Q&As

Makers of glassware premiums are readying a push to support new federal legislation that would ease pressure on marketers in California.

The weight-loss instructor who filed a lawsuit several weeks ago against the Coca-Cola Co. claiming that its popular My Coke Rewards program might prompt kids to drink so much soda that they could die or at the very least become obese, has dropped the suit.

Could this week be Old Navy’s “Best Week Ever” for back-to-school sales?

A multi-pronged tie-in with VH1’s hit show Best Week Ever drives traffic to Old Navy stores with an in-store instant-win game that awards prizes each hour. The top prizes: A walk-on role on VH1’s show; Chrysler Crossfires (four winners nationally) and tickets on United Airlines. Lesser prizes include Baskin-Robbins ice cream cones, a Best Week Ever sampler CD, compiled by VH1 and discounts on Old Navy goods.

A month after Alltel Corp. spun off its landline business merging it with Valor Communications Group Inc. and forming the new entity, Windstream Communications, the new company has launched a Green Truck Tour in a 33-market grassroots effort to introduce its services to consumers.

Something wicked is brewing on New York and New Jersey beaches. In an effort to generate buzz around the Broadway hit Wicked: The Untold Story of the Witches of Oz, brand ambassadors are hitting the sand to dole out Wicked-branded premiums. …

Chevrolet, Coca-Cola Co., McDonald’s Corp., PepsiCo’s Gatorade and Molten Worldwide Distributing have teamed up with USA Basketball the governing body for men’s and women’s basketball in the U.S., to sponsor exhibition games, special events and …

Melitta USA takes its new single-serve coffeemaker to college this fall with a 36-campus tour. Melitta will tout its Ready, Set, Joe One-Cup coffeemaker with a sampling program slated to reach 300,000 students. Sample packs include a Ready, Set, Joe …

MasterCard and retailer Bed Bath & Beyond are courting college students with a back-to-school sweeps dangling a grand-prize $100,000 for tuition. The 2006 MasterCard Back to College Sweepstakes with Bed Bath & Beyond gives shoppers one automatic entry …

I’m going to give direct response marketing a rest this week. Brand advertising has more than its shares of foibles, and in the spirit of balance I offer the following, which vivisects one such campaign. A slightly different version of the following piece first appeared in CM Plus (www.chiefmarketer.com/cm_plus), Direct executive editor Beth Negus Viveiros’s excellent newsletter which covers the lighter side of marketing. The spot itself is available on the YouTube video sharing site I wrote about last week (www.youtube.com). Type “Manthem” into the search box and… enjoy?

In a scant six months, Burger King’s television commercials have gone from the sublime to the ridiculous.

(Multichannel Merchant) Imagine creating and sending a print mail piece only to find out that before delivering it, the U.S. Postal Service stripped out the graphics and put little symbols where pictures used to be.