Radar Pays Big For Tom Cruise, No Money Left For Promotion

It's rumored Radar magazine paid $300,000 for insider info on the Tom Cruise Scientology feature which appeared in its September issue. That, perhaps, explains the apparent lack of funds available to support any street marketing beyond a couple of lame stickers shown in this image taken by our street shot snapper Bucky Turco.

Four Pound Vogue Beast Makes Its Thump

Tipping the scale at four pounds, the September issue of Vogue contains 691 ad pages beating last years record of 651. While Vogue Publisher Thomas Florio is lovin' it, we have to wonder what it's like as an advertiser to have a one in 691 chance of your ad being seen. Can you say ego buy?

Maxim Extends Brand to Nightclubs

Ever the proliferator of female hotness, Maxim magazine is now proliferating itself, as it has a few times before, beyond the confines of the printed page and in to the dark, inner world of the nightclub. Dennis Publishing has signed a deal with nightclub developers Rande and Scott Gerber to create a nationwide chain of Maxim-branded nightclubs. We hope it's more than just plastering the walls of nightclubs with Maxim cover shots.

Nike Likes Big Butts...and Thighs...And Knees

With the launch of a new campaign, Nike has made official the mini-trend towards celebrating less than stick figure sized woman. Following Dove's much talked about campaign, Nike has launched a series of print ads that celebrates big butts, thunder thighs and tomboy knees. The big 'ol booty is pushing aside the anorexic runway model and Ms. Magazine Founder Gloria Steinem is very happy about it telling Ad Age, "It is a change that women and some men, too have been agitating for 35 years. I spent 15 years of my life pleading for ads that reflected our readers by age, race and ethnicity. We could demonstrate that women responded better to ads that were more inclusive of them, but they just weren't coming." The campaign comes from Wieden & Kennedy

Gold Industry Signs Marketing Deal With Joss Stone

The World Gold Council has signed a deal with Joss Stone, recently seen in GAP ads, to appear in the group's "Speak Gold" ad campaign. A four-page spread, shot by fashion photographer Patrick Demarchelier, will appear an October Conde Nast Fashion Rocks supplement inserted in Conde Nast Traveler, Glamour, Lucky, Self, Vogue, Vanity Fair and W. In the ad, Stone will be decked in Italian jeweler Di MODOLA's gold jewelery collection.

Librarian Fantasy Promotes Librarian Bar

As male fantasies go, right up there with school girls clad in plaid skirts are librarians dressed as though they were too busy reading to finish dressing. New York City's Library Bar created an ad that maximizes this fantasy in a way that aligns nicely with the brand. Oh, screw that marketing blather. They dressed their hot bartenders up in sexy librarian-wear to attract drooling men incapable of resistance. The ad features Erinn and Elizabeth who both work at Library Bar.

Radar Magazine Parodies 1968 Muhammed Ali Esquire Cover

Radar magazine's Maer Roshan has brought legendary adman and cover designer George Lois out of retirement to design the issue's September/October issue, on sale August 16th. The cover will be a riff on the 1968 Esquire cover Louis did with Muhammed Ali.

When Lois saw Radar writer Kim Masters' investigative piece on Tom Cruise and his relationship with Scientology, he was reminded of the April 1968 Esquire cover which showed Ali as Saint Sebastian. Louis convinced Ali to pose as a martyr, wounded and near death but still holding on. Back then, Esquire's editor Harold Hayes was deluged with angry letters and the cover was denounced on the Senate floor. But now, with everything a parody of its former self, a new parody will grace the cover of Radar with Tom Cruise appearing as Ali did on the April 1968 cover.

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OK Magazine Launches With Red Carpet Paparazzi-fest

Like Paris Hilton in the center of a paparazzi frenzy, everyone buying a copy of the new OK Magazine was treated to their own, personal paparazzi shoot. To promote the launch of its new magazine, OK turned a New York City newsstand into a red carpet event. Everyone who went up to buy a copy of the just released celebrity magazine (do we need another?) was treated to cheering fans, paparazzi and onlooking tourists

Enjoyment of Sound Likened to Enjoyment of Female Form

Somehow equating automotive sound system components to female body components, this ad for Toyota and Pioneer certainly grabs attention. flickr user Barrybar points to the copy on the back of the ad, which he graciously translated, that pumps up the suggestive nature of the ad. Citing the directions from which one can enjoy quality sound, the copy eludes to directions from which one can enjoy female components: "from above, from below, from the middle, inside, from the front, from behind."

Magazine Product Placement Yields Hush-Hush Hilarity

On her arrangement with several magazines to use images of Lexus vehicles in editorial, Lexus VP of Marketing Deborah Wahl Meyer told Ad Age, "I'm not talking about pushing anyone to do this We highly respect what a journalist and editor do. We're not talking about crossing any boundaries that are well established." Clearly, the simple act of asking certainly crosses the line. It places journalist in a compromising position. They have been influenced whether they decided to go along with the request or not. Don't worry. We haven't turned into a myopic infant. We know this stuff been going on forever but slowly and surely the line between editorial and advertising is becoming obliterated. Uninfluenced, independent commentary is becoming increasingly difficult to find.

As evil as this may sound, people still have brains, whether marketers realize this or not, and they will adjust to this blurring of reality. Though, it's just not something that needs to be there in the first place. Lending a bit of humor to this magazine product placement trend is the hilariously clandestine, hush-hush attitude both sides have taken on as if knowing which publishers and which marketers are in bed together is as important as codes to detonate a nuclear device.