Charlie Ergen's Dish Network offers to buy Sprint for $25.5 billion in a bid to one up SoftBank.

ConAgra, Heinz and Nestle lead frozen food battle to reverse negative image.

Nike seeks to regain its edge with fewer ads following Tiger Woods stumble.

Dannon uses Greek-style to leapfrog Yoplait to top of U.S. yogurt business.

Apple clearly enters post-Jobs era.

Justin Bieber sparks controversy with Anne Frank comment.

Boeing sees new inspection order on its 737s.Continue reading...

If innovation is the lifeblood of business, then General Mills will be pumping hard in the new year. The CPG giant released news about more than 100 new products that it will launch in its U.S. retail portfolio alone during its fiscal 2013.

General Mills would like to generate between 4 percent and 5 percent of its sales from new products "and we think we will be very much in that range," CEO Ken Powell told Wall Street analysts during a conference call this week, according to Ad Age. "We want to make sure that we are launching products that are bringing new consumers into [their brand] franchise, and we have steadily improved that number."

The new products range from new varieties of Fiber One products to a Snickerdoodles flavor of Chex Mix Muddy Buddies. And if there are some underlying themes to the whole list, they would be peanut butter and chocolate, along with fiber and protein, according to a General Mills blog post detailing the roster of new products.Continue reading...

NFL settlement with referees clears the way for marketers.

Tempur-Pedic goes to the mattresses to buy Sealy for $228.6 million.

American Greetings hears buyout offer from founding family and CEO.

Amazon rejects false advertising claim in Apple app store suit.

Apple-Google maps talks failed on voice navigation.

BAE proposed merger with Airbus parent EADS hits snag in Germany.

Bayer partners with feline vets.

BlackBerry 10 will determine RIM's fate as company courts app developers.Continue reading...

AIG pushes plan for independence from U.S. government.

Burger King says that menu and marketing changes have boosted bottom lilne.

Campbell Soup creates limited edition to help food bank.

Chick-fil-A supporters (and Wendy's) show up for "Appreciation Day."

Christina Aguillera lends her voice to a good cause.

Costco experiences strong U.S. sales.

Crocs celebrates milestone a little too exuberantly.

DirecTV sees U.S. subscribers decline for first time.Continue reading...

Just because Chobani has opened up a huge lead in the Greek-style category it invented — and that is reshaping the U.S. yogurt business — doesn't mean that others can't try to chip away. Dannon has grabbed a significant share after sensing the opportunity with Chobani's rapid rise.

Other players, big and small, also are attempting to make more noise and get their stakes of a Greek-style market that has been calculated at about $1.5 billion a year now and still growing by strong double-digits — even coming up in discussions of Greece's Eurozone crisis. Yoplait, Hain Celestial and the Pinkberry chain are among the brands that are making their own plays. Ben & Jerry's just revamped its frozen yogurt line to make Greek Yogurt the basis of the line. Fage and Chobani have a friend in U.S. senator Chuck Schumer.

The most closely watched Greek yogurt brand is Yoplait. The General Mills line, which has shared the top of the U.S. yogurt market with Dannon for many years, got a particularly late start in the Greek segment. But now it's launching 40 new yogurt products, and Greek yogurt will be the centerpiece of that rollout this summer.Continue reading...

Chobani made Greek-style yogurt part of the American food mainstream, and now the brand is trying to stay on top against catch-up efforts by every other major yogurt brand in the land.

Dannon, with its Oikos brand, has managed to join the startup Chobani brand on the top tier of the only category of yogurt consumption that is growing in the U.S. market these days. But the original Greek-yogurt brand in America, Fage, and Yoplait, which also is trying to play catch-up, are fading in their efforts to ride the boom that Chobani created.

Chobani already has become about a $1-billion concern over the past few years and owns nearly 50 percent of the category, according to a recent report by the Sanford Bernstein securities firm. Even after a furious catch-up effort, Dannon USA still has a less-than-20 percent share, and Fage 14 percent, while General Mills' Yoplait brand limps in with just 6 percent.

"We're dealing with some large organizations that aren't as nimble as Chobani," Niel Sandfort, director of marketing for Chobani, told brandchannel. "We're a billion-dollar company but still entrepreneurial. And we're continually investing in our core."Continue reading...

Because it owned the house, it was predictable that Ford's new reality-TV show on NBC, Escape Routes, would find every angle to tout the automaker's new 2013 Ford Escape — the namesake inspiration for the show. And it did.

But what viewers of the first installment of the show might not have expected was to see a number of other blue-chip brands — including McDonald's, J.C. Penney, several Procter & Gamble marques, even Ford rival Volkswagen — go along for the ride.

The six-week Escape Routes series, which debuted on March 31st, is the latest way for Ford to push the envelope with new-era marketing formats, where it has demonstrated industry leadership.

And while the first installment was hardly Emmy-worthy appointment viewing, Ford executives tell brandchannel they're pleased with the social TV meets branded entertainment experiment.Continue reading...

Dannon USA hasn't advertised in the Super Bowl before, but executives of the American arm of France's Groupe Danone know a good Super Bowl ad when they see one.

"It has to be memorable," Michael Newirth, senior director of communications for Dannon USA, told brandchannel. "It tends to have a healthy dose of humor. And usually it's got some element of surprise. And you can expect to see some of all of those in [the ad] we share on February 5."

And actually, Dannon has given a lot away already about what its first-ever ad in the Big Game will entail.Continue reading...