Off to the races
TSN is set to race around the world with this year’s Champ Car World Series, providing race fans with 11 races spanning across four different countries.
Starting off in Long Beach at 4 p.m. on Sunday, April 10, this season will feature seven races from the United States, two from Mexico and one each from South Korea and Australia. The races will be broadcast periodically from April through to November and will feature the talents of Canadians Paul Tracy, Alex Tagliani and last year’s Atlantic Series Rookie of the Year, Andrew Ranger.
For a complete listing of TSN’s 2005 race schedule, visit http://www.tsn.ca.
Die-hards get Corrie specials
As if the current 10-week double-episode blitz weren’t enough, beginning Sunday, April 24, CBC will air a series of six specials focusing on different aspects of venerable ratings grabber Coronation Street. The Street Undressed looks at Corrie fashions over the past 45 years, from Hilda’s rollers to Bet’s beehive. At the other end of the spectrum, Hunks chronicles the street’s macho mechanics and fashionable factory lads.
Thibault joins Ski Press
Todd Thibault, 22-year veteran of all things skiing, is the newest addition to McMasterville, Que.’s Ski Press Media team as U.S. sales account manager and promotions director. After years in ski equipment testing, retail, movies, magazines, marketing and special events co-ordination, Thibault will be given the task of ensuring strong ties to retail for Ski Press USA. His duties will also include advertising and promotional schedules, and heading up the company’s new events and promotions department. Ski Press USA has a circulation of 625,000.
Events
April 19
Making Email Work
Second City, Toronto
(416) 760-3344
http://www.aimscanada.com
A recent Jupiter study cites e-mail deliverability and better targeting as marketers’ primary concerns for e-mail marketing this year. This session, presented by the Association of Internet Marketing & Sales, looks at how to effectively protect and leverage your invesment in e-mail communications.
April 27
AIMS Think Tank Series Presents: Morning with the Masters
National Club, Toronto
(416) 760-3344
http://www.aimscanada.com
CEOs of two leading global Internet services firms examine what’s on the horizon. Panelists include Mark Kingdon, CEO of Organic, New York, and Canada’s own Gurval Caer, CEO of Blast Radius. Presented by the Association of Internet Marketing & Sales.
PMB Factoid
16% of Canadians participate in a department store customer reward program. 25-34s are 23% more likely to belong.
PMB 2005 shows steady market
‘There’s a lot of good news for magazines,’ says PHD Canada’s Rob Young of the PMB 2005 study released yesterday. ‘If I were Rogers or Transcontinental, I’d be saying ‘yippee!”
PMB released readership data on a record number of 102 magazines. This includes more first-timers than ever before with eight English and five French pubs participating. The new books included Canadian Home & Country, Cottage Life, Fashion18, Inside Entertainment, Ottawa City, Sports Illustrated, TORO, Where Canada, Cote Jardins, En Primeur, Le Devoir, Recevoir and Styles de Vie
Product placement rakes in billions
Product placement in TV shows reached US$3.46 billion in 2004, says a study by Stamford, Conn.-based PQ Media, a custom media research firm. This reflects a 30.5% jump over the previous year and it appears that it’s only going to grow.
‘Product Placement Spending in Media 2005’ reveals that paid product placement is growing more quickly than unpaid, making up 29.2% of the market, compared to 18% in 1974. The study cites ad-skipping technology such as TiVo as triggering the boom, especially in reality series. Product placement is projected to grow another 22.7% to $4.24 billion in 2005 due to more paid placements, larger deals and increased use of PVRs.
http://www.pqmedia.com/research-publications.html
Caribana keeps on trucking
Toronto’s 38th Caribana street festival isn’t far off and MangoMoose Media is offering an alternative advertising opportunity in the form of trucks that travel the parade route on the peak day of the festival, July 31. There are five trucks still available with the advertiser’s message to be placed on both sides of the vehicle. Cost for these two faces is $3,950 and for the whole fleet (10 faces) $15,000. Ad size is 20 feet by seven feet. This is the first year Mango is offering the service. One advertiser is signed up so far: Hardknock Music of Toronto is using a truck to launch a new artist.
Caribana was created in 1967 as a community heritage project for Canada’s centennial year. Based on the Trinidad Carnival, the festival now also includes the music, dance, food and costumes of Jamaica, Guyana, the Bahamas, Brazil and other cultures represented in Toronto. It attracts about a million partygoers each year, with hundreds of thousands of people traveling from the U.S. to participate.
http://www.mangomoose.ca
http://www.caribana.com/
Juicy Fruit launches youth contest
Juicy Fruit gum is reinforcing its ‘Sweeeet’ positioning with a redesigned Web site http://www.juicyfruit.ca/. The site has been revamped to be more appealing to the gum’s target teen audience with a lot of interactivity and a colourful, graphics-driven interface.
The site plays a key role in the ‘Sweeeet Shot Contest,’ running March 27 to July 31. Participants give personal info and sink virtual basketballs to win a chance at a trip to Toronto, $500 spending money and $5,000 towards post-secondary tuition. Once in T.O., the winner attends an NBA game and takes three shots from the free-throw line. Each ball in wins them an additional $5,000, up to $20,000. There are also weekly draws for 18 iPod minis. The agency behind the initiative is BBDO.
ComBase Market Focus: Vancouver, B.C.
* More than 1,250,000 adults in Vancouver report reading a weekday or weekend edition of their local community newspaper. This is 78% of the city’s adult population.
* By comparison, 67% of adults report reading any daily newspaper (weekday or weekend).
* Almost a quarter of the Vancouver population (367,900 adults) cannot be reached with daily newspapers and only read community newspapers.
* Exclusive community newspaper readers in Vancouver tend to be female and between the ages of 25 and 34.
And when it comes to other media in Vancouver:
* 27% of adults admit they didn’t listen to any radio yesterday.
* 15% report listening to non-commercial CBC stations.
* 44% of adults report watching less than 9.5 hours of television in the past week, or less than an hour and a half a day.
Source: ComBase 2003-2004 Study
ComBase, the Community Newspaper Database, is a syndicated consumer-media survey of more than 400 Canadian markets that provides market-by-market information. It is an initiative of the Canadian Community Newspaper Association and its nearly 700 members across the country. For more information, contact Kelly Levson, senior project manager, kellylevson@combase.ca.
HGTV has designs on the generation gap
HGTV is combining family dynamics with design as two twentysomething offspring enlist a couple of young designers to redo an outdated room in their parents’ house. Called, oddly enough, My Parents’ House, the show will air Tuesdays at 9:30 p.m. beginning April 5. Will the eccentric characters, sometimes charged family interaction and chic design transformations make for compelling viewing? HGTV is hoping both generations will tune in to find out.
Life offers fashion series
The backbiting fashion industry is the latest forum for reality TV. Life is introducing Project Runway, hosted by supermodel Heidi Klum. The series starts with 12 amateur designers, one of whom is eliminated each week, as a team of judges and industry mentors weed out the chaff to discover the next big design talent.
The 12-part series will air Mondays at 8 p.m. beginning April 11. It’s a pick-up from the Bravo channel in the U.S. Life is looking for an aud of adults 25-54. Banana Republic is a sponsor in the prize.
http://www.LifeNetwork.ca
SRC taps into battle of the sexes
Radio-Canada is preeming a new show called La Guerre des sexes (The Battle of the Sexes) which pits a male team and a female team in a car rally that includes several tests of visual/spacial skill. According to scientific evidence, the men should prove the winners, but will they?
The five-episode series will run Mondays at 9 p.m. beginning April 11.
FT introduces a straight man’s POV
Citytv’s FT-FashionTelevision is debuting a new segment. ‘The Husk Report’ features Kids in the Hall alum Scott Thompson as Danny Husk, ‘a straight man, asking hard questions.’ Husk has been assigned to cover the behind-the-scenes events surrounding Fashion Week and will use his experience as a war correspondent, investigative journalist, and fire marshall to do so. ‘The Husk Report’ will appear in five weekly segments airing Saturday, April 23 at 6:30 p.m. through May 21 on Citytv Toronto and Citytv Vancouver.
http://www.fashiontelevision.com
