Mattel is producing a collector's series of dolls based on the characters in the "Mad Men" television show -- "a move," writes Paul Harris, "that would have the male denizens of Sterling Cooper reaching for their whisky and cigarettes." But Barbie's and Ken's new buddies won't, of course, be puffing or boozing. Nor, presumably, will there be any other extracurricular shenanigans by the four dolls in the Barbie Fashion Model line: Don Draper, his wife, Betty, and colleagues Roger Sterling and Joan Holloway. Each will retail as $74.95 starting this summer. The …

Micah Solomon, co-author of Exceptional Service, Exceptional Profit: The Secrets of Building a Five-Star Customer Service Organization and president of Oasis Disc Manufacturing pulls together some offbeat but eminently useful suggestions for 21st Century customer service that are laced with real-word examples. The first is to make sure "your doorknobs sparkle." The example is a gift shop in Bar Harbor, Maine, that goes against the grain by welcoming customers bearing food and pets. Shoppers are greeted by a sign that says, "YES: Your Ice Cream Cones Are Welcome (just be careful of the drips) …

Samsung CMO Sue Shim tells Elaine Wong that an economic downturn is actually a good time to launch pricey, but innovative products such as the company's 3D LED TVs, which start at $1,700. (Aaron Barr lays out the details behind Samsung's ambitious global advertising effort for the product in this morning's Marketing Daily.) "Consumers are more concerned about value, [i.e.] what they are getting by paying that much money to buy [a particular] brand or product," Shim says. "So, if the value meets the consumers' wants and needs, they are willing to pay for it. …

I wonder what the litigious Lindsey Lohan thinks about the adjective that precedes her name in Rupal Parekh's run-down of the $100 million suit she has filed against E-Trade for a commercial in which a baby girl accusingly asks her baby boyfriend: "And that milkoholic Lindsay wasn't over?" The descriptor in question is the Murdochian "pop-tart." Lohan's lawyer, Stephanie Ovadia, told the New York Post that E-trade is using her first name "as a parody of her life. Why didn't they use the name Susan? This is a subliminal message. Everybody's talking about it and saying …

Six of the twelve industries in Booz & Company's annual reflection of the year past and projection of what's ahead are said to be "in search of survival" and three of those six, in a report edited by Karen Henrie, are probably of interest to many of our readers: consumer packaged goods, technology and retail banking. The growing power of emerging markets is helping to redefine the technology sector and companies in the developing world are becoming more sophisticated, write Barry H. Jaruzelski, Gregor Harter, and Kenny Kurtzman. "Ultimately, these firms will begin to go well beyond manufacturing goods …

Dennis Overbye previews Megan Prelinger's Another Science Fiction: Advertising the Space Race 1957-1962, which will be published in May.

Women's earned income in developing nations is growing at 8.1% compared to 5.8% for men, according to Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu, and women currently control nearly $12 trillion of the $18 trillion total overall consumer spending globally. "More significant, the majority of tertiary degrees are now being awarded to women," writes Sylvia Ann Hewlett. "Highly qualified, well-educated and ambitious, these women are taking over the talent pool from Delhi to Dubai and bringing new urgency to the issue of managing diversity." Companies such as Goldman Sachs and Google in India are investing in women in emerging markets …

Laurie Burkitt tells the engaging tale of the growth of Hint -- a sugar-free, zero-calorie water that is lightly and naturally flavored with fruit -- from the switched-on light bulb in Kara Goldin's head to distribution deals with Target, Costco and, later this month, Starbucks. Goldin, who had been a vp at AOL, came up with the idea when she was diagnosed with gestational diabetes while she was pregnant in 2004. She and her husband and partner, Theo, first sold the beverage to health-food stores and yoga studios, pitching it to consumers who were not just health-conscious but …