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Ozempic Aims to Stand Apart; Hotels Ask How Much Guests Care About Bathroom Doors; Beyond Meat Tries Protein Drinks; ChatGPT to Test Ads
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Good morning. Today, Novo Nordisk brings back “I’m a Mac” but casts Ozempic in the place of Apple; hotels’ latest innovation in the guest experience leaves out bathroom doors; a new protein drink uses a brand name known for solid food; and Sam Altman turns to his last resort.
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New Ozempic ads reunite Justin Long, left, and John Hodgman from the ‘Get a Mac’ campaign. Joey Martinez for Novo Nordisk
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The new ads reunite Justin Long, who embodied a hip Mac laptop in Apple’s commercials, with John Hodgman, who played a hapless PC. Long now stars as Ozempic, which he says has Food and Drug Administration approval for more indications than other GLP-1s when taken for Type 2 diabetes. Hodgman represents the other GLP-1s.
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The push comes as Novo Nordisk’s grip on the GLP-1 market has slipped.
Does the “Get a Mac” premise still work when it becomes “Get on Ozempic” (not the campaign’s real name)?
And is Ozempic cool enough to take the place of Mac?
Apple’s ads broke through because they brought humanity and humor to an overserious competition of thinking machines.
Novo Nordisk marketing executive Ed Cinca told Megan that “There’s Only One Ozempic” (the campaign’s actual name) uses a more irreverent tone than most pharma ads in order to catch consumers’ attention.
Reverent or not, though, Justin Long’s Mac had a little more cool factor than Justin Long’s semaglutide approved for complications of Type 2 diabetes. The contrast may not play well for those who remember.
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Content from our sponsor: Deloitte
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From Followers to Customers: Social Media Strategies for Retail Brands
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To leverage the power of social media marketing, retail brands can tap into creator partnerships, use social listening to personalize content, and streamline social commerce experiences. Read More
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Hotel guest Sadie Lowell began a ‘Bring Back Doors’ campaign after stays in hotels like this one. Sadie Lowell
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Hotel guests are leaving behind the luxury of a fully-closable, opaque door to the bathroom, the WSJ Leadership Institute’s Katie Deighton writes, and checking in to find sliding barn doors, curtains, translucent glass and strategically placed walls.
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“You couldn’t see the fine details, but you could see everything else,” said Denise Milano Sprung of the frosted bathroom door of the hotel room she shared with her husband at the Calgary Airport Marriott. “I’ve been married for 25 years, I love my husband, but I don’t want to see him use the restroom.”
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Thank hotel cost-cutting for your new openness with traveling companions.
But some travelers are starting to organize around what they consider a key product feature.
After digital marketer Sadie Lowell realized there wasn’t a solid bathroom door in the hotel room she was sharing with her father, she began a name-and-shame campaign (and searchable website) called “Bring Back Doors.”
More than 500 hotels have been listed in the no-door group.
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Beyond Meat losses have grown as demand for meat substitutes slowed. Scott Olson/Getty Images
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We’re about to get a live test of brand elasticity.
Beyond Meat, whose sales of plant-based beef, chicken and pork have been declining along with consumer interest in the category, is introducing a line of protein drinks it hopes will go down more smoothly, Patrick Coffee reports for the WSJ Leadership Institute.
Beyond Immerse asks consumers to make a leap with the Beyond brand, from savory solid meals with a sustainable pitch to new skinny cans of carbonated drinks in flavors like Peach Mango.
One factor in Beyond Meat’s favor is that the beverages themselves are unlike the dense, calorie-heavy shakes that dominate the protein beverage market, according to Tim Calkins, a marketing professor at Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management.
People don’t picture bubbly water when they think of protein drinks, Calkins said. “That’s a different proposition.”
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OpenAI said the ads it’s about to test won’t affect ChatGPT’s answers. Davide Bonaldo/Zuma Press
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OpenAI is finally starting the ad test that everyone’s been waiting for.
That’s not to say everyone’s been looking forward to ads in ChatGPT, which might explain why OpenAI announced the news on a Friday before a three-day weekend.
Even CEO Sam Altman wishes there were another way, worrying that commercial incentives could erode users’ trust in ChatGPT replies, as Berber Jin pointed out for the Journal:
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“Ads plus AI is sort of uniquely unsettling to me,” he said at a fireside chat at Harvard University two years ago. “I kind of think of ads as a last resort for us for a business model.”
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But OpenAI has bills to pay—far more than most companies, even in AI.
The new ads will soon show up, labeled as such, at the bottom of ChatGPT responses. The company said marketers and their ads won’t influence the chatbot’s answers, and that it will never sell user data to advertisers.
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“I think a lot of that rhetoric comes from people who are trying to justify valuations around companies, where they go: ‘We’re going to change everything in two years, there’s going to be no more work.’ ”
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— Ben Affleck in an appearance on “The Joe Rogan Experience,” discussing claims that AI will transform the world. “Well, the reason they're saying that is because they need to ascribe a valuation for investment that can warrant the capex spend they're going to make on these data centers,” he added.
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The community where marketing leaders drop the corporate speak and share what’s actually happening. The WSJ CMO Council unites leaders from the world’s most influential brands including Adobe, Audi, Google, IBM, Intel, Johnson & Johnson, Meta, Taco Bell, P&G and Verizon.
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Valentino with Brooke Shields during his 1981 spring couture show in Rome. Vittoriano Rastelli/CORBIS/Getty Images
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Eleven moments that defined the legacy of Valentino, the “Last Emperor” of high fashion, who died at 93. [WSJ]
Warner Bros. Discovery’s board of directors approved a new all-cash bid from Netflix for the company’s studios and HBO Max, and released financial details on its soon-to-be spun-off cable networks. [WSJ]
Super Bowl ads for brands including Raisin Bran, Oikos and Poppi are raising the possibility of a “Wellness Bowl.” [Adweek]
TikTok has introduced a standalone app for microdramas called PineDrama. [BI]
Developers plan to build a “mini Sphere” in the metro D.C. area, wrapped like its Las Vegas forerunner in an enormous “exosphere” electronic billboard. [Music Business]
Americans, not foreigners, are bearing almost the entire cost of U.S. tariffs, according to new research that contradicts a key claim by President Trump. [WSJ]
Honda’s sleek new “H mark” logo will finally progress from concept cars to road models starting next year. [Creative Bloq]
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