Small businesses that produce dog treats, toys, eggs and compost are vying for a chance to have a commercial during the Super Bowl.
The four companies are finalists in a competition held by software maker Intuit, which will pay millions of dollars to give the winner a 30-second spot in the game Feb. 2. They were selected by Intuit's 8,000 employees. The winner will be chosen in a vote open to anyone who visits the competition website: www.smallbusinessbiggame.com through Dec. 1.
The finalists are Barley Labs, of Durham, N.C., which makes dog treats out of barley; GoldieBlox, based in Oakland, Calif., maker of engineering toys aimed at girls; Locally Laid Egg Co., a Duluth, Minn., egg producer and POOP — Natural Dairy Compost, a Nampa, Idaho, fertilizer maker.
All four businesses are young. Dairy Poop was founded this year, while the others were launched in 2012.
Barley labs makes treats from grain left over from beer brewing, while POOP uses cattle manure to manufacture fertilizer. GoldieBlox's products are blocks and other toys that teach girls about engineering and construction. And Locally Laid Egg produces eggs from hens that live in pastures rather than in coops.
Nearly 15,000 small businesses entered the contest during the summer. Intuit employees voted for the 20 best, and that field was winnowed down to four. The make the final four, a small business had to prove that it could handle the bump up in business that a Super Bowl ad could give it.
Super Bowl ads are usually run by huge companies and brands like Budweiser and Chevrolet, not small businesses. Intuit has never had an ad of its own. But some famous ads have been run by companies that were not yet giants, including Apple Inc., which ran an ad in 1984 that raised the public's awareness about the impending launch of the Macintosh.
The ads give a company of any size great visibility; more than 100 million people are expected to watch the game.
The advertising agency RPA, which has created Super Bowl ads in the past, will create the spot. It is creating ads for all four finalists, but only one will be seen on the Super Bowl. The others will be shown at other times.
Netflix Series “The Leopard” Spots Classic Italian Novel, Remakes It As A Sumptuous Period Drama
"The Leopard," a new Netflix series, takes the classic Italian novel by Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa and transforms it into a sumptuous period piece showing the struggles of the aristocracy in 19th-century Sicily, during tumultuous social upheavals as their way of life is crumbling around them.
Tom Shankland, who directs four of the eight episodes, had the courage to attempt his own version of what is one of the most popular films in Italian history. The 1963 movie "The Leopard," directed by Luchino Visconti, starring Burt Lancaster, Alain Delon and Claudia Cardinale, won the Palme d'Or in Cannes.
One Italian critic said that it would be the equivalent of a director in the United States taking "Gone with the Wind" and turning it into a series, but Shankland wasn't the least bit intimidated.
He said that he didn't think of anything other than his own passion for the project, which grew out of his love of the book. His father was a university professor of Italian literature in England, and as a child, he loved the book and traveling to Sicily with his family.
The book tells the story of Don Fabrizio Corbera, the Prince of Salina, a tall, handsome, wealthy aristocrat who owns palaces and land across Sicily.
His comfortable world is shaken with the invasion of Sicily in 1860 by Giuseppe Garibaldi, who was to overthrow the Bourbon king in Naples and bring about the Unification of Italy.
The prince's family leads an opulent life in their magnificent palaces with servants and peasants kowtowing to their every need. They spend their time at opulent banquets and lavish balls with their fellow aristocrats.
Shankland has made the series into a visual feast with tables heaped with food, elaborate gardens and sensuous costumes.... Read More