As restaurant brand executives cut jobs and announced their intentions to raise prices in the wake of President Obama's re-election, no one can say they weren't forewarned.

Chains such as Papa John's are explicitly tying their actions to the costs of Obamacare, while other brands — including GE Healthcare and Virgin Airlines — also are announcing job cuts as a result of their expectations for a continuation of U.S. economic sluggishness in the wake of the voting results.

Papa John's CEO John Schnatter has been the most outspoken. The Mitt Romney backer has said that he'll raise the price of a pizza pie by 10 to 14 cents as well as slash employee hours — but it's not, he says, because of the two million pizzas he's giving away, but due to the cotss of Obamacare. He's not alone. A Denny's franchisee in Florida, John Metz, said that he plans to add a five-percent surcharge to his customers' bills and also to reduce his employees' hours.Continue reading...

The London Olympics have been over for nearly a month and most Americans have pretty much forgotten – if they ever even knew – the names of such competitors as wrestler Jacob Varner, diver David Boudis, and boxer Claressa Shields.

Sure, they all won gold medals, but in sports that Americans watch by the millions. Gymnast Gabby Douglas and swimmer Ryan Lochte, who were two of the biggest American brands coming out of the Games, are lucky enough to have selected sports that more U.S. residents care about. So these two, along with the marketing geniuses assigned to them, are doing everything they can to help Americans stick their names into the permanent memory book that already features such folks as Bruce Jenner, Mary Lou Retton, and Eric Heiden.Continue reading...

Are you ready for some football? Big brands surely are. The National Football League may be a marketing and TV-programing juggernaut, but it is carrying more weight for more major brands than ever.

Take auto advertisers, for instance. Despite football telecasts that already were slated to be crowded with other car brands, Audi decided to use tonight's kickoff game between the New York Giants and Dallas Cowboys for the marketing launch of its crucial new 2013 S Models. These performance nameplates (S6, S7 and S8) and the "S" brand are fundamental for Audi to move to the next phase of its positioning in the U.S. market, as a provider of exciting, luxurious and well-designed automobiles.

And so the NFL gets the call tonight to host the first Audi ad under its new tagline, "Heighten Every Moment," featuring the Audi S8. The 60-second spot (watch it above) will run in the first break after kickoff. Audi also announced that it will appear in the Super Bowl game in February, its sixth consecutive advertising appearance in the big game.Continue reading...

Peyton Manning brought back his aw-shucks charm and dry wit this week, resurfacing as a pitch man for the Buick Verano compact car. He's still got that commercial appeal, however he fares in his new football uniform.

After a year off from football because of a neck injury, and his release by the Indianapolis Colts and subsequent signing by the Denver Broncos, Manning is mounting a comeback on TV already that has nothing to do with NFL games. On the ESPY Awards on ESPN Wednesday evening, Manning introduced a video tribute to Pat Summitt, recently retired head coach of the women's basketball program at the University of Tennessee, Manning's alma mater.

During the telecast, Manning also appeared in the new spot for Verano, pretending to call "audibles" in the car using its voice-activated navigation system. The spot is the most notable bit of marketing for the new Buick entry since its recent TV campaign starring Shaquille O'Neal.

Meanwhile, in other developments in an auto industry where news remains hot even in the depths of a summer in the Northern Hemisphere:Continue reading...

The Twitter trending hashtag #tebowtakesmanhattan is one just one sign that Tim Tebow has arrived in the Big Apple.

The New York Jets held a press conference Monday to "announce" the acquisition of Tim Tebow via a trade with the Denver Broncos, but Tebowmania already has moved far beyond the team's control. Just ask the thousands of motorists who spotted the quarterback's sponsor Jockey's electronic billboard featuring Tebow's image (see above) outside the Lincoln Tunnel, on the New Jersey side, over the weekend. And there's already a new "Jetbow" sandwich at a New York deli.

"We Support Tebow & New York. Jockey" the sign reads. It's supposed to come down by Friday, but Jockey's broadside in support of its highly visible spokesman is only the beginning of the wars over Tebow.Continue reading...

What a difference a year — let alone a day — makes in the National Football League.

Last year, the NFL, owners, management and players were just settling in for what promised to be a long-haul labor dispute which essentially kept professional football out of the regular flow of news for months, during the crucial time after the April draft when fan excitement typically builds over prospects for the coming season. Its relevance and even the NFL brand faded for a while.

This year, however, the NFL's off season is pulling a 180-degree turn worthy of the league's nimblest scatback. Today's announcement by Commissioner Roger Goodell of very stiff penalties for head coach Sean Payton and others associated with the New Orleans Saints for their bounty-hunting exploits broke on the same day that the Denver Broncos traded the closely watched Tim Tebow to that media-wallflower team, the New York Jets.

And oh, yes — the signing of Peyton Manning by those same Broncos? That already is so two days ago.Continue reading...

Amazon acquires Kiva Systems for warehouse automation.

Apple sold 3 million new iPads in first 3 days, while legal handling of iPad China trademark dispute questioned, while app developers favor iOS platform.

AstraZeneca abandons experimental antidepressant.

Bed, Bath & Beyond deals with radioactive scare.

Cheesecake Factory revamps menu.

Chevron faces troubled waters after spill off Brazil.

Disney writes down John Carter as flop.

GM faces labor push-back in Europe.

Gap opens first store in South Africa.Continue reading...

The news had barely broken on ESPN's SportsCenter today about Peyton Manning's signing with John Elway's Denver Boncos when a new focus of speculation immediately heated up: what about Tim Tebow?

Remember Tebowing, and how the religious Denver Broncos quarterback led the team to the playoffs and to an unlikely first-round victory despite all odds including a derisive national media, the misgivings of team management, and his own undependable throwing motion. There are all sorts of thoughts already where Denver now will trade Tebow, his Tebowing, buzz around his dating Taylor Swift, and his rising value as a brand endorser.

As NFL.com's "Tim Tebow stock watch" is now tracking, speculation is running high. Could Tebow go to Florida, maybe Miami — which was briefly in the Manning hunt — or even to Jacksonville, where Tebow's hometown Jaguars certainly would seem to provide a great fit? Maybe Arizona, a red state whose Cardinals also flirted with Manning?Continue reading...