Agency

General Motors will possibly continue the “employee discount” promotion beyond August 1, 2005.

Verizon Wireless and The Pepsi Bottling Group announced they have wrapped a joint promotion into the sale of Pepsi 24-packs to reach Latino consumers in Southern California.

AOL Latino announced the launch of a new television and radio campaign targeting five top Hispanic markets including New York, Los Angeles, Miami, Chicago and Dallas. The ads will communicate an overall theme of how AOL Latino takes members further than any other Internet provider. The spots will air throughout the fall on all the major Spanish language networks including Univision, Telemundo and Azteca America .

Kmart launched its new Back-to-School campaign this week with original television and radio commercials created by Hispanic agency WingLatino. The ad campaign, which carries the theme of “one product inspires the other,” consists of 15 and 30 second spots that target Hispanics gearing up for the busy back-to-school shopping season. The commercials are scheduled to run from now through the end of August.

Bank of America issues a review of their agencies.

More than two-thirds (66 PERCENT) of respondents to a MediaPost survey believe Nielsen Media Research is an unregulated monopoly, but most of them don’t believe a law should be created regulating the TV ratings business. Those are some of the key findings of a survey fielded online by InsightExpress for MediaPost leading up to today’s Congressional hearings on a bill designed to regulate the TV ratings business. The findings, based on the responses of 248 subscribers, more than 66 percent of who identified themselves as either advertiser or agency executives, are consistent with the positions taken by top ad industry associations, which oppose Senate bill 1371, or the so-called FAIR Ratings Act.

Agency leaders specializing in multicultural advertising and marketing voiced strong opposition to Senate Bill 1372, authored by U.S. Senator Conrad Burns (R-Mt) and known as the “Fairness, Accuracy, Inclusivity and Responsiveness in Ratings Act of 2005.” Three leading agencies agreed that S. 1372 would mandate a costly and unnecessary accreditation process for private corporations responsible for monitoring the broadcast viewing habits of consumers.

In the latest round of political debate surrounding the TV ratings business, representatives from Madison Avenue, the TV industry and the research business testified on Capitol Hill Wednesday, stripping away much of their partisan rhetoric and reducing their positions to a few simple themes, mainly whether the so-called FAIR TV Ratings bill would stifle or nurture competition and innovation in an industry that now has one self-regulated monopoly.

WPP Group owned S,C,P,F in Spain will launch a new advertising agency office in Miami in the Fall of 2005.

By 2009, the vast majority of consumer credit cards in circulation will offer some sort of reward for its usage, according to The U.S. Market for Rewards Cards, a new report from market research publisher Packaged Facts, a division of MarketResearch.com.

Verizon Wireless announced it has selected Latinvox, an independent New York-based Hispanic integrated communications company, as its advertising agency of record for the company’s Hispanic marketing initiatives across the Northeast. The decision was made following an in-depth review of agencies.

With the upcoming 15TH Anniversary of the Disability Act, Familia Unida Wheelchair Wash celebration will kick-off with hundreds of disabled residences, and community volunteers armed with soap and water. White Memorial Medical Center will sponsor the Second Familia Unida Wheelchair Wash on July 31 from 12:00 p.m. to 4:00 p.m. at White Memorial Medical Center located at 1701 Cesar Chavez Avenue in Boyle Heights, California.