Iconic Toy Store Brand is Back Just in Time for the Holidays

Reading Time: 3 minutesTru Kids Brands™ (“Tru Kids”), the proud parent of the Toys”R”Us® brand, today relaunched its annual Geoffrey’s Hot Toy List for the 2020 holiday season. As the leading authority on all things play, the Toys”R”Us team has uncovered the biggest toy trends and play patterns, selecting the top 20 hottest toys of the year from the world’s best toy brands including Fisher-Price, Hasbro, LEGO, Mattel, Spin Master, VTech, and more. This year’s Hot Toy List is brought to life in a YouTube video starring real play expert kids showing key features and capturing the fun and…

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Stamps are Beginning to Look Alot Like Christmas

Reading Time: 2 minutesThe U.S. Postal Service today celebrated the majesty and visual mystique of the winter season by dedicating new Winter Scenes stamps. The virtual ceremony can be viewed on the Postal Service’s Facebook and Twitter pages. These Forever stamps are available at Post Office locations nationwide and at usps.com/winterscenesstamp. The booklet of 20 captures the serenity of snowy seasonal landscapes. The 10 photographs featured on the stamps show iconic scenes of winter in the Northern United States. Art director Derry Noyes designed the stamps with existing images taken by various photographers. “The winter landscape shines…

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Musk’s Innovative Underground System is Going to Vegas

Reading Time: 2 minutesInitial steps to expand Elon Musk’s innovative underground tunnel system throughout Las Vegas will soon be underway. The Vegas Loop will represent a first-of-its-kind transportation solution for a tourism destination, offering convenient transportation and reduced congestion throughout the Las Vegas resort corridor. During the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority’s (LVCVA) Board of Directors meeting today, Steve Hill, LVCVA president and CEO, shared that Musk’s tunneling company recently submitted its special use permit application to the City of Las Vegas and intends to file a land use (design review) application in Clark County shortly, the first steps in the process to…

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Travelocity Makes Predictions About the Holidays

Reading Time: 3 minutesThe holiday season is typically one of the biggest travel moments of the year, but with COVID-19 still active in the U.S., a recent survey by Travelocity®  finds that almost 60% of Americans report they won’t be traveling to see friends and family this year and of those, nearly one-in-three said they won’t celebrate the holidays at all. However, that doesn’t mean they’re staying home this winter, either. The Travelocity 2020 Holiday Outlook survey1, conducted in mid-September, found that some travelers are feeling optimistic when it comes to leisure travel for the remainder of the year. One-in-four respondents said they have a personal…

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Remdesivir Shows Positive Results in Treating COVID-19

Reading Time: 4 minutesPress Release courtesy of BusinessWire. The New England Journal of Medicine(NEJM) today published the final results from the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases’ (NIAID) double-blind, placebo-controlled, Phase 3 ACTT-1 trial of Gilead’s (Nasdaq: GILD) investigational antiviral Veklury® (remdesivir) for the treatment of adults hospitalized with mild-moderate or severe COVID-19. The final ACTT-1 study results build on the preliminary results published in NEJM in May 2020, showing that treatment with Veklury resulted in consistent, clinically meaningful improvements across multiple outcome assessments compared with placebo in COVID-19 patients. The final results demonstrate that treatment…

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New Initiative Uses Iconic Cartoon to Promote Worldwide Kindness

Reading Time: 2 minutesTake Care of Yourself (focused on physical and mental wellness), Take Care of Each Other (community and philanthropy), and Take Care of the Earth (nature and sustainability)—that inspire a major worldwide philanthropic endeavor, among other components. “TAKE CARE WITH PEANUTS is an initiative after my own heart, as it celebrates all the themes that my husband featured regularly in his comic strip,” says Jeanne Schulz, widow of Peanuts creator Charles Schulz. “Sparky shared messages of taking care of each other and respecting nature for years—he was always a man ahead of his time!” PHILANTHROPY:…

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Major Retail Site Explains Why Holiday Season will Start Early

Reading Time: 2 minutesRetailMeNot reports:   According to a new survey from leading savings destination RetailMeNot, a Vericast company, this year’s unprecedented holiday season will start earlier than previous years. While many Americans’ wallets are tighter this season, 66% of consumers say they plan to spend the same amount of money or more this holiday in order to create a sense of normalcy and keep traditions alive. The majority of Americans (75%) prefer to shop online this year, and the same amount will aim to complete all of their holiday shopping as early…

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COVID is Changing the Education Landscape

Reading Time: 2 minutesFollowing a season during which summer learning programs affected by the pandemic struggled to meet demand for their services, a large majority of afterschool programs that are open this fall report facing significant barriers as they strain to meet the needs of the students and families they have long supported. Among the challenges: Students who stand to benefit the most from these programs are now less likely than others to be able to access them. Those are key results from national surveys of parents and of afterschool providers, conducted by…

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New Magazine Creates Opportunities for Owners to Discuss Their Pets

Reading Time: 2 minutesDROOL proudly announces its launch as the first-ever quarterly magazine that puts dogs at the heart of the story. Written as a celebration of our canine companions, DROOL is a new platform from pet nutrition company, BIXBI, to share the most interesting stories about dogs. While editorial coverage around man’s best friend has typically revolved around product reviews and training tips, DROOL goes deeper into dog’s lives than ever before to discover the experiences, relationships and connections with our dogs that enrich our lives. The inaugural issue introduces readers to…

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Candy Sales Are Up, But is That Halloween Related?

Reading Time: 2 minutesNew data from the National Confectioners Association shows that Halloween chocolate and candy sales are up this year. For the latest four weeks ending September 6 versus the same period in 2019, total Halloween chocolate & candy sales are up 13% – growth that is driven by Halloween chocolate, which is up 25.3%. The grocery channel is a key driver for the growth of Halloween chocolate and candy sales as consumer behaviors continue to evolve during the pandemic and more people shop at grocery stores more often. In the grocery channel alone,…

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