Brand Noise

Food: Simple, Fresh, Economical--On Message

On the West Coast, Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market has introduced a new line of ready-to-eat products that can be mixed and matched to create over 200 meal ideas. The line includes 30 different varieties of fresh pastas, sauces, meat and vegetarian dishes, and sides which pair to create meals for two for about $10.  All Fresh & Easy products contain no added trans fats, no artificial flavors and colors and only use preservatives when absolutely necessary. At roughly 10,000 square feet, Fresh & Easy markets are smaller than the typical supermarket to give customers a faster, easier shopping experience. In addition to fresh, prepared meals and produce, Fresh & Easy offers national brands and household items at everyday low prices. (Photo: Oakmonster.)

Counting Calories Gives Control Back

When all else is failing, it beckons the need to gain control wherever you can. We're seeing it across the board. One way they're seizing the opportunity is by counting calories. It's do-able.

"For the last few decades, the most popular diets were complex formulas that promised abundant eating with just the right combinations of fat, protein and carbohydrates. Now those regimens are starting to look like exotic mortgages and other risky financing instruments. And just like a reliable savings account, good old calorie counting is coming back into fashion...New Yorkers got a harsh dose of calorie reality this summer when restaurants with 15 or more outlets were forced to post the calorie content of food next to the price."

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Lip her up. No lead.

Now is the time when will women take comfort in the indulgent but relatively inexpensive pleasure of lipstick. " When lipstick sales go up, people don't want to buy dresses," says Leonard Lauder, Chairman of Estee Lauder Cosmetics. Lauder is credited with the "lipstick theory" which suggests that the economy can be read by the rise and fall of lipstick sales. Indeed, he should know, since Lauder's Leading Lipstick Index tracks their team of brands, which account for roughly half of the prestige cosmetic sales in the U.S., and includes well know labels like Clinique, Stila, Origins, Bobbi Brown, Prescriptives and MAC...

The bad news? Before you rush out and spend those last few stimulus payment dollars squirreled safely away in the cookie jar on a new tube of crimson, be warned: a study from 2007 by the Campaign for Safe Cosmetics found that a significant portion of lipstick manufactured in the United States contains surprisingly high levels of lead, which can be toxic when ingested.

Now there's an angle for a lead-free lipstick maker to grab on to...call it corporate responsibility.

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For Some, When it Comes to Green: Pretty is as Pretty Does

Discovery Network's Planet Green figures that viewers will swallow their environmental medicine only if it comes coated in a bright, sugary syrup.

• On “Emeril Green”: The diet lentil salad Emeril Lagasse prepared for a woman trying to maintain her 130-pound weight loss came topped with a fried egg. Layering organic tomato, lettuce and avocado on a hamburger — on a brioche bun — for a picky teenager, Mr. Lagasse, the Louisiana-trained chef, implored her to let him add mayonnaise. “How about just a little bit?” he urged. “Because it’s homemade.”
• On “Hollywood Green”: A recent segment celebrated a tanning salon with solar-powered tanning beds. The show reported glowingly on the establishment’s bamboo walls and air purifiers but didn’t point out that the solar-powered tanning beds still rely on carcinogenic UV rays to darken customers’ skin.
• On “Wasted!”: A family living in a vast McMansion (a 9,000-square-foot living room) with five cars was asked to cut back on everything from gasoline (its consumption comes to about 218 gallons of crude oil a week) to paper towels and lighting. After three weeks even modest stinting helped, though the lady of the house drew the line at replacing flame-shaped light bulbs in her chandeliers with boxier energy-efficient ones. “They’re absolutely hideous,” she explained.

At least they're honest. With multi facets of green consumers today, you can't make all extremes happy--so why fault Planet Green for "narrowing their focus?" Better a little green gets through to these consumers than none at all. And the backlash provides fodder for other content.

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Noxzema: Little Blue Jar Ripe for Reinvention

Noxzema was once in nearly every American medicine cabinet--but "Procter didn't love it enough." People familiar with the matter said Procter & Gamble has been trying to sell the once-ubiquitous brand for several months. Interestingly, Noxzema's history was as a prototypical wiki-brand molded by fans. The product was invented in 1911 by physician Robert Townsend in Ocean City, Md., as a sunburn remedy for vacationers. Later, women began to use it as a cleanser. They still do.

They say its appeal is the smell and crunch. Couldn't Noxzema be reinvented with a hi-lo nod of synergy to Kiehls?  A little blue jar of basic stuff that can handle your very own unique issues--with custom add-ins that you fold in yourself? Hmmm...I too miss Noxzema now. It still lives out there, but...heck it aids tattoo healing!

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Opium Growth in the US

Opium production increased to nearly 9,000 tonnes in 2007, the highest level for years, according to a United Nations annual “World Drug Report” published on Thursday June 26th.  The only country to use more than it did a century ago is America.  Read more (The Economist/Image: Getty Images)

Smokeless Tobacco: An Odd Solution Toward Health

Big Tobacco is trying a new approach to keep America's dwindling 45 million smokers in the fold, reports AdAge.

The solution: snus (they are always curiously plural), a pinch of steam-cured tobacco nestled in a tiny tea-bag-like pouch. Snus don't need to be spit out like traditional fermented dipping tobacco; they simply remain under your upper lip until you've gotten your nicotine fix.

According to the American Cancer Society and the medical journal Lancet, if every smoker in America were to switch to snus, substantial reductions in heart disease and certain cancers would be evident in a decade's time...

This, on the heels of Amy Winehouse's emphysema diagnosis. The Sunday Mirror quoted Mitch Winehouse as saying that Amy has an irregular heartbeat, and has been warned that she will have to wear an oxygen mask unless she stops smoking drugs.

Runner, Running Free--From Marketing

The Star Tribune reports that this autumn will mark Dean Laiti's 27th Twin Cities Marathon, nearly all done without shoes… it was nearly 30 years ago when Laiti left his shoes behind for a run. "I do it because I can," said the 115-pound runner. "It psyches people out." Dr. Paul Langer, who works at Minnesota Orthopaedic Specialists and is a clinical faculty member at the University of Minnesota Medical School, said misinformation in the 1980s started the myth that cushioning in shoes is always better. "It became more about marketing and less about biomechanics," he said. But sneaker culture has already responded to the reports. Nike's Free line, for example, tries to mimic the manner of a bare sole striking earth, eliminating arch support and reducing heel padding to provide a pliable sole that lets the foot flex. On the extreme end, Vibram released its FiveFingers "foot glove" in 2006 with articulated toes and a thin sole...Yet Laiti and runners like him continue to run barefoot.

Price & No Sugar Carve Niche for Happoshu

In Japan, third-category beer, which is often made from soybeans, corn and peas, is priced cheaper than regular beer and happoshu low-malt beer…A 350-milliliter can of third-category beer sells for about 140 yen at convenience stores, about 20 yen less than happoshu and 75 yen less than regular beer. Beer makers, believing the sales battle will be fought over third-category beers, are putting new brands on the market and advertising them using big-name celebrities. Asahi Breweries Ltd. and Sapporo, two of the four major brewers in the country, each launched new third-category beer brands earlier this year. Meantime, sugar-free, low-malt beer called "happoshu" is enjoying increased sales after companies began this April screening employees for metabolic syndrome as part of the regular company health checkups, reports Mainichi Daily News. Read the whole story.

Game Tech Treats Soldiers

In a small, windowless room at the Walter Reed Army Medical Center, researchers are using the latest video game technology - plus a smell machine and a vibration platform - to help patients suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder.
Known as "Virtual Iraq," the treatment may help many soldiers who don't find relief from medication or traditional psychotherapy." It really jogs their memory," says Col. Michael Roy, who runs the digital therapy program at Walter Reed. "It puts them back there very powerfully and makes them realize a lot of things they had consciously or subconsciously repressed."
 Read more from the Baltimore Sun.