A year after changing ownership hands, America’s Finest News Source has opened America’s Finest Creative Agency.

The Onion is offering copywriting and creative strategy services to brands under its new agency moniker. That includes help with everything from stunt marketing to email copy to social-first vertical video.

“We are certainly not a one-and-done shop,” CMO Leila Brillson exclusively told Marketing Brew. “The concept here is that we are going to give you the tools that you need for a really entertaining and human-feeling campaign.”

Marnie Shure, who previously was managing editor at The Onion from 2012 to 2017, and Howie Kaplan, who currently works as a marketing consultant for The Onion, will run the agency internally and oversee a lean team of copywriters, most of whom have experience writing for The Onion and many of whom have written for events like awards shows, Brillson said.

“We are hoping to make a brand’s content as smart and entertaining as our content,” Brillson said, “like having a little writer’s room in your pocket or a writer's room on speed dial.”

Continue reading here.—KH

Live musical numbers, a Steve Aoki DJ set, and jokes about the nearly 50-year age gap between University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill head football coach Bill Belichick and his girlfriend Jordon Hudson. The 2025 upfronts season really had it all.

This year, there was also plenty of uncertainty. With fears of an economic downturn casting a figurative (and sometimes literal) rain cloud over the week, media execs were tasked with reassuring an industry expecting an ad spend slowdown that their precious dollars would be well spent—and could be adjusted—if entrusted to them.

Ryan Gould, president of ad sales and client partnerships at Warner Bros. Discovery, told advertisers to “rest assured” that deals would be negotiated under “fully flexible” agreements; ad sales chief Rita Ferro said the company “is committed to being that strategic partner you can count on for flexibility and value.”

Keeping it simple—kind of: Throughout the week, media companies pitched simplifying things for ad buyers, and there are efforts to do the same in streaming—or at least to try to make the branding less confusing.

Continue reading here.—JS

At Meta’s NewFronts presentation, three creators, including social series Street Hearts host Tiff Baira, participated in an onstage game show hosted by comedian Roy Wood Jr.

The stunt was an apt representation of how Meta wants to position itself as a centralized hub for the creator economy. Advertisers continue to pour billions of dollars into the space, and other companies, including Snapchat and TikTok, also spent NewFronts week emphasizing the ways they can help facilitate work with creators on their platforms.

Meta didn’t just talk creators during the presentation; it also touted a handful of new live and video ad capabilities all aimed at continuing to keep advertisers interested.

Link in bio: On the creator side, Meta is testing a trends feed in Instagram’s Creator Marketplace, a feature that is designed to help advertisers identify trending topics on Instagram Reels with links to examples of Reels that fall under the trend, so they can see the types of content and topics that are resonating with audiences. Meta’s also testing trending ads on Reels, which will also allow advertisers to show up against trending content.

Continue reading here.—JS

Your inbox isn’t the only place for Marketing Brew. The Refill brings you the week’s sharpest marketing stories, narrated by AI and brewed for your earbuds. This week, we’re recapping this year’s upfronts, diving into The Onion’s new creative agency, and exploring how the New York Mets are connecting with younger fans.

Listen to the latest episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you prefer to listen.

Stories we’re jealous of.

• Wired wrote about Bluesky’s ambitions to take over the social media world.
• The New York Times wrote about the TikTok trend where users share the “propaganda” they’re not falling for.
• Ad Age wrote about Duolingo scrubbing its TikTok and Instagram accounts after it received backlash for using AI.