The Wall Street Journal
Time Warner's New Line Cinema has a tricky marketing challenge on its hands as the "Sex and the City" movie generates buzz in a group that isn't supposed to see the R-rated flick: girls under 17 years of age. On HBO, the series was known for using bawdy sexuality and frank language, but for the past few years, a sanitized version of the show has been in heavy rotation on Time Warner's TBS network. A survey by Intelligence Group indicates that "Sex and the City" is one of the most anticipated summer movies for teen girls, right up with "Indiana …
New York Times
Christian Dior, the French fashion brand, has dropped ads featuring Sharon Stone from its ad campaign in China in the wake of the actresses' remarks that the earthquakes in Sichuan Province were karmic retribution for Beijing's treatment of Tibet. The luxury goods company was facing the possibility of a boycott. A spokesman for Dior in Paris says that its office in Shanghai has issued a statement in which it recognizes that the comments had been "hurtful." Stone also apologizes in a statement released by Dior. She says that she will "wholly devote" herself to helping earthquake victims. The …
Seattle Post-Intelligencer
Amazon founder and CEO Jeff Bezos has simplified the business of Amazon.com -- which has ventured into a whole new arena of computing services -- by breaking down its customers into three groups: consumers, third-party sellers and developers. Speaking at the company's annual meeting of shareholders Thursday, Bezos says that third-party sellers account for 30% of the units sold on Amazon. The amount of bandwidth used by Amazon Web Services, which includes cloud computing and server storage space, recently surpassed the bandwidth used for its retail business, according to Bezos. Cloud computing allows companies to outsource part of their …
The New York Times
Reversing its position after a backlash among members, the National African American Tobacco Prevention Network says that a bill to regulate tobacco products fails to adequately protect the health of African-Americans because it would not ban menthol flavorings from cigarettes. The legislation, which has been cleared by crucial committees in both the Senate and the House of Representatives, would ban candy, fruit and spice flavorings in cigarettes, but specifically exempts menthol flavorings. That special protection for menthol has been considered crucial to getting the nation's biggest cigarette maker, Philip Morris USA, to support the legislation. Menthol-flavored cigarettes account …
USA Today
Advances in software and technology are allowing stores such as Abercrombie & Fitch, Gap, Aéropostale and Kohl's to offer the latest fashion trends weeks -- or even months -- faster than before and giving the beleaguered retailers more stable profitability, says Jeff Klinefelter, an analyst at Piper Jaffray. New software lets designers, buyers and manufacturers view the same fabric swatch or color at the same time, ending the need to fly designers around the globe or to send overnight packages. By quickly moving the most desirable items into stores, retailers can also ease their reliance on price markdowns. …
Reuters
National Public Radio
The New York Times
Players of popular video game The Sims will soon be able to enjoy the same Ikea furniture in their virtual reality as they do in their real one. That's because game developer Electronic Arts has decided to accommodate the requests of players looking for more realistic furniture, and make a little sponsorship money at the same time. It's the kind of move that would have yielded howls of protest from gamer purists just a few years ago. But branded items are increasingly being incorporated into video games as marketers look for new footholds in the massive video game market, …
The Wall Street Journal
Despite having increased its profit in each of the 31 quarters since it went public in 2000, luxury retailer Coach is projected to experience a slowdown in the coming months thanks to consumer cutbacks on spending. But rather than hunker down, Coach is expanding. In this Q&A, Coach CEO Lew Frankfort explains why his company is planning to open 200 stores in the U.S. over the next few years, at a rate of about 40 per year, as well as push into China. The company is also bucking conventional wisdom by launching a series of higher-priced products in …
BrandWeek
The value of Super Bowl ads has long been a point of debate among marketers, but at least one advertiser who spent big on this year's game-and was largely slammed for the quality of its creative-is reaping the rewards. Amp and SoBe LifeWater, both of which were advertised on the Super Bowl for the first time this year, experienced significant Q1 sales surges. Amp outpaced all of the other major brands in the energy category with 28.7% growth, while LifeWater experienced a 247.9% increase in sales, giving it 6.6% of the enhanced water category. Those numbers …