinkedIn outlined the steps it is taking to fight racial inequity and remove the systemic barriers to economic opportunity. Chief marketing and communications officer Melissa Selcher said in a blog post, “As an organization deeply rooted in our vision to create economic opportunity for every member of the global workforce, we have a responsibility to…
Facebook detailed some new features for its Portal From Facebook video-calling devices, highlighted by the addition of group video calls via Messenger Rooms. Up to 50 people can participate in Messenger Rooms group video calls, and Facebook accounts are not a requirement. Portal Spaces gives users dynamic backdrops that change over time, which can be…
Unless you’re a design pro you might not have noticed that the Heinz logo, along with the typeface on packaging, hasn’t always been completely uniform. Until now, the global food giant-which has products spanning 20 categories, including pantry staples like ketchup, beans and mayonnaise-has used variations of branding, with the Heinz logo appearing sometimes on…
With the Covid-19 pandemic throwing a wrench into the television industry’s upfront plans, Univision rescheduled its presentation to the ad community for this afternoon, going the virtual “at-home” route so many broadcasters have in 2020. The most-watched network on Spanish-language TV for 28 straight seasons, and No. 5 in all of U.S. TV, followed up…
Google confirmed today that it took issue with two conservative websites over comments sections that violated the company’s policies on “dangerous and derogatory” content. Zero Hedge will no longer be able to use Google’s ad platform to monetize its content as of last week, and The Federalist was warned about their comments section and was…
On Tuesday, PepsiCo CEO and chairman Ramon Laguarta announced on Twitter that the CPG conglomerate would be committing $400 million to fund several initiatives centered around racial justice and equality. The $400 million will be spent over the next five years as part of an effort to “to lift up Black communities and increase Black…
In April, organizers of the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity, advertising’s largest event, canceled the 2020 edition due to the Covid-19 pandemic, marking the first time in nearly 70 years the festival won’t be held. While the event is slated to return to France in 2021, organizers were determined provide an outlet to engage…
The National Football League announced on Friday in an internal memo that it will observe Juneteenth as a league holiday, joining the increasing ranks of companies including Google, Nike and Twitter planning to give their employees June 19 off. Juneteenth commemorates the end of legal slavery in the U.S. in 1965, when the last remaining…
NBCUniversal promised it would hold a big upfront event for both marketers and audiences–and the company seems to have found a way to satisfy both groups: by combining its upfront with a 30 Rock reunion. The company is reuniting the cast of Tina Fey’s hit NBC sitcom–including Fey (Liz Lemon), Alec Baldwin (Jack Donaghy), Jane…
YouTube’s FameBit branded content studio is now YouTube BrandConnect, which the Google-owned video site described as a platform where brands and creators can collaborate on branded content for its platform. YouTube BrandConnect global business head Lori Sobel and product manager Henry Scott Green said in a blog post that the influencer marketing industry as a…
To many, the Civil Rights protests of the 1960s seem a distant memory. But watching police crack down on protesters as a movement spread nationwide also makes it feel like it could be happening today. A new video, created as a passion project by a trio of 72andSunny New York staffers, highlights how what happened…
GroupM chief investment officer Matt Sweeney thinks gaming and esports will be central to the future of entertainment, calling the content “intriguing.” “It will be interesting to see what happens to esports when live sports gets back on the air,” Sweeney told Lisa Granatstein, editor, svp, programming, Adweek, as part of Adweek at Home, a…
Alexis Johnson and Michael Santiago, who are black, said The Post-Gazette had unfairly kept them from covering antiracism protests.
Brands have been slow to embrace conversation settings Twitter began testing last month that enable accounts to determine who can reply to their tweets–everyone, only people they follow or only people they mention in that tweet–but Hulu is giving the feature a test drive Tuesday night as part of a watch party for its screening…
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