KENTUCKY FRIED CHICKEN: is getting plenty of complaints from British TV watchers who don’t like its TV ads showing call center representatives singing with their mouths full. The Brits said it depicts bad manners and looks unpleasant. Some 1,671 complaints were logged by the Advertising Standards Authority, making the ad Britons most complained-about TV commercial. KFC said the run was over and would not show it again, according to news reports. The ad was created by Bartle Bogle Hegarty, which is minority owned by Publicis.
CINGULAR WIRELESS: set a new record for text messaging in the fourth season of America Idol, recording more than 41.5 million text messages throughout the show’s 12-week voting period. The number more than tripled the amount of text messages recorded in the 2004 season. The messages included votes, trivia, sweepstakes entries, TXT chats, fan club and vote number reminders.
PROCTER & GAMBLE: hired Barefoot Advertising, Cincinnati, to handle its Home Made Simple e-mail newsletter for home-care brands including Mr. Clean, Dawn, Febreze and Swiffer. Cincinnati shop Bridge Worldwide had handled the five-year-old newsletter, which goes to six million-plus subscribers. Bridge continues to handle a similar newsletter, Health Expressions, and other P&G projects.
UPSHOT: Chicago, promoted Jay Davidson to VP-account services, a new post, from senior director. Davidson oversees Upshot’s work for Disney and ACNielsen.
INTERACTIVE SHOP REFINERY: Hatboro, PA, hired Gerry McGoldrick as senior VP-search engine services, a new post. He had been president and co-founder of directMASS, a search-engine marketing agency that Refinery recently bought.
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