Wrapping Up the Year: From Electrolytes to Soup-er Bowls and Kosher Deals

Welcome back to the Spotlight! Hard enough as it is to believe, but as sure as I am incessantly refreshing my web browser for stories about Juan Soto’s free agency, we’re nearly at the end of the year. Indeed, if the cold weather and manufactured deadlines that overlook that the calendar rolls over to a new day (granted, an increasingly questionable proposition in this crazy world…) were not evidence enough, people are receiving and gratuitously posting their Spotify Wrapped highlights from 2024. If I had the budget to support it, I’d do a version of my own that tracked the number of dad jokes and sports and entertainment business headlines but there’s always next year (I think). Although tomorrow may not be promised, a cringe, eye-roll and/or smile is on the below:

• Alex Cooper -- host of the second most streamed podcast on Spotify, “Call Her Daddy” – becomes the latest celebrity to wade into the beverage industry, launching “Unwell,” an electrolyte-infused drink marketed to women. With her following, the brand may just do better than its name suggests.  
• The Washington Commanders make something of an unconventional hire for their front office, bringing in the former CEO of the Campbell Soup Company to serve as the team’s President. In so doing, the team is one step closer to a souper bowl.
• Speaking of soup, the traditional Jewish soup dumpling that is a matzo ball may soon be taking a more oblong shape, as Brigham Young University’s first Jewish quarterback Jake Retzlaff unveils his NIL sponsorship with kosher food company, Manischewitz. Now that’s something to kvell at!