Product placement works - on WWAY news

I truly do not look for reasons to pick on WWAY. But the news item I saw last night about the local BMW dealer earning a 2007 "Center of Excellence Award" - from BMW, not some objective outside party - is the single worst instance of pandering I've ever seen.

I can't provide a link to the story, as they had the good sense not to post it on the website. But here's what I recall: it was an actual reporter package, with a soundbite from someone from BMW who looked like a deer in headlights, probably startled to have TV coverage of such absolute non-news. It was as gushy as if someone from UNC Wilmington had won the freaking Nobel Prize - ONLY the top 10% of dealers each year attain this pinnacle of customer satisfaction blah blah .....

OK, so there are about 350 BMW dealers in North America, which means that 35 of them won this award this year. In fact, a quick google finds that at least one other dealership in North Carolina won it this year - and they earned it in February, which I suspect would also be true of the local award. This award isn't for having the most kidney donors on staff. BMW says: "The Center of Excellence award is reserved for those dealers who excel in brand values and customer satisfaction while achieving key business objectives related to vehicle and parts sales. "

I wouldn't consider it worth a reporter package on the 6:00 news if they were named the very best BMW dealership in the country, but this is absolutely ridiculous. An internal company award is simply not real news, EVER and one announced four months ago isn't even slightly like news. If they want to buy commercial time and brag about it, that's fine, but it just doesn't get news coverage.

This was so transparently either a direct tie-in to an ad sale already made, or a big pitch to make one, that I almost lost my lunch. I suppose it's conceivable that an amateur news director might think it acceptable to call this news, but I simply can't believe the wall between ads and news has so completely crumbled.