McDonald's latest limited-time U.S. promotion touts its icy fruit drinks, including "Pucker Up," below. Now the fast-food giant has received something of a wet kiss from an unexpected corner — The New York Times — for turning around its reputation in America.

Sunday's New York Times Magazine paid tribute to McDonald's for engineering a comeback in a feature, titled "How McDonald's Came Back Bigger Than Ever," that gives credit to its U.S. brand strategists and franchisees. And, to some extent, for succeeding on the terms of the activist opponents who've been criticizing the chain over its ingredients, menu and marketing to kids.Continue reading...

If a Jaguar growls in the automotive jungle, will anyone notice? That's the challenge faced by the venerable ultra-luxury brand as it attempts to become globally relevant again after a few years "away" — and as its competitors largely have stepped up their games.

India's Tata industrial conglomerate picked up Jaguar and Land Rover in 2008 as Ford was disassembling its stable of European luxury brands, and Tata automotive executives have gradualy been restoring some of the luster to the two fabled marques since then. The combined Land Rover Jaguar North American sales rose by 17 percent in November over a year earlier, and were up by 10 percent year to date. Jaguar finally began national advertising in TV in the U.S. last spring.

But a new campaign that kicked off last week, created by Jaguar's new global ad agency of record, Los Angeles-based Spark44, represents Jaguar's most robust attempt yet at returning forcefully to the American luxury-market conversation. Over the last three years, high-end competition from Mercedes-Benz, Audi and others has grown, while shaky global finances have kept even the best-heeled car shoppers a bit off balance.Continue reading...

Before pro golfer Tiger Woods had a bizarre car accident outside of his Florida home late in 2009 and it was discovered that he had a slew of mistresses, which led to his divorce (and him handing over $750 million and custody of his kids to his ex-wife), he used to make quite a few bucks just smiling for the camera as well as using or wearing various products.

Woods made about $90 million annually through such corporate sponsorships as AT&T and Gillette and a major chunk of that disappeared when the sordid facts of his various affairs began to leak out. Since then, of course, Woods hasn’t won a big tournament and has fallen out of the top 50 golfers worldwide list for the first time since 2006. 

But his corporate-sponsor comeback is now underway. Sure, he signed a deal to represent a Japanese muscle-rub company earlier this year, but now the big names are starting to come out. Well, OK, one big name: Woods has just signed on to rep Rolex, marking the return of the luxury watchmaker and A-list brands to Team Tiger.Continue reading...

Since the latest fall of the U.S. economy in late 2008, the American International Group hasn’t bothered to use its own damaged brand name in advertisements.

After taking $182.3 million in bailout cash from the federal government and being publicly lambasted for the behavior of some of its employees pre-financial fall and post-bailout, AIG likely wanted to hide. But it’s pretty hard to do that when you’re the poster child of the bailout, particularly when you’re a company that is so entwined in the business of others that the government called it “too big to fail.”

Clearly, the embattled insurance giant is eager to put all that behind it. Bloomberg reports that AIG is finally returning to using its name in television advertising, with its first national marketing campaign using the AIG moniker, via its AIG Direct life insurance arm.Continue reading...

Remember "Nothing beats a great pair of L’eggs"? The hosiery line is making a comeback, with a new marketing campaign and its first national television ads in more than 14 years and a new tagline: “You’re in luck. You’re in L’eggs.” 

“We want to stay true to our brand positioning and personality — fun and kind of flirty,” Angela Hawkins of Hanesbrands tells the New York Times of the campaign, which is aimed at women 18-34.Continue reading...

Stop your sobbing, Saab fans — the brand's back, and wants your forgiveness — and input.

Sweden's troubled automaker this week kicked off "The Story of Saab," a multimedia, multi-faceted national advertising campaign in North America that includes ads written by Saab fans.

The brand is staging its comeback with print ads (such as the one above) in the Wall Street Journal, online outreach (particularly on Saab's Facebook page, where it passed 50,000 fans in December), and a TV campaign that breaks Jan. 31.Continue reading...