AGENCY WORK HIGHLIGHTS

• Minions: The Rise of Gru shattered the Fourth of July US box office record with a totally bananas $125M opening. Congrats to our field team who worked in 35 North American markets and secured more than $500K in promotional value, on top of thousands more via traditional and social media coverage garnered through another successful multi-city costume character tour (from The WHITE House to FULL House). Check out just one of the fun segments HERE.

  

• Our Experiential team worked with Chicago Field and National Publicity to produce an event designed to generate buzz for Prime Video's new series, A League of Their Own. We partnered with the city of Rockford, IL to celebrate the 30th anniversary of the original film. We hosted a screening event and outdoor street fair that got fans excited for the next chapter of the Rockford Peaches and AAGPBL (All-American Girls Professional Baseball League) stories. The street fair portion of the program included swing dancers jitterbugging to the music of a live band on stage and a food truck with complimentary hot dogs, peanuts, and Cracker Jacks. There were also pitching cages where attendees could win prizes and an opportunity to get photo made into a baseball card. More than 2K fans watched an exclusive screening of the first episode of the series followed by an hour-long Q&A featuring co-creators and executive producers Abbi Jacobson and Will Graham, executive producer Desta Tedros Reff, original AAGPBL member Maybelle Blair and cast members D’Arcy Carden and Chanté Adams. The event was featured in a full page story in the New York Times in addition to other national and local coverage which has garnered over 52M impressions.

  

INDUSTRY UPDATES

Ad Vendors / Platforms / Data

• Google and Meta outperformed TikTok during Q4 holiday campaigns, with Google being the best performing platform for 30% of marketers. (Venture Beat)

  

• In the US, time spent with smartphones will reach three hours and 19 minutes per day this year, up 8 minutes from 2021. It's expected to increase an additional 7 minutes in 2023. (eMarketer)

  

• Half of marketers are not spending enough in a channel to get maximum ROI. While 50% of media plans are underinvested by a median of 50%, ROI can be improved 50% with an ideal budget, which Nielsen describes as the “50-50-50 Gap.” (Marketing Dive)

• Twitter wants performance-based ad revenue to make up 50% of its total revenue. To support the effort, it has launched a dedicated team to support performance and independent agencies. (Adweek)

Awards / Festivals

• The British Independent Film Awards is moving to gender-neutral performance categories and adding a new feature documentary debut director category. (THR)

• NBC’s This Is Us and HBO’s Succession led broadcast network and cable nominations for the 2022 Hollywood Critics Association TV Awards, which takes place on August 14th. (THR)

• The 16th annual Pitchfork Music Festival will take place July 15th-17th at Chicago’s Union Park. The headliners are The National, Mitski, and The Roots. (Pitchfork)

Cinemas / Theatrical

• Minions: The Rise of Gru scored a four-day opening of $125.2M in the US. Overseas, the movie earned over $86M for a global total of over $200M. (THR)

• China's theater ticket sales over the past six months are down 38% from the same period in 2021, totaling $2.6B, while North American ticket revenue reached $3.7B, up 236% YoY. (THR)

• About 33% of US children aged 12-15 prefer to watch movies in theaters, and 45% prefer to watch a movie as soon as it comes out. (GWI)

• At ₹10,637 Crore, 2022 was India’s second biggest ever at the box office, and only ₹300 Crore less than 2019, its best-ever year. (Ormax)

Gambling / Casinos

• AGM client Station Casinos is bringing a Wildfire casino to downtown Las Vegas. Wildfire casinos are typically heavy on slot machines and video poker, with casual, affordable dining options that cater to locals. (Casino.org)

• Virginia has joined eight other US states in exceeding $5B in combined sports betting wagers since its launch. It reported over $42.5M in gross revenue for May alone, up 17% YoY. (Gambling News)

• FanDuel will no longer market its products as “risk-free" and will replace the term with the less controversial "no sweat." (Gambling News)

Live Events / Attractions

• The 2022 Anime Expo drew thousands of attendees to the Los Angeles Convention Center after a 2-year hiatus. It featured dance parties, video game trailers, TV show reveals and activities celebrating Japanese pop culture. (LA Times)

• The inaugural Metaverse Expo took place over the weekend in Las Vegas. Attendees had access to exclusive NFT giveaways, keynote speakers, high-level tech networking, and live entertainment. (Review Journal)

• Almost Famous the musical will be hitting Broadway starting November 3rd. The cast features Chris Wood, Anika Larsen, Solea Pfeiffer, Drew Gehling, Rob Colletti and Casey Likes. (Deadline)

Music / Audio / Podcasts

• About 29% of US children aged 12-15 listen to podcasts, up 13% YoY. Their favorite genres are comedy (59%) and gaming (50%). (GWI)

  

• Spotify has launched a Stranger-Things-themed upside down playlist with a personalized “savior song," letting users know what track would save them from Vecna. (Mashable)

• Napster is planning a $NAPSTER token launch on Algorand. It also released a litepaper outlining its plans to build out its existing music streaming ecosystem on the layer-1 blockchain, though a launch date has yet to be announced. (Decrypt)

• Time spent streaming music has continued to rise in every region but APAC, taking up 45% of the total time consumers spend on audio daily. (GWI)

  

NFT / Blockchain / Crypto

• Meta will shut down its digital wallet, Novi, on September 1st. The move comes amid a broad downturn in the cryptocurrency market and new scrutiny on stablecoins. (CNBC)

• Vauld, a crypto lender backed by Coinbase, paused withdrawals, trading, and deposits in order to weather the turmoil facing the crypto market. (Yahoo)

• Reddit launched an NFT-based avatar marketplace that lets users purchase a profile picture NFT with a credit or debit card. It has also developed its own own wallet product so users can store their NFTs. (Tech Crunch)

• Meta has enabled a group of US creators to showcase NFTs on their Facebook profiles. It also launched digital collectibles support on Facebook. (Crypto News)

• Crypto․com now supports Apple Pay purchases for its iOS app, letting users buy crypto using a debit card stored in their Apple Wallet. (9to5mac)

• Bitcoin is the most popular crypto owned by Americans, with 75% of US crypto owners having it. (Morning Consult)

  

• Meta will no longer use Facebook logins as its metaverse ID system. It's introducing a new type of login called a Meta account which can be used to log in to the Quest VR headset. (Tech Crunch)

OTT / Streaming

• Netflix's Stranger Things amassed 7.2B minutes of viewing time for the week of May 30-June 5 — the highest weekly total for any streaming title ever. (THR)

• HBO Max will no longer produce originals in several European countries, including Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Finland, Central Europe, the Netherlands and Turkey, as part of a plan to cut $3B in costs. (Engadget)

• Children worldwide currently use an average of 4.2 streaming services including YouTube. The most popular shows are ones that they can sing and dance to. (GWI)

• GAC has launched its ad-supported TV (FAST) channel, Great American Adventures. The channel premiered on free streaming platform Xumo. (Streamable)

• From July 8th-10th, Sling TV gave subscribers a free preview of the Hallmark Channel’s streaming service Hallmark Movies Now as part of its “Freeview Weekends” promotion. (Streamable)

• Stranger Things 4 became the second Netflix show to hit over 1B hours viewed, accumulating 1.15B hours of viewing time over the first 28 days of release. (Tech Spot)

• Kristen Finney will lead content curation for Disney+'s international division. As executive vice president, Finney will work on content needs and appropriateness for Disney+ and Star/Star+. (Reuters)

• As part of the promotion for Prime Day, Prime members were given a 60-second sneak peek of Prime Video’s upcoming series “The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power.” (Tech Crunch)

• TelevisaUnivision will launch its Spanish-language SVOD service ViX+ on July 21st in the US, Mexico and LatAm. The service will cost $6.99/mo in the US and MX$119 in Mexico. (THR)

• Over a third of Irish consumers are considering cancelling or pausing a streaming subscription. About 36% would end up switching services, while 20% would cancel altogether. (Advanced Television)

• Netflix is introducing spatial audio to some of its original titles including Stranger Things and The Adam Project. Users can find titles that currently support the option by typing “Spatial Audio” into the search bar. (Streamable)

Retail / Lifestyle / Travel

• Nearly 2.5M people passed through US airport security checkpoints July 3rd, the most since February 2020. About 27% of US-based carriers' arrivals were delayed and 464 flights were canceled. (Axios)

• In the US, comfort with flying domestically (70%) and internationally (41%) are at an all time high since the start of the pandemic. (Morning Consult)

  

• Approximately 50K stores in the US are forecast to close by 2026 (5.7%), while online sales are expected to grow by 50%. (Fast Company)

Social Media

• In 2022, two-thirds of the US population will use social media on a monthly basis, with the largest influx of new users coming from Gen Z. (eMarketer)

  

• About 4 in 10 US children aged 12-15 say watching livestreams is a main reason for using social media, up 11% YoY. Another 20% indicate the fear of missing out as a main reason, up 19% YoY. (GWI)

  

• Meta is launching its Reels API for external use. The new API will support content scheduling, insights, moderation, hashtag search and more within Reels. (Social Media Today)

• TikTok use among Boomers globally has almost doubled since Q4 2020, while use among Gen X has seen 67% growth during the same period. (GWI)

Video Games

• After more than doubling from 2015 to 2021, the global games content and services market is expected to see a decline of 1.2% this year to $188B. (Yahoo)

• McDonald’s is the first major sponsor of OfflineTV, a collective of online gaming content creators. The partnership includes sponsored livestreams, integrated content and in-person events. (Marketing Dive)

• Britain’s competition watchdog launched an investigation into Microsoft’s deal to acquire Activision Blizzard. The CMA is investigating whether the transaction "may be expected to result in a substantial lessening of competition." (THR)

• 48% of teen gamers worldwide want games to include either teamwork or events, rising to 56% among Minecraft users. (GWI)

• Mobile gaming revenue is on pace to generate $21.4B during Q2, an 30% increase from Q2 2019. (Games Industry)

Interesting Campaigns / Creative

• Coca-Cola is promoting its Coke Summer Music events with an AR experience on Snapchat featuring musician Kid Laroi. In addition to the Lens Carousel, the AR experience is available by scanning billboards in New York and Chicago, visiting Coke Studio’s website or scanning a Snapcode. (Marketing Dive)

  

AND NOW THE GOOD STUFF

• The UK government published its national AI strategy, which outlines its long-term vision for the technology and its impact on society.

• Rodney Brooks, the creator of the Roomba, throws cold water on the idea that AI will surpass human intelligence in the near future.

• A unique look behind the curtain at how one VC fund increased returns.

• How Peloton uses design and gamification to keep people on the exercise platform.

• If you think gentrification is about new coffee shops and high rents, you are missing an essential aesthetic element.

• Watch out for the Trisolarians! Scientists might have found the first-known planet orbiting three stars at once.