Staples Sells Easy Button

Apparently, so many people like the Easy Button featured in the latest batch of Staples commercial, the office supply retailer has decides to sell the button which, when pushed, utters, "That was easy." It's rare when a commercial creates a product other than the one it intended to sell. Not that the Easy Button will actually help you get more work done but at least it will for a bit of office diversion.

Mountain Dew Funds Movie

In a subtle bit of Product placement, Mountain Dew has financed a snowboarding film, opening December 2, called First Descent. The brand is said to make subtle, casual appearances in the film but will not, it seems, be overbearing. Audiences will make that determination.

DC Girls Are Rumpalicious

Advertising and design agency 72andSunny has launched a campaign called "I Have A Secret" for DC Shoes' new girls division. The centerpiece of the campaign is a 44-page book, called Girls Who Have Secrets Are Sexy, showcasing the DC Girls snowboarding team and the Holiday 05-06 line of apparel, footwear, outerwear and snowboard boots. The book will be available at retailers and poly-bagged with fashion and lifestyle magazines. Other components of the campaign include a 12-page teaser book, print ads in ELLEGirl and SG magazines, and a website slated to launch soon.

The book is a collection of sassy, hip and slightly rebellious girls with attitude who snowboard. Each page features photography of DC-sponsored pro snowboarders outfitted in DC Shoes gear, including Priscilla Levac, the top-ranked female rider in the world, as well as Erin Valverde, Jacqui Berg, Drea Russell and DC Girls' skateboard team rider Lyn-Z Adams Hawkins.

The book is quite beautiful looking and we particularly like the image with the headline, "I am Rumpalicious, Trunktastic, Assmerizing, the Caboosiest."

'Earl' Promotes We Clothing on Billboard

Large scale, hand-painted outdoor mural company Colossal Media, has undertaken a new project for We Clothing, a Swedish based clothing company entering the US market, painting a billboard advertisement at Colossal's Broadway/Houston location featuring We Activist and celebrity Jason Lee.

The ad features Lee, star of the NBC sitcom My Name is Earl and his "twin," an overweight version of Lee, eating the hamburgers that the skinny Lee "twin" is cooking on a grill. The We Clothing store is opening nearby, on Lafayette Street in New York City's SoHo shopping district in late November. Colossal started painting this We Clothing project at the beginning of October.

Marriage and Virginity to Hit Times Square

Campaign For Our Children, the folks who brought the Marriage Works campaign last Spring are bringing a new version of campaign, breaking this fall, to New York, along with a campaign called Pink which touts the benefits of marriage to older teens and promotes abstinence among tweens and young teens. While we were a bit snide when the original campaign broke, writing, "the only thing that will reduce teen pregnancy is surgically implanting a permanent female condom inside every girl under the age of 18. Oh, and a little dose of open, parental discussion about sex and its consequences," we admit education on these issues is a very good thing but marriage does not always guarantee an ideal life.

Sanders Consulting Hosts New Business Seminars

Sanders Consulting, a company that trains agencies on winning new business, is hosting a series of seminars beginning October 31 in Los Angeles. Other seminars will be held November 2 in Chicago, November 4 in New York and November 13-14 in Miami.Having personally been through this seminar a few years ago, we can vouch for its quality and effectiveness. Sanders Consulting aims to better an agency's chances of reeling in new business and that's a good thing. After all, without a steady stream of new business, the fickle nature of agency-hopping clients will shutter an agency faster than Paris Hilton can break off an engagement.

AstraZeneca Provides Breast Cancer Education

AstraZeneca recently launched a Disease Awareness program aimed at enhancing awareness of the risk of breast cancer recurrence and how to reduce that risk among survivors. The program consists of a television commercial called "If You Were My Sister," an interactive Web site called , and an educational information kit, all featuring real women who are breast cancer survivors. The campaign encourages the public to learn and share critical information about the risk of breast cancer recurrence.

The site, developed by MBC, allows women to read general information or answer several questions about their individual situation and then read information specific to their situation. Lest we forget this is marketing, an email address is, optionally, requested at the end of the questions. We're sure AstraZeneca's drugs are promoted here somewhere but, aside from the separate corporate site, we couldn't find it which, of course, is refreshing.

New Zealand Telecom Promotion Blows Up Battleship

Reaffirming New Zealanders know how to have fun, Telecom Mobile has launched an SMS campaign inspired by the board game Battleship and called Push the Button. The player who wins an SMS game to locate a virtual version of the former HMNZS Wellington battleship will win a trip, along with three friends, to push a button that will blow up the real HMNZS Wellington which will then sink to become an artificial marine reef and diving attraction. The contest launched September 30 and Telecom 027 customers must register by October 9 to play the game.

$150,000 of other prizes will also be awarded, including a Sanyo 32-inch widescreen televisions, Sanyo T3G mobile phones, dive gear and courses, Microsoft X Box consoles, airtime credit and other prizes. The game finishes on 31 October with the winner announced thereafter, and the sinking will take place on November 12.

In true shrimp-on-the-barbie style, experiential agency TOUCH/CAST conceived the Push The Button promotion over a lazy Christmas Day Bar-B-Q at one of the employees homes.

Absolut APeach Launched With Video Series

To introduce its new Peach flavored vodka, Absolut has come up with a series of quirky videos that reveal how Absolut APeach, as they call it, was created. The first episode reveals it was created by accident after the company had planned to introduce Absolut Cinnamon Roll only to find out Wyrskybogg Vodka had already release the same flavor. So, it was back to the drawing board with the company's top secret development team, originally formed in 1982, pulled back into action to create a new flavor. Dry wit ensues.

AOL to Acquire Weblogs, Inc.

Paid Content is reporting AOL will acquire Jason Calacanis' Weblogs Inc., a two and a half year-old network of 75-plus weblogs including Engadget, Autoblog and AdJab. The deal is said to be finalized with plans in place to announce the deal this week. Calacanis isn't confirming or denying the deal according to Paid Content.

The deal could be worth as much as $35 million but it's likely to be far less. Even so, that's a lot of money for anything weblog-related and perhaps is an encouraging stamp of approval of sorts for the medium. It is said AOL plans to keep the Weblogs, Inc. network of blogs separate from the rest of AOL properties at least for the time being. No doubt, more details will follow.