To paraphrase the late US Sen. Everett Dirksen of Illinois: "A billion dollars here, a billion dollars there—pretty soon you're talking about real money."

That's why investors, analysts, journalists and CEOs all tend to listen to activist investor Bill Ackman: He can throw around $1 billion at a time, and it is very real money. Right now, for example, he's got a $1 billion short position on Herbalife, betting that the multi-level-marketing company's shares eventually will be worthless.

But for today, at least, there's reason to doubt the acumen of Ackman on Herbalife, a marketer of weight-loss shakes and skin lotions that he has condemned as a pyramid scheme. The company beat analysts' expectations about its quarterly earnings again this week and raised its full-year outlook, as well as celebrated the growing influence of Carl Icahn, an old-school corporate raider who's increased his stake in the company and publicly defended it against nouveau gadfly Ackman.Continue reading...

The death toll from the factory building collapse in Bangladesh could reach as high as 1,400, with at least 900 workers still missing six days after Rana Plaza in Savar crumbled and the owners facing possible prison terms for not protecting the tenants or workers.

The Dhaka collapse is the deadliest to hit Bangladesh's garment industry—worth upwards of $20 billion—but little has changed since last November's Tazreen factory blaze that killed 112 workers despite public outcry and pledges to improve safety standards. 

However, the cumulative effect of such tragedies, which have been magnified through the power of social media and the internet, is forcing major Western retailers such as Britain's Primark, Canada's Loblaw and Spain's Mango to admit involvement and ultimately offer up aid or a solution.

But for every brand that steps up and admits fault, another places blame elsewhere or remains mum. Italy's Benetton acknowledged that their products were made in Rana, but claimed it was a "one-time order," while Walmart has maintained that its third-party supplier was not authorized to outsource manufacturing to the Bangladeshi factory.Continue reading...

The death toll in the latest Bangladesh garment industry disaster has risen to more than 300 as rescue crews continue to pull survivors from the rubble of Rana Plaza and search for an estimated 500 workers still missing, with more than 2,500 already rescued.

In the aftermath of the garment factory collapse in Dhaka, Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has called for those responsible to turn themselves in. It is believed that the building owner and factory owners are in hiding after ignoring warnings from police and industry officials to forbid workers to enter the building after cracks were discovered on Tuesday. The building collapsed on Wednesday. 

"Whoever might be the culprits, and if even they belong to our party, they won't go scot-free," the impoverished nation's Prime Minister warned. (Update: The factory owners were arrested on Friday night, when the death toll had risen to 336.)

The disaster shines a light, yet again, on global apparel companies that outsource manufacturing to Bangladesh, a practice that has ballooned into an $18 billion industry as clothing companies continue to adandon manufacturing in China, where inflation and rising wages are pushing up costs. The upshot: Bangladesh and its questionable garment industry is now the world's second-biggest garment manufacturing center.Continue reading...

The recent, cartoonish prospective print ads by Ford's agency in India—depicting Silvio Berlusconi and Paris Hilton as heartless kidnappers—turned out to be mere child's play in the modern universe of tin-eared automotive marketing. Hyundai has just set the bar at a new low with an online ad in Europe for its iX35 fuel-cell car, which depicts a suicide attempt in the car—which eventually fails because of the vehicles clean emissions.

The spot by Innocean, Hyundai's agency of record because it is owned by Hyundai, shows a man sitting in the driver's seat of a Hyundai in his garage, having made all the necessary preparations for offing himself by breathing in carbon monoxide. But, despite the foreboding music, it doesn't work. The commercial shows a tube—run into the passenger compartment from the exhaust pipe—emitting what looks like smoke but turns out to be vapor, as the car runs on "100-percent water emissions," a tagline informs the viewer. The guy is out of luck.

Hyundai today pulled the ad (which was posted last week) from YouTube, but it has gone wildly viral and enraged the brand's fans and non-fans the world over. "Hyundai understands the video has caused offense," Hyundai Europe said in a statement (update: scroll down for additional statements). "We apologize unreservedly. The video has been taken down and will not be used in any of our advertising or marketing."Continue reading...

Marvel Entertainment may have brought a lot of joy to a lot of folks over the years with the creation of such characters as Spider-Man, Captain America and the Hulk, among tons of others, but one group isn’t exactly feeling the love these days: American musicians.

The unhappiness stems from the fact that Marvel, which is owned by Disney, has been using European musicians that come cheaper than their American counterparts to score its many successful films in recent years, the Los Angeles Times reports. 

The American Federation of Musicians is drawing attention to their discontent with protests at Marvel Entertainment’s L.A. locations as well as nearby stops where the newest installment of Captain America is currently being shot and outside the El Capitan Theatre, which will host the world premiere of Iron Man 3 Wednesday.Continue reading...

Cigarette warning labels haven’t changed a bit in the last 30 years, despite lots of data being unearthed in that time on the dangers of smoking and plenty of efforts by the government and consumer groups to have those labels changed. The main reason no change has occurred is because of the undying efforts of Big Tobacco’s legal departments. 

Those departments took a hit Monday when the Supreme Court rejected Big Tobacco’s efforts to challenge a 2009 federal law “that requires graphic warning labels on cigarettes and expanded marketing restrictions on tobacco products,” the Wall Street Journal reports.

This doesn’t mean that smokers will soon be carrying around cigarette packs with gruesome images such as a sewn-up cadaver, a crying woman who apparently has lung cancer, smoke coming out of a man’s trachea, and other such unpleasant sights. It will take time to get new images approved and they will likely go through their own legal challenges along the way. Plus, last August, the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit “ruled that the proposed labels violated the tobacco industry's free-speech rights under the First Amendment,” the Journal reminds. The Obama Administration later said “it wouldn't mount a further legal defense of the labels, leaving the agency to consider new proposals."Continue reading...

The self-inflicted brand damage continues at Lululemon as the company has announced the departure of its chief product officer, Sheree Waterson, effective April 15. Waterson had been with the company since 2008.

Lululemon called the change part of a "reorganization of our product organization," but it is widely believed that Waterson's exit is directly related to the company's recent yoga pants recall.

Last month, as brandchannel reported, Lululemon was forced to recall its black Luon pants because the bottoms were too sheer, revealing areas of the body and causing potential embarrassment. Lululemon pulled the product from stores—effecting about 17 percent of its retail products—and its website and offered customers a full refund. The problem was not only a blow to an exceedingly popular lifestyle brand, it could also cost Lululemon around $60 million, according to Bloomberg Businessweek. In fact, analysts expected the company's earnings and stock price to take a big hit.Continue reading...

For many parents, tiredly pouring the little pouch of mysterious dry ingredients that comes in your Kraft Macaroni & Cheese box into the pasta and watching the whole thing turn a scary orangish color is a rite of passage. There are some, though, who are alarmed (and awake) enough to try and put an end to it

Vani Hari mostly writes her Food Babe blog from North Carolina, but she recently traveled to Northfield, Illinois, to pay a visit to Kraft Foods HQ in Northfield, Illinois, on Monday and demand that the company stop putting yellow #5 and yellow #6 dyes in its food, as Hari noted in a blog post.

Kraft, of course, wasn’t backing down. "The safety and quality of our products is our highest priority and we take consumer concerns very seriously," a Kraft spokeswoman said in a statement, the Chicago Tribune reports. "We carefully follow the laws and regulations in the countries where our products are sold."Continue reading...