advertisers: Last News

Subscribe here.Please support our advertisers and help keep independent LGBTQ journalism strong! Click the links below to the individual advertisers in our most recent issue, browse the magazine above, or Click Here.Alden TheatreArlandria FloorsAtlas Performing Arts CenterBarns at Wolf TrapBirchmereBite the FruitBroadway at the NationalCity DogsDC Quit NowDignity WashingtonFolger TheatreGALA Hispanic Theatre: The 22+ Weddings of HugoGay Men’s Chorus of Washington, D.C.Glen Echo Park: Arts FestivalGlen Echo Park: ExhibitionsGreen Lantern DCInn at Lost RiverJade FitnessKeegan TheatreKennedy Center: ClueKennedy Center: Fall Arts SeasonLGBT Counseling DMVMiss PixiesMosaic Theater: Lady DayNational PhilharmonicNumber 9Olney Theatre CenterPG Parks: Unwine FestivalShakespeare Theatre Company: BabbitShaw’s TavernSignature TheatreStrathmoreTrade BarVocal Arts DCWunder GartenPlease click here to subscribe for FREE to our weekly magazine and newsletter.Browse back issues at our digital bookcase: Click here.To inquire about advertising in Metro Weekly or on MetroWeekly.com, please Click Here.

S. Charles Lee, the architect of hundreds of ornate Art Deco movie theaters, had a famous saying about his goal of engaging audiences before they settled into their seats: “The show starts on the sidewalk.”

Brian Steinberg Senior TV Editor Can there ever be too much NFL on TV? Netflix is about to find out. The streaming giant is likely to meet early resistance in its effort to woo advertisers to two Christmas Day NFL games that it has secured for next season, according to four people familiar with the current “upfront” market, during which U.S.

Brian Steinberg Senior TV Editor Lauren Anderson, the Amazon MGM Studios executive who oversees ad-supported original content for Amazon MGM Studios, will expand her duties to include helping develop ties with advertisers and sponsors for those shows. As head of brand and content innovation, a new role, Anderson will “manage Studios’ creative collaboration with brands, helping them find engaging moments to partner across our Originals slate,” said Vernon Sanders, head of television for Amazon MGM Studios, in a memo to staff.

CNN‘s Mark Thompson told advertisers additional details about the network’s strategy, with plans to expand franchises to digital platforms and to build new branded verticals around topics beyond politics.

Senior Amazon execs Paul Kotas and Mike Hopkins opened the tech giant’s first upfront by detailing the steps toward becoming what Hopkins called a “one-stop shop” for viewers and advertisers.

Brian Steinberg Senior TV Editor Audiences may not be the only thing about TV that continues to shrink. Advertisers are expected to once again press for “rollbacks,” or declines in the rates they pay for reaching streaming and TV viewers, in early “upfront” talks with TV networks, according to five media buying executives and other people familiar with these annual discussions in which U.S. media companies try to sell the bulk of their commercial inventory ahead of their next cycle of programming.

TikTok is capping off this week of NewFronts in New York with an even larger extravaganza than its first-ever edition in 2023.

Brian Steinberg Senior TV Editor Taylor Tomlinson has proven herself to be a big draw among younger crowds and those savvy with social media. Now CBS hopes the new “After Midnight” host will have similar appeal with a decidedly niche sector: B-to-B advertisers. The network is trying to develop partnerships with a cluster of marketers that typically find their customers among decision-making executives at corporations.

Brian Steinberg Senior TV Editor Before marketers can start putting their commercials into Netflix programs for the year to come, they’ll have to step into those programs themselves. Netflix plans to host an interactive “Netflix Experience” for advertising clients and buyers, all via an event to be held throughout Thursday, May 16, at New York’s Pier 59 Studios. Those who choose to participate will traverse through rooms and experiences built around Netflix series like “Stranger Things” or the comedy offerings of “Netflix is a Joke.” The company also plans to hold what it calls “an intimate first-look presentation” with its executives on Mary 15 in the afternoon.

Brian Steinberg Senior TV Editor Paramount Global set a new senior vice president over its efforts to win small-and-medium-sized advertisers, another nod of the growing importance of non-traditional market segments to the business of TV, which has long relied on just Madison Avenue’s biggest residents. Paramount named Emily Huo as its senior vice president of “SMB Advertising.” The category often includes entrepreneurial digital advertisers and regional and local marketers who in the past found national TV too broad or, more likely than not, too expensive. In the streaming era, however, smaller advertisers can run pitches aimed at narrower slices of geography or specific consumer niches.

After a 2023 upfront season marred by the WGA strike, Warner Bros. Discovery is first out of the gate to declare a return engagement this spring at New York’s Theater at Madison Square Garden.

Las Vegas trade show CES always kicks off the new year in gadget-happy style, showcasing the innovations that will (sometimes) define the future.

Brian Steinberg Senior TV Editor Interpublic Group, the ad-holding company that has made a concerted bid to enlist new kinds of audience data into planning how and where commercials run, hopes to turbocharge its efforts in a new partnership with OpenAP, a consortium of the big U.S media companies that helps identify similar consumer audiences across different companies’ platforms. Under terms of the new pact, Interpublic Group’s Magna media-investment arm will be able to identify discrete group of consumer audiences and distribute commercials to reach them via OpenAP.

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor Linda Yaccarino, who’s already facing an uphill battle in winning over advertisers to X, has her work cut out for her to restore trust with big marketers after her boss profanely dissed those who had suspended advertising from the platform. Almost six months into her gig as CEO of X, Yaccarino continues to try to clean up PR messes created by Elon Musk, the shoot-from-the-lip megabillionaire and self-appointed defender of free speech who owns the company formerly known as Twitter.

Elon Musk made plain his view of the widespread advertiser withdrawal this month from X, formerly Twitter.

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor A visibly irate Elon Musk said advertisers who pulled spending from X/Twitter, following his post that endorsed an antisemitic conspiracy theory, were trying to “blackmail” the company and threatened to drive it into bankruptcy. Musk, currently the world’s wealthiest individual, had a message to big advertisers including Disney that halted spending on his social network: “Go fuck yourself… Go. Fuck.

Brian Steinberg Senior TV Editor If movie and TV studios get nervous about advertising, so should everyone else. Advertisers loathe controversy, and often “pull” or “yank” their commercials from individual pieces of content that generate it.

Meredith Woerner Deputy Editor, Variety.com The masterminds behind memorable marketing moments from “Barbie,” “Call of Duty,” “Pokerface” and even that creepy “Smile” campaign that placed grinning actors at various Major League Baseball games gathered Thursday at the Variety + Spotify Advertising’s Visionaries dinner to toast leaders in the field. West Hollywoods’ Sunset Tower Hotel welcomed the industry’s leading innovators selected for Variety’s 2023 Digital Marketing Impact Report and the four recipients of the Variety Entertainment Marketing Visionaries Award, presented by Spotify.

Snapchat parent Snap hit a warning note on the ad front today, saying “forward visibility of advertising demand” is limited in part by reduced spending due to the Israel-Hamas war.

Russell Brand’s last show on mainstream British TV was binned without making it to air five years ago, following allegations by a female comedian of his predatory behaviour, according to The Sun newspaper.