IKEA Pods Promote Store Opening

Advertising For Peanuts points to a campaign for IKEA which consists of 14 outdoor mini-stores placed along streets to promote the opening of the Funabashi store in Japan. We wonder how many people crawled into the things and adopted them as their temporary home.

Kate Moss Is Back With Calvin Klein

Despite the brand bailout following Kate Moss' cocaine dalliance, Calvin Klein, who Moss had been with fourteen years ago when she appeared along side Marky Mark (Mark Wahlberg) as he was then known, has re-signed the supermodel to in a new ad campaign for the brand. Moss will appear in ads along with Jamie Dornan, formerly of Keira Knightley boyfriend fame and a model for Calvin Klein since 1992. The deal is worth about $890,000 U.S. dollars. Ads were shot over this past weekend in New York and will begin to appear Fall 2006.

Design Studio Pits Young Guns Against Old Ones

Somebody, Jeremy Abbett according to Whois, went out and created a site that pits the large holding companies (Old Ones) against the independents (Young Guns). Lining up fpr the Old Ones are WPP, Dentsu, Omnicom, Publicis and Interpublic. Stepping on the field for the Young Ones are W+K, CP+B, Naked, Mother and Strawberry Frog. It's a game of strength as the Young Guns hurl media bombs (TV, Print, Net and WOM) at the business-suited Old Guns hoping to eradicate their asses from the world. While it's funny, it's also a pretty clear representation of what's going on in the ad agency world right now.

As it turns out, Jeremy Abbett is a partner at Truth Dare Double Dare, a design studio that probably hopes to eradicate the world of both Young Guns and Old Guns so it can take over all creation of the earth's marketing.

Sexy Billboard Called 'Sexist Shite'

It seems somebody has taken offense to the imagery of beautiful, barely dressed women used in ads to promote products and has expressed him/herself calling this billboard "sexist shite."

Inline Skating Company Taps MySpace Users With News Ticker

Extreme skating company Roller Warehouse hopes to jump on whats left of the MySpace bandwagon with an interesting promotion. Roller Warehouse's Rid D tells us, "We've created a news ticker that can be pasted within any MySpace page, and are rewarding any MySpacers who use this ticker with a 5% discount on any purchase. We think this is a great buzz-marketing effort, and we've already seen a significant increase in sales since implementing the program." Reviewing any typical MySpace page, it's clear members love their widgets so this Roller Warehouse widget would feel right at home.

Life Might Take Visa But 'America Runs On Dunkin'"

Sounding oddly similar to Visa's new tagline "Life Takes Visa," Hill Holliday has just introduced a new tagline for Dunkin' Donuts: "America Runs On Dunkin'" Hmm. Well, we're not complaining. After all, there's isn't much more you need to get through life than a credit card and caffeine. There are eight spots in the campaign, most of which play like music videos and do the whole coffee as lifestyle thing. Our favorite, Pleather, rocks on about that annoying summer problem of legs sticking to leather/pleather car seats. The campaign also includes nine radio spots, print, in-store advertising, outdoor and online.

UPDATE: Hill Holliday lays out all the work and the thinking behind it on their new website/blog.

Continental Airlines Advertises On Chopsticks

Following Ella Blache Paris' draping nude women over chopsticks to promote its "skin good enough to eat," Continental Airlines has placed wraps on chopsticks in New York City Japanese restaurants which read, "Sticking it to the competition." Maybe Continental should hook up with sushi bars that promote their establishments with their food draped over nude models.

Nepotism And Scandal Fill Old Navy Creative Department

Hmm...now we now why all those Old Navy ads are so kooky. A tipster give us the lowdown on the allegedly scandal and nepotism filled world of the Old Navy in-house creative department writing, "Word from the tumultuous in-house marketing department at Old Navy is that the creative director, Mr. Landis Smithers (yes, that's his name), has fired the departmental IT expert and subsequently replaced him with another IT "expert" (credentials not known by this tipster) who just so happens to be the domestic partner/boyfriend/significant other (it's San Francisco, so we need to be p.c.) of one Mr. Smithers.

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State Farm Promotes Disney Pixar 'Cars' Movie

It seems pretty obvious - a car insurance company sponsoring a movie about cars - but insurance companies aren't usually the sort of company that gets in bed with Hollywood. That line of thinking's ended with State Farm's promotional sponsorship of the upcoming Disney Pixar movie Cars. State Farm will co-brand and launch a sweepstakes called State Farm Countdown to Cars, created by Disney Online, which will run through June 19 and offer 25 grand prize winners who will be awarded a 2007 red Ford Mustang two door coupe.

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Heineken Sends Us Beer, Launches Campaign

The other day, we received our very own, specially packaged bottle of Heineken Premium Light. We promptly did our job by taking a few pictures of the packaging to share with you and then placed the bottle in the fridge for future enjoyment. Well, that future came and we can tell you we liked what came out of that bottle.

In terms of promotion, Heineken Premium Light is getting $50 million thrown at it in the form of a national marketing campaign with simple layouts of a Heineken Premium Light bottle and taglines such as "Succumb to Smooth." There's also an out-of-home component to support the wider distribution of the beer and national television advertising kicks off on April 17.

Krystal Restaurant Puts Customers Faces on Packaging

Apparently, there's this really popular restaurant in the South called Krystal. Who knew? We sure didn't and we also didn't know the chain's website has a very attractive spokesperson named Krystal to guide visitors around the company's website. Aside from that, Krystal has this thing called Krystal Lovers Hall of Fame, an area that features Krystal lovers from around the restaurant's six state area.

Their big thing is the Krystal Hamburger box or the Cheese Krystal box, boxes full of small, square burgers. Hmm, sounds a lot like White Castle. That's because, as a commenter points out, it's the southern cousin of White Castle. Krystal will now feature its Hall of Famers on these boxes as a promotion.

Nikon Celebrates Optics With Military Gun Site Ad

Following in the boundary-pushing footsteps of the Schering baby-in-a-dumpster ad comes this Thialand ad for the Nikon Cool Pix S4 which uses military gun site imagery to convey the effectiveness of Nikon technology. Surely and ad that would never run in America but, apparently, the rest of the world has dispensed with this thing called political correctness.

Unilever's Sure Unleashes the World Cup Beasts

Unilever's Sure Sport is getting Football (soccer) fans all worked up with a new video clip featuring all manner of wild animals and site that has anything and everything a football fan cold possibly wish for. Spend some time with it.

Advertising Age.com Redesigns

Advertising Age has a very cool new design. It feels much more contemporary and easier to dive into. It's taken on a wider width as many recent relaunches have. The headlines are easier to read. The redesigned email newsletters look great too. The contents of the print edition will be available to subscribers Sunday night. It's all a welcome change.

AAAA Execs Use Dues to Fly First Class, Cost-Conscious CEOs Fly Coach

A tipster who wishes to remain anonymous traveled to the AAAA's Conference last week and tells us about an interesting observation. We'll let them tell it in their own words. "I was flying to the 4A's conference and something struck me as funny. There were 3 4A's staff (senior level) heading out to the conference all in first class. There were about 6 agency execs (one being a c-level) all in coach. Per the presentation at the meeting over 70% of the 4A's revenues comes from dues paid by the agencies. Unbelievable that they [the AAAA's execs] chose to spend it less responsibly than the agencies that give it to them in the first place. Lower spending = Lower dues." Right on. Ah, but how ad wags love their perks.

News Corp. Launches Teen Stalker Awareness Campaign

OK, that's it for all you teen-loving 30/40-something men. With the launch of a new stalker awareness campaign, News Corp. hopes to make MySpace teens completely aware of your shenanigans and boot you back to women your own age. Created by the Ad Council in 2005, the campaign will blanket Fox properties MySpace, Fox network, FX, National Geographic and Fuel TV. With the ever-imaginative tagline, "Don't believe the type," the ads point people to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children's center website which then links to a page specific to the campaign. On that page are links to the PSAa, a game that aims to teach kids about the sketchiness on online profiles and an area with information for parents.