Sherilyn McCoy hasn’t even been the CEO of Avon Products for a full week and she’s already right in the middle of a potential takeover of the company by fellow beauty-product manufacturer Coty, Inc., an offer that had shareholders excited before Avon nixed the bid. 

Coty sent another letter over to Avon on Wednesday that said that it would love to end the stalemate between the two companies and it's more keen than ever to buy the company, according to a press release issued by Avon.

McCoy, a former Johnson & Johnson exec, is hardly getting a chance to ease into her new role. The previous CEO of the company, Andrea Jung, had been in that spot for a dozen years, apparently asked to be replaced, CNN reports. It’s no wonder. Even with Reese Witherspoon as a brand ambassador, the wobbly company’s stock has plummeted 27% since the start of 2010.Continue reading...

American Greetings, the second largest greeting card company in the U.S. behind Hallmark, has bought the debts of struggling Clinton Cards, the largest card retailer in the UK, in an action akin to a hostile corporate takeover. The unusual move essentially puts American Greetings in control of Clinton's fate and is expected to force the retailer into administration, the British form of bankruptcy.

American Greetings is the biggest supplier to Clinton Cards, which operates 628 Clinton Cards stores and 139 "Birthdays" outlets throughout the UK, employing over 8,000 people, whose jobs could now be at risk. Clinton was unable to repay a 35 million pound loan (more than $56 million) to its banks so the firm "had no option but to agree to a proposal by the new owner of the debt," reports Reuters.

The American invasion clearly took the British retailer and many industry observers by surprise.Continue reading...

It's tough being CNN. The brand that invented the 24-hour news cycle and which made its name covering the Iraq war and other crises has always had to find a way to drive tune-in when there isn't an OJ Simpson-on-the-lam or other breaking news story.

So if you're a CNN executive these or most other days, you're hoping — to yourself, at least — for another "drop everything and watch this" story to unfold somewhere in the world. Nothing really nasty, mind you; just something that will rivet viewers' attention on CNN the way they always do when something goes bad somewhere around the globe.

"The world still knows to turn to CNN whenever a crisis erupts," David Bohrman, the Current TV president who served as CNN's Washington bureau chief, commented to the Wall Street Journal. "That is the brand." And therein likes the rub.Continue reading...

Seems like the iconic Avon Lady needs to wed the skills of door-to-door digital sales with a dash of machismo to survive.

Yes, the fabled Avon Lady is struggling. New Avon CEO Sherilyn McCoy, who replaced Andrea Jung, has her hands full just turning around the company's operations. In a world dominated by e-commerce, Avon products aren’t even carried by drugstore.com, one of the largest online beauty products retailers.

Making McCoy's job tougher: Coty’s $10 billion unsolicited take-over bid, which saw Avon stock slip and attracted a "credit negative" assessment according to Fitch analysts.

“We believe the time for Avon shareholders to act is now,” commented Bart Becht, Coty’s chairman, to the New York Times. “Door-to-door is a growth industry in the U.S. Avon isn’t. There’s something wrong with Avon operationally.”Continue reading...

There was a time, not so long ago, that every athlete in the land dreamed of seeing his or her face on a box of Wheaties, "the Breakfast of Champions." Wrestler Stone Cold Steve Austin has been there. Hall of Fame catcher Johnny Bench has been there. Soccer legend Mia Hamm has been there.

Probably the most famous Wheaties box, though, was the one featuring Olympic decathlete Bruce Jenner, who won gold in Montreal in 1976 and of course went on to be the step-patriarch of the Kardashian family. In all, hundreds of athletes have been on a Wheaties box since the practice began in 1934. It’s not looking good for the athletes of tomorrow to get the same pleasure. In fact, most athletes of tomorrow aren’t likely eating Wheaties for breakfast.

General Mills, the maker of Wheaties and a slew of other cereals, may be responsible to 32% of the cereal market domestically, but Wheaties is only bringing in 0.5% of the market these days, according to CNBC’s Darren Rovell. Back in the ’60s, Wheaties was powerhouse as it took care of 6.5% of all cereals, he notes.

"Wheaties had a clear brand identity," stated Lloyd Moritz, the editor of cereal blog The Breakfast Bowl, on CNBC. "The problem was they rested on their laurels."

Rovell points out that Wheaties has made efforts to expand with Honey Frosted Wheaties in the mid-90's, Wheaties Energy Crunch in 2001, and the two-year-old Wheaties Fuel — but none of them caught on.Continue reading...

When JetBlue Airways captain Clayton Osbon started wigging out aboard Flight 191 to Las Vegas last week and saying a long list of odd, disturbing stuff that resulted in him being wrestled to the floor by passengers and the flight crew, nobody was really too concerned immediately about what it meant to the JetBlue brand. After all, there was the safety of a flight full of passengers, a crew, and a man who was having an unfortunate and unbelievable meltdown.

Now, while prosecutors are aiming to get Osbon (who's facing criminal charges) held without bail and his wife released a statement via the airline, the questions are popping up on just how Osbon ended up being approved to fly by the company and if JetBlue has procedures and training in place for such things.Continue reading...

Ever wonder what all those extra fees on your phone bill are paying for? Well, some part of it goes to help the deaf and hard-of-hearing be able to make phone calls. The service is given to folks “at no charge to place calls to hearing individuals through text messages over the Internet that are relayed by employees of a so-called IP Relay provider,” Reuters reports. Companies receive about $1.30 for each minute of the calls from the FCC.

Well, the U.S. government does not like how AT&T has been handling its relay services and has taken the telecom giant to court, saying that it has cheated the government “out of millions of dollars by knowingly failing to prevent swindlers from using a subsidized telephone service meant for deaf people,” the wire service notes. This is in addition to a suit filed by a whistleblower who used to work at one of the company’s call centers.Continue reading...

It remains The New York Times' most emailed story two days after it was published: "How the U.S. Lost Out on iPhone Work."

The explosive article tells the story of how, early last year, President Barack Obama publicly asked Steve Jobs "what would it take to make iPhones in the United States." Retorted Jobs, reportedly: “Those jobs aren’t coming back."

It's no secret that many of "those jobs" are in China, where Apple is increasingly under fire about the working conditions facing those who assemble America's favorite tech gadgets. But it goes further, with Apple no longer feeling "an obligation to support American workers." It's a direction that threatens to turn the iPhone into the Hummer of its day.Continue reading...