-The General insurance is going beyond its usual Shaq-led commercials and into the recording studio. The General Sound Studio is a mobile recording studio built inside an SUV, and last month, nine artists were selected by The General and Epic Records to experience the magic of the auto-based studio. The artists include Kid Culture, Reyna Roberts, AG Club, Lex Bratcher, Bodhi, The Absolutely, Ethan Gander and Morgan Keller. The aim is to support early stage artists and ultimately help them get their big break, according to John Kirkpatrick, svp of brand partnerships at Epic Records.
-Stagwell is looking to bring Crispin Porter + Bogusky back to the top of the agency world again, but will this latest reinvention be the one that finally does it?
–Scott Hancock, the CEO of San Diego-based branding agency BLVR, writes about his love for footwear brand Vans and how it has shaped culture.
–Faux out-of-home, or hyper-realistic CGI ads, offer advertisers and agencies the chance to explore the ambiguity between reality and digital manipulation, but they may come at a cost.
-UM’s new commerce tool, Shoptimizer, gives clients more control over their retail media investments.
-In celebration of International Cat Day on Aug. 8, Fancy Feast hosted “Fête du Feline,” a two-day “feastival” in New York’s Madison Square Park.
-A humorous video for new Cheeba Chews pain-fighting product comes from longtime agency Piggyback and is a spoof of pharma ads.
-A new study from the Ad Council Research Institute and the Joyce Foundation on Extreme Risk Protection Orders (ERPOs) uncovered that, while awareness of ERPOs is at 65%, only %7 of the public is very familiar with them. ERPOs, often known as “red flag laws,” are meant to empower families and law enforcement to prevent gun tragedies by temporarily restricting access to guns for individuals at an elevated risk of harming themselves or others. Read more about the study here.