Danone will be the exclusive distributor of Chiquita Just Fruit in a Bottle and all future Chiquita-branded beverage products in Europe. Chiquita will provide local sales, marketing and supply chain services.

It's early in the day, but we'd have to say that this story from our friends in Jolly Old England, replete with several video interviews, is this year's hands-down winner of the Most Ambitious Marketing-Oriented April Fool's Story sweepstakes. In short, a Lithuanian (or is it "Ukranian"? The copy and videos differ on this point) farmer discovers that the milk from one of his cows, Lola, tastes like cola because a neighboring bar is pouring beverage waste in his fields. That's when the forces of the media, global commerce and genetic engineering come into play.

Country singer Rodney Atkins touts one of the benefits of Velveeta Shells & Cheese -- "the more we get, the more we get together" -- in a tune he wrote for a new "Best Side of Dinner" TV spot for the shelf-stable "dessert of the dinner plate," which is how Kraft says consumers often think of macaroni and cheese. Research determined that Velveeta Shells & Cheese consumers value family and tradition, Elaine Wong reports. Though "time-stressed," mom is "trying to put these balanced meals on the table that she knows she can feel good about and that the …

Pfizer says it paid $35 million to about 4,500 doctors and researchers from July through December 2009 for a variety of services, Ransdell Pierson and Bill Berkrot report. About $15.3 million of the total went to about 250 research organizations for clinical trials or studies. About 1,500 healthcare professionals were paid an average of $5,000 for advice; about 2,800 doctors were paid an average of $3,400 to lecture peers about Pfizer's drugs, the company said. Speaking engagements have been among the most controversial marketing practices in the pharmaceutical industry but Freda Lewis-Hall, Pfizer's chief medical officer, …

Stephen Fry, a self-confessed Apple "fanboy" from way back when he became the second person in Great Britain to own a Macintosh, hits the trifecta this morning in a piece in which he gets to play with an iPad at Apple HQ in Cupertino, gets the inside scoop about the device from execs Phil Schiller and Eddy Cue (vp of worldwide product marketing and vp of Internet services, respectively) as well as designer Jonathan Ive, and then -- hold that curtsey -- is ushered into an audience with the Jobs himself. "I have met five British …

Jackie Crosby, who writes for the Minneapolis Star Tribune/ McClatchy, reports on how Robert Stephens' Geek Squad took off once he signed a deal to bring his quirky tech-support operation under the Best Buy Corporate umbrella. The company has grown from 60 employees to 24,000 worldwide who sport white shirts and clip-on ties and make house calls in "Geekmobiles." "I felt like a fighter pilot stuck in a crop duster," Stephens says. "I couldn't wait to get to Best Buy and learn how to take off in a Boeing 777." The transition from entrepreneur who traveled from …