The divorced dad is undergoing a commercial image makeover. A new Ford Motor campaign shows two parents, two children and a dog spending a weekend shopping, driving and hanging out at the beach. At the end of the day, the dad is dropped off at his place. "Thanks for inviting me this weekend," he says, while hugging his children. "Sure," responds his apparent ex-wife, before driving away in the Ford Freestyle. "Divorce is so common that I don't think people view it as sad and depressing anymore," says Allan P. Adamson, a managing director at corporate identity firm Landor Associates. …

More than 20 Maria Sharapova look-alikes will descend on Manhattan during U.S. Open week to promote Canon USA's new line of PowerShot digital cameras. From Aug. 28 to Sept. 4, doubles of the photogenic 6-foot-tall tennis star will hand out 80,000 branded fans and 100,000 branded subway maps with information on getting to the U.S. Open. Canon's PowerShot.com Web site will direct consumers to the location of the Marias, and offers a sweepstakes prize--a trip for two to watch her play anywhere in the world. Canon's competitor Olympus swept up the camera category rights to the U.S. Open, so this …

MTV is making its biggest multi-platform attempt yet to get this year's MTV Video Music Awards in front of as many teens as possible. The Aug. 31 awards show will be broadcast on MTV, while sibling MTV2 airs its own version. Web site MTV Overdrive will feature a backstage view of the show, as mtvU on college campuses airs a college-themed version. MTV will also send updates to cell phone users who sign up for wireless content.. "Clearly, our audience is consuming entertainment across multiple platforms, so it is no puzzle to us that we have to increase that," says …

And now for the latest in ad creep. Kroger Stores is testing advertising on its grocery conveyor belts in a few dozen stores in Arkansas, Mississippi and Tennessee. Thirteen Harps Food stores are also testing the EnVision Marketing Group system in Little Rock, Ark., which holds a patent to print digital, photo-quality ads directly on the belts. Alltel, the nation's fifth-largest wireless company, is the first major advertiser to buy conveyor ads. "It really only works to raise brand awareness," says Andrew Moreau, vp, corporate communications. "You can only change the message every two weeks." EnVision president/CEO Frank Cox is …

Recipients opened email messages from restaurants more than any other industry for the first six months this year, according to the Harte-Hanks Postfuture Index, a comparative aggregate of 4,300 business and consumer email campaigns. Restaurant open rates of 167.7 percent included pass-along and reopened email. The industry also had the highest click-through rate of 57.7 percent. The 13 industries in descending order of click-through rates were: restaurants (57.5 percent), publishing (55.6 percent), pharmaceutical (23.8 percent), travel and hospitality (23.4 percent), conference events (14.2 percent), financial services (11 percent), technology (10.9 percent), government (9.5 percent), insurance (9.5 percent), consumer packaged goods …

As more consumers make the Internet their first choice for medical information, online spending by pharmaceutical marketers will increase almost 25 percent this year to $780 million, projects eMarketer in a new report. With nearly 100 million Americans using the Internet to find health information in 2005, health-focused portals are poised to become the next big vertical market. Leaders such as WebMD will soon be joined by Revolution, a consumer health site backed by former AOL founder Steve Case. As they attempt to develop relationships with consumers, drug company sites are evolving with the times. "Pharmaceutical marketers are giving their …

Drink milk and look good is the message rolling out to teens in 45,000 middle and high schools. That's thanks to the new Body by Milk campaign from the International Dairy Foods Association, the people who brought you the famed milk mustache. Borrowing a page from soda marketers, such as Coca-Cola, the campaign centers on a continuity auction program. Teens use UPCs and expiration dates from milk containers to bid on items, ranging from T-shirts to musical instruments to unique brand experiences from Adidas, Fender, Roland, CCS, Epic and Baby Phat. Auction items will change each week of the campaign, …

David Neeleman, founder and CEO of JetBlue, credits the success of his 6-year-old startup in the brutally competitive airline industry to creating a "customer-experience company that enabled people to travel in aircraft." The commitment included hiring the right people and finding innovative work approaches. Customers calling JetBlue's toll-free number, for example, speak to employees who work from their homes, not an anonymous overseas high-tech call center. Neeleman flies on a JetBlue flight at least once a week, serving drinks and snacks, talking to customers and crewmembers, and helping unload baggage. This helps him keep in touch with what it's like …

The Ask Dr. Z ad campaign and a fresher lineup of vehicles should lift retail sales of Chrysler Group vehicles in August, according to George Murphy, svp of global brand marketing. On Tuesday, Chrysler added a sweepstakes component to the month-old $100 million Dr. Z initiative, which features DaimlerChrysler AG Chairman Dieter Zetsche. Nine vehicles will be given away through Labor Day to consumers who visit a Chrysler, Jeep or Dodge dealer. Chrysler is looking to new models such as the Dodge Caliber, Jeep Compass, Chrysler Aspen and Dodge Nitro to counterbalance weak SUV sales. The company brought back employee-pricing …

Spending on paid product placement worldwide will reach $3.1 billion this year, compared with $2.2 billion in 2005, according to a new report from PQ Media. By 2010, the report predicts, that number will total almost $7.6 billion. The U.S. leads the way, with $1.5 billion in paid placements last year, followed by Brazil, Australia, France and Japan. In paid placements, marketers spend money to weave their wares into plots, scripts and content of entertainment offerings. If all types of placements are taken into account (including barter for promotional mention), spending will total $7.4 billion this year, compared with just …