Check out the new website (in beta stage), www.food52.com. It’s the brainchild of food writers Amanda Hesser (Cooking for Mr. Latte, The New York Times Magazine) and Merrill Stubbs, and it’s based on a series of year-round, weekly recipe contests—and HarperStudio will publish the cookbook that collects the winners at the end of the year.
I have paused virtually every time I’ve reached for the OJ this past month at the grocery store: 35 million dollars for that new juice carton. Ad Age reports Tropicana sales have decreased 20 percent on account of the poor redesign and the company quickly pulled the plug. As Debbie said in an earlier post: Why didn’t they put the 35 mil towards lowering their price?
A year ago I heard about Gary Vaynerchuk’s Wine Library Tv video blog. I’m not so into wine, but I watched because he was such a character. I then discovered his other video blog, garyvaynerchuk.com — and I watched them as fast as he put them up.
However, it was when I heard him speak at the Web 2.0 Conference last September that I knew without a doubt that I had to work with Gary. Before he left the stage I’d shot him an email, and by the time I left the Javitz Center I’d already heard back.
“That’s Your Book,” I screamed over the blackberry. “You need to write a book about passion just like the speech you just gave.”
And so the six month long conversation began…..that brought us to this exciting moment.
You can check out the stories about the book deal on wsj.com and TechCrunch, but for me, the best part is to see the reaction on Search.Twitter.com.
Here’s the speech that inspired the deal:
At the SXSW conference held last week in Austin, Texas, our recently signed authors and creators of thisiswhyyourefat.com put their own spin on Mims’s hip-hop hit, “This Is Why I’m Hot.” It’s just as catchy, but whether it will stave off your cravings for a good ol’ fashioned meat cake is another question.
Last month a friend forwarded me a link to thisiswhyyourefat.com the hilarious and cringe inducing “junk food-porn” site created by Jessica Amason and Richard Blakeley. Then another friend. Then another. Fast forward to yesterday: HarperStudio acquired the rights to a book based on the blog, which has pulled in over ten million page-views in its first month. Amason and Blakeley are currently in TV development talks. What would their show be called? The Biggest Gainer?
Burger King has a new Facebook application whereby you actually get a real whopper when you delete 10 of your friends.
— and therefore cookbooks must be the next big thing.
Gary Vaynerchuk came over to talk about Social Media and showed us the instant gratification of Twitter.
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