8/26

DIVERSIFIED ENTERTAINMENT INC. and direct marketing executive Joel Margulies launched The Margulies Agency, a full-service strategic marketing and branding company. In 1996, Margulies founded Transactional Marketing Partners, a relationship marketing organization that serves the electronic retailing industry. The new agency will be based in the Los Angeles headquarters of Diversified Entertainment, a holding company.

8/25

CMGI INC. appointed Joseph C. Lawler president and CEO. He takes over the post from George A. McMillan. During the last eight years, Lawler was executive vice president at R.R. Donnelley. He serves as vice chair of the Direct Marketing Association and is past chairman of the United Negro College Fund Advisory Board in Chicago.

THE NAUTILUS GROUP elected Donald Keeble to its board of directors. Since his retirement from Kmart Corp. in 2000, Keeble has been president of AKK Consulting. He also is executive vice president and COO of Spirit Entities, a water purification systems contractor.

8/24

ADVO INC. will expand its weekend shared-advertising distribution area into Southern California. The territory will encompass 7.2 million homes in communities such as Los Angeles, San Diego, Santa Barbara and Bakersfield. The program will run along with its current midweek effort in that region.

EXPERIAN acquired Americas Software Corp., a developer of regulatory compliance software systems, for an undisclosed sum. Americas Software specializes in anti-money-laundering programs for banks and other financial institutions. The two companies will combine their existing products to help clients with identity verification, fraud, money-laundering detection and compliance with government regulations. Americas Software will become part of Experian’s Fraud Solutions unit, but will remain in Miami. Current management and employees will stay on.

GROUP 1 SOFTWARE named Tim Waggoner executive vice president of product development and operations for its enterprise solutions division. Waggoner has been with the company since 1992, most recently as chief technology officer. In his new position, he will be responsible for all of Group 1’s data quality mailing efficiency and data integration software products, as well as customer support, education, and product fulfillment for the division.

THE DIRECT MARKETING DAY FOUNDATION awarded more than $124,000 in grants to regional colleges and universities. Twenty grants were given in four categories: student scholarships, student-attended seminar programs, a direct marketing resource center and school libraries. “Investing in the education and training of the next generation of direct and interactive marketers is essential for the growth of our industry,” said Lee Epstein, chairman and founder of the Direct Marketing Day Foundation, in a statement.

8/20

CASUAL MALE RETAIL GROUP INC. signed an agreement to acquire Rochester Big & Tall Clothing Inc. for $15 million in cash and the assumption about $5 million in debt. In a statement, David Levin, CEO of Canton, MA-based Casual Male, said the company sees significant expansion opportunities for Rochester, both domestically and internationally.

ALC OF NEW YORK LLC set up I-Media, a business unit that will concentrate on package insert programs, blow-ins, ride-alongs and other alternative marketing vehicles. I-media now represents programs from such companies as Ross-Simons, One Step Ahead, Hammacher Schlemmer, Home Trends, Smith & Hawken and The Wine Enthusiast.

8/19

Wakefield, MA-based database services provider BENOW named Ned McMullen senior vice president of sales. McMullen will lead sales efforts for BeNow’s multichannel retail segment. He previously was vice president of business development for loyalty marketing provider S&H GreenPoints, specializing in providing database hosting and customer loyalty for consumer retailers.

8/17

THE FEDERAL TRADE COMMISSION approved a settlement with Paul Schroeder, the last of seven defendants to face FTC litigation in conjunction with First Capital Consumers Group. According to the settlement, Schroeder is required to transfer two houses and various bank accounts, worth an estimated $1.8 million, to the FTC. According to the complaint, First Capital, also operating as US Guardian United Consumers, Trans America United Benefits Group, Transglobal National Consumers Group, and First Guardian National Benefits, operated a fraudulent pre-approved credit card scam based in Toronto that targeted U.S. consumers with poor credit histories. It advertised a pre-approved credit card, from MasterCard or Visa, with no annual fee and a credit limit as high as $2,500. A one-time processing and membership fee of between $189 and $219 was deducted electronically from the customer’s bank account. The FTC charged that consumers who registered with First Capital never received a credit card. Instead, Schroeder would send some customers coupons and discount offers for cell phones, credit, magazines, legal services, prescription programs, satellite systems, car loans and travel. Other customers received a stored-value card that required them to deposit money before using it. The six other defendants in the First Capital case were two Canadian corporations and the four owners of First Capital: David Dalglish, Leslie Anderson, Lloyd Prudenza and Mark Lennox. The FTC settled with Anderson on Feb. 4, and he paid $250,000 in consumer redress. The remaining five defendants received two bans and a monetary judgment equivalent to First Capital’s net sales, or $8.27 million.

8/16

MKTG SERVICES OF NEW YORK expanded its list management and brokerage operations by acquiring Markettouch for undisclosed terms. “This acquisition will offer a great deal of cross-selling opportunities between our organizations,” said MKTG executive vice president James Ryan in a statement. Markettouch will continue to operate from its office in Alpharetta, GA. The deal includes Markettouch’s Real America database, which includes records for 215 million individuals in 103 million families and more than 60 million e-mail records. More than 100 lists previously managed by Markettouch were transferred in April to MKTG Services, an affiliate of the credit bureau CBC Cos.

4/16

FAO INC.’S efforts to emerge from Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection hit a substantial obstacle when investors withdrew their proposed funding. In early April, the King of Prussia, PA-based toy marketer received confirmation of $77 million in financing: $67 million was to come from a group of banks led by Fleet Retail Finance Inc., with another $10 million promised from Back Bay Capital Funding LLC. But FAO said “unexpected complications” in completing its exit funding caused these financiers to withdraw their offers. FAO anticipated using the cash infusion to pay off loans that were to come due April 18. FAO is exploring other options, including obtaining replacement equity funding to complete its confirmed plan, a sale of all or portions of its operations and liquidation.

AMERICA ONLINE INC. has filed five separate lawsuits against more than a dozen different companies and individuals in an effort to reduce unwanted e-mail solicitations. The papers were filed in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia in Alexandria. AOL is seeking civil penalties, total monetary damages of at least $10 million, and court orders to immediately halt unsolicited messaging from these defendants. According to AOL, the defendants are responsible for sending its members more than 1 billion pieces of spam, which generated some 8 million member complaints. Neither a trial date nor a hearing to determine when a trial might be held have been set, according to AOL spokesman Nicholas J. Graham.

4/14

LANDMARK COMMUNICATIONS acquired an equity stake in Alliant Cooperative Data Solutions. The stock purchase was valued in the seven figures and gave Landmark “significant minority investor” status, according to Alliant CEO JoAnne Monfradi Dunn. The cash infusion will allow Alliant to complete development of TransactionBase, a cooperative database containing customer performance records of bill-me marketers. The file currently contains 200 million undeduped consumer records and will be available in June to the nine marketers that contributed customer data for the first file build.

USA INTERACTIVE purchased the nearly 32% of Hotels.com stock it didn’t already own for $1.1 billion. Hotels.com will continue to operate separately from the parent company, but USA Interactive would not rule out the idea of combining Hotels.com with its Expedia subsidiary or other travel-related properties.

4/11

The Senate reintroduced the CAN-SPAM BILL authored by Sen. Conrad Burns (R-MT) and Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR). The bill, similar to one introduced last year by the 107th Congress, would require consumers to be given a chance to opt out of individual e-mail lists, and would allow the Federal Trade Commission to impose civil fines on violators. Companion anti-spam legislation was set to be introduced in the House of Representatives by Rep. Billy Tauzin (R-LA). The biggest difference between this Senate proposal and last year’s version is that mailers would have the option of including hyperlinks for opting out instead of a return e-mail address, according to Jennifer O’Shea, a spokeswoman for Burns.

FINGERHUT DIRECT received a $100 million line of secured credit to finance inventory, receivables and working capital. The company, which mailed its first catalog in November 2002 and six catalogs in the first quarter of 2003, is owned and operated by FAC Acquisition.

4/9

THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES unanimously passed S.380, a bill removing from the U.S. Postal Service the burden of paying the pensions of many retired employees. Last fall, the USPS discovered it had overpaid the Civil Service Retirement System fund by more than $70 billion. A week earlier, the Senate approved a version of virtually the same measure, which also would postpone a postage rate increase until 2006. “This delay will do much to encourage growth in the 9 million-job mailing industry,” said Direct Marketing Association CEO H. Robert Wientzen.

OFFICE DEPOT INC. made a bid to acquire the contract sales business of French office supplies marketer Guilbert S.A. from Pinault-Printemps-Redoute Group for 815 million euros, or $872 million. Contract sales are usually conducted through electronic data interchange. The transaction could close later this spring. Last year, Staples Inc. purchased Guilbert’s mail order business for about $807 million.

4/8

A MARYLAND DISTRICT COURT JUDGE ruled that an anti-spam advocate had the right to post the name and address of an alleged spammer on the Internet. The court found that Francis Uy was “simply exercising his First Amendment right to free speech and disseminating information to others” when he publicized George Allen Moore’s name and address on online anti-spam forums such as netabuse-email, according to Jonathan Biedron, Uy’s attorney. Moore’s attorney, Cheryl Assenio, did not return calls from Direct for comment. Moore claimed that because of Uy’s actions he received more than 70 packages and 200 magazines he did not order, as well as threatening phone calls.

4/7

New York State Attorney General ELIOT SPITZER and Minnesota Attorney General MIKE HATCH filed suit against Cross Country Bank of Wilmington, DE, alleging that it defrauded and harassed low-income consumers with poor credit. Also named in the complaints was Applied Card Systems of Glen Mills, PA, which allegedly made abusive collection calls. The attorneys general, who said they acted after receiving hundreds of complaints apiece, are seeking civil penalties, restitution and court orders barring the firms from continuing their practices.

L.W. ROBBINS ASSOCIATES won best of show honors in the New England Direct Marketing Association’s Awards for Creative Excellence. The agency won for the American Bible Society’s 2001 annual member mailing.

4/3

INTERNET RESEARCH FIRM JMXI INC., formerly known as Jupiter Media Metrix, went out of business. The company planned to file a Certificate of Dissolution with the Secretary of the State of Delaware on or before May 1, and would cease all operations, making a cash liquidating payout to its stockholders. JMXI fell on hard times after a planned merger with NetRatings in February 2002 collapsed under FTC scrutiny of loan agreements between the two companies.

BLYTH INC., a home fragrance and decorations marketer, completed its acquisition of the Miles Kimball Co. The transaction was valued at $65 million. Miles Kimball’s Oshkosh, WI operations and 275 employees will stay in place. Blyth currently has neither a Web site nor catalog, relying instead on retail sales and Amway-style sales parties.