Groupon Effect Spreads Further Into CGP as TotalBeauty Launches Deep Deals

• The Groupon-ification of packaged goods is taking another step forward as beauty-review site TotalBeauty.com today launched the first of what CEO Emrah Kovacoglu expects will be many deep-discounted voucher offers for beauty products.
• Total Beauty Deals launched at around 1 p.m. EST with an offer of $25 worth of E.L.F. cosmetics for $10 and redeemable through EyesLipsFace.com.
• The beauty deal comes less than a week after General Mills became the first packaged-goods player to dip its toe in the daily-deal water by offering via Groupon a 12-item assortment of packaged food valued at $40 for $20 to be direct-shipped to consumers in San Francisco and Minneapolis.
• And while traditional CPG couponing players Valassis Communications and News Corp.’s SmartSource so far haven’t done their own deep-discount daily deal propositions, that isn’t stopping CPG brands from giving it a try. (www.adage.com)

P&G Reinvents Laundry With $150 Million Tide Pods Launch

• Procter & Gamble Co. is preparing to launch what it describes as its biggest laundry innovation in more than a quarter century with Tide Pods: a line of highly concentrated liquid detergent tablets, backed by a massive $150 million marketing budget.
• Pods, which are similar but more complex than the single-chamber liquid-filled laundry tabs P&G sells in Europe, will be widely available in September. But P&G will begin limited “pre-seeding” sales and sampling in July to start building buzz for the product, said Alex Keith, VP-North American laundry. “We want marketing that’s as innovative as the product technology,” Ms. Keith said, though she declined to provide specifics.
• P&G has told retailers that, ultimately, liquid-filled tabs could take a 30% share of a U.S. laundry market that industry executives said totals $6.5 billion, making them a multibillion-dollar product proposition. In the U.K., currently the most-advanced market for unit-dose laundry tablets, all forms of tablets including powder now exceed 30% of the market, according to an executive familiar with the matter.
• The packaging and three-chamber product certainly are different than anything U.S. consumers have seen before. Tide Pods have an orange and blue swirl pattern from two smaller chambers on top of a larger chamber of white fluid, all housed in a clear fishbowl-style container with a flip-top lid. Ms. Keith said the product has produced the highest consumer-satisfaction scores the company has ever seen for a new laundry product. (www.adage.com)

What the Rich Are Reading Biggest surprises: Costco Connection and AARP’s magazine

• The rich are cheap. And old. Those are just a couple of conclusions to draw from our review of magazine reading in households making $250K or more. How else to explain the presence of Costco Connection and AARP: The Magazine among the most read titles?
• When it comes to favorite magazines, however, it looks like the wealthy are just as aspirational if overscheduled as the rest of us, putting The New Yorker at the top of their personal Hot List, but (since it doesn’t rank high on the percentage reading rankings) never finishing the articles. Only Consumer Reports and National Geographic managed to crack all three of our top 10 lists.
• Data for the review were provided by GfK MRI from its Fall 2010 Survey of the American Consumer. They covered 860 households with income of $250k or more and excluded publications with less than 50 readers.

(www.adweek.com)

 Pepsi Uses New Technology To Take MLB Activation To The Max

• Since relaunching Pepsi Max last summer, PepsiCo Inc. has leveraged its partnerships with the NFL and NHL to promote the zero-calorie beverage. Now that it’s MLB’s turn, PepsiCo Americas Beverages has added a high-tech, social media twist. The beverage giant last week rolled out the first of two new MLB-themed Pepsi Max TV spots. (www.sponsorship.com)

el Jimador Tequila Scores Big With Major Soccer Sponsorship

• Brown-Forman, the owners of Casa Herradura Tequilas including el Jimador, announced today a new multi-million dollar, four-year partnership  with Soccer United Marketing (SUM), making the company the official tequila sponsor of Major League Soccer (MLS), U.S. Soccer and the U.S. Men’s and Women’s National Teams, and the Mexican National Team’s annual tour of the United States.
• This sponsorship is the single largest marketing investment Brown-Forman has made in its tequila brands since acquiring Casa Herradura in 2007 and provides the brand with a comprehensive  activation platform across the highest levels of the sport, including:
• MLS and its marquee events: MLS First Kick, the AT&T MLS All-Star  Game, and MLS Cup, MLS’ championship game.
• Global rights to the U.S. Men’s and Women’s National Teams, which will  represent the U.S. in the 2011 FIFA Women’s World Cup, 2012 Olympic Games, and  2014 FIFA World Cup.
• Sponsorship of the hugely popular annual United  States tour by the Mexican National Team.
• Brown-Forman will receive extensive marketing and promotional rights across the properties to leverage with its consumers including logo rights for promotions, on-field signage at over 100 nationally televised matches per year, on-site presence at matches, ability to develop co-branded merchandise, player appearances and to be announced proprietary programs. All messaging will remind consumers to drink responsibly, a key emphasis for the brand, the company and the SUM properties. (www.sponsorship.com)

Cereal Marketers Scoop Up Sponsorships

• Although The Kellogg Co., General Mills, Inc. and other breakfast cereal marketers have dabbled in sponsorship over the years, recent deal making indicates the category’s heightened interest in the medium. Activity is largely focused on national properties that afford media exposure and local promotional extensions. (www.sponsorship.com)

YouTube to Broaden Its Movie Rentals

• Google Inc.’s YouTube is expanding its movie-rental service to include more and newer titles that will be available on the same day they appear on other video-on-demand services, said people familiar with matter.
• At least four studios—Time Warner Inc.’s Warner Bros., Sony Corp.’s Sony Pictures, Comcast Corp.’s Universal Pictures and Lions Gate Entertainment Corp.—are expected to contribute films to the service, according to the people familiar with the matter. (www.wsj.com)

Tales of Reading in Reintroducing a Color Device

• “TILL rhymes stop rhyming, and pots stop boiling,” a voice-over says, “by hook or by crook, by book or by nook.”
• Make that Nook Color, the e-reading tablet that Barnes & Noble is hoping to reintroduce to consumers in an advertising campaign that begins on Monday.
• In gently singsong language that evokes Dr. Seuss — sure enough, “The Cat in the Hat” makes a brief appearance later in the ad — a commercial makes a general pitch for reading as it depicts people, old and young, utterly absorbed in their books while the world goes on around them. (www.nytimes.com)

Gwyneth Paltrow poses for new Coach ads

• Gwyneth Paltrow is the new model for luxury handbag maker Coach, which she calls “the quintessential New York brand.”
• But the new ads will appear exclusively overseas in select European and Asian markets, where the company has labeled key places for expansion.
• The first images will launch in the fall to coincide with Coach’s 70th-anniversary campaign.
• Coach President and Executive Creative Director Reed Krakoff said in a statement Tuesday that Paltrow has the spirit, energy and elegance associated with Coach Inc.’s leather goods, footwear and jewelry. (www.ap.com)

Oakland Coliseum set to take stock with naming rights deal

• The Oakland-Alameda County Coliseum, home to National Football League team the Oakland Raiders and Major League Baseball franchise Oakland Athletics is reportedly set for a name-change following an initial agreement with Overstock.com.
• Under the proposals of this new naming rights package, the multi-purpose stadium will be known as either the Overstock.com Coliseum, or the O.Co Coliseum, as the internet seller of surplus stock is changing its name.
• It has been widely reported in the local press that the agreement will run for six years, and Overstock.com will initially pay US$1.2 million in the first year, increasing three percent in each year that follows. Half of this will be paid directly to the Raiders, with the remainder going to the stadium authority. (www.sportspromedia.com)

Nautica secures one-race deal with Richard Petty

• Nascar Sprint Cup Series team Richard Petty Motorsports (RPM) has secured the support of Nautica for the next round of the series after agreeing a one-race primary sponsorship agreement with the sports clothing company.  
• Nautica will take over from electronics retailer Best Buy as the primary sponsor of AJ Allmendinger’s Number 43 car at the Crown Royal Presents the Matthew and Daniel Hansen 400, which takes place on 30th April at the Richmond International Raceway. The company’s logo will thus appear on the hood of the car at the two-day event.
• Whilst no official announcement of the valuation of the partnership has been given, a one-race primary sponsorship deal typically commands a fee of up to US$750,000. (www.sportspromedia.com)

Ram Truck Launches Outdoorsman Online

• Chrysler’s Ram Truck division has rolled out a new version of the pickup called the Outdoorsman, designed for people who hunt, fish, camp and are more likely to bring a bowie knife than a camera into the boonies. They are, therefore, likely to need storage bins, a good towing capacity, chargers and a rugged-looking vehicle.
• The Chrysler LLC division is getting that point across with a new integrated campaign that includes TV spots via Ram Truck traditional-media AOR The Richards Group, Dallas, and an Internet program via SapientNitro.
• While the TV ads offer vignettes of guys in the woods roughing it and doing things like using a bow and arrow to stop a bird from tweeting in the middle of the night, the digital effort includes online ads and centers on a microsite positioning the truck as Father Nature. (www.mediapost.com)

Edge Gel Launches First TV Push In Years

• Edge Shave Gel is hitting the airwaves for the first time in at least three years with a new TV spot via AOR JWT. The ad — intended to appeal to regular guys, versus super athletes and the elite — started Tuesday night on cable networks like Comedy Central, History, MTV, Spike, TBS, ESPN, and Versus, and goes on Fox later this week.
• The new spot uses a “ready room” theme that has the main Edge spokesperson, played by actor John Behlmann, walking through different environments — a locker room, garage, and vestibule before a wedding — where guys get ready “for whatever it is they’re getting ready for.”
• Jeffrey Wolf, senior brand manager for Edge, says the timing of the new campaign is in part to mark the second anniversary of parent St. Louis, Mo.-based Energizer Holding’s acquisition of Edge and Skintimate from S.C. Johnson & Son Inc. $275 million.
• “Their focus had been driving volume in the short term versus equity building. We are trying to drive brands. The good news is since Edge is still seen as a pioneer out there, brand awareness and equity are strong,” says Wolf, who adds that the company discovered from its own study via Millward-Brown that the Edge brand is in good health, “but we can’t rest on our laurels because of the competitiveness of the segment.” (www.mediapost.com)

Beam Global’s Hornitos Announces First US ‘Mariachi Mash Up’ Competition

• Beam Global’s Hornitos Premium Tequila is giving up-and-coming bands a chance at stardom via the new Hornitos Tequila Mariachi Mash Up competition with official media partner Billboard Magazine. Whether it’s rock, hip-hop or classical, the national contest challenges musical acts of all types to create their own mariachi-inspired mash up in celebration of the official kick-off to tequila season.
• Started on April 25, on Hornitos’ official Facebook page, the Mariachi Mash Up competition is encouraging US bands to submit a three minute video incorporating traditional mariachi elements (trumpets, violins or even guitarrons) into a well-known song in order to create a memorable musical mix-up.  Entrants will be evaluated by an esteemed panel of judges, including Billboard Editor Tye Comer and a tequila expert from Hornitos.
• Entrants can select from five well-known songs (list can be found on the Hornitos Facebook page) and have some fun performing their own ‘Mariachi style’ interpretation. The top band will be featured in Billboard Magazine’s coveted ‘Backbeat’ section in a June 2011 issue and will receive a $10,000 cash prize (contest winners will be announced on June 6). (www.popsop.com)