A typical Budweiser has 5.3 percent alcohol. Sam Adams Boston Lager: 4.8 percent. Coors Light: 4.2. Armageddon: 65. No wonder the measuring-tape holders at the Guinness Book of World Records are reportedly checking to see if the new brew out of Scotland sets a new high for alcohol content in a beer. 

If so, it will have beaten out a brewery in Holland that produced Start The Future, which featured 60 percent alcohol, since July of 2010. According to the UK's Daily Mail, the battle for the top percentage has been raging for the last three years, started by Scotland’s BrewDog with the fabulously named Tactical Nuclear Penguin brew, which boasted 32 percent alcohol content.

That was followed by Germany’s Schorschbock with 40 percent alcohol and then BrewDog’s Sink the Bismarck, which only upped the ante by one percentage point. A German brewer answered the call with a  44 percent beer but then was trumped again by BrewDog with the 55 percent End of History brew. That one was the most difficult one to get since only 12 bottles produced. However, it was the most uniquely packaged. The Daily Mail reports that each was sold inside a stuffed squirrel.

Now they're all quaking in their boots at Armageddon, which just launched at the Inverness Beer Festival.Continue reading...

Ask any New Yorker or any savvy visitor where to find the best frozen hot chocolate in Manhattan and they’ll tell you Serendipity 3 on the tony Upper East Side.

Also famous for serving hamburgers since 1954 to Marilyn Monroe, Grace Kelly, Cary Grant, Andy Warhol, as well as more contemporary celebs including everyone from President Bill Clinton and Sarah Palin to Madonna and Justin Bieber, Serendipity 3 today announced a new Guinness World Record: its $295.00 hamburger (limited edition with 48-hour notice) is now the world's priciest. What, pray tell, merits a $300 burger, besides the solid gold toothpick that accompanies it?

Honoring National Hamburger Month, and dubbed Le Burger Extravagant, it’s a culinary extravaganza — check it out below — combining Japanese Waygu beef infused with 10-herb white truffle butter. But wait, there's more!Continue reading...

Pepsi has announced an exclusive global partnership with Michael Jackson’s Estate as part of its new "Live for Now" campaign, PepsiCo’s global platform to re-engage teens via pop music and culture influencers including Nicki Minaj and Katy Perry, whose upcoming movie the brand is sponsoring.

The deal coincides with brand's legacy with the King of Pop and the 25th anniversary of Jackson's multi-platinum Bad album (released August 31, 1987) and record-breaking tour, and Pepsi and Sony Music will share new mixes, as well as one billion — that's right, billion — special edition Michael Jackson Bad 25 Pepsi limited edition cans with an iconic silhouette of Jackson, as you can see below.Continue reading...

The world’s most popular teen superstar celebrates a major milestone today, as Canadian songbird Justin Bieber turns 18. For a pop idol who got his start after being discovered on YouTube in 2007, it's only fitting that his fans are trying to set a Guinness World Record for the most social media messages ever, which are being aggregated on happybirthdayjustinbieber.com. 

The goal is to set that record on his actual birthday, by tweeting or posting to Facebook the official message: “Please RT: Setting a world record for @justinbieber! #leggo http://bit.ly/jb18th"

With just under seven hours left at this writing, the effort has already passed the current Guinness World Record of 209,771. Happy Birthday, kidrauhl!

John Deere, best known for its agricultural machinery and iconic slogan, "Nothing Runs Like a Deere," has just leaped like a deer into social media with the “Can Do” Project.

The brand is constructing a combine out of cans, using upwards of 300,000 cans of food and replicating a full-sized S-690 Combine, the world’s most powerful combine that can harvest over 350 acres of grain a day.

The cans are being collected via a Facebook drive with support from Hy-Vee Food Stores, and the completed sculpture will be 60 feet wide, 80 feet long and 16 feet tall weighing about 170 tons and exhibited at the John Deere Pavilion in downtown Moline, Illinois.Continue reading...

On one weekend this November, sleepy and cash-strapped Londoners will have their lucky day: An attempt is going to be made to set a new world record by giving out 1 million free coffees in 48 hours. 

A world record with free coffees? Seems like a good time to offer brand exposure, don’t you think? Well, event organizer and native Australian James McDonald certainly thinks so.

“This kind of event is one of a new breed of unconventional guerrilla marketing that captures the imagination of the consumers it touches,” Journalism.co.uk reports.

While it seems like the kind of stunt that, say, Starbucks or McDonald's could do on their own (and share the proceeds with charity), McDonald has other plans.

On the event’s site — 1 Weekend, 1 Million Free Coffees — the plan is laid out for businesses to gain brand exposure. With each pound a business puts into the project, their brand’s logo will be on one coffee-cup sleeve that will be given out in central London.

Also, “businesses can promote their products and services with an incentive printed (on) the sleeve around every cup,” the press release notes. “The sleeves can be removed and presented or have unique codes to redeem the special offer.”Continue reading...

It’s a long-running conundrum for better-for-you food and beverage marketers: How do you leverage a “natural” positioning for new, healthful products compared with marketing new “organic” items?

USDA standards have defined and regulated organic labeling for several years now, but the meaning of “natural” is something that still remains unaddressed by regulators and, consequently, by marketers.

American consumers remain vastly confused by the two terms, with studies showing that they tend to credit many more important nutrition and health attributes to products labeled “natural” than they do to those labeled “organic” – even though the latter are the only ones consumers really can count on.Continue reading...

Maria Shriver (who recently hinted she's in transition) and Arnold Schwarzenegger prepare to divorce as he announces movie comeback and their son Patrick responds on Twitter.

Bristol Palin lands reality show on History Channel's BIO cable channel.

Facebook asks to be exempt from US political advertising rules.

Audi launches roadside assistance app.

Australian advertisers face opposition on self-regulation and children's marketing.

BMW launches eBay store in the UK.Continue reading...