Dustin Hoffman has reprised his role from "The Graduate" to hawk the Audi A6 and a new ad. It's been banned from airing in the U.S. When will marketers, handler and stars themselves realize it is impossible to prevent the spread of these things. Of course, half the time it's planned that way. And becasue it's been promoted as "banned," the poor servers are working overtime at Ad Age to serve this thing to the whole world that isn't supposed to see it.
With an estimated half-million college students on Spring Break from mid-March through mid-April in Panama City, advertisers are taking note. Namely, the Army. The U.S. Army's Goodwill Ambassadors' elite parachute team, The Golden Knights, are making jumps down on the students as a recruitment effort.
I can envision the conversations. Army officer to drunk hot babe in tiny bikini: "Would you be interested in hearing about a career in the Army?" Hot babe responds: "Sure, after you show me your weapon and let me size it up."
Magazines have seen a 70 percent decline in newstand sales. Read Ad Age's Special Report: Circulation Solutions, an in-depth look at the state of magazine publishing affairs.
Oh, those acquisition rumors. Don't you love them? Yesterday, the New York Times reported Havas media services agency MPG had received an offer for a 49 percent stake in the company. Well, today, it's all being denied.
"We've had no offer" for MPG, said Havas spokesman Simon Gillham, and clarifying, "absolutely none of MPG in any form, whole or tiny parts, is for sale" because "it's part of our core business."
Havas has had some financial turbulence lately reporting some losses last quarter and perhaps wants to keep rumors quite even if there's a chance they may be true. It's so easy to plant a story and then deny it and you never really now what's true until after it's all done.
While Japan is far from being as uptight about smoking as those in America are, Japan Tobacco Inc. has launched an ad campaign urging consumers not to quit but to be more considerate. Instead of discussing the health issues surrounding the death sticks, the campaign carries copy such as, "The hand holding a lit cigarette is the same height as a child's face." Hmm, so it's OK to suck down that nicotine, just don't burn a kids face off while you are doing it.
Less than two months after the breast baring even that sent the nation into a puritanically conservative spiral, CBS, the network that started it all, is getting back to reality and won't use a 10-second delay during the NCAA Final Four tournament.
The New York Times had originally quoted a source over at CBS, Martin Franks, who said the network would add a delay. He was corrected by his PR spokesman Dana McClintock who said, "A CBS executive overstated the company's position. The network will not be delaying any of the games." Get your story straight guys.
