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Men, if you've been looking for a manly fistful of fragrance, a scent that, say, invokes the adrenaline rush of NASCAR rather than a shirtless jog on the beach, take a deep breath -- the industry is paying attention to the growing percentage of guys who are taking care of their own grooming and buying their own scents. That's why, alongside faces like Matthew McConaughey and James Franco (shilling for Dolce & Gabbana's the One and Gucci by Gucci, respectively), you're likely to see rapper 50 Cent pitching Power, and Common promoting Diesel's Only the Brave. Words such as "power"...

Battle of the South Florida billboards heats up The billboard catches the attention of drivers and truckers traveling on the highways. "YOUR WIFE IS HOT" -- BETTER GET YOUR A/C FIXED," it reads, in big bold letters. A clever and sexy slogan developed in January by Air Around the Clock, an A/C and appliance service based in Broward County. But now the slogan is generating a lot of heat after its competitor, All Year Cooling, flipped the phrase this summer. "YOUR WIFE IS NOT HOT! Because you called All Year Cooling to replace your A/C rather than the other guys,"...

The Washington City Paper reports that the team's vendors were selling beer to patrons while they made use of the facilities last Sunday during their game against the Kansas City Chiefs. The report says a poster named Gracelander first complained about the washroom sales more than a year ago on the Redskins' official message board ExtremeSkins.com. "[W]hat made me mad was when I went to the bathroom at the start of the 3rd quarter and this guy was in the BATHROOM selling beers to guys who waited for the urinals. I found this just wrong on so many accounts." While...

Video Description - Quote: October 12, 2009 All presidents have periods where they lose popularity. So companies tying their brands to individual politicians are either naive about politics, or they and their ad agencies are run by people suffering from groupthink. Were they all drinking the Obama kool-aid? Had they not considered what might happen when Obama inevitably fell from messiah status to that of mortal politician? Category: News & Politics Tags: barack obama pepsi politics inaugural inauguration dc ny nyc marketing advertising democrats republicans protest protests t-shirts vendors

This month, like every October, a sea of pink ribbons washes over products from sneakers to snacks. While the effort raises research dollars, it leaves some breast cancer survivors feeling that companies are profiting from their pain.When KimZielinski was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2007 at the age of 33, well-meaning friends inundated her with products bearing a little pink ribbon. Each product’s maker promised a cut of the sales price to a breast cancer charity, and these friends felt they were supporting the cause and, by association, Zielinski. A petite brunette who’s now 35, she was enormously grateful for...

Having spent much of the past thirty years of my life in the advertising industry, the flaws of President Obama’s health care message are apparent and massive. Most people outside the ad business will tell you that commercials try to beat you over the head to make you buy what you don’t need or want. In truth advertising that doesn’t address the public’s needs or wants does not work. On top of that if a consumer keeps being exposed to a message that does not meet a need, they begin to tune it out quickly, it’s called wear-out. Finally if...

Microsoft is fessing up and apologizing for altering a Web site photo to change a person's race. A photo on the Seattle-based company's U.S. Web site shows two men and a woman sitting around a conference table. The ad reads, "Empower your people with the IT tools you need." For the U.S. audience the men are Asian and African American. But on the Web site of Microsoft's Polish business unit, the black man's head has been replaced with a white face. When you look real hard, its clear there is something off about the white man sitting in the middle...

LOS ANGELES: Software giant Microsoft Corp is apologising for altering a photo on its website to change the race of one of the people shown in t he picture. A photo on the Seattle-based company's US website shows two men, one Asian and one black, and a white woman seated at a conference room table.

LOS ANGELES — Software giant Microsoft Corp. is apologizing for altering a photo on its Web site to change the race of one of the people shown in the picture. A photo on the Seattle-based company's U.S. Web site shows two men, one Asian and one black, and a white woman seated at a conference room table. But on the Web site of Microsoft's Polish business unit, the black man's head has been replaced with that of a white man. The color of his hand remains unchanged.

I finally had to sit down with my 11-year-old daughter for “the talk.” Despite my best efforts to preserve her innocence and protect her from growing up too quickly, I simply had to tell her some important facts of life. No, we didn’t have a talk about how babies are born. This talk was about America’s assault on girlhood. The time finally came for me to explain to my daughter the relationship between media and marketing and money, and why some people think nothing of exploiting girls if it increases their ratings, sells advertising and beefs up the bottom line....

MONTGOMERY, Ala. (AP) -- Alabama's ban on a wine that features a nude nymph on the label became a business opportunity for a California vintner who is preparing a marketing campaign to capitalize on being "Banned in Bama." The Alabama Alcoholic Beverage Control Board recently told stores and restaurants to quit serving Cycles Gladiator wine because of the label. Board attorney Bob Martin said the stylized, art-nouveau rendition of a nude female with a flying bicycle violated Alabama rules against displaying "a person posed in an immoral or sensuous manner." Bill Leigon, president of Hahn Family Wines in Soledad, Calif.,...

A Missouri car dealer is giving away vouchers for a free AK-47 assault rifle with the purchase of a pickup truck.

With one word Monday, Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele helped the GOP get back in the fight over health care and the entire Obama agenda. The word was “experiment.” “Candidate Obama promised change,” Steele said in a speech at the National Press Club. “President Obama is conducting an experiment.” Steele went on to accuse Barack Obama of carrying out dangerous experiments with the nation’s health care, with the economy, with taxpayers’ dollars.

Grand Strand marketers turn eyes toward Europe. BY MIKE CHERNEY MYRTLE BEACH — When it comes to attracting foreign visitors to the Grand Strand, some local tourism leaders are looking to Congress for help. The Travel Promotion Act of 2009, which has been introduced in the House and Senate, would create a nonprofit corporation to advertise the U.S. as a travel destination in foreign countries. The campaign would be funded by industry contributions and a $10 fee on foreign travelers who do not have to pay for a visa. The travel industry, including the U.S. Travel Association and the American...

The princess industry has been booming in the past few years -- not just the Disney dolls and scratchy toy-store ball gowns that are a rite of passage in most American girlhoods, but a brazen new breed of princess products that target a far wider age range and tap into less seemly attitudes. The hot-pink, leopard-print princess backpacks, T-shirts, purses and bedspreads that girls are now buying (or, rather, their parents are buying for them) have little to do with indulging sweet princess fantasies and everything to do with catering to over-indulged princess egos. [Taste] Sara Schwartz Take the popular...

Happened upon Obama's page on health care, and the words in all caps STAND WITH THE PRESIDENT, and DECLARE YOUR SUPPORT stood out to me. You might also sign up to be Barack's friend, and keep in mind that the page is POWERED by HOPE. If you click through to maybe sign up there, you read this innocent statement: I support President Obama's three principles for real health care reform, and I call on Congress to enact a plan upholding them in 2009. If you didn't read the previous page carefully or don't care, you're about to sign up for...

CHICAGO (AP) — Reporters at the Chicago Tribune say they believe the marketing department in recent weeks solicited subscribers' opinions on stories before they were published, a practice they said raises ethical questions, as well as legal and competitive issues. An e-mail signed by 55 reporters and editors, sent Wednesday to Editor Gerould Kern and Managing Editor Jane Hirt and obtained Thursday by The Associated Press, questions why the newspaper was conducting the surveys and what stories were used. They also wanted to know which readers were surveyed and whether any story had been altered as a result of reader...

America is raising a generation of children on porn - and your child just might be one of them. According to the London School of Economics, nine out of 10 teens who go online will view pornography. The Kaiser Family Foundation reports that 70 percent of those who viewed porn stumbled across it - many while innocently doing their homework - and had not been looking for it. The purveyors of hard-core porn are so fixated on creating addicts out of our sons and daughters that they have made it virtually impossible for children to escape their clutches. Even one...

At Stanford University, California, two sales representatives from Nike were watching the athletics team practise. Part of their job was to gather feedback from the company's sponsored runners about which shoes they preferred. Unfortunately, it was proving difficult that day as the runners all seemed to prefer... nothing. 'Didn't we send you enough shoes?' they asked head coach Vin Lananna. They had, he was just refusing to use them. 'I can't prove this,' the well-respected coach told them. 'But I believe that when my runners train barefoot they run faster and suffer fewer injuries.' Nike sponsored the Stanford team as...

It's an advertiser's nightmare. Layoffs multiply, spreading anxiety. Americans spend less, hurting businesses big and small. And companies slash marketing budgets, raising the stakes for remaining ads. Like all of Nikki Becker's personal training clients, Dawn Hanson (on ball) benefits from a $4-a-session price break in this economy. Becker introduced her "stimulus package" last fall as a way to help her clients -- and her business, Miss Fit Adventures -- weather the recession. "It's different from just a particular industry going bad," Becker says. "Every industry is going bad." Most avoid mentioning the lousy economy. After all, why remind consumers...