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THE HEADLINES
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DOGGY DAYCARE
Mars, best known for their chocolate and candy brands, has purchased veterinary firm Anicura for $2.36B. Wait … what?
When they aren’t busy making diabetes a reality for all Americans by flooding Walmarts and Costco with 75-pound bags of Snickers, 3-Musketeers, and Milkyway, Mars is producing treats for your pets.
In fact, their love for man’s best friend dates all the way back to 1935. Mars owns Iams and Pedigree which accounts for ruff-ly $35B of the confectioner’s annual revenue.
With the acquisition of Anicura, Mars has spent over $10B in the pet sector over the past year alone. Anicura offers preventative, health care, intensive surgery, and orthopedics services for fur babies.
Water Cooler Talking Point: “The key to creating brand synergies here will be keeping the dogs away from the chocolate.”
CATCH THE BUG
Last week IHOP began cryptically tweeting that its stores would be changing their name to IHOb. Not that we follow IHOP … or Denny’s. Naturally, the internet lost its collective mind as people began to guess what the name change could mean.
On Monday IHOb ended the suspense, announcing that the B stood for burgers. The chain hopes the move will help attract more than moms who are trying to make breakfast-for-dinner a thing. Not on our watch, Sharon.
Domino’s, on the other hand, took a much more literal approach to their viral marketing campaign. The pizza chain is actually filling potholes in four cities across the country to ensure that pizzas make it home unscathed, quite literally.
Water Cooler Talking Point: “The only way Domino’s can outdo pizza-chain branded construction equipment is with pizza-themed catcalling. Your move Domino’s.”
SHOULD’VE SEEN (B)IT COMING
The year of our Lord, 2018 has not been kind to cryptocurrency.
Despite officially attaining recognition by the SEC, the highly volatile currency took its latest dive after a South Korean exchange, Coinrail was hacked. Bitcoin dropped to its lowest value in six months, likely due to security concerns. Appreciate that advice to HODL in December 2017, Chet from high school.
But wait, there’s more!
Wells Fargo will prohibit their credit card holders from buying crypto, joining JP Morgan Chase, and Bank of America. A study by LendEDU showed that 18% of Bitcoin purchases were made via credit, and 22% of those couldn’t pay off the purchase.
Water Cooler Talking Point: “Idiots who buy crypto with credit are the reason we can’t have nice things … or a global decentralized currency.”
IN OTHER NEWS
- Bozoma Saint John is leaving her entirely made up role as Chief Brand Officer of Uber only a year into the new gig. Apparently making apology commercials wasn’t what she was looking for in a career.
- There’s anarchy in the proverbial digital streets. Obama-era net neutrality rules were officially repealed yesterday ushering in a lawless age … where nothing will likely change.
- Today in massive M&A activity that only a mother could love, Knauf will buy USG for $7B and KKR will take Envision private in a deal worth $5.57B.
- Rolls Royce plans to layoff more than 4k workers amid struggles in its aircraft engine business.
- Classic Elon. The fearless leader of Tesla hinted at full self-driving features and a rocket-powered roadster via Twitter. What didn’t he promise? To deliver all of the back-ordered Telsa Model 3’s.
- US indices were up yesterday:
- DOW: +0.02%
- S&P 500: +0.11%
- NASDAQ: +0.19%