Ads to Appear on Parking Lot Stripes

In the seemingly endless quest to plaster every last surface of the world with advertising, Denver ad man, Greg Gorman, creator of the Budweiser frogs and their signature "Bud-Wei-Ser," has applied for a patent and trademarked the words, "Parking Stripe," which is the name of his company. The company will work with 3M, a client of Gorman's at Golden advertising, and parking lot owners to adhere special strips containing ad messages right over existing parking lot lines. Parking lots could become very colorful places in the not too distant future.

CareerBuilder Wants College Grads to Get A Job

Engaging in a bit of experiential marketing, job-search engine CareerBuilder.com is launching a college event marketing campaign, a mobile marketing tour that kicks off October 1. The tour will be split up into three regions (West Coast, Central, and East Coast), with two vans carrying a total of four ambassadors in each region. Currently, twenty-three campuses are on the agenda with more to follow. Hooking up with each school's career center, CareerBuilder.com will hold informal job-search seminars showing students how to search for jobs on the Internet, how to write an effective resume, and how to use the Web to send a resume. Also at each stop are mini seminars on how students can market themselves to employers; games; chances to win a cruise, plasma screen TVs, and MP3 players; and premium giveaways. San Francisco's Swivel Media organized the program.

Wipe Your Ass With This Ad

As part of our continual bickering about the incessant proliferation of inefficient, un-targeted advertising, over two years ago we predicted toilet paper would be the next medium of choice. Well, yesterday, we were sent a link to Just Toilet Paper, a company that imprints toilet paper with all sorts of cutesy designs but that also sells ad space and, as it turns out, has been doing so since 2001. The company, which claims people go to the bathroom, on average, six times a day, will imprint a company's logo or design on various sizes of toilet paper. While there's certainly merit to this medium, what with it's "captive" audience, we're just not sure many brands want people wiping there ass with precious corporate logos. Of course, it's a great way for consumers to take out their aggressions on brands and shit all over the ones they don't like.

Kanye West Bush Comment Becomes T-Shirt

As soon as Kanye West went off-prompter during NBC's A Concert for Hurricane Relief Friday saying, "George Bush doesn't care about black people," enterprising t-shirt company Moe Wampum began marketing shirts with West's comment emblazoned upon them. Bucky Turco informs us the shirts are being promoted through the BlogAds ad network and appear on, among others, Gawker Media's Wonkette.

Tour Markets Tech Gadgets to College Students

Co-produced by The Consumer Electronics Assocation and college marketing firm Mr. Youth and sponsored by NVIDIA, RCA, SIRIUS Satellite Radio, HP Lightscribe, Nintendo, Logitech, Gibson Guitars, Geek Squad, Sony, and Audiovox, the TechKnowOverload will visit 24 college campuses and two college festivals placing the latest gadgets in front of 60,000 technology-voracious college students. As part of the tour, students can enter to win a $10,000 "Ultimate Dorm Room" tech makeover

Book Promoted With 'TwattyGirl' Apparel

Having gone to trademark court to prove the word "TwattyGirl" is "not immoral or scandalous," let alone referential to a particular female body part, New York-based hedge fund executive Precious Marlowe (again, who names their kids like this?) has launched an apparel brand called TwattyGirl. According to the press release, the line is "designed for independent, sexy, bold, outspoken women from 18-45 and is inspired by the main character, TwattyGirl, in Marlowe's forthcoming novel – 'Bulletproof –Things Twattygirl Told You, But You Didn't Want to Hear.'" Of course, this whole thing is just a stunt to promote the book.

The line will include t-shirts with inspirational slogans or "twattyisms" along with lingerie, jewelry, baseball caps and greeting cards.

'Got Milk' Campaign Becomes Clothing Line

Extending its brand, the California Milk Processor Board has signed deals with apparel manufacturers MJC Corp. and Cutie Pie Baby to create lines of Got Milk? branded men's boxers and baby clothing respectively. The MJC line will be sold through Wal-mart and the Cutie Pie Baby line will be sold trough Babies' R Us, Buy Buy Baby Baby Depot and Federated stores. There are plans for a an MJC women's wear line which will be sold through Target.

Branded Hotel Key Card Goes Un-Noticed

While we're sure this has been done before though we're not sure how effective it was since a friend had to point it out to us, Datran Media sponsored the hotel room key cards at the Sheraton Hotel in Chicago during the ad:tech online marketing conference. Every attendee who was staying in the hotel was given a Datran-branded version of the hotel's room key card.

Whether it was the Pampered Chef conference attendees cackling like hens in the elevator or simply the innocuous nature of a hotel room key, our attention was not drawn to the card. Perhaps it was the design. Perhaps it was our weary, conference-addled brain. We just didn't notice the card. What we did notice, disturbingly, was our car keys missing from our briefcase upon arrival at Logan Airport in Boston and the hundred dollar cab ride we had to take home while knowing those Massport folks would be collecting $29 for each day we had to wait for our keys to be FedEx'd back to us from Chicago. Who said conferences where uneventful?

Flip Book Makes Comeback

Low Tech Interactivity

Over 100 years ago, Henry Van Hovenbergh invented and patented the flip book. The first flip books consisted of simple drawings stacked in sequential stages of movement with a single staple binding. When the pages were flipped, they would create the optical illusion of motion. Flip books were then popularized in the early 1900's by the Cracker Jack Company who gave them away as free in-pack prizes. Other marketers soon followed suit, including manufacturers of breakfast cereals, bubble gum, cigarettes, automobiles and snack foods.

A company called Flippies has re-engineered (although it looks the same to us) the original concept a bit resulting in a perfect bound book that plays back, according to the company, crystal clear clips of full motion video with one thumb flip. Flippies has also created a process to easily convert video footage to flip book format. The company intends to promote its services to marketers who might be interested in off beat media through which to advertise.