Salon.com com (NASDAQ: SALN,
www.salon.com), one of the Internet's leading media companies, today
announced the renewal of an exclusive content sponsorship agreement with
Lexus, one of the world's leading luxury automobile companies.
Under terms of the agreement, Lexus will renew its year-long sponsorship of
Salon.com's popular Brilliant Careers feature, a weekly series that
chronicles the lives of today's outstanding achievers. In significantly expanding its commitment over last year's, Lexus will also become the
featured sponsor of the Salon People site. Additional facets of the fully
integrated partnership include: a signature event, a co-branded micro-site
utilizing innovative technology and prominent placement of the Lexus logo
throughout Salon People.
"We are thrilled with the evolution of the Salon-Lexus partnership over the
past year," said Michael O'Donnell, CEO and president of Salon.com. "Working with Lexus and their agency Team One, were proving that "beyond-the-banner" online advertising works. By marrying Lexus prestigious brand to Salon.coms award-winning content and offline events, were helping them target an influential audience."
Brilliant Careers, which began in November 1998, profiles the most
influential figures of our time. In the words of David Talbot, editor in
chief of Salon.com, "We launched Brilliant Careers for a simple reason: We
got tired of having to wait for interesting people to die before reading
something intelligent about them." Over the past year, some of the diverse
personalities featured include: Leonard Cohen, Sir Edmund Hillary, Jane
Goodall, Wayne Gretzky, Steve Jobs, Marcel Marceau, Paul Newman and Anna
Deavere Smith.
On Thursday October 21, Salon.com and Lexus hosted a live, "real-time" celebration of Brilliant Careers in San Francisco. Hosted by National Public Radio host Michael Feldman, the salon by Salon featured cultural and political luminaries including: nationally syndicated columnist Arianna Huffington; author and critic Stanley Crouch; renowned chef Alice Waters; esteemed photojournalist Mary Ellen Mark; and the founder of the modern midwife movement, Ina May Gaskin.
"Salon.com is one of the elite Internet brands," said Paul Ratzky, director
of Interactive Marketing Team One, the advertising agency for Lexus. "Lexus
recognized this one year ago and Salon has continued to distinguished
itself as the destination on the Web for superb, original content and
sophisticated style. Salon.com captures precisely the audience that Lexus
aims to reach through its advertising campaigns."
Salon People (http://www.salon.com/people) is one of Salon.com's most
popular sites. In addition to Brilliant Careers, the site features the
writing of renowned feminist and author Camille Paglia, as well as Nothing
Personal, Amy Reiter's daily column, which looks at the feats and foibles
of the famous and nearly famous, and Rogues' Gallery, a column by Douglas
Cruickshank that uncovers the absurd world of crime and punishment.
About Salon:
Salon.com (NASDAQ: SALN; www.salon.com; AOL Keyword: Salon) is an Internet
media company that produces a network of 10 original content sites and two
communities -- Table Talk and The Well. Salon.com was founded by David
Talbot, former arts editor of the San Francisco Examiner. Other premier
advertisers and sponsors of Salon.com include Visa, IBM, Microsoft,
Virgin.com, Intel, DrKoop.com, barnesandnoble.com and EDS. Salon.com also
has distribution agreements with major online companies including America
Online, Go.com, Alta Vista, CNN.com and CNet.
Salon recently announced an e-commerce ticketing arrangement with
CultureFinder.com and a distribution arrangement for its books content via
Rocket eBooks. Salon.com's content is also syndicated to U.S. newspapers
through United Features. In September 1999, the site had 1.9 million unique visitors.
About Lexus:
Lexus, the luxury vehicle division of Toyota Motor Sales, U.S.A., Inc.,
markets and sells luxury cars and sport utility vehicles through 176
dealers in the United States. Lexus prides itself on providing the best in
vehicle quality, service and customer satisfaction. The company's dealers
have achieved the highest honors in customer satisfaction eight out of the
last nine years from the independent research firm J.D. Powers and
Associates. Additionally, with record-setting sales in 1998, Lexus is one
of the fastest-growing luxury nameplates in the industry
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