8.24.00
Pork-barreling Promoters Get Productive
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Audience-un-friendly?
"Advertisers need to take hold of content and call it their own so that they have a platform from which they can advertise, market, promote and shape the shows that will serve them well."

Those frightening words, featured in an 8/21 Advertising Age print edition story, come from a man with plenty of experience in the advertising/content integration field. Robert Riesenberg started out at BBDO Worldwide, New York as a media buyer, where a programming department developed movies for Campbell's Soup and Chrysler. Now he's the executive VP -- broadcast and programming at McCann-Erickson Worldwide's media unit, Universal McCann. That's the company responsible for those extended Coca-Cola ads disguised as the WB series, Young Americans.

Sure, back in the nascent days of TV, this sort of thing was prevalent. To be blunt, folks were more gullible back then -- perhaps more accepting of direct product promotion. Times have changed, as the TV Land campaign aptly claims, and people, specifically the young'uns, are far more savvy when it comes to advertising and marketing than any other generation. Couple that with the television ad clutter that's become the bane of agencies these days, and you get frustrated execs squirming and struggling to find more insidious ways through which to translate their all-important messages.

In the future, "McCann will package projects for outside producers and advertisers that own the programming," according to the Ad Age article. "The unit also will incorporate product placement and advertiser-friendly story lines into the shows."

The words "kill your television" have never been quite so relevant.

That's just the beginning! We can also look forward to partnerships between McCann and "the best there is in Hollywood," too!

Hey, why not? That's essentially what the Democrats did at their star-infested convention this year, right?

What a Kroc!
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McDonald's Learns Ya Real Good
As an inquisitive child, curious about my Italian and Irish heritages, I did what any kid would do to learn about her history. I visited my local Pizza Hut and studied the backs of Lucky Charms boxes. Needless to say, I've become something of an expert when it comes to little known spicy meatball- and leprechaun-related factoids.

And now, thankfully, that tradition is being perpetuated by our anthropologically-aware friends at McDonald's. However, since those of Italian- and Irish-American descent already have become enlightened through shamrock shakes and rubbery chicken sammys smothered in tomato sauce, Mickey D's has decided to salute a different ethnic-group this time. According to the 8/18 Yahoo! Finance story, as part of its "year-long celebration of African American heritage and culture," the burger-bloaters have developed a collection of tales entitled, "Little Known Black History Facts."

Of course, Ronald and pals required the aptitude of a true historian to prepare this brain food. So, they called upon Harvard Professor Henry Louis Gates, Jr., co-author of Microsoft's encyclopedia Encarta Africana. ABC radio talk show host Tom Joyner helped out, too.

Yes, with the purchase of any nutritionally devoid food-like substance, folks can pick up one of two booklets and bulk up on forgotten facts involving "education, sports, arts and entertainment, medicine, politics, inventions and African-American firsts."

Hmmm...I wonder if McDonald's included the harrowing tale of the first African-American to die of complications due to fast-food-induced high-blood pressure, hypertension and obesity....

What about those unfortunate, yet eager-minded students without access to the sparsely located McDonald's restaurants? No worries...for them, a teaching supplement has been developed by Scholastic, Inc. and co-sponsored by Coca-Cola. Yes, public high school "[t]eachers will be encouraged to incorporate Little Known Black History Facts into their regular lesson plans throughout the school year."

According to anonymous Lowbrow Lowdown sources, Coca-Cola has predicted that 98% of kids attending Pepsi-partnering schools will be hampered by their severe lack of the Little Known Black History knowledge they so desperately need to succeed in life. In retaliation, Pepsi deep throats have revealed plans to confiscate all Little Known Black History booklets to be used as kindling for Pepsi Day bonfires.

BK's Backside Blasters
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Stan's Super Cross-promotional Schlock
A spaceship crash lands outside a concert hall teeming with teeny-boppers. A "curvaceous interstellar visitor" offers DNA-twisting amulets that fuel super powers. Now Brian "can leap small buildings in a single bound" (that's right: small buildings). Kevin could lift "a 10-ton potato chip," "if he needed to," that is. What is this, some lame, new Pringles campaign?

You're close enough. It's new and it's lame, but this is the latest attempt at dumbed-down super-hero sludge by Marvel's mush-mouthed comic quack, Stan Lee. It's also the premise of a multi-tiered online/offline Burger King promotion featuring the Backstreet Boys' spandex-wearing alter-egos.

As featured in the 8/18 Wall Street Journal report, "The new animation Web site, backstreetproject.com, will in turn be the focus of an extravagant promotional campaign from Burger King this fall." Apparently, Burger King is counting on TV ads featuring the glamour boys, along with videos, CDs, kids' meal action figures, and a concert tour sponsorship, to attract customers to the restaurant chain's flame-broiled delights.

In full-on capitalistic splendor, Stan Lee Media hopes to parlay the new comic series into "a licensed property for a TV show, movie or theme park," notes the WSJ piece. Already, the company has sent about 1.5 million promo emails to fans of the well-groomed, high-pitched wonders.

You heard it here first, folks: Unnamed sources have told the Lowbrow Lowdown that Howard Stern's Backside Boys are currently negotiating potential promotional deals with lesser-known BK rivals, White Castle and In-N-Out Burger. Stay tuned for updates.

(Download the hilarious Backside Boys tune, Backside's Back.)

Potent Quotables
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Birth! School! Fun! Death!
His bombastically egregious writing style causes grammarians everywhere to cringe! His obnoxious speaking style repels just about anyone else without completely dulled sensibilities! He's on a "personal crusade against mediocrity, passionlessness, and blandness"! By the way, he really digs exclamation points!

He's tompeters! Yes, tompeters! You know -- he's the self-branded proselytizer of the "Work Matters" mantra who's managed to propel himself to super-rich seminar circuit stardom by disseminating his misguided belief that work-life and personal-life should be as one.

Could it be, however, that his work=fun façade is eroding? Consider his comment in a September Red Herring feature regarding his decision to "take himself out of the day-to-day management" of his firm, The Tom Peters Group:

"I am the management guru, and secretly know that management sucks....I want a life."

A-ha! You see, tompeters! Work does suck! You've been busted!

A Traipse Down the Gilded Aisle
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Don't Forget the Heart-shaped Rice
Chances are, if you're sporting an engagement rock on that dainty finger of yours, you've spent some time online doing research and planning for the big event. As reported in the 8/17 edition of ICONOCAST, 48% of newlyweds-to-be with Web access have done just that, according to an NPD Group survey.

Sites like theknot.com offer "pop-the-question primers" for unimaginative dolts. WeddingChannel.com inspires indulgent brides-in-waiting to register for necessities like $9000 shuffleboard tables and $900 Jacobean wine cabinets from Neiman Marcus and Restoration Hardware. In fact, the hubbub surrounding American weddings has built a $70 billion industry.

Things are changing, though, and not for the subtler. Take StockGift.com, for instance. According to ICONOCAST, the site enables registrants, including "grads, newborns and engaged couples" to choose up to four publicly traded stocks or mutual funds towards which obligated friends and relatives are expected to cough up dough. Heartwarming, isn't it?

What's become of the gift-giving tradition? Although I'm sure to be in the minority, I will never understand this notion of gift registry, since it completely obliterates the true spirit of gift-giving. Let's put that aside, though, and consider this: At this point, engaged couples have gone from requesting "utilitarian" items like crystal Tiffany candy dishes and gelato makers to, essentially asking friends and family, in a grossly blatant manner, to make them rich!

The ICONOCAST coverage encapsulates the sad state of bestowment: "Truth is that couples want cash and aren't afraid to say so."

Now, thanks to an exponentially growing number of online wish lists, it looks as though most of today's kids will have been brought up to believe that a present can be ordered in the same sterile, impersonal way that one places an order for General Tsao's chicken and won ton soup!

Horse-powered Promos
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I'll Bust a Cap in Yo' Ad!
Is your car's ad-wrap no longer attracting ogling hordes of onlookers? Has that stuffed Garfield doll strapped to your grill lost his fluff-appeal? Well, never fear! There's a brand new way to garner street stares. That's right. In a tireless effort to provide our readers with the latest in innovative advertising formats, The Lowbrow Lowdown has discovered Singapore's answer to road-rage-inspiration: promotional hubcaps!

Ad agency, CityDreams calls its freewheelin' promo placement "Cap2Cap." As featured in Wired's September print issue, the ads have been placed on the hubcaps of a Singapore taxi fleet and "stay upright and readable at any speed."

Everywhere, truck drivers rejoice in the knowledge that soon, their pre-ordered Taz, Yosemite Sam and naked chick hubcaps will arrive. Unfortunately for many Hell's Angels members, however, the "Give me head 'til I'm dead" caps are still on back order.