Hasta La Creative!

LONDON – Depaul Trust, the national youth homeless charity, has launched a one-day campaign today, the shortest day of the year, to highlight the plight of young homeless people who will be enduring the longest night.

Consumer agency Exposure has been forced to pay thousands of pounds for its involvement in a spat between The Daily Telegraph newspaper and actress Nicole Kidman.

LONDON – Arla Foods’ Lactofree dairy drink is to appear in TV ads for the first time at the beginning of January, as part of a £3m cross-media campaign, including national TV and print advertising, sampling, online and PR support.

Time Out has appointed The SPA Way to handle its consumer business following a six-way pitch.

Congratulations all copywriters. Merriam-Webster’s Word of the Year 2007 is w00t! so now you may use it. This means all other words have been done now that we’ve officially run out of alphabet and begun using numbers in spelling. N34t. The loosing lolcats could not be reached for comments but I suspect they are plotting revenge. Sneaky cats.

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Sure, FINE, damn you Kiwis just rub it in you have summer down there while we freeze our bums off up here. Just rub it in won’t you. In fact, rub it in with a series of coke pinup posters featuring bikini clad babes frolicking with giant bottles why don’t you? Go ahead. See if I care.

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NEW YORK (AdAge.com) — Tony Palmer Kimberly-Clark's first chief marketing officer, has taken some radical steps at the marketer that spent $412 million on worldwide advertising last year. The latest: enlisting communications-planning shop Naked Communications — known for its emphasis on nontraditional marketing — as Kimberly-Clark's new agency partner.

NEW YORK (AdAge.com) — Dow Jones under the new control of News Corp. has found the next chief marketing officer for its consumer properties, including The Wall Street Journal and Barron's, by looking internally: The company today promoted Paul Bascobert, senior VP-operations, to CMO of the Dow Jones Consumer Media Group. He succeeds Ann Marks, who left last Friday after nine years as CMO, but is assuming a position that seems to be taking a broader shape than before.

What were the biggest marketing blunders of 2007? I’m too buzzed on eggnog to compile my own list, but both Fortune and Collateral Damage have amusing roundups. The former (which we Twittered earlier in the week) selects Procter & Gamble at No. 1 for putting kids’ pictures on a diaper boxes without forking over the big bucks, or even informing their parents. (Hey, I was at that casting call. I really should’ve shaved.) Topping the Collateral Damage chart: Take Two Software’s inclusion of O.J. Simpson as a player for a team called the Assassins in its All Pro Football game. I’m not sure that’s a blunder, since O.J.’s inclusion makes me want to check out a product I’d normally have zero interest in. Go, Juice! Cartoon Network’s outdoor push for its Aqua Teen Hunger Force movie placed high on both lists. Parent company Turner Broadcasting shelled out $2 million to the city of Boston after the campaign ignited … sorry, strike that … I mean, set off … sigh, just forget it … a bomb scare in Boston. Given the quality of the film in question, I’d say a bomb scare was pretty much inevitable.

—Posted by David Gianatasio

Controversy seems inevitable when you create ransom-note- style ads beginning with phrases like, “We have taken your son.” But apparently it’s the message, not the approach, that has put a quick end to a new poster campaign for the Child Study Center. The ads, which you can see at Osocio, were created pro bono by BBDO to raise awareness of psychiatric disorders like depression, autism, ADHD and OCD. The writing is terse and visceral. “We have your daughter,” one poster says. “We are forcing her to throw up after every meal she eats.” But not all disorders are as clear-cut as bulimia. Advocates for children with autism felt the campaign perpetuated negative stereotypes with phrases like, “He will no longer be able to care for himself or interact socially as long as he lives.” While it’s obvious the campaign was intended to spark controversy, Child Study Center founder Dr. Harold S. Koplwicz raises a valid point when he says, “It’s the first time that the issue of children’s mental health has gotten national attention without being precipitated by a shooting at a high school or college.”

—Posted by David Griner