The Federal Trade Commission has its sights set on food marketing to children. The Interagency Working Group, a coordination of four federal agencies including the FTC, Department of Agriculture, the Food and Drug Administration, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, is recommending "voluntary" guidelines on food advertising for products that can cause weight problems or do not contribute to a healthy diet. Proponents claim the new guidelines would urge food manufacturers to slow production of foods that contain high amounts of fat, salt, and sugar, which contribute to childhood obesity and other health-related problems. Critics say …

New WNBA league President Laurel Richie is popular with players. In December, she will reveal a "master plan" she has been working on since taking over from Donna Orender in April for the WNBA's 15th season. Unlike the past two League presidents, she has no hands-on basketball experience and admits to finding it "a little scary" to sit courtside at WNBA games for fear of errant passes. But she has a lot of marketing ability, most recently as the CMO for the Girl Scouts of America and previously worked for Ogilvy and Mather.

Marcel Fenez, global entertainment & media leader, PwC, predicts U.S. advertising will come back to 2009 spending levels through 2011 because of non-traditional media. Also, China will record brisk growth and, according to Fenez, will surpass Japan to become the world's No. 2 ad market by 2015.

Forty Wall St., once the tallest building in the world, is now home to a 22,000-square-foot flagship store for Duane Reade. The 24-hour store, scheduled to open Thursday, has an "up market" focus, with health care, food and beauty offerings, plus exclusive services and amenities never before seen in a Duane Reade or any other drugstore. Among the distinctly non-drug store type amenities are a Sushi Station, featuring a chef and full menu; a Juice Market, offering smoothies; a Starbucks coffee and fresh bakery counter; one of Coca-Cola's new Freestyle machine dispensing 130 varieties of Coca-Cola; and an expanded …

Columnist Scott Burgess reads the tea leaves in June auto sales numbers, which are up 7.1% versus the month last year. Among his observations: Ford's Lincoln brand is supposed to get an overhaul soon, but it's not soon enough. Yes, sales were up 16.5% in June, "but that number pulls down Ford's overall growth. The Ford badge saw sales jump 19.9%. Ford sold more Econoline vans, 7,952, than Lincoln sold vehicles, 7,361." He also points out that through June, Kia sold more compact Forte cars, 43,022, for the year than Lincoln has sold total vehicles, 42,003, during the …

24/7 Wall St.'s list of brands that will disappear soon is out. Bad news for Sears, Sony Pictures, American Apparel, Nokia, Saab, A&W All-American Foods Restaurants, Soap Opera Digest, Sony Ericsson, MySpace, and Kellogg's Corn Pops. Read on and (if you're a shareholder) sell now or weep later, assuming that crystal ball is working.

Schenectady, N.Y.-based Price Chopper Supermarkets is partnering with SavingStar for a program that lets shoppers select offers at SavingStar.com that are linked to their Price Chopper AdvantEdge loyalty card. Shoppers register their card number at SavingStar.com, and after buying promoted products at Price Chopper, the savings is collected in an account that is linked to a bank deposit, a Paypal deposit, an Amazon gift card or a donation to charity.

Entenmann's hashtag #notguilty seems to suggest the company is making a comment on the sensational Casey Anthony murder verdict. But the pastry maker actually tweeted "Who's #notguilty about eating all the tasty treats they want?!" The company soon realized its mistake, and deleted the tweet with the message, "Sorry everyone, we weren't trying to reference the trial in our tweet! We should have checked the trending hashtag first," and then adding ,"Our #notguilty tweet was insensitive, albeit completely unintentional. We are sincerely sorry."

Paul Eisenstein over at the Detroit Bureau has caught wind of rumors that Nissan may bring back the Datsun name for vehicles bound for emerging markets. It seems Japan's Nikkei, and U.S. site TruthAboutCars.com, have been talking about the possibility.

Marketers at Sears' Craftsman are pitching the tool brand to people who don't normally use tools at all, a big switch from the traditional approach of promoting tools to do-it-yourselfers. The effort centers on an online reality show for which Craftsman has been auditioning people since late June. The show is to feature someone who has "little to no tool skills whatsoever, but must be ready to face anything in pursuit of DIY knowledge," according to contest guidelines. Prospects have to upload two-minute videos describing their incompetence. The Web show starts mid-August, wherein the winner gets put in …