COVID

Vaccine Tracker: XL Edition

Bumping up our weekly vaccine tracker to “top story” status today because, well, there’s a ton of vaccine news going on and there is nothing more important to the global economy.

Let’s start with the numbers.

• US: The country hit a milestone of 100 million vaccine doses administered yesterday, and 13.5% of all US adults are fully vaccinated (meaning two doses of Moderna or Pfizer-BioNTech, or one of J&J). The seven-day average of doses administered per day is 2.23 million, a 9% bump over the week before.
• International: More than 345 million doses have been administered across 121 countries, a 27% jump from last week.

Now to the headlines...

The debate over unused doses

A cross-border kerfuffle is brewing over millions of unused doses of AstraZeneca’s vaccine. Those doses, which are currently sitting in cold storage in the US, aren’t being used because the US has yet to authorize the vaccine. More than 70 countries have authorized this vaccine, so they’ve been asking the US to please kindly hand over the doses that are sitting around.

• Yesterday, AstraZeneca itself entered the chat, asking the Biden administration to consider sending the doses to the EU.
• The White House, which is facing increased pressure to send these doses abroad, said that’s not on the table.

How we got here: The US ordered 300 million doses of AstraZeneca’s vaccine last year, but regulators are still waiting on data from a clinical trial to begin the authorization process. 

Meanwhile, more age limits are coming down

An increasing number of states are expanding eligibility to people in the “no, I don’t quite remember Woodstock” range. Texas is opening up doses to anyone 50 or older starting next week, and Georgia, Minnesota, and Ohio will also begin loosening age requirements.

Michigan said all adults will be eligible on April 5, almost a month ahead of President Biden’s mandate. Yesterday, he pledged that all US adults would be able to sign up to get a vaccine by May 1.

BIG TECH

Umm That’s Kinda Our Thing: Rubio Writes About Amazon

Sen. Marco Rubio, a Florida Republican, found common cause with the Federal Trade Commission and fans of Sneaky Pete by getting peeved at Amazon. In a USA Today op-ed published yesterday, Rubio railed against the company and backed the workers currently pushing to unionize at a warehouse in Bessemer, Alabama. 

• The move made him one of very few Republicans to support organized labor. 

The backstory: Rubio’s Amazon irritation began earlier this month, when the company removed from Kindle and Audible a book titled When Harry Became Sally on the basis that it framed transgender identity as a mental illness. A group of senators, including Rubio, wrote to Amazon to protest the decision. 

So...no, Rubio didn’t decide to buck his party's position on labor organizing after downing some IPAs with Bernie Sanders. Rubio maintained in the op-ed that “adversarial relations between labor and management are wrong.” He clarified that he supported the Bessemer workers because Amazon’s leadership “has decided to wage culture war against working-class values.” 

Looking ahead...the Amazon workers’ votes on whether to unionize are due by the 29th. 

STOCKS

GameStop to ABC

It still isn’t over. ABC’s documentary on the GameStop saga debuts on Hulu next week, but it might want to start planning a sequel as the stock continues to rise and fall faster than an old air mattress. 

The video game store-turned-Reddit-darling gained 92% this week to close at $265 per share. That’s down from a peak of $483 in late January, but way up from $17 at the beginning of the year.

This week’s moonward trajectory followed an announcement that Chewy cofounder and GameStop board member Ryan Cohen will lead the retailer’s transition to e-commerce.

In November, Cohen sent a letter to GameStop’s board that gives us some insight into where he’ll focus his efforts. He wrote that GameStop needs to prune underperforming stores and markets and catch up to three major changes in the gaming industry:

1. The switch from physical games and consoles to streamed content (like cloud gaming)
2. The growth of Candy Crush-ing mobile gamers
3. The rising number of gamers buying equipment from mass retailers like Amazon

Looking ahead...Cohen turned Chewy into the “Amazon for pets,” proving there’s an appetite for Not Everything Stores. His next task will be to turn GameStop’s reputation from “ye olde gaming equipment pawn shop” into “Amazon for gaming.”

SPONSORED BY CARIUMA

Spring Sneakers Have Officially Sprung

How can you tell when it’s springtime? Hint: it’s got nothin’ to do with flowers, sunshine, or birdies chirping in trees. 

It’s got everything to do with everyone rockin’ CARIUMA’s vibrantly-colored kicks. 

Come out of hibernation looking like a tulip in full bloom while sporting a pair of these crazy-comfortable, sustainably made CARIUMA sneaks. They come in an array of feel-good spring colors—like rose, green, yellow, and classic white. 

You can dress em’ up or down. The one constant? Your CARIUMAs are carbon neutral. 

There’s never been a better time to wake up and smell fresh sneaks, because last spring, these babies had an 8k-person waitlist. 

Brew readers can get 15% off their kicks—but just like the season, this offer is limited. 

Get your CARIUMAs before they’re gone. 

GRAB BAG

Key Performance Indicators

Typically, the KPI section consists of one stat, one quote, and one read. But honestly we found way too many interesting stats yesterday, so today we’re doing a statistics takeover.

Tech stat: Facebook has nearly 10,000 employees working on its augmented and virtual reality devices, according to The Information. That’s almost 20% of its entire workforce, and double the number of Twitter’s total employees.

Wealth stat: US households finished 2020 with a record net worth of $130.2 trillion, up 10% from the year before. Asset prices across the board, from stocks to houses, climbed last year despite the pandemic.

Streaming stat: HBO Max is updating its subscriber targets to 120 million–150 million by 2025; the previous forecast had been 75 million to 90 million. Parent AT&T expects revenue in the HBO division to more than double to $15 billion by the same year.

Babies stat: More twins are being born now than at any point in history, according to a study published yesterday. The rate of twin births has grown by a third since the 1980s, which the researchers attribute to a rise in fertility treatments.

FOOD

I’ll Take a Dry Erase Whiteboard With Fries, Please

Ever order lunch with coworkers and wonder, “Can I expense this?” 

Good Fortune Burger, a local joint in Toronto, is eliminating all your concerns. In a perfectly executed marketing campaign, it temporarily renamed some menu items as generic office supplies so you can expense them without raising any HR eyebrows. 

Here’s what the menu looks like from Uber Eats:

 Just don’t be the person who orders their ergonomic aluminum laptop stand well-done.

WHAT ELSE IS BREWING

• Lordstown Motors, the GM backed electric vehicle startup, has been accused by the short-seller Hindenburg of misleading investors. Hindenburg is the same firm that accused Nikola of being an “intricate fraud.” 
• Microsoft and Google are duking it out in public over their relationship with the news media, cybersecurity, and more.
• The buyer of Beeple’s $69.3 million NFT has been identified, kinda. It’s a crypto investor who goes by Metakovan, but no one knows Metakovan’s real identity.
• Ant Group CEO Simon Hu resigned as the Chinese fintech giant faces increased scrutiny from the Chinese government.
• Richard Branson is reportedly on the hunt to find a SPAC to take another of his space companies, Virgin Orbit, public.

SPONSORED BY ATTENTIVE

These SMS marketing trends speak for themselves. Consumer behavior has shifted to a mobile-first mindset—meaning your brand needs to get on the text train. Luckily, Attentive’s latest report has done a lot of the heavy lifting for you. Of the 2,000 US consumers they surveyed, 91% are interested in signing up for texts and 58% want to get hit up multiple times a week. Download the full report and get your mobile marketing strategy cranking today.

BREW'S BETS

Intergalactic breakfast: Mocked-up images of the first space hotel, the Voyager Station.

GPOAT: Round #1 is in the books! Head on over to our results page to find out the winners. Then, take a breather this weekend because voting for Round #2 starts Monday. 

Weekend Conversation Starters:

• What day of the week is the first day of the week?
• Is ketchup a vegetable?
• What’s up with this bed?
• No sleep > six hours of sleep

GAMES

Brew Crossword

Today's puzzle, created by Kate Repka, will be a favorite for anyone who's rooted for Tony Soprano, Madeline Mackenzie, or Omar Little.

Difficulty: 6.2

Favorite clue: “Much-maligned manager-speakers” (6 letters)

Play the crossword here

+ Think you have what it takes to make your own crossword? Spoiler: You do. Check out our tutorial, and then be sure to submit. If we select your crossword, we'll also send you the iconic Brewneck sweatshirt.