Pabst's "Blast," a flavored, alcoholic drink, is under the gun as 17 states are now urging parent Pabst Blue Ribbon Co. to cut the alcohol content of the beverage. The line of PBR's Colt 45 comes in grape, strawberry lemonade, raspberry, watermelon and blueberry pomegranate flavors. The AG's also want the company to stop marketing the drink as if it were a cool kind of soda. In a letter to the company, the AG's cited the drink's fruit flavors and its spokesperson -- Snoop Dogg. The beverage is 12% alcohol in a 23.5-ounce container. PBR's response to the …

Large marketers will get a postage-back guarantee starting next month if they agree to advertise their products through First-Class and Standard mail. The USPS is offering the "Mail Works Guarantee" program to companies that spend at least $250 million a year on ads starting May 16.

Deal-seekers are looking online before going to the store. Post-recession consumers are more deal conscious and more than a fifth are not just researching electronics and other high-ticket items. They are also looking at food and beverage prices on the web. Retailers and brands are responding by reaching out to consumers with blogs, social-media sites and online campaigns.

Sales of environmentally friendly products have been hit by the economic downturn, at least in some cases. In 2008, sales of Clorox Green Works products topped $100 million. But the recession has changed that, ending consumers' affection for saving the planet. While farmers' markets and Toyota's Prius are the exception, green sub-brands of big home products brands are limping now. Sales of Green Works products have fallen to $60 million a year and similar lines from other manufacturers have fallen as well. Analysts say even a few extra pennies for a cleaning product that also cleans your conscience …

NBA commish David Stern said Laurel Richie will be the new president of the WNBA. She was most recently senior VP and CMO of the Girl Scouts of the USA. She has also been with Leo Burnett Worldwide and Ogilvy and Mather overseeing accounts like AmEx and Pepperidge Farms. ESPN columnist Mechelle Voepel says the league missed a nice opportunity by making the announcement two weeks after the women's Final Four and a week after the WNBA draft. She points out that Donna Orender said she would leave as president December 3, with the league saying it would start looking …

The Qwest name may vanish into the chiaroscuro of brands past. Parent CenturyLink, based in Monroe, La., has started showing video-board ads at Coors Field in Denver and other ballparks that say, "Qwest is becoming CenturyLink." In August the 14-state telecom brand will be replaced by CenturyLink, which acquired the Denver-based Qwest on April 1. When the company acquired Qwest a year ago, it said it might keep the Qwest name for large business and government operations. That won't happen, according to the company.

The Cornucopia Institute has filed a request with the Federal Trade Commission asking it to look into Dean Foods' ads for Horizon milk with Omega-3 DHA. Cornucopia charges the nation's largest dairy conglomerate with consumer fraud in misrepresenting the benefits of its products. Dean's White Wave division, which markets Horizon organic milk, has launched a campaign saying DHA oil benefits childrens' brain development. The Institute says Dean's claims aren't corroborated by hard science. DHA oil is processed from fermented algae. The institute says that what scientists aver is that DHA, one of the many naturally occurring omega-3 fatty acids, is …

Coca-Cola's UK operations are launching a review, including incumbents, for digital shops to support Glaceau Vitaminwater. The brand plans a big digital push centered on social media in both the UK and Nordic regions. The division has previously worked with such agencies as Exposure, which created a UK online and outdoor push last July that talked about the spectrum of colors used on the brand's packaging.

Well, while I was looking at Gene Simmons at the Auto Show's Mini stand, Chevrolet very carefully dollied a gigantic Transformers-shaped cake into the north wing of New York's Jacob Javits Convention Center. The stunt, done with the TLC cable show "Cake Boss," involved a 2,000-pound piece of epicurean sin in the shape of Bumblebee Camaro from "Transformers: Dark of the Moon," the third installment in the franchise. The cake's excoriation from the back of a truck was captured on tape for a coming "Cake Boss" episode.Note to SoHo-loft investment bankers, hedge fund managers, and their pet psychiatrists …

Morgan Spurlock says he is as jaded now as he was when he started making "Pom Wonderful Presents: The Greatest Movie Ever Sold," his movie about the ubiquity of branding, but that he was hoping to raise social consciousness with the new film. "A certain amount of marketing is OK," he said. "But the question is where you draw the line. I was at a subway station the other day that was named after a brand. They're selling advertising in schools, and schools are supposed to be sacred."