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This post is part of a series on celebrity spokespeople who ended up doing serious harm to the brands they were hired to promote, or vice versa. See how we rank the 20 top spokesperson fiascos.

Okay, to begin with, I should be completely honest: I'm a definite Kirstie Alley fan. I've watched her since the beginning, since she walked into Shelly Long's shoes on Cheers and took the show to a whole other level. I watched as she began to mature gracefully in Summer School and the Look Who's Talking movies, and even stayed with Veronica's Closet for way longer than I should have. Over the years, I watched her bloom, blossom, expand her horizons, umm...

Okay, yes, I also watched her gain a lot of weight. Somewhere between the overripe evil of Gladys Leeman in Drop Dead Gorgeous and the impressive avoirdupois of Fat Actress, Kirstie Alley definitely put on some serious pounds. When they started shooting her in low light with dark clothes, I had my suspicions; when Fat Actress debuted, there was no longer any doubt.

Still, I was rooting for Kirstie, and I was happy when she got a gig working for Jenny Craig (a division of Nestle, VTX:NESN). While I'm not sure that weight loss is for everyone, I have no doubt that, for Kirstie Alley, it meant the difference between being gainfully employed and using her royalties from syndicated TV shows to buy herself an island and a bunch of muumuus. I hoped that the marriage between Kirstie and Jennie would thrive and be, if not fruitful, at least healthy.

This post is part of a series on celebrity spokespeople who ended up doing serious harm to the brands they were hired to promote, or vice versa. See how we rank the 20 top spokesperson fiascos.

In the mid-eighties, a couple of years before I began to drink legally, wine coolers became the alcoholic beverage of choice. Sweet and mildly alcoholic, they came in a variety of fruit flavors and neatly halved the distance between mixed drinks and a Shirley Temple. The combination of cheap wine, carbonated water, fruit juice, and sugar actually packed a pretty decent kick, particularly given that the sweetness almost completely obscured the taste of the alcohol.

One of the toughest problems with wine coolers was selling them to an adult audience. While precocious youngsters were quick to appreciate the Lolita-esque appeal of a super-sweet alcoholic version of Kool-Aid, this image was far from attractive to most of the people who actually bought alcohol. To combat the soda pop overtones of the product, Ernest and Julio Gallo used a version of conservative, home-town sincerity to push their "Bartles and Jaymes" brand. Beginning in 1984, they ran a series of ads featuring two men in hats and suspenders -- "Frank Bartles" and "Ed Jaymes" -- talking in halting sentences about their fine products. The commercials took off and Bartles and Jaymes became an industry leader.

Seagram's (Diageo plc, NYSE:DEO), desperate to up the sales of its flagging brand, hired Bruce Willis in 1986. Popular as "David Addison" on Moonlighting, Willis brought a fun, wisecracking sensibility to the ads, which borrowed heavily from the Bartles and Jaymes brand, often featuring a group of friends sitting around a porch, jamming about the glories of Seagram's Golden Wine coolers. The commercials were exceedingly popular, spawning Willis' short-lived singing career and vaulting Segrams from fifth-ranked to top-ranked brand within two years.

This post is part of a series on celebrity spokespeople who ended up doing serious harm to the brands they were hired to promote, or vice versa. See how we rank the 20 top spokesperson fiascos.

I have to wonder what Slim-Fast (Unilever ADR, NYSE:UL) was thinking when they hired Whoopi Goldberg. Many of their earlier spokespersons, including Ann Jillian and Kathy Lee Gifford, exuded a sort of "if you don't love me, I'll die," desperation. On the other hand, Whoopi's self-confidence and pride are as much a part of her persona as her granny glasses and trademark braided hair. Although she has never shied away from the spotlight, a great deal of Whoopi's strength lies in her low-key energy and undeniable power. In retrospect, this might have made her a less than ideal choice to shill for the brand, which thrives on insecurity.

Regardless, in late 2003, Slim-Fast talked Whoopi into hawking their shakes; presumably, there was a very large check involved. Things progressed relatively well until July 2004, when she decided to appear at a gala fundraiser for Democratic Presidential candidate John Kerry. Carrying a bottle of wine onstage, Goldberg pretended to read from the label: "When Bush comes to shove, don't whine. Vote Kerry." She proceeded to launch into a series of bush-themed double entendres.

Almost immediately, Bush supporters began calling and writing Slim-Fast, threatening to boycott the company's products if it continued to employ Goldberg. Slim-Fast quickly caved, stating that it was disappointed in Whoopi and would no longer air her commercials. She responded that, "While I can appreciate what the Slim-Fast people need to do in order to protect their business, I must also do what I need to do as an artist, as a writer, and as an American -- not to mention as a comic [...] I only wish that the Republican re-election committee would spend as much time working on the economy as they seem to be spending trying to harm my pocketbook."

Goldberg proceeded to reprise the routine at other venues; she later found a place on The View. In the meantime, Slim-Fast went on to hire Rachel Hunter, whose conventional good looks and palpable insecurity are far more fitting for their marketing demographic. Recently, however, the company has demonstrated an amazing inability to learn from the mistakes of the past. In January 2008, they approached rapper Eminem with an endorsement offer; one can't help but wonder if his misogynistic, violent lyrics might not alienate Slim Fast's target market!

Read the entire series

A couple of weeks ago, Carol Vinzant noted that Hertz (NYSE: HTZ) had stopped its practice of gouging customers for gas fill-ups. Rather than charge exorbitant prices for gas, the renter instead chose the market rate, merely tacking on a $7 surcharge for the cost of paying somebody to fill up. While Hertz claimed that this was a voluntary decision, it coincided suspiciously with the Maryland Attorney General's threat to sue large rental firms for their exorbitant gas charges.

Whether Hertz is trying to find ways to offset their gas losses or is just trying to generate a little extra income in what are becoming hard times for the rental industry, their latest revenue stream is pretty smart: they're renting out ad space in their rental fleet. In addition to printing ads on ticket jackets and hang tags, the company is planning to utilize printed trunk liners and will also be offering free samples to customers. This, of course, follows the lead set by some airlines, which have begun plastering ads atop everything that doesn't move.

Hertz is hoping that its advertising strategy will help offset losses that it has incurred as high gas prices have caused customers to cancel trips, severely undercutting the rental industry. These days, anything that helps keep prices down and service up seems like a burst of genius!

A few weeks ago, amid concerns about Midwest flooding, corn futures exploded. For a brief period, in fact, they nudged over $8 a bushel for May 2009, a four-fold jump over their 2006 prices, and were expected to go higher.

On June 30, however, a report by the Department of Agriculture put things into perspective. While the Midwest floods destroyed roughly 9% of the corn crop, this loss should be largely offset by the fact that farmers planted more corn than expected. Inspired by the rising prices of the grain and the promise of ethanol, farmers cultivated more than a million extra acres, which means that the U.S.'s corn supply should remain relatively steady.

This should be a boon to the ethanol industry, which lost no time in pointing out that the forecasted harvest should be more than sufficient to supply its needs, while leaving a sufficient quantity for food use. Of course, just because we are once again able to make corn ethanol doesn't mean we should. However, it still remains to be seen whether policymakers will ignore this scare or accept it as an indicator of the dangers that we face when we put all our eggs in one basket -- or all our ears in one bushel!

Over the years, eBay (NASDAQ: EBAY) has overcome numerous adversaries, from customer fears about online purchasing to the very real threat of physical retailers. It has defeated or absorbed dozens of competitors, constantly morphing to offer fresh services to its users while continuing to draw a hefty profit. However, as Gary Sattler recently noted, eBay's unbelievable success may have begun to sow the seeds of its downfall. Once a counter-cultural answer to the monopoly (and monotony) of physical retailers, the online giant has become the dominant culture. Moreover, it's monopoly of online marketing and apparent lack of concern for its users have resulted in massively increased prices and fees, driving many of its sellers right out of the market.

As if eBay's self-destructive tendencies weren't enough of a problem, France's courts have joined in on the march to disaster. In an attempt to protect the integrity of French luxury brands, a French court ruled that eBay must pay approximately $63 million to French companies whose products have been victimized by online sales. The plaintiff, LVMH, which represents several French luxury brands, argued that its businesses have been undermined by eBay. Ebay's first crime was permitting counterfeit copies of Vuitton and Dior bags to appear on the site. As if this wasn't enough, the company was cited for permitting actual bottles of Dior, Kenzo, Givenchy and Guerlain perfume to be sold, as these are only supposed to be sold in specialty stores. On the surface, this seems like a minor hiccup, but the promulgation of high-quality knockoffs and the availability of partially-used luxury brand items are central to a large portion of eBay's business. It seems like the loss of these two lucrative revenue streams could cost the company a great deal.

Between increased shipping rates, French courts, and its own excesses, it doesn't seem like a good time to be eBay!

Things just keep looking brighter for Exxon Mobil (NYSE: XOM). After reporting the highest profits ever posted by an American company, it is able to look forward to an even more profitable 2008. With crude oil prices steadily creeping upward and renewable energy replacements a distant solution, Exxon can look forward to, once again, rewriting the record books.

As if that wasn't enough, the Supreme Court recently ruled that Exxon's punitive damages in the Valdez case were excessive and dropped them to one fifth of the original ruling. In 1994, the original judgment against Exxon in Baker v. Exxon was $287 million in actual damages and $5 billion in punitive damages. At the time, the punitive damages were equivalent to one year of profit for the oil company. After two subsequent appeals, the judge reset the damages to $4 billion, $4.5 billion, and ultimately to $2.5 billion. On Wednesday, twenty years after the original accident, the Supreme Court ruled that Exxon now owes $507 million. With interest, that would come to approximately $1 billion, but Exxon is expected to appeal the interest.

Recently, I was shopping for a couple of books on half.com. However, having spent about a half hour in my search, I decided, at the last minute, to forego my purchases. While the sellers were offering great prices, the shipping raised the books' costs to above what I would pay in a local bookstore. In the end, it just wasn't worth it.

As the price of gas goes up, so does the price of postage. While this hasn't been much of a concern with the U.S. Postal Service, private carriers like DHL, UPS (NYSE: UPS), and FedEx (NYSE: FDX) all pass the cost of fuel on to their customers. For example, at the end of 2007, UPS was tacking on a 4.75% gas surcharge for ground deliveries. Right now, it's 8.5%, with an even higher price for express shipping.

Some retailers are fighting back with free shipping or a flat fee for unlimited shipping. Unfortunately, while these deals may draw in customers, they chip away at the sellers' bottom line. As many online sellers have built their client base by offering better-than-store prices, the added costs may make it impossible for them to generate sufficient profit. This is likely to be particularly devastating for companies like Amazon.com (NASDAQ: AMZN), who are completely reliant upon their internet sales. At the very least, we're likely to see a major surge in companies that use U.S. Postal Service!

During summers and winters in the early 1990s, I used to work for Williams-Sonoma (NYSE: WSM). In many ways, it was a dream job. I was paid to talk about cooking, learn about cooking and demonstrate cooking tools. One day, however, it occurred to me that, as much as I loved adopting a slightly condescending air when selling high-priced kitchen items, there really was a problem with the products that I was hawking. That afternoon, I talked an older woman into buying a "Tuscan grape drainer" as a gift for her niece's wedding. As the woman left the store, I realized that I had just convinced her to shell out $49.95 for what was, essentially, an earthenware bowl with holes in it and a couple of grape decals stuck on top.

As much as I like cooking, I have to acknowledge that nobody really needs a berry spoon, an asparagus peeler, a corn shucker, or most of the numerous other items that Williams-Sonoma hawks to its customers. The store is, in its own way, comparable to Sharper Image, Wilson's, or any number of the other specialty niche retailers that are finding it so difficult to weather the recession. Recently, in an attempt to lure shoppers into its premium stores, the retailer reduced prices massively, cutting into its profit margin and producing a 42% drop in fiscal first quarter profits.

As some analysts have noted, part of William-Sonoma's problem is that it is supporting an expensive catalog division that isn't really pulling its own weight. Moreover, as shipping prices continue to increase, it is likely that the company will see its catalog sales continue to decline. However, this is only half the issue: while most stores are feeling the recession pinch, it is hitting specialty retailers particularly hard. As Linens N' Things, Sharper Image, Wilson's Leather, and other companies could certainly attest, it's not a good time to specialize. Or, to put it another way, in this economic climate, people are using colanders to drain their grapes.

And who's next on the block? Well, have you taken a peek at the Gap (NYSE: GPS) recently?

It seems to me like the ultimate test of a tool lies not with its functionality, but with who uses it. This goes double for search tools, as their ability to access information vastly increases their popularity, and thus marketability. Personally, I firmly believe that most questions in the world can be answered by one of three sites. If it's a movie or TV question, I head to IMDB. If IMDB doesn't have the answer, I generally head over to Wikipedia. And if, for some reason, Wiki's answer doesn't suffice, I pull out the big guns and head over to Google (NASDAQ: GOOG). Of course, so does pretty much everyone else in the world.

This, of course, explains why the United States has begun investing heavily in Google Ads in foreign countries. While the government's online presence is pretty impressive, even the best website is only useful if it can generate hits; given the United States' overseas unpopularity right now, getting foreign nationals to visit its sites is an uphill battle. With this in mind, Google now displays ads for various United States government agencies when the user enters various key words and phrases. Currently, the terms that will generate an ad from the America.gov website include "terrorism," "Middle East peace," "human rights," "press freedom," and "U.S. elections."

The U.S. is paying Google based on the number of hits that its ads generate. Currently, that ranges from $25,000 to $30,000 per month for the America.gov website and a further $15,000 for other Middle-East oriented sites. Given that the $15,000 expenditure generates roughly 300,000 hits per month, it seems like a pretty good deal. For that matter, it's worth noting that an internet search platform has become the U.S. government's go-to guy for worldwide advertising. If Google can get people in Saudi Arabia to express an interest in the U.S.'s informational website, it seems like there's little that the company can't do!

When I lived in Southwest Virginia, my house was about a mile from a Wal-Mart Supercenter. Although I had shopped at Wal-Mart (NYSE: WMT) for years, the convenience of the big store made it into my go-to place for everything from oil filters to rutabagas. I became a Wal-Mart junkie.

One of the things that I quickly noticed about the Squalor Mart was the fact that it is a perfect example of capitalism in action. In my years of shopping at the store, I noticed that obscure products would show up regularly. Sometimes they'd stay, sometimes they'd leave; it all depended upon how well they sold. For example, when the area got a huge influx of Latin Americans, the store dedicated an entire row to dried chilies, beans, hot sauces, tortillas and whatnot. Similarly, as more and more yuppies began frequenting the store, I noticed a definite spike in organic convenience foods. In both cases, Wal-Mart offered better prices (and better service) than the small stores that specialized in these obscure items.

Wal-Mart's problem lies not with what it can offer, but with what it can't: intimacy and a small scale. This, of course, is why many areas have fought so hard to keep Wal-Mart out. They don't want to lose their cute little neighborhood stores to the big, bad capitalist behemoth, which leads to an inevitable question: can Wal-Mart, the ultimate superstore, offer a shopping experience that is anathema to its time-proven formula?

Recently, the Environmental Working Group stated that celery is one of the so-called "Dirty Dozen," the twelve most contaminated fruits and vegetables on the market. As I was chewing on a piece of celery at the time, I began to notice the bitter overtones of what I assumed was a nasty chemical fertilizer. I began to wonder if it might be sarin or perhaps some dioxin derivative. Completely unable to enjoy my snack any longer, I resolved to find some organic celery.

After a long and fruitless (vegetable-less?) search, I finally broke down and decided to go to Whole Foods (NASDAQ: WFMI) . There, tucked into an extensive and impressive collection of colorful veggies, I found what I was looking for: fresh, organic celery. The price? $4.99.

To be honest, if I'm paying $4.99 for a vegetable, I expect it to pick my daughter up from daycare and maybe help out with the rent. I'm used to paying between $1 and $1.25 for a bunch of celery, which made Whole Foods' prices seem like a particularly tasteless joke. However, rather than throw the celery to the ground and loudly denounce Whole Foods as a bunch of money-grubbing ripoff artists, I politely returned the bunch to the counter and left.

There were two reasons for my restrained response: first, I'm saving up my first arrest for something special, like picketing Anne Coulter's funeral, and there's no way I'm getting carted off for yelling at a bunch of celery opportunists. The second reason is that I wasn't really all that surprised. You see, I've gotten used to Whole Foods' massively inflated prices and somewhat snotty attitude.

A few years back, The Onion ran a spoof article in which it claimed that Microsoft was trying to copyright ones and zeros, in an attempt to corner the market on binary code. Of course, the problem with satire is, just when you think you've hit the jackpot on ridiculousness, reality trumps you.

Recently, Juicy Couture Inc. filed a lawsuit against Victoria's Secret, claiming that the lingerie giant had stolen many of its marketing gimmicks and design features. Among other things, Juicy stated that Victoria's Secret had copied:

• Juicy's packaging, which resembles candy (Lingerie disguised as candy?!? Didn't Spencer's Gifts come up with this idea somewhere around 1978?).
• Juicy's most popular color scheme, which revolves around the color pink (Pink? For girls? Clearly, Juicy's designers are underappreciated revolutionaries!).
• Juicy's most popular design, in which its logo is emblazoned across the backside of the wearer (I wonder if Juicy's next step will be to go after all the lower-back tattoo wearers out there. Tramp-stampers, beware!).

While Victoria's Secret (a subsidiary of Limited Brands, Inc.: NYSE: LTD) may well be guilty of plundering the ideas of others (in particular, Katerina Plew, whose lawsuit seems to have a little more merit), it seems like Juicy is getting a little ridiculous. Intellectual property is all well and good, but is it legitimate to copyright the color pink?

Still, as a luxury item, lingerie is probably not selling all that well right now. Maybe Juicy needs the dough?

Last month, Stephen Schwarzman's Blackstone fund announced that its fourth-quarter earnings for 2007 had plunged a precipitous 89%. What was particularly galling was that this occurred in the same year that the fund released its IPO, for which it received top dollar. Of course, by the time this was announced, Schwarzman had already collected a $5.1 billion paycheck for 2007.

There has been some talk about how Blackstone's declining profits had led to a comparable decline in Schwarzman's fortunes. However, given his considerable 2007 salary, it doesn't seem like he's hurting all that much. In fact, he recently donated $100 million to the New York Public Library; while this is a very impressive gift, it comes with an equally impressive price: the main library building at 42nd Street and Fifth Avenue will now be named the Stephen Schwarzman Building. In return for his munificence, Schwarzman's name will be carved in five separate places on the white marble edifice: thrice on the front of the building and twice on the 42nd Street side. While this will, no doubt, be far more attractive than a graffiti "tag," one cannot escape the feeling that the concept is the same.

One Blackstone investor has recently sued the fund, claiming that, in its IPO documents, it failed to disclose key information about the unimpressive performance of some of its companies. Had this information been made available to investors, they presumably would have had lower expectations for Blackstone and would have paid considerably less for shares in it. In addition to being unethical, the suit avers that this is a violation of federal securities laws.

Every so often, you hear about an idea that is so godawfully bad that you have to giggle. I'm not talking about minor stupidities like a Porsche minivan or a movie based on a video game. No, I'm talking monstrously bad, like McDonald's selling sushi, condoms marketed to Catholics, or beer made for toddlers: ideas that are so hideously terrible that they are epic.

Here's an example: Llewellyn Werner, the Chairman of C3, a Los Angeles-based holding company for private equity firms, is investing $525 million into an amusement park in downtown Baghdad. You heard me right: Baghdad Disney.

I'm not even going to go into the terrible jokes that this brings to mind, although I already have some great ideas for colorful characters that could wander through the park in big animal suits. Regardless, "The Baghdad Zoo and Entertainment Experience" will have a skateboarding area, a concert theater and a museum, and is being developed with the help of the group that built Disneyland. While I admire Werner's dedication to bringing fun and entertainment to the embattled residents of Baghdad, I can't help but wonder about the wisdom of building an American-style amusement park in an area where any reflection of American culture is a red flag. Werner, however, is convinced that the people of Iraq will embrace the lighthearted fun of his new venture.

On the other hand, maybe he's right. "Baghdad Disney" might be just the thing to bring American values to Iraq. I wonder if there are any plans in the works for a water park!

Bruce Watson is a freelance writer, blogger, and all-around cheapskate. After a half-hour in any amusement park, he starts to plot against American culture.