Thanks to the plummeting dollar, overseas tourists are shopping till they're dropping--especially in New York. "We're seeing outsize growth in jewelry, handbags, shoes and some of the designer brands," says Stephen I. Sadove, chairman and CEO of Saks. "We're seeing it mostly in New York, but we may be getting some [lift] in the major gateway cities like Los Angeles and Chicago." The Shops at Columbus Circle at the Time Warner Center on Manhattan's West Side has seen a 25% increase in foreign travelers this fall, and year-to-date sales at the center are up 25%, says David Froelke, gm …

Although Lee Westerfield feels the ad industry is "tiptoeing toward the edge of recession," he and two other prominent prognosticators believe that the strength of ad spending online--as well as the effects of the elections and the Summer Olympics--should keep the industry from suffering a recession. Westerfield, a senior analyst at BMO Capital Markets, says that ad spending in this country will show 3.6% growth in 2008, compared with the 4.3% he formerly predicted. Robert J. Coen, senior vice president and director for forecasting at Universal McCann, and Steve King, worldwide CEO at ZenithOptimedia, also reduced their …

Shoppers may soon find numerical ratings, star ratings or letter grades plastered on the shelf next to virtually every product in a store. After years of conflicting health claims on food, various groups are creating systems to make sense of it all, and grocery chains are starting to line up behind one system or another. But consumer advocates worry that the sudden flurry of rating systems could add to shopper confusion--not ameliorate it--at least until one of the systems becomes a national standard. Moreover, determining what foods are healthier is as much art as science. The ratings systems under …

Vivendi plans to take a controlling stake in U.S. videogame maker Activision, minting a new rival to Electronic Arts, the current top player in the industry. The French entertainment and telecommunications group will merge its own gaming division into Activision and contribute cash to form a new company called Activision Blizzard. The merger brings together complementary pieces: Activision's top-selling games include Guitar Hero, on which players use a guitar-shaped controller to play along with popular songs, and Tony Hawk, a skateboard-game franchise. Its business model is based on selling games for a one-time fee of $50 to $60. Vivendi's gaming …

After failing to sell Volvo, Ford has decided to move the brand more upmarket in a bid to boost sales and profits -- a risky strategy that is making Volvo executives in Sweden jittery because it could alienate traditional buyers. Lewis Booth, the chief of Ford's European operations, last month told Volvo executives that he wants Volvo to become a legitimate premium alternative to rivals like Lexus, BMW and Mercedes-Benz -- not by reinventing Volvo, but by intensifying its focus on safety, simplicity and Scandinavian design. "It's not a change of direction, it's just building on what they've got," Booth …

Pinnacle Foods has found success by purchasing tired but well-known packaged food brands, such as Swanson TV dinners, Lender's Bagels and Vlasic Pickles, and reintroducing them, adding modern-day twists. Consumers know the products from ad campaigns of decades ago, and the company tries to capitalize on that recognition, says Pinnacle CEO Jeffrey Ansell. But there's a challenge: The American diet has changed. People want healthful options, prompting Pinnacle to add new products. Ansell says consumers responded well to Log Cabin's introduction of a 100%-pure maple syrup product in an old-fashioned country jug. Hungry-Man frozen dinners will offer new …

Cross-trainers--the versatile if clunky sneakers that grew explosively in the late 1980s and early 1990s--are on their way back into the mainstream if Nike and Under Armour have anything to say about it. Both marketers are planning to launch lines of cross-trainers during the first half of 2008 and have indicated that they will be supported with robust marketing efforts. Cross-trainers were derailed by at least two forces: First, a surge in one-sport specialization among young athletes fueled a boom in specialty-shoe sales. Second, the surging popularity of so-called retro or non-performance shoes put fashion above functionality. The category has …