-F’Real, a maker of blend-it-yourself shakes and smoothies at convenience stores, is looking to appeal to the Gen Z market with a bizarrely decisive puppet mascot. Lil’ Gutty helps c-store customers make better snacking decisions—and in a couple of ads from Muhtayzik Hoffer, the fuzzy blue character guides a teen named Jeff away from goopy, slushy drinks and stale chips to the F’Real shake machine. The spots were produced by Goat Island and the puppet was built by James Kemp.
-Former Wieden+Kennedy president and CCO Colleen DeCourcy has come out of retirement to take the chief creative officer position at Snap.
-Sony has kicked off a global media review for its Playstation business, putting hundreds of millions in media spend up for grabs.
-Memphis Grizzlies point guard Ja Morant is front and center in a new campaign for Beats by Dre, a music video-style spot featuring an original song from Lil Baby.
-It’s Mental Health Month and a new mobile app has launched that lets users track their mood with one tap a day. Mood is a digital tool that tracks a user’s daily mood and visualizes it through color. Mood was invented by Welsh architect Gareth Dauncey and was designed and built in collaboration with agency Red & Co. The app, available on the App Store and on Google Play, is private and users’ data can’t be seen, shared, tracked or sold.
-Wunderman Thompson has named Vanessa Kerkhoff as its new chief executive in Germany.
-Ad trade bodies the Institute of Practitioners in Advertising and the Incorporated Society of British Advertisers have banded together to get brands, agencies and intermediaries to commit to the Pitch Positive Pledge.
-FirstBank is making bankers less intimidating in a new ad campaign created by 15-year ad agency partner TDA Boulder. It features relatable, and fairly cute, real photos of FirstBank employees when they were kids.
