Tag: Media and Marketing

Media and Marketing

What happens to the CJ in the increasingly likely event Gannett adds the Los Angeles Times and 40-plus other titles?

By Jim Hopkins
Boulevard Publisher

To paraphrase a famous misquote, what’s good for Gannett is good for its Courier-Journal subsidiary here in Louisville. That was the gist of Gannett’s argument in favor of its $815 million offer last spring for Tribune Publishing — now called Tronc, the parent company of The Los Angeles Times, Chicago Tribune, seven other big dailies, and 160 smaller weekly and monthly niche titles and their more than 7,000 employees.

CJ August 29 2016
Today’s front page.

“As one company,” Gannett said April 25 in disclosing its surprise offer, “Gannett and Tribune would have the financial stability to continue maintaining journalistic excellence, independence, high standards and integrity for years to come.”

The immediate path to that goal would be the $50 million Gannett predicted the two companies would save if they consolidated overlapping functions, which means eliminating jobs in areas like finance, marketing and production, and through greater purchasing power for things like newsprint and technology.

Today, with the Tronc deal looking more likely than ever — a published report last week said the two companies are now just haggling over a considerably sweetened final price — it makes sense to turn to the possible impact on the CJ.

The Louisville paper is a much smaller operation than it was 10 years ago, before the newspaper industry cratered during the financial collapse. It’s no longer Kentucky’s dominant statewide paper, and its influence even in Louisville has diminished as other news outlets have started from scratch (Insider Louisville) or bulked up (WDRB and, just last month, LEO Weekly’s parent).

Gannett logoBut the CJ is still a local player. And it’s also Continue reading “What happens to the CJ in the increasingly likely event Gannett adds the Los Angeles Times and 40-plus other titles?” →

Wayback News

60 years ago today: a White House race amid Mideast troubles; the future mom of a ‘Silver Fox’ marries (again), and a strike threatens a big Louisville employer

By Jim Hopkins
Boulevard Publisher

The last Tuesday in August 1956 was quite like today: A presidential race geared up for the final, post-Labor Day push, amid boiling Mideast tensions and questions about one candidate’s health. Hot and humid, Louisville distracted itself with celebrity news: a very rich New York socialite with a blue-chip name had just married husband No. 3; years later, her son would become a famous TV news anchor dubbed the “Silver Fox.” And contract talks between a major local manufacturer and thousands of employees were the business story of the day. These were the headlines on The Courier-Journal’s front page that Aug. 28, 1956.

CJ front page August 28 1956
The Courier-Journal front page, Aug 28, 1956.

An editor’s playful headline, “Sweat-ery,” summed up what readers should expect that day: temperatures in the 90s, news to make them wince when many employers still didn’t have air conditioning. But the workplace differed in far worse ways.

Companies openly discriminated on the basis of gender and race. The help-wanted classifieds section for women included Curl’s Tavern on Brook Street, offering $30 a week ($265 in today’s dollars) for short-order cooks; applicants had to be white. Kleins Restaurant on Broadway needed a cook, too — but “colored,” adding: “apply at rear.”

White and colored clerks wanted
Help-wanted ads reflected 1956 segregated Louisville.

That summer’s presidential race was a rematch between the Republican incumbent Dwight D. Eisenhower, 65, and the long-shot Democratic nominee he’d beaten four years before: Adlai Stevenson, 56, and a former Illinois governor. Their dueling campaigns argued over whether the economy was adding jobs fast enough. But the greater concern was the crisis in Egypt, where new President Gamal Abdel Nasser had just nationalized the Suez Canal.

Eisenhower and Stevenson
Eisenhower and Stevenson.

Eisenhower, a retired five-star general, was heading back to Washington after a West Coast golfing vacation in Pebble Beach, Calif., with his wife Mamie; it was a pleasure trip, but also meant to project good health after a heart attack he’d suffered the year before.

The gossipy news? It was about Gloria Vanderbilt, born into one of the nation’s wealthiest families, and still known as the “poor little rich girl” because she’d been the subject of a high-profile custody battle between her mother and an aunt over a $4 million trust fund ($67 million in today’s dollars). She was 10 years old at the time.

Vanderbilt and Lumet
Just married: Vanderbilt and Lumet.

In a photograph on the CJ’s front page, the 32-year-old socialite posed for photographers with her new husband, the director Sidney Lumet; they’d wed the previous day. The marriage lasted 11 years until they divorced, and she married husband No. 4 — her last: Wyatt Emory Cooper. They would have two sons. The second, born when she was 43, was named Anderson Hays Cooper. (Her first son, Carter Vanderbilt Cooper, committed suicide at 23 by jumping from the ledge of the family’s 14th-floor apartment on Manhattan’s posh upper East Side, as Vanderbilt watched in horror, pleading for him to stop.)

The big business news was a strike Continue reading “60 years ago today: a White House race amid Mideast troubles; the future mom of a ‘Silver Fox’ marries (again), and a strike threatens a big Louisville employer” →

Latest Headlines

With its Extra Crispy sunscreen going for $202 on eBay, KFC gave away 3,000 more rare bottles; plus, starting today: a Snapchat lens for fans to ‘Colonel-ize’ themselves

A news summary, focused on 10 big employers; updated 10:22 a.m.

eBay KFC sunscreen 500
An Alabama eBay seller is accepting bids through Monday.

KFC might want to get into the sunscreen business permanently. The chain offered another 3,000 free bottles of its fried chicken-scented Colonel Sanders Extra Crispy Sunscreen yesterday — and emptied its inventory immediately — after the marketing stunt succeeded far more than the fast-food chain expected when it launched Monday. The second round began yesterday for U.S. residents-only, but the order form is already gone, replaced with a notice saying “incredible free offer all gone.”

KFC suncreen offer already goneInitially, the Yum unit promised 3,000 bottles on a first-come, first-served basis. “But the Colonel forgot to hit the ‘off switch,'” the company said in a press release, “which resulted in more than 9,000 bottles requested in about two hours, with 5,000 of those requests in the final 10 minutes.”

The bottles were so popular, at least four are now being auctioned on eBay, with one seller in Birmingham, Ala., showing a current high bid of $202.50 — the highest of 55 so far; offers are being accepted through Monday. Bids on the other three bottles by different sellers now stand at $51 to $97.

Meanwhile today, KFC introduced a Snapchat lens that let’s  fans “Colonel-ize” themselves — “glasses, bowtie, goatee, age spots and all” — in a campaign to duplicate the success sister chain Taco Bell had with a Cinco de Mayo promotion last spring.

KFC Snapchat lens
You can look like  this.

The Snapchat lens capitalizes on the popularity of the chain’s series of TV commercials portraying resurrected versions of very long-dead KFC founder Harland Sanders — including the current version, famously suntanned actor George Hamilton, who plays the “Extra Crispy” one.

“Starring as the Colonel in our advertising may be an exclusive gig, but on Saturday, anyone can be the Colonel on Snapchat,” the company says.

For Boulevard readers over the age of, say, 14, here’s a more technical explanation, no doubt supplied by the mobile app company itself: “Sponsored lenses offer Snapchatters the ability to apply real-time visual effects and sounds to their selfies, allowing brands to take part in communication on the platform in the most interactive, fun, and personal way.”

KFC is aiming for the same result Taco Bell scored last spring, when its Cinco de Mayo lens smashed Snapchat records. That campaign turned consumers’ heads into a giant taco shell, resulting in 224 million views in one day, according to AdWeek.

GE Hair logoGE: A former GE Appliances employee has sued General Electric, saying he was singled out, harassed and ultimately fired for being transgender. Mykel Mickens worked at Appliance Park from October 2014 to June of this year. He says co-workers turned on him when they discovered he once was a woman named Michelle. It appears his suit is against GE Appliances, rather than the parent company that owned the division until late June, when China-based Haier bought it for $5.6 billion. Last night, GE Appliances told WDRB that it doesn’t comment on matters in litigation, but said the company “embraces diversity and supports organizations like our LGBT group” (WDRB).

Former parent company GE’s gambit to morph into something akin to a Silicon Valley start-up began five years ago, when it quietly opened a software center in San Ramon, Calif., 24 miles east of San Francisco. The complex, home to GE Digital, now employs 1,400 people (New York Times).

Latest Headlines

KFC’s new extra-crispy marketing recipe revealed! Big name + bizarre thing = smell of success

A news summary, focused on 10 big employers; updated 9:43 a.m.

KFC‘s latest publicity stunt — fried chicken-scented sunscreen — zigged in the U.S. from People magazine, then zagged to the U.K.’s Marie Claire, rolling up untold millions of dollars in free PR over the past 48 hours since its brief Monday launch. And it all involved just 3,000 bottles of a fake product never meant to get into consumer’s hands, according to trade site DigiDay.

KFC sunscreen 75Google News counted nearly 100 websites mentioning KFC Extra Crispy Sunscreen. Huffington Post’s story had 3,100 shares. The retro promotional infomercial video got nearly 280,000 views since it was posted on YouTube. And it won 11,000 mentions on social media, said Brandwatch analyst Kellan Terry.

The campaign was by the W+K agency in Portland, Ore., and followed the same formula W+K used for another client: Old Spice. “Its irreverent and unconventional,” Terry said, “and people love to laugh and watch the ad as it unfolds. These types of spots are tailored for multiple platform success.” And it paired perfectly with fake Colonel Harland “Extra Crispy” Sanders, played by actor-turned-pro tanner George Hamilton (photo, top).

The sunblock gimmick followed KFC’s two edible nail varnishes — flavored Original and Hot and Spicy — released in Hong Kong back in May.

TACO BELL is once more in the very unwelcome spotlight after reports employees refused to serve law enforcement officers. The latest incident, involving five Louisville Metro Police officers, comes amid a summer of rising tensions between police and the public.

The one in Louisville happened last week at the Taco Bell at Preston Highway and Phillips Lane, when the officers were taking a work break from duty at the Kentucky State Fair. One employee told co-workers he wouldn’t take the officers’ order, though another worker did eventually take the order, according to Sgt. Dave Mutchler, president of the River City FOP union representing officers.

“However, in the meantime,” Mutchler wrote in an e-mail, “another employee stated to a co-worker ‘I want to mess with them. I want to mess with them. I’m going to mess with them. I’m going to mess with them.'” Seeing no manager, the officers left.

Both Taco Bell and the Louisville franchise owner apologized to Louisville Metro Police and directly to the officers. The franchise owner says police made it clear they didn’t want any of the employees fired, and said he would retrain staff (Courier-Journal and WKYT).

The incident echoed one last month in Phenix City, Ala., where a Taco Bell clerk wouldn’t serve two sheriff’s deputies after another customer complained about the officers being there. The employee was fired and the chain apologized to the deputies and to the sheriff’s office. But there have been others involving cops:

  • In Toledo, Ohio, last week, a sheriff’s deputy was fired after making inappropriate Facebook posts about Taco Bell employees he said made vulgar remarks about him. One post said a black employee and a co-worker inside the restaurant yelled “Black lives matter,” and laughed at him while he was in his car in the drive-thru. The deputy was in uniform at the time.
  • A KFC employee in Missouri was fired early this month after reportedly threatening to spit in a Franklin County sheriff’s deputy’s order.

UPS: In Richmond, Va., the shipper says it plans to lay off 160 workers from its UPS Freight unit there within the next 12 months in a cost-cutting move. News reports didn’t give a total headcount there, however (Times-Dispatch).

Latest Headlines

Brown-Forman’s BenRiach launches new whiskeys; KFC’s PR stunt smells like success; and Papa John’s pitchman Manning is fumbling in the kitchen

A news summary focused on 10 big employers.

BROWN-FORMAN‘s BenRiach Distillery Co. has launched 15 new whiskies, including a dozen single cask releases, its first since Brown-Forman bought the Scottish distillery in June for $405 million (Scotch Whiskey).

KFC sunscreen 75KFC‘s newest limited-time marketing gimmick is (was!) a natural followup to its current fake Colonel Harland Sanders pitchman: sun screen that smells like fried chicken. And the Yum division wasn’t kidding about availability; introduced today, the chain’s inventory was already exhausted by day’s end. Col. Sanders Extra Crispy Sunscreen followed the late-June introduction of the extra-crispy colonel played by perpetually suntanned actor George Hamilton. And it recalled the chain’s brief experiment last spring with nail polish that tasted like chicken.

PAPA JOHN’S today launched its latest TV commercial starring retired Denver Broncos quarterback — and franchise owner — Peyton Manning, casting him in an exceptionally unlikely new career:

Media and Marketing

Fasten your VR seatbelt: Ford’s the latest Louisville employer to debut virtual reality marketing

The automaker today unveiled a free virtual reality app that (almost) literally puts U.S. consumers in the driver’s seat. Ford says the new app for iOS and Android users “delivers a powerful storytelling platform for consumers and fans to experience Ford innovations like never before,” according to a press release.

The first content is the story behind the new Ford GT’s return to the iconic French 24 Hours of Le Mans race in June. (Eight-plus minute video, above, but you’ll need to watch it with the app.) Ford developed the software with production company Tool of North America, in Santa Monica, Calif., a leader in virtual reality and 360-degree content and mobile app creation. Consumers can download the app now for iOS and Android. More about Ford’s Louisville operations.

Ford’s app follows Brown-Forman’s dive into VR in mid-July with a 360-degree VR video promoting the flagship Jack Daniel’s brand on its 150th anniversary. The spirits maker showed it at festivals this summer, with plans also for September’s Life is Beautiful in Las Vegas. Watch that video here:

Companies across industries see potential in VR marketing to reach the most coveted consumers, young buyers attracted to the latest technologies. Especially hot sectors include auto, travel and fashion, according to Inc. magazine. Volvo launched a “Volvo Reality” app, immersing consumers in a VR test drive. “Shot on a 60-mile stretch of road,” Inc. said last spring, “this first-ever fully immersive virtual reality test drive blends a CG build of the interior of the car with footage shot on a 60-mile stretch of road in Vancouver, and can be viewed with or without Google Cardboard.”