Hey kids, just say no to drugs -- and to product integration. That's been the prevailing line over the years, and marketers have generally toed the party line. Most marketers, anyway. In the recent Universal Pictures children's release "Curious George," the studio thumbed its nose at all the product integration no-nos, having the famous chimp from the popular book series crash into crates of Dole fruit, while the Man in the Yellow Hat tools around in a Volkswagen.

Racing and romance novels? Why not? Since last fall's joint licensing agreement between Harlequin Enterprises Limited and NASCAR, auto racing-themed romance novels have flown off the shelves thanks to the sport's growing female fan base.

As globetrotting business travelers dart in and out of airports, they're barraged with ad messages everywhere they turn: on the walls, the floors, even the baggage carts. To combat the perceived ad overload, Chase Commercial Banking charged ad firm Bradley and Montgomery with finding a novel way to reach business decision makers.

Finally, Cooking Light magazine isn't just a magazine. Now, thanks to its partnership with Lettuce Entertain You Enterprises, Inc. (LEYE), it's also a restaurant. Cooking Light's signature healthy dishes can be bought prepared at the Cooking Light kiosk at Foodlife, in Water Tower Place on Chicago's Magnificent Mile. The magazine's healthy recipes are also available for takeout. The kiosk offers advertisers a venue for instant focus groups, live research, product sampling, and opportunities for product integration.  

When Media approached us to offer our perspective as students on the industry at large, what got us stirring like swizzle sticks at an open bar was the idea of new creative teams. In meeting with agencies across the country, we've learned that most see the potential in pushing beyond the traditional agency model. They go about this in various ways, so that in some agencies we meet with the planning director, in others we meet with the head of media or creative directors, and sometimes we meet with all three. Agencies are creating new …

State lotteries are long shots indeed, but here's an inside tip: Advertise on the back of every ticket sold and every ticket could be a winner. That's what's known as playing the house odds. The bet via LuckyMedia, a unit of Anomaly, a New York-based boutique, leverages that bare space on every scratch-to-win and printed ticket in a deal with the Michigan Lottery.

Kentucky Fried Chicken recently proved that a potent dish can be cooked up by stirring in the right mix of subliminal advertising, free food, and the Web.

Advertisers are increasingly grappling with the fact that despite the enduring myth of the "couch potato," more than ever, American consumers are a moving target, and none more so than the most affluent consumers. These consumers are among the busiest and fastest-moving members of society -- many are going to and from private airports.

What would Martha Stewart's media company look like without its namesake? Perhaps a bit like Branded Media Corp. The Madison Avenue operation uses a similar model to Stewart's, building celebrity-cum-expert brands through television, and then attaching the monikers to an array of consumer products. But it deploys a broader array of tactics. "Martha's business really depends on Martha," says Todd Schwartz, BMC's senior vice president. "We think it's much better to diversify [our] portfolio."

A Dallas-based startup is betting that the best way to reach consumers in the last eight seconds before they decide to make a purchase comes in a cigar box-size unit called ShelfAds. ShelfAds, marketed by POP Broadcasting, is an embedded system that transmits short ads wirelessly and directly to customers as they browse store shelves. The product, whose technology was designed by AvidWireless, uses an ultrasonic sensor to determine when a person is standing in front of the unit. It automatically plays a 10- or 15-second video with digital sound featuring an animated display of pricing and …