Meanwhile, upon reading the headline for The New York Times ad column this morning -- "As the Leaves Change, Holiday Ads Arrive " -- I sputtered over my Starbucks: "Where have you been, Stu Elliott?" According to his lede, though, he and I have been out and about in similar places -- online and off -- for the last month. Whatever happened to Halloween? It must have been the day after Labor Day that I was feeling sympathy for the Costco clerks who would have to listen for weeks to the tinny tune emanating from mechanical Xmas …

One surefire way to dominate the clutter is by upping the ante, so PepsiCo is offering $1 million to anyone who can create a Super Bowl commercial for Doritos tortilla chips that wins the top spot in USA Today's Super Bowl Ad Meter. It hopes to co-opt the months of pre-game buzz, which many public-relations and ad executives say is far more valuable than winning myriad Super Bowl ad polls. PepsiCo's consumer-generated ad would have to outperform Budweiser, which has won the top spot for the past 10 years in a row, thanks in part to a highly detailed …

Toyota will display a concept version of a compressed natural gas-electric hybrid Camry at the Los Angeles Auto Show in November. Several automakers, including Toyota, offered CNG-powered vehicles nearly a decade ago but quit when interest flagged. CNG-powered vehicles usually have less range than gas-powered vehicles and less trunk space because of the large fuel tanks. The announcement comes amid splashy, big-budget ad campaigns that have attempted to move natural gas off the energy back burner. Texas billionaire T. Boone Pickens has touted natural gas and wind power as the centerpieces of his "Pickens Plan" for energy independence. And …

Walmart, which had been testing its exclusive home line with Better Homes and Gardens in a limited number of stores for several months, says that it has completed a national launch. The BHG line involves about 550 items, including interior and patio furniture, bed and bath sets, dinnerware and decorative accessories like candleholders, throw pillows and picture frames. A broader assortment of the line will be introduced next year. The second half of the launch will add more bedding and bath products, and additional garden pieces and accents, Walmart says. "Better Homes and Gardens …

Reactions to a product that hasn't been unveiled yet -- the T-Mobile Google Android phone -- have been decidedly mixed but today's the day that bloggers and MSM reviewers can start wailing and flailing away in earnest. Gearlog, for one, will be covering the press conference live starting at 10:30 EST. Quoting Forrester analyst Charles Golvin, Bloomberg reports that "T-Mobile may sell fewer than 500,000 of the phones in the next three months because they don't have the same cachet as the iPhone." As a long-time Apple lover locked into a T-Mobile family contract, I …

An NPD Group poll shows that more folks are bringing their own lunches to the office than they were a few years ago and Brandweek rounds up a few examples of marketers responding the to development. They include Deli Fresh Natural Cheese slices and Oscar Mayer thick-carved and family-sized meat varieties from Kraft; ConAgra's new Banquet Select Recipes frozen lunches; and Ronzoni Bistro microwaveable pasta from New World Pasta. While "brown-bagging" has become a useful gerund to describe the process, I suspect most people now use some sort of plastic material to transport their lunches to and fro. …

Back in the day, unsatisfied crowds would pelt actors and vaudeville performers with eggs and tomatoes. Then the price went up. In a probably unrelated development, the Journal reports that federal prosecutors have opened separate criminal probes into possible price-fixing by major egg producers and California tomato processors. Federal agencies already are pursuing criminal or civil inquiries in markets including fertilizer, cheese and milk to determine if suppliers have been manipulating prices. Many farm groups and cooperatives are allowed to work together under antitrust exemptions such as the 1922 Capper-Volstead Act. The act, one of a web of …

Things go wrong with customers. Even more important than making them right is fixing the problem so that it doesn't happen again, according to three academics. We missed this in Monday's Journal but see that it was among the most emailed articles, suggesting it struck a chord. "The key is to address tensions that arise among front-line employees who handle complaints, the managers of those employees, and the customers themselves," the article's summation states. "Steps include starting a complaints database that managers can analyze and use to improve service, and rewarding service employees not for reductions in complaints …