Husband and wife design team/bloggers/authors Armin Vit and Bryony Gomez-Palacio offer the "juicy" stories behind the design of a dozen brands. Sure, there's the Coca-Cola and FedEx labels, the Playboy Bunny and Campbell's Soup can. But there are some pleasant surprises, too, such as the 500 covers that Reid Miles designed for Blue Note jazz albums in the Fifties and Sixties. Also notable is the Penguin paperback line designed by a 21-year-old employee in 1935. Part of the charm is the penguin at the bottom, inspired by a trip to the London Zoo, that remains endearingly incongruous today. …

Sears, which exited the toy business decades ago when Wal-Mart and other big box chains put the squeeze on prices, is opening toy shops at 20 of its stores starting in August, Sandra M. Jones reports. The chain has been famous for generations for its Christmas Wish Book. Sears began to dabble in toys several years ago by hiring KB Toys to set up temporary shops inside hundreds of stores, but the experiment fizzled and KB went out of business last year. Sears toy shops are set to debut Aug. 15 inside seven stores in the Chicago area, …

I initially missed this Ad Age piece by Nat Ives and Rich Thomaselli ("yeah, yeah, covered this; covered that"), as well as an accompanying editorial calling for the ad industry to protect its interests, but was alerted to it by a ringing endorsement by Randall Rothenberg, CEO of the Internet Advertising Bureau, on his Facebook page. It just so happens that Rothenberg is the first industry official quoted in the story, and perhaps he says it all: "Advertising is the makeup on the public face of capitalism, for better or for worse, so any tension that …

MillerCoors is testing a 1.5-gallon, $20 "Home Draft" system for its Miller Lite and Coors Light brands in about a half-dozen cities, David Kesmodel reports. It's designed to fit upright into refrigerators for drinkers to pour an occasional glass rather than for keggers. The beer stays fresh for about 30 days, and the price per ounce is roughly 15% higher than for an 18-pack, MillerCoors says. The recyclable product is targeted to the 30% of beer drinkers who say they prefer draft beer to a bottled or canned brew, according to MillerCoors CMO Andy England. "We're really …

Responding to changes in the way its customers use its services, Bank of America plans to close up to 10% of its 6,100 branches nationwide, E. Scott Reckard and Jerry Hirsch report, as it simultaneously beefs up its online and mobile offerings. Online banking, which initially was used mostly by younger customers, has caught on throughout the population, and BOA has been in the forefront of the trend. It was the first to offer free bill-paying services, for example, and last year the company began allowing customers to chat online with bank representatives 24 hours a day. The company's …

On the other side of the spectrum, the venerable Mark Dolliver rounds up reports and experts and provides a clear picture of perhaps the murkiest demographic in marketing: the 65-plus consumer. To start, a recent Pew Research Center Social & Demographic Trends survey confirms what anyone who plays in a senior softball league knows anecdotally: 60% of respondents age 65-plus say they feel younger than their actual age -- "in many cases much younger." People in the Silent Generation (including those born from 1925 to 1942) are pioneering a change in what this life stage means, Ann Fishman, president …