As tentpole movies increasingly become vehicles to move items off store shelves, one "product" that has excelled at leveraging onscreen placements is "geography." And when it comes to comic book titles and their real life cities, probably no hero is better at local marketing than Spider-Man.

No surprise then that, with a brandtastic new Spider-Man reboot hitting cinemas today, Sony and Marvel marketers leveraged Peter "Spider-Man" Parker's real life New York City home as part of its amazing marketing campaign, with one mild-mannered exception.Continue reading...

Everyone knows the funniest Americans were born in Canada, so why not leverage that to bring a few tourism dollars north of the border?

Now playing in New York City: a series of spots featuring Canadian expat actor Eric McCormack, pitching the great white north to Manhattanites and visitors. The "Canada for Fun" tourism and branding campaign, from a consortium of Canadian tourism boards, aims to boost awareness of "why Canada is such a fun place to visit." It just launched in the New York metro market on NBC-owned TV stations; online at CanadaForFun.com and YouTube, where you can watch more of the spots; in taxis (where this expat Canadian caught the campaign); and on digital signage in commuter rail stations such as Penn Station. 

"Humour is an intrinsic part of our culture and is a great way to give Americans who haven't had a chance to visit Canada an inside look at their northern neighbours. We hope they enjoy Eric's take on our myths and realities," noted Greg Klassen, SVP of the Canadian Tourism Commission. Follow along on Twitter: @canadaforfun and #canadaforfun 

Everybody is looking for cash these days, but how to drum it up when everybody is also paying extra close attention to where a wallet’s contents are disappearing to. Cities are no different. Government services are hurting for cash and there are only so many ways to generate more dough.

So cities are getting creative, the New York Times reports. Baltimore is currently trying to sell space on its fire engines to raise some extra pennies. And why not? The city’s current budget has made the elimination of three city fire companies necessary this summer.

Philadelphia is selling ad space on its subway fare cards and one of the city’s main train stops is now named for AT&T. Chicago is selling naming rights to its eleven "L" subway stations. As for the Times' hometown, the naming rights for the Atlantic Avenue subway station at the new Barclays Center in Brooklyn were sold in 2009, and the MTA implemented the Barclays name change in May.Continue reading...

Disney Pixar's latest film Brave opens today and promises to clean up at the box office. The film's official partner, Visit Scotland, is hoping audiences will want to "Experience the land that inspired Disney-Pixar’s Brave" (even as the Atlanta Braves have their legal issues with the movie).

Brave's opening means that Madagascar 3, the nation's top film for two weeks running, is about to be forgotten until DVD time. As Madagascar 3 pushes off, and with Brave's Scotland tie-in in mind, we have one nagging question before it goes: why the hit animated franchise failed to make the obvious marketing tie-in with New York's Central Park Zoo? Continue reading...

Australians have been enjoying Pie Face bakery cafes since 2003. There are now 75 locations dotted along the continent’s eastern coastline.

It currently has a single store in the U.S., located in New York next to David Letterman's NYC home at the Ed Sullivan Theater just north of Times Square (hence its tagline, "From Bondi Beach to Broadway").

But don’t worry, Americans, your days of living without Pie Face's version of the humble Australia meat pie may be soon coming to an end.

Steve Wynn, the founder and CEO of Wynn Resorts who has been in the biz since 1963 when he took over his family’s Maryland bingo parlor, is investing $15 million into Pie Face to help the brand expand.

“Having met the Pie Face USA management team recently and having visited their first store in New York, I came to the conclusion that they were bright people with a bright concept,” Wynn stated. “I look forward to backing them as they expand throughout Manhattan and across the United States.”Continue reading...

P&G and Walmart aren't the only brands putting the "mobile" into their marketing mix by hitching their brands to the food truck craze.

A new kind of chuck wagon hits New York City today as financial services brand Charles Schwab invites locals to their “Oh, Chuck! Truck” on June 13-14 for the chance to win $10,000 in a Schwab Brokerage Account. 

The campaign is part of Schwab’s YouTube video series, “Oh, Chuck! I Blew My Cash,” which features Chuck proffering financial advice to people confessing to unfortunate purchases causing regret and angst.Continue reading...

As New York City enters a period of public comment on Mayor Michael Bloomberg's proposed ban on large soft drinks, it seems that everyone already has had a lot to say about it. What's left?

There's the contingent who's backing the entire idea, including the city's health commissioner, Dr. Thomas Farley. He heads NYC's Board of Health, which voted unanimously on Tuesday to put Bloomberg's controversial (and lampooned on the current cover of The New Yorker) proposal to the public.

Other avowed fans of the proposed ban include ex-Coca-Cola marketing executive Todd Putman, who has gone on a mea culpa tour to oppose the soft-drink industry and expose his earlier 'dirty' work.

"How can we drive more ounces into more bodies more often" was how Putman described what he perceived as his mission as a Coke marketer.

Meanwhile, however, the proposed ban has fallen flat with New Yorkers in a new poll by Quinnipiac University. Slightly more than half — 51 percent — are against the idea, led by older voters, with 57 percent of those aged 50 to 64 raising their hands as opposed. Manhattan lodged the highest geographic support.Continue reading...

With the price of gasoline easing off, and summer upon us, it's no wonder that more brands than ever seem to be hitting the road. And just like Hope and Crosby, those two buddy behemoths, Procter & Gamble and Walmart, are out loading up their wagon once again. Well, not exactly a wagon. This time around the two oft-cooperating brands are teaming up in a month-long marketing effort in New York to promote online and mobile shopping and free delivery from Walmart with a food-truck-like mobile initiative.

@PGMobile — also the Twitter handle to follow the mobile truck's whereabouts — will visit a dozen popular locations around Manhattan this month, featuring QR codes for several P&G and Walmart product and brands including Bounty paper towels, Head & Shoulders shampoo and Iams dog food — and that's just on one side of the vehicle.Continue reading...