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Texas Pacific Group's acquisition of Burger King may lead to new advertising for the fast-food hamburger chain, whose ad duties were recently consolidated with Deutsch, the Interpublic Group unit. Given that the value of Burger King's brand dropped from $2.8 billion to $2.16 billion in 1999 and that its market share of the fast-food burger market has fallen, Texas Pacific's reputation for rehabilitating underleveraged brands will be put to the test.

Dockers, Quizno's, Taco Bell and H&R Block have all signed on for spots on this year's Super Bowl, hoping for the big bang from the big audience. Foote, Cone & Belding created Dockers' ads introducing Dress Casuals. Cliff Freeman & Partners crafted Quizno's ad for shock and humor. Campbell Mithun's ad for H&R Block was filmed by Joel and Ethan Coen using message over humor.

Wendy's International, Denny's restaurant chains and Taco Bell find that a significant number of their customers make purchases after 9 p.m., and consequently are rolling out ads aimed at encouraging late-night patronage.

The morning after the election, Pizza Hut marketing officer Randy Gier had called BBDO to concoct a commercial that ran the next evening, poking fun at the electoral fiasco to sell their 'Insider' pizza. McIlhenny Co., with DDB, ran a post-election print ad for red and green hot sauce with a mocking comment about having a choice. And Swatch congratulates 'Mr GOREBUSHOFF'.

Responding to pressure from franchisers, Taco Bell is replacing ads featuring the famous talking Chihuahua with those featuring food. TBWA Chiat/Day created the Chihuahua, who became celebrated at movie premieres, on music videos and on magazines. Taco Bell's new marketing hombre, Kip Knight wants to see promotions responsible for actual sales. Now, the challenge for the company is to make the food look as wonderful to the public as the dog.

Burger King claims its Whopper is America's favorite burger in its new TV ad campaign. And it seems Taco Bell must have agreed when, last summer, it ran ads saying, 'Hasta La Vista, Whopper,' claiming it needed to compare its Gorditas against 'the best in the fast-food business.' The problem McDonald's has with these claims is that the numbers are based on surveys, not number of burgers sold. Maybe Burger King just needs to open up the same number of restaurants in all the same locations as McDonald's in order to get at the truth.