Table of contents for Nov-02-15 in Adweek

With competition for Black Friday shoppers reaching fever pitch, brick-and-mortar stores’ Friday morning doorbuster deals have crept earlier and earlier into Thanksgiving Day. Now, with retailers facing criticism for forcing employees to work on the national holiday, a handful of companies are reversing course on their Black Friday strategies. Staples, which has opened on Thanksgiving for the past two years, and GameStop, which allowed shoppers in at midnight on Friday, have both said that they won’t open their doors until Friday morning. REI took things a step further by announcing last week that all of its 143 store locations will remain closed on Black Friday, while the company’s 12,000 employees will receive full pay. The retailer is encouraging others to stay home—or, more specifically, spend time outdoors—on Black Friday with…

ESPN on Friday announced it was suspending its critically acclaimed sports and pop culture site Grantland. The move comes just five months after the exit of founder Bill Simmons and subsequent staff defections, many of whom are joining Simmons’ new unnamed venture. ESPN has been fending off a declining subscriber base and rising programming costs. Last month, the network cut more than 300 staffers. Grantland launched in 2011 and broke ground as a thoughtful destination for sportswriting online.…

In recent months, Time Inc. has been scooping up digital brands in an effort to reach millennials. Last week, the publisher acquired xoJane, the women’s lifestyle site launched by Say Media and veteran editor Jane Pratt in 2011. We spoke with Pratt about her plans for the website and return to the world of magazine publishing. You wrote in a post on xoJane that you actually worked with Time Inc. to launch Jane back in the ’90s. What happened? Yeah, I was developing Jane magazine with Time Inc., and I was there for almost two years doing other things at the same time. But then Time Inc. Ventures, which was the division I was working with, folded. So I actually ended up taking it over to Fairchild and launching it…

Some words of wisdom for ad pros heading back to work and for employers considering a “returnship” program: FOR RETURNEES Volunteer and freelance first to bolster your current experience. During your search, tap into your professional network; contact your former managers and colleagues. “Specialize. Have a specific strong skill or expertise and then look for an agency that has that particular void,” said Patrick Kavanagh, head of experiential marketing at Ottawa shop Acart Communications, who recently spent three years away from the business as a stay-at-home dad. Value your nonadvertising experience. If you were a PTA president, for example, you’ve had valuable training in people management. Once hired, don’t be afraid to ask for help and seek out mentors. FOR EMPLOYERS Remember, a returnship program can’t just be for show,…

BRANDS, AGENCIES and marketers are among the most important constituencies at CES, and there’s now an experience dedicated specifically to their needs. C Space is an overarching program for the more than 25,000 attendees in the advertising, marketing and digital communities, highlighting how content, creativity, technology and the consumer all come together at CES. Debuting last year, C Space in 2016 will be more than double in size with a richer breadth and depth of opportunities for networking, education and a little serendipity. The C Space Storyteller conference track will explore the intersection of marketing and innovation with premier sessions reserved for C-title and high-level executives. Plus, you won’t be limited to just C Space content—you’ll be able to cover the entire CES show floor to see what’s new and…

Dozens of heads, torsos and rows of various, dismembered limbs hang on the walls of a storage room in Spaeth Design’s Queens, N.Y., office. They are labeled—‘Macy’s, ’99, Fat Man’— and belong to the ghosts of holidays past, the dozens of mannequins that have at one time or another populated the fantastical world of the famous New York City holiday window displays of retailers like Bloomingdale’s, Macy’s, Lord & Taylor, Tiffany & Co., Saks Fifth Avenue and Bergdorf Goodman. You know, the windows people travel from all over the world to see between Thanksgiving and New Year’s. October is crunch time for Spaeth Design. It’s one of the best-known design firms making up a small but critical cottage industry of decorating department store windows for the holidays. It’s a business…

Star Wars BB-8 by Sphero $149 Sorry R2-D2, but Star Wars fans have a new favorite droid: the uber-adorable (for a piece of metal, anyway) BB-8. While Episode VII doesn’t hit theaters until Dec. 18, you can already bring home your own pint-size version of BB-8 thanks to connected toy company Sphero. The app-enabled drone can be guided manually via your smartphone or set to automatic patrol mode, and features a holographic projector that shows messages from R2-D2 and C-3PO. Like its movie counterpart, BB-8 even has a personality—or, at least, adaptive expressions and sounds that change based on your interactions and voice commands. Buy it: sphero.com BARBIE Girl Talk Hello Barbie $74 One of this year’s hottest holiday toy launches is also the most controversial: Hello Barbie, the Wi-Fi-connected…

Specs Age 33 Claim to fame Stars as Jessica Huang in the ABC comedy Fresh Off the Boat (Tuesdays, 8:30 p.m.) Base Los Angeles Twitter @ConstanceWu What’s your morning routine? I like to have a really leisurely morning [laughs], which isn’t great because when you work in production, you have a 6 a.m. call time. But when I do have time, I like to get up and read the paper or make coffee, and then after that, I check my computer. You love posting pictures of your bunny on Instagram. Why a bunny? That’s not a very common celeb pet. It’s actually kind of strange, but for some bizarre reason, I’ve always just had a love and affection for rabbits. But I never got a rabbit until I was an…

While last week’s GOP debate on CNBC was the network’s most-watched program ever, it pulled in the lowest ratings of the three Republican debates—and commanded the shortest attention span. According to Samba TV, the average viewer watched only 60 minutes of the debate, compared with 71 minutes for the first debate (which was two hours long) and 85 minutes for the second. NBCU won’t have to worry about viewership for any more GOP debates, though: The party is pulling its Feb. 26 debate from NBC amid complaints that the CNBC moderators seemed “snarky” and “biased.” “The creative department is a boys’ club. It wasn’t until I was in the club, inside looking out, that I realized how uncomfortable it could be for women.”TRANSGENDER ADVOCATE AND FORMER ARNOLD EVP, GROUP CREATIVE…

Magazine publishers are going after millennial women in a big way—through digital acquisitions. Last Tuesday, Hearst announced that it had inked a deal to distribute and sell ads for Lenny, the twice-weekly newsletter founded by Girls creator/star Lena Dunham and her executive producer Jenni Konner this past summer. The same day, Time Inc., which paid a reported $20 million for Zooey Deschanel’s HelloGiggles.com just last week, confirmed rumors that it planned to buy Jane Pratt’s 4-year-old lifestyle site xoJane from Say Media.…

When the iPhone launched in 2007, chic tech accessories were few and far between; today, nearly every fashion brand imaginable produces smartphone and tablet cases. Now, a handful of savvy designers are going beyond just protecting consumers’ favorite devices to launching “smart” accessories of their own—just in time for the holiday season. “These designers are capitalizing on a hot spending trend,” explained Kantar Retail svp Mary Brett Whitfield. “As digital technology becomes more ingrained in everyday routines, spending on technology often takes precedence over other discretionary purchases such as apparel and fashion accessories, so the fashion technology products are a way to preserve share of shoppers’ spending.” Rebecca Minkoff, who has produced a line of smartphone accessories with Case-Mate since 2014, recently expanded her tech offerings to include smart jewelry,…

After nearly two years of allowing only a few dozen brands to run ads on the platform, Facebook-owned Instagram in August opened up to all marketers. At the same time, it partnered with eight third-party vendors to sell promos via its open application programming interface (API)—and business is already booming for those partners. Five of the vendors—Brand Networks, Media Solutions, Ampush, SocialCode and Nanigans—said ad sales have significantly increased, in some cases doubling or tripling. It would seem to be a gold rush akin to the early days of Facebook advertising. The partners aim to mimic the enormous success of Facebook API vendors of the past like Buddy Media and Vitrue, acquired for hundreds of millions of dollars by Salesforce and Oracle, respectively, in 2012. Before Instagram rolled out its…

Specs Current gig Managing partner, chief digital officer at David&Goliath Previous gig President and chief integration officer at JWT North America Twitter @tastytruth Age 48 You’re responsible for building the agency’s digital practice. How are you doing that? David&Goliath already has an amount of digital work coming in from most clients—I want to raise it to the next level. I’ve only been here six months, but I’ve already hired six or seven digital creatives. We started an analytics department. We hired a digital strategist [and] production people. We’re starting a content studio because everyone talks about content. I’m also overseeing all of broadcast, print and studio production, so it’s not just digital. You’ve spent years working in digital at JWT and Goodby, Silverstein & Partners. What’s changed in the way…

11.9 Adweek 50 50 muscle men and women in advertising, marketing, media and tech who are indispensable to their organizations and key to keeping the wheels of the business spinning. 12.7 Agency of the Year A celebration of the best and boldest global, U.S. and digital agencies of 2015! SPECIAL SECTION EMAIL MARKETING GUIDE 11.16 The L.A. Issue An inside look at the most fascinating mix of celebs, entrepreneurs and execs behind the scenes and on the front lines in L.A. 12.14 Adfreak Issue A look back on 2015’s best and worst in advertising, branding and design! Featuring ADS OF THE YEAR THE YEAR IN REVIEW 11.30 Hot List Issue A salute to the editors’ picks of the supernovas of print, TV and digital. SPECIAL SECTION AUDIENCE TARGETING GUIDE…

South by Southwest Interactive added a daylong summit about anti-harassment to its 2016 lineup after sparking significant backlash from its decision to cancel two panels focused on the Gamergate movement and video game culture. On Tuesday, BuzzFeed and Vox Media withdrew their involvement at the conference, and branding consultant Cindy Gallop urged all marketers to boycott the festival during a keynote at The 3 Percent Conference in New York before SXSW reversed its ruling. At press time on Friday, BuzzFeed and Vox Media had not changed their decision. –Lauren Johnson…

Sue Vering was an associate creative director at DDB Chicago when she left in 1998, ultimately taking seven years off from the ad business to raise her daughter, get involved in community activities and write freelance features for the Chicago Tribune. By 2005, when circumstances dictated a return to agency life, she found herself at FCB Chicago, on the KFC account, and struggling to fit into a world that had grown unfamiliar during her absence. Many nuances of the business—from technology and workflow to the office jargon—seemed strange. “It was a lot more difficult than I thought it was going to be,” said Vering. “Even coming physically to an office every day was disconcerting and disorientating. You put up this front, that it’s seamless. It’s not.” Stacy McIntyre knows that…

Hitting up CES in Las Vegas this January? If you’re like many marketers, the rapid developmentsinconsumertechnology are impacting how you’re approaching your job. Disruptive technologies transform consumer behavior and change how marketers get their messages across. That’s why staying ahead of the next big thing has never been more important. We’ve been through the year of mobile and the year of data. So what breakthrough will shift the balance this year? We’ve outlined five of the top technologies you’ll want to keep your eyes on as you’re scouring the CES show floor. 1 VIRTUAL REALITY It’s been less than two years since the Oculus Rift VR headset took the world by storm, with Facebook chipping in $2 billion to purchase the company. While over that time VR has seemed like…

Not so long ago, Comedy Central’s late-night lineup consisted of The Daily Show with Jon Stewart and The Colbert Report. What a difference a year makes. “If you had told me a year and a half ago that Jon and Stephen [Colbert] would leave within 12 months of each other and we’d launch two new series in a period of nine months, I would have gone and crawled under a rock somewhere,” says Michele Ganeless, the network’s president. “But looking back, it seems to all make sense now.” When Colbert signed off last December as he prepared to take over The Late Show from David Letterman on CBS, Comedy Central tapped Larry Wilmore as his successor. Then in February, Stewart said he’d retire as Daily Show host by year’s end.…

THE PAPER These days, kraft paper gets points for being eco-friendly. In 1973, it was just unusual—plain, unadorned and so pointedly un-chic that it became chic. THE FONT Bloomingdale’s uses its own custom font, on the bags and also throughout the store. But the style is essentially Avant Garde Gothic Extra Light. THE BULK Bloomingdale’s high volume in pillows, sheets, towels and comforters required commodious bags. The big and medium bags were born of pure necessity. Make it minimal The Bloomingdale’s brown bag is a rare example of simple, monochromatic packaging that’s still instantly recognizable as a brand’s trademark. Tiffany and Apple have managed it, too. The name of Marvin S. Traub probably doesn’t ring a bell for most people. But it was the far-seeing Traub who, in the postwar…

Game on The annual Ping-Pong tournament is a hit with employees. The arduous task of wedding planning is the stuff of legends. So it should come as no surprise that the more than $100 billion events industry—which should be noted has also been the subject of more than a few Hollywood blockbusters—can get a little mucky for brides-to-be and their planners. This is where WeddingWire comes in. The 8-year-old tech company boasts the largest online marketplace where merchants and brides can come together for a more seamless planning experience. Seamless collaboration is also the motif of the company’s real-life outpost in the D.C. area. “WeddingWire’s offices were designed with collaboration in mind. The office itself is shaped like a honeycomb and is always buzzing with activity,” said WeddingWire vp of…