5 Blogs Before Lunch

Big numbers for CBS Super Bowl broadcast

CBS has set a Super Bowl record for commercial time, airing 47 minutes and 50 seconds of ads, compared with NBC's 2009 record of 45 minutes and 5 seconds, Kantar Media is reporting.

There were 41 advertisers who bought time this year, of which 22 percent were first-time sponsors.

The CBS broadcast, with 106.5 million viewers, also eclipsed last year's record TV audience of 98.7 million, according to Nielsen estimates.

Marketers who ponied up for Super Bowl ads saw dramatic increases in online activity, as measured by blog posts, according to research from Interpublic unit Prophesee

Sources: MediaWeek and Adweek

Another blow to Coke and Pepsi: Study finds soft drinks may cause cancer

Apparently, sugary soft drinks not only rot your teeth and promote weight gain, they may also cause cancer.

A long-term study of 60,000 Singaporeans found that sugary soft drinks drastically increase the risk of developing pancreatic cancer.

Researchers at the University of Minnesota followed thousands of men and women participating in the Singapore Chinese Health Study for 14 years. At the end of the study, published this month in the journal Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers & Prevention, the team found that those drank two or more soft drinks a week had an 87 percent higher risk of developing pancreatic cancer.

The study found that those who drank fruit juice, which can have as much sugar as soda, didn't have the same cancer risk. 

Seems that Coke and Pepsi may need to start thinking about warning labels on their cans.

Source

Google to add Social Media tools to Gmail

Google is planning to add streaming status updates and video-viewing capabilities to Gmail in an attempt to bring the service more in line with social-media sites such as Facebook and Twitter.

It's an attempt at trying to get users to turn to Gmail as a place they can go to see what's up with their friends. But whether users will want to blend sending email with browsing friends' content is unclear.

Yahoo added a similar feature to Yahoo Mail last year, allowing users to see whether friends have uploaded a photo to a site like Flickr, for example.

More at WSJ.com and NYT.com

PajamaJeans: the latest in indoor-outdoor clothing

Bowing to the consumer trend of wearing pajama-bottoms in public, a company has introduced PajamaJeans--as comfortable as pajamas, but with the look of a pair of jeans.

Promoted as "the pajamas to live in, and the jeans to sleep in." the company says that PajamaJeans have all the detailing of jeans -- high contrast top stitching, back pocket design details, even brass rivets.

"We were noticing that people were wearing their pajamas on airplanes and in grocery stores. But a lot of people have mixed feelings about it because they think it's inappropriate and sloppy," Stacey Buonanno, merchandising manager for The PajamaGram Company, maker of the double duty "denim," explained to StyleList.

"We thought, why don't we develop something that you're comfortable hanging around the house in or even sleeping in, but it looks acceptable when you go out of the house?"

Tristar eco-friendly jeans from Brazil want you to clean your jeans inside your freezer

Here's a new twist on eco-friendly jeans.

A Brazilian company called Tristar has introduced a new line of organic reversible cotton jeans that comes with directions to trade your washing machine for your freezer.

Jandira Barone, CEO of Tristar says, “After use, just put them inside a plastic or cloth bag and leave them in the freezer for 24 hours to kill the bacteria."

Keep in mind that this will have no effect on the stains. Consumers will need to use the good old washing method for that, or just hide the stains by using the other side of the jeans as they are reversible.

Of course, if the jeans do get stained or are particularly dirty, they can be washed with more conventional techniques.

Toyota continues to falter: Dealers pull ads from ABC, Corporate runs feel-good ad

Just as Toyota headquarters (Toyota Motor Sales) started running their feel-good mea culpa ad, the Toyota dealers in five southeastern US states have pulled their ads from local ABC television affiliates over complaints about coverage of the automaker's recalls.

The dealer association, known as Southeast Toyota represents 173 dealers shifted their commercial spots to non-ABC stations in the same US markets as punishment for the reporting. The group includes dealers in Florida, Georgia, Alabama, South Carolina and North Carolina and represents about 20% of Toyota sales in the U.S.

This type of arrogance (believing that networks should only report positive news about the automaker) is just another example of out-of-touch executives who do not have a "customer-first" philosophy so necessary when dealing with such a crisis.

The dealers are complaining about the network's reporting on the sudden acceleration issues, believing that they pointed too much to how explanations from Toyota did not match the experiences of drivers it profiled..

Marcia Owens-Reder, senior vice-president of 22Squared, an Atlanta advertising agency for Toyota Southeast, said she had "tried" to talk the dealers out of the move, ABC said.

"We have counselled the client on the pros and cons of this, and ultimately it was their decision to make," the agency said in an e-mail sent to the television stations last week.

Source: AFP via Yahoo News

Here's the ad Toyota Motor Sales is currently running:

Old Spice Manmercials

Don't smell like sunsets and baby powder. Smell like jet fighters and punching.

That's what the Old Spice ads tell us.

For the last couple of years, Old Spice has been producing some side-splitting ads for a product that is best known to be found in your grandpa's medicine cabinet.

Here's a trip down Old Spice advertising lane (of late).

It all started with the Old Spice Centaur, where your man is two things: a man and a horse a man and a pretty smart shopper

Then actor Neil Patrick Harris told us how chronic body odor ruins lives:

And finally, The Man Your Man Could Smell Like tells us to stop using lady-scented body wash

Hat tip to @maringuy and @pazarm who say "dude that is some FUNNY SHIT."

5 ads that stood out during the Super Bowl

Here are 5 ads that floated to the top during yesterday's Super Bowl. They're ads that surprised, entertained, hit strategic targets and some that were disappointingly bad.

Best surprise: The ad for the Late Show with David Letterman featuring Dave, Oprah and surprise guest Jay Leno featured a wonderful "no way " moment. It revisited a promo from the 2007 Super Bowl with Letterman and Winfrey watching the big game. But with the surprise addition of Leno, addressing their recent "late night feud."

Best comedy: The Sinckers ad featuring Betty White and Abe Vigoda under the tagline "You're not you when you're hungry. Snickers satisfies." delivered a strong brand message while being hysterically funny. The line: "Mike, you're playing like Betty White out there." just makes me laugh.

Best epic story: Budweiser created a series of surprising tales to demonstrate Bud fans loyal commitment to the brand. In "Bridge" fans build a human bridge to ensure safe delivery of the their beloved Bud. In "Stranded" plane crash victims would rather party with Bud than be rescued. This is a good use of the Super Bowl environment and audience.

Best let down: The extremist christian group Focus on the Family generated a tremendous amount of publicity around the fact that they were allowed to run an ad on the Super Bowl--the group is known for its hateful speech and rigid stance against abortion and homosexuality. The controversy should have been around the deceptive message it delivered (portraying the group as something that its not) rather than playing up the supposed antiabortion message (which was washed away by the censors).

Best Waste of $3 million: Monster produced a commercial with a fiddling beaver to try to encourage viewers to help find their path with Monster's new precision job search function. Say what? The concept did not relate well to the message, and most viewers will remember the beaver and forget the sponsor. A poor execution. The only redeeming value in this commercial: the beaver's kinda cute.

Diamond Foods targets retailers with its Emerald Nuts and Pop-Secret popcorn spot on the Super Bowl

Everyone seems to be looking for value pricing these days.

Even on the Super Bowl broadcast.

Diamond Foods will pitch its Emerald Nuts AND its Pop-Secret popcorn in a single 30-second Super Bowl ad.

The ad is said to include a dolphin trainer at a theme park and the line "Awesome + Awesome = Awesomer.

Chances are they'll be diluting the strength of a single-focused message by mixing product lines.

But consumers are not the primary audience of this ad (via Ad Age):

Diamond Foods executives say there's some method behind what seems like madness: Retailers pay more attention to your products when they know there's a guarantee they will be promoted aggressively. And if retailers grant your product better positioning in the aisles because a promotion is coming, sales generally see a lift, said Michael Mendes, chairman, president and CEO of Diamond Foods.

Disney Parks promotion offers one day free for one day of service

Here's a good-hearted promotion that sits well with Disney's brand reputation.

In 2010, Disney wants to inspire 1 million people to volunteer a day of service to a participating organization in their communities.

Each will be given a one-day admission to a theme park at Disneyland Resort or Walt Disney World Resort, free.

Give one day of service, get one day of Disney fun. That's quite a deal.

Two Cents, and Two Points on why Toyota crisis management has been so poor

There's a lot being said about how Toyota is handling its recent recall crisis--and most of it has been negative.

It feels a bit like the Tiger Woods scandal--poorly managed as the story got bigger and bigger every day.

I can't help believe there are two major contributing factors to why Toyota's crisis management has been so poorly handled.

1). Toyota culture. The concept of consensus-building before decision-making simply does not work in a crisis. It makes Toyota look like it is sweeping things under the floor mats rug and not addressing consumer concerns. They're looking at this as a technical problem and not examining it as a consumer confidence problem.

They need a leader who can get out in front of the public and assuage fears. And Akia Toyoda just doesn't seem like that guy. Neither does Jim Press who is left as the mouthpiece for Toyota in the U.S.

2). They've let strong marketing leaders go to Detroit. I don't think it should be disregarded that Toyota has lost two STRONG marketers in the last couple of years, that I believe could have been a valuable asset during this crisis. Remember, marketing and PR lead crisis management strategies within organizations.

Jim Press left Toyota after decades of running sales and marketing for the company (rising to the head of Toyota Motor Sales). Jim knew how to run an automaker, and even though things haven't worked out the best for Chrysler, Press is still a top notch car guy. And Jim Farley, known for being the marketing genius behind Scion and other Toyota initiatives set off for Ford last year. Chrysler and Ford's gain has been Toyota's loss.

This all makes me begin to imagine the unimaginable: Maybe there is hope of Detroit becoming home to world class car companies once again--if only on the backs of other's failures.

Spanx for Men. Spanx for the beach. Everyone can now suck in their tummy and love-handles.

Spanx is one of those indescribable marketplace phenomenons like the Wonderbra and the Snuggie.

The "body shaping" undergarments are intended to give the wearer a slim and shapely appearance. About 5.4 million Spanx power panties have been sold in the last decade, with global retail sales for Spanx products exceeding $750 million for 2008.

Now, Spanx are headed to the pool and the beach with swimwear for women. The line is available exclusively on Spanx.com.

And, men can now take advantage of their patented stomach-sucking shaping technology with a re-defined cotton compression undershirt. As their press release says "Spanx is re-shaping men’s abs and expectations with Cotton compression undershirts designed for everyday wear that are guaranteed to perform every time."

Twitter and blogs are not for Millennials

In a Pew Research Center study designed to gauge the online habits of America's "millennial generation," a demographic group considered a bellwether of future technology trends, it was clear that blogging and Tweeting are not part of their daily lives.

The number of teenagers and young adults who blog has dropped in half over the last three years.

Amanda Lenhart, one of the report's authors said one reason for the shift might have come from the rapid ascent of Facebook over MySpace to the top of the social media charts in the past year. The MySpace format encourages members to blog, while Facebook instead features short status updates.

And teens who Tweet? Forget about it. Twitter, has failed to catch on with the vast majority of younger teenagers, according to the study.

Only 8 percent of online teens said they had ever used Twitter. Teens clearly preferred sending text messages - 66 percent - to tweeting. And with Facebook, Twitter may just be too much of the same.

The study also found:

-- 59 percent of young adults owned a video game console like a Microsoft Xbox or Sony PlayStation, and 22 percent owned a portable gaming device like a Sony PSP or Nintendo DS. The percentages were even greater for teens - 80 percent had a game console and 51 percent owned a portable.

-- Almost 4 in 5 teenagers, 79 percent, owned an iPod or MP3 player.

-- Of teens, 62 percent went online to get news of current events or politics.

-- More young adults, 66 percent, owned a laptop computer than a desktop, 53 percent.

And 81 percent of young adults who went online did so wirelessly, compared with 63 percent of adults age 30 to 49 and 34 percent of adults 50 and older.

Source: San Francisco Chronicle

Americans aged 8-18 consume 10 hours and 45 minutes of media per day

According to a recent Kaiser Foundation study, Americans aged 8-18 have increased their media usage since 2004.

That's not much of a shocker.

The shocker is that it found that this age group consumed 10 hours and 45 minutes worth of media per day in 2009-that's up over 2 hours per day from the 2004 study.

According to the study, 8-18 year-olds devote an average of 7 hours and 38 minutes (7:38) to using entertainment media across a typical day (more than 53 hours a week).  And because they spend so much of that time 'media multitasking' (using more than one medium at a time), they actually manage to pack a total of 10 hours and 45 minutes (10:45) worth of media content into those 7½ hours

It is that combination of the mobile device, the personal computer, and television that swallows up most of their lives.

Whether they're multi-tasking or sequentially consuming media, it goes to show marketers that finding ways to dialog with consumers through media devices is alive and well-as long as you know how to communicate to this highly suspicious, media-savvy group.

Those marketers who deliver transparent, honest, community-based communication will have a leg up on this group. And those who understand how to be in-service to their customers, and know how to foster (but not control) word-of-mouth efforts will be the real winners.

Source: The New York Times and the Kaiser Foundation

Has the fresh look of Abercrombie & Fitch turned stale?

American teens have showed amazing buying restraint during the Great Recession.

And Abercrombie & Fitch has felt the brunt of teen's conservative spending habits.

But even as signs of a consumer recovery are all around us, A&F, the one-time sales and fashion star of teen retailing, has yet to show signs of recovery, raising questions about whether the bloom is off the A&F brand.

From The Wall Street Journal

Abercrombie succeeded for years by selling at prices sometimes twice its competitors' and refusing to discount. When the recession made that approach untenable, the chain was slow to react. It has since experimented with lowering some of its prices. Abercrombie's average unit retail price was down 14% during the holiday season, according to Christine Chen, a retail analyst with brokers Needham & Co.

A&F was among the worst performers during the holiday season, posting a 19% decline in December sales at stores open at least a year, and even its low-priced brand, Hollister, down 25% in December from a year earlier.

Abercrombie has long charged a premium for its sexy brand, with teens spending ridiculous amounts of money to look cool, and sexy with the A&F logo plastered on the chest, butt and underwear.

But the idea of Abercrombie being the unofficial school uniform has become passe, and created an opening for lower-priced competitors such as Aeropostale and American Eagle Outfitters, and given teens a choice in what they buy, and still look cool.

So while A&F's competitors are seeing sales increase, the company that made teen fashion cool is struggling with staying relevant and left trying to figure out what the next hot trend is.

If A&F can become cool again, perhaps they have a chance.