According to advertising research firm Ace Metrix, Pizza Hut, Domino's, Papa John's and CiCi's Pizza have debuted 46 national commercials so far in 2011, and ads promoting products and prices have racked up some of the highest "Ace Scores." Pizza Hut had the No. 1 ad for its Stuffed Crust Pizzas, with an Ace Score of 634 out of a possible 950. Domino's highest-scoring commercial, which promoted its improved chicken items, had an Ace Score of 629, placing it third in the pizza segment's rankings. Ace Metrix calculates Ace Scores by surveying consumers about advertisements' persuasiveness and watchable …

If the government defaults on its debt, we can bid the economic recovery, such as it is, goodbye. What would it do to the auto industry? It would hurt everything from sales to suppliers. Though auto executives and analysts predict the deadlock will be resolved, if it isn't, "the psychological impact will be huge," said David Cosper, CFO of Sonic Automotive Inc., the nation's third-largest dealership group. Interest rates would take off, killing lending, and consumer confidence would fizzle, and the dollar would weaken. "Our industry would stop as we would be in shock as a …

Chinese authorities shut two unauthorized Apple stores in Kunming for operating without business licenses. Investigators also examined three other stores that used Apple's logo without the company's permission, though they were found to have operating permits, according to the Dushi Shibao newspaper report posted today on the Kunming government's website. The report says the findings were part of a probe into more than 300 electronics vendors in the city. The move comes about a week after a blogger began posting photographs of a fake Apple store that looks like the real thing. "In areas outside of …

Walmart Express is slated to open Wednesday on Chicago's South Side. The store is a test of 15 Walmart Express stores in three pilot markets this year. Besides Chicago, Richfield, N.C., and Arkansas will get five stores each. The Bentonville, Ark.-based company's overseas stores are infusing revenue as same-store sales at its U.S. outposts have slipped for eight consecutive quarters.

General Motors Co. launched an ad campaign this week aimed at U.S. apparatchiks to emphasize its contributions to the U.S. economy and its post-bankruptcy outlook. The ads, in pubs like Politico, National Journal, Roll Call and The Hill, will run through late November. They invite people to take a look at a "completely new" GM. The effort launches with a two-page spread in The Hill. It features a picture of a GM Distribution Center in Rancho Cucamonga, Calif., and its rooftop solar panels. "There's a solar energy company inside every car we engineer," the ad says, noting the carmaker also …

PepsiCo's SoBe has partnered with Mike Tyson's Main Event game in launching a mobile gaming campaign for teas, fruit juice blends, and enhanced waters. The "Try Everything Challenge" invites iPhone users to compete for a high score in a fruit-smashing game within the existing Tyson Main Event game. The highest-point earner wins a trip to Las Vegas in October to train with Tyson. SoBe worked with iPhone game developers RockLive and Omnicom's OMD Gaming and OMD's Ignition Factory on the initiative. Mike Tyson: Main Event has attracted 1.6 million downloads so far since its March launch.

Marni Walden, who last year was named CMO of Verizon Wireless, replacing John Stratton, who was elevated to the COO spot, has challenges ahead. In her role overseeing Verizon Wireless' marketing in the months ahead, she has to deal with competitive jabs at Verizon's introduction of a new tiered-pricing plan for mobile data. Sprint, for one, has mocked the move and highlight the caps and throttling employed by Verizon and other competitors, and reiterate Sprint's offer of uncapped smartphone data. But Walden seems confident that Verizon's network and device strategy will persevere.

L'Oréal has been forced to pull ad campaigns featuring Julia Roberts and model Christy Turlington, after complaints by Liberal Democrat MP Jo Swinson that the images were overly airbrushed. Swinson has fought artifice in advertising photography in depictions of women. The new ads are for L'Oreal's Lanc"me and Maybelline brands. A two-page ad for Lanc"me featuring Roberts, promoted a foundation called Teint Miracle, which it claims creates a "natural light" that emanates from beautiful skin. The ad for Maybelline featured Turlington promoting a foundation called The Eraser, which is claimed to be an "anti-ageing" product. Swinson said that images …

A new movie-screening service on Walmart.com from Vudu, which it acquired last year, lets customers rent or buy movies over the Internet and stream them to their TVs, Blu-ray players and a variety of Vudu-enabled devices such as Sony's PlayStation 3 and HDTVs from LG Electronics, Sharp and Panasonic.

A gigantic tile mosaic of KFC icon Colonel Sanders in Rachel, Nev., was built in 2006. KFC says it is "the world's first brand visible from outer space." Not so, say Alex and James Turnbull of the blog Google Sightseeing. They say the oldest "astrovertisement" is a Readymix logo that was carved into the Australian desert in 1965.