Burger King Girl Brooke Burke Spotted At McDonald's

brooke_burke_mcd.jpg

Apparently, Brooke Burke didn't have a non compete clause in her agreement with Burger King and Crispin Porter + Bogusky as indicated by these images of her entering and leaving a McDonald's.

Or, according to a Buzznet editor, these images may simply be a twisted continuation of the Burger King Brooke Burke photo viral. The editor tells us, "The 'boink' galleries where the Brooke Burke pics are posted seem to be owned by someone who is 'in the industry' PR-wise. The person/company behind 'boink' tends to have a lot of pics that end up being widely available but they really seem to have them first. There's a couple other galleries like 'boink' at buzznet that could be the same person but are posting promotional photos of bands, etc." We'll keep you updated.

by Steve Hall    Feb-17-06    
Topic: Brands, Campaigns, Celebrity



Mary-Kate And Ashley Olsen to Front Badgley Mischka Fashion Campaign

badgley_olsen.jpg

Perhaps in an effort to dispel their dowdy look and to get fashion critic Richard Blackwell to lay off dissing the pair, Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen have signed a deal with designers Mark Badgley and James Mischka to represent the label in an upcoming ad campaign. The ads, photographed by Gilles Bensimon in the Presidential Suite of the St. Regis Hotel in Manhattan,, will grace the pages of Vanity Fair, Vogue, Elle and InStyle beginning with April issues. The collection is said to be a bit more colorful then the sister's usually drab outerwear.

by Steve Hall    Feb-16-06    
Topic: Campaigns, Celebrity, Magazine



Virgin Mobile Shoot Brings Out the Hipsters

Kristin1.jpg

If you want to see what a hipster really looks like or, at least, what Virgin Mobile deems to be a hipster, you can take a look at images from yesterday's photoshoot/party for an upcoming campaign. The shoot took place at Milk studios, was shot by Ryan McGinley and Ben Cho provided the tunes for ths hipsters to gyrate to as they were shot. If these are what hipsters look like, I'll take a good 'ol country girl anytime. OK, Kristin is kinda cute.

UPDATE: Seems the page the link points to has been removed. We'll follow up to see where the page has been moved to.

by Steve Hall    Feb-15-06    
Topic: Campaigns, Events



DVR-Resistant 'Smushed' Ad Grabs Attention

smushed.jpg

While fast forwarding through the ads in a recent episode of "The O.C.," an ad from the Office of National Drug Control Policy's National Youth Anti-Drug Media Campaign caught our attention with it's DVR-resistant, slow-cut tactic. The ad, with only four "segments" is called Smushed and is part of the Office's Above the Influence effort. Apart from catching our attention by appearing as a "still" while fast forwarding, the imagery of a girl who looked like she'd just stepped out from under an industrial compression-like machine also caused us to stop, rewind and watch the ad.

The ad itself dealt with issues of peer pressure to be cool, to fit in, to drink, to get high, to be popular, to never say the wrong thing. This ad is one of six currently running on MTV, Fuse, The N, FOX, The WB, UPN and others. The online component appears on Yahoo, GameSpy, IGN and print ads appear in 23 magazines including Teen People, Skateboarder, J-14 and Playstation. The entire collection of spots, all of which are very good, and print ads can be seen here.



Elizabeth Hurley Next 'Got Milk?' Celebrity

elizabeth-hurley-got-milk.jpg

Elizabeth Hurley is said to be the next in the long line of celebrities to appear in the American Dairy Association's Got Milk campaign according to Contact Music. In the ad, Hurley will appear a white T-shirt and bikini bottoms accompanied by copy, "Shocked Im a mom? You should know by now that milks nine essential nutrients make for one irresistible body." AdPunch has a larger image of the ad here.

by Steve Hall    Feb-14-06    
Topic: Campaigns, Celebrity



GE Explains 'Healthcare Re-Imagined" Campaign in Podcast

GE_healthcare.jpg

Today, GE has launched the online component of its Healthcare Re-Imagined campaign currently running during the Olympics. The company has published a podcast with Judy Hu, GE's global executive director of Advertising & Branding and Jen Walsh, GE's director of digital media in which Judy describes the thought process behind the campaign and Jen explains why the online medium is so important to GE's healthcare focus. In the podcast, Judy explains the company chose to go with a more serious tone in the campaign as research found humor didn't play well with healthcare topics and Jen explains the online component which includes a Yahoo page takeover February 14 and 15, videos on Webshots and AOL.com and a local language International roll out.

by Steve Hall    Feb-14-06    
Topic: Brands, Campaigns, Podcast



GM Paints 'New York Post' Yellow For New Corn-Based Fuel

post_gm_corn.jpg

With the tagline "live green, go yellow" GM, today, has painted the homepage of the New York Post's online site along with other sites such as the Austin American-Statesman yellow to promote the company's E85 ethanol-fueled vehicles of which there are already 1.5 million on the road. The vehicles can run on either gasoline or the new E85 fuel. E85 fuel is 85 percent ethanol and 15 percent gasoline and is made from U.S.-grown corn and other grains. The company will introduce and promote more E85-capable vehicles mid-2006.

The yellow takeover and the ads point to a live green go yellow microsite where visitors can find out about the fuel's benefits, how it's made, what vehicles will run on it, play a Stalk Car Race game, see the TV and print ads and get live green go yellow goodies.

by Steve Hall    Feb-10-06    
Topic: Brands, Campaigns, Online, Television



Visa Bows New Tagline During Olympic Opening Ceremony

life_takes_visa.jpg

Retiring its 20 year old "It's everywhere you want to be," Visa will introduce a new TBWA/Chiat/Day LA-created tagline, "Life Takes Visa," during the opening ceremony of the Olympics. Interestingly, the tagline was created a few years ago by Visa's previous agency BBDO New York and was in some Latin America ads created by Leo Burnett.

Unlike Intel's new but meaningless "Leap Ahead" tagline, Visa's tagline nicely connotes you can get just about everything you need in life with a Visa card. That is, everything that costs money. A piece of plastic isn't going to help solve your marital woes but hey, we can only ask so much from a piece of plastic.

by Steve Hall    Feb- 7-06    
Topic: Brands, Campaigns, Good, Television



Grocery Store Uses Body Parts to Sell Produce

mellons_for_sale.jpg

While we know there's all sorts of metaphors for human body parts and the selling of such parts, we don't seem to recall seeing a grocery store liken it's produce to body parts in quite this particular manner. In these ads, asparagus, pears, bananas and, yes, melons are compared to the various body parts one might envision when thinking about such produce.

by Steve Hall    Feb- 2-06    
Topic: Campaigns, Good, Magazine



Naomi Campbell, John Malkovich Star in Pirelli Long-Form Ad

pirelli_the_call.jpg

In the works since last year, tire maker Pirelli will, in March. release The Call, a 10-minute video, created by Leo Burnett and set in the Vatican, starring John Malkovich who plays a priest and Naomi Campbell who plays the devil. Using the power stuggle between good and evil, Pirelli claims the film, directed by Antoine Fuqua, will be a metaphor for the company's "power is nothing without control" tagline. The film will be released exclusively online and receive promotion through online, print and television.

This is Hollywood-style, celebrity-powered ad is sure to give Russell Crowe plenty of ammunition to further castigate celebrities for selling out. That said, if we, as an industry want better ads, we have to tap better talent. Big names bring a sea of eyeballs and getting noticed in today's media environment is becoming an impossible task. Granted, Malkovick, though a superb actor, isn't A-list in terms of popularity and Campbell, while very popular, is no Malkovich in the acting department but together, they just might bring some notoriety and sales to Pirelli and its sleepy, commodity-like category of automotive tires.

by Steve Hall    Jan-30-06    
Topic: Campaigns, Celebrity, Commercials, Good, Online, Opinion