Arandell, a printer with catalog clients including Target, Macy's and Neiman Marcus, has added BCC Software's Mail Manager Full Service platform to increase its compatibility with the Intelligent Mail Barcode.

Montreal-based Groupe Aeroplan announced on November 3 that it will acquire Carlson Marketing, a Minneapolis-based company also operating in the loyalty space. The deal is expected to close next month. Executives for both companies said they expect the $175.3 million deal to help the combined organization expand outside of North America.

InfoGroup Chairman Roger Siboni said in a November 1 statement that the company's management has "made no decision to sell the company." The press release came one day after the Omaha World-Herald reported that at least 33 potential bidders have expressed interest in the firm to its financial advisor, Evercore Partners.

My wife has been disappointed by my unwillingness to think of a Halloween costume. But that might have changed.

Integrated agency Loomis Group announced a strategic partnership with Capella Advisors that will provide healthcare companies with strategic planning, commercialization expertise and marketing programs for new consumer-facing products.

Forrester Research data released this month shows that just over one in 10 companies value data-driven customer intelligence at the C-level. However, analyst Dave Frankland, the report's author, expects that to improve. Forrester found in its October 16 study, The Intelligent Approach to Customer Intelligence, that 12% of company executives embrace customer intelligence.

Though three-quarters of nonprofits gather consumers' names and locations when they sign up for e-mail communications, that's often where consumer data collection ends for those groups, according to a Return Path study, released October 20. Nonprofits are half as likely as for-profit companies to collect information beyond name and geographic location from their e-mail subscribers — 20% vs. 42%.

Doctors noted their dissatisfaction with a direct mail marketing arrangement between Eli Lilly and CVS Caremark in an Indianapolis Star report.

Advamed, a trade assocation for medical technology companies, recently completed a survey with Porter Novelli about direct-to-consumer marketing in the sector.

Magna, an agency in the Interpublic Group division Mediabrands, predicted this week that revenue for owners of direct media — a diverse group comprising search engines, the US Postal Service and phone directories, among others — will rise 3.3% next year. That rise occurs when national and local brand-based advertisers are included and revenue is evaluated as a whole.