Gods of Advertising

I feel so blessed to be part of a vital agency. Hard work getting Euro RSCG Chicago back into respectability but so worth it. Back in ‘04 most people wrote this place off for dead and delighted in kicking the corpse. Gratifying then to be so damn alive.

Let’s talk about gratitude. Lots of people piss and moan about their jobs, and it’s no exception in advertising. The fact that our business features a creative department means the bitching can be awfully creative. All you have to do is go online or read the trades. This agency is done for. That is agency is in trouble. Can we pause from all that…

I recall a group meeting at my former employer, Leo Burnett during a dark period, perhaps just after one of another countless reorganizations. (Beware Reorga, the fiend from upper management!) Anyway, the whole creative department had assembled for a so-called “Town Meeting” to discuss what happened and where we were headed, etc.

After numerous scathing and paranoid remarks from the creative troops, one soldier elected to tell a story. It went, more or less, as follows:

A long time ago a group of farmers gathered under a huge, old and withered tree in the center of a vast plain to escape the noon sun. As they ate lunch the farmers began talking poorly about the old tree.
“What good is this tree,” said one, “it bears no fruit at all?”
“And just try milking it for sap!” bellowed a second man.
“And the wood is too gnarled for chopping,” spoke another.
On and on this went, until lunch was over and they all ventured back into the field and forests to continue working.
That night a terrible storm arose and lightning felled the giant tree, incinerating it.
The next day, when the sun was at its highest, the farmers hiked to the spot where the tree once stood. As the sun beat down upon them, they saw what had happened and what had been taken from them. It was here where they had sought and found shade. It was here they had all communed with one another. It was here they found support, community and relief. Weeping now, they all realized that these things were just as important as fruit and wood and sap. They had the tree for granted. And now it was gone.

While you get you hankies out let me sum up. The point of the story, I felt then, was to remind all the cynics and naysayer just how special a place their agency was. Though she may have fallen on hard times she was not down…and we should all be thankful for that and for all the agency had done for us –including, I might add, allowing everyone to gather under its branches and complain about it!

Food for thought, next time you’re sucking on a Starbucks with your buds, hating on the agency.

Rule #1: Getting in.

Half my job is about winning new business or trying to. In my opinion, it’s a hell of a lot harder than making good ads. Pitching. Sometimes it’s fun. Other times it can bring you, and your agency, to its knees. But it’s always exciting. The following is first of several posts about my experiences, good and bad, with regard to pitching…

I watch Sports Center almost every morning while jogging on my treadmill. There’s something inspirational about it, particularly on cold, dark mornings, particularly during playoffs. The playoffs (I don’t care which sport) are what I enjoy most. It’s sport taken to the highest level. The amplifier turned up to ‘11’. Winning and losing acquire new meaning, fraught with risk, always thrilling. In morbid preparation for these all-important games, athletes like to tell themselves: It’s do or die. Loser goes home.

Playoffs are no different than agency pitches. Lose a few and you’re forgotten. Win a few and you’re exalted. Don’t get in and, well, you’re screwed. After being mathematically eliminated from playoff contention, NFL football coach Jim Mora howled and swore and cried at a press conference. Promptly dismissed, he may never be hired again. Though losing in them, the also-fired Tony Dungee at least got his team (the Bucs) into the playoffs that year. Subsequently, the Indianapolis Colts –the very team, incidentally, that rid itself of Mr. Mora, quickly hired him. The rest is NFL history.

And that’s rule number 1. You absolutely, positively have got to get in to pitches. In order to survive (let alone thrive) an agency has to generate new revenues. Has to. Frankly, existing clients spend much of their time at an agency cutting back on spending, or so it seems. And then they leave! Exasperating the situation is the seemingly continuous dearth of new business activity. Paraphrasing Chief Executive David Beals of search firm Jones Lundin Beals: “There’s a lot more noise going on than business.” I take that to mean a lot of clients are window-shopping but few are opening their pocketbooks. Adding to the malaise, consider this: The average tenure of a client/agency relationship is only 3 or 4 years. And that number is only getting smaller. A while back, Revlon gave its new agency (Kirshenbaum & Bond) the boot just four months after hiring them. Like Hollywood divorces, splits happen all the time. It’s no longer even vaguely surprising.

Getting in to pitches is so critical agencies have new business departments, often comprising many individuals. At my former agency (Leo Burnett), the new business department was so big it had more than one leader. And planner. And account executive. And so on.

Getting in pitches is also vital to an agency’s reputation. Unlike the pre 2008 Chicago Cubs, you cannot suck year after year and be successful. If you’re reputation is bad the phone won’t ring. Employees will bail. Recruitment is impossible. Clients defect. Sea of pain. After all, an agency is in the business of creating image. It’s own had better be a good one. Doing great work and winning pitches are the only way an agency can improve its rep. The two are like the proverbial chicken and egg.

To be continued…

I’ve stepped in another puddle of reality TV, though certainly not the dirtiest, for it contains no naked ladies, deadly crustaceans or has-been TV stars. According to the ad, a print piece in Entertainment Weekly: “Accidents happen and cleaning up the mess isn’t for the faint of heart.”

It’s called “Wrecked, Life in the Crash lane.”

You’ve got to hand it to Speed TV (whatever that is) for hitting upon the most obvious concept EVER. People DO gawk at automobile accidents. It stands to reason they will gape at “Wrecked.” It’s ghoulishly delicious. Or is it? Because then there’s this impotent come on from the ad’s sub head: “Be on the scene with the crew from O’Hare Towing as they put their lives on the double-yellow line.”

Huh? That’s not any kind of fix for your average voyeur. O’Hare Towing? Talk about an anti-climax. Call me crazy, but watching tow trucks move double-parked grandmothers at O’Hare airport sounds like the total opposite of entertainment. No one crashes at the airport unless it’s on a chair by their gate. And as for human drama, even if someone sassed back at the tow truck driver (horrors!), there are more police per square foot in this location than perhaps anywhere in the world. The row would be over before it started.

Observing a towing company harass people as they wait to pick up their loved ones. It certainly is real. So much so, it may give paint drying a run for its money.

Don’t hate me because I’m rich, newly rich, beautiful or simply just ridiculous.

My last post called out pop star, Peter Wentz for being “that guy.” You know, an individual, who for some silly-ass reason bugs the living crap out of me. And presumably countless others.

But why stop at Hollywood celebrities? Hating on them is mainstream entertainment. What about us: the advertising cognoscenti? Read the trade press. The countless ad blogs. I know there are numerous people in our business who, for whatever reasons, drive us crazy. Christ, I’m no doubt one of them. With my clichéd baldhead. My writing about God and advertising. I’d hate me! What about others? How ’bout the threesome pictured above? Just looking at these guys, right?

Is it the fame? The good looks? Or just the shape of their heads?

Who’s your Bette Noir? Who among our ranks drives you bonkers because of their status, reputation or whatever? This is inane…insane. Even the Gods of Advertising are rolling their eyes. But I’m on summer vacation. Let’s have some fun. We can take it, can’t we?

I vowed not to devote this space to dishing on popular culture, let alone advertising. I’m on record somewhere saying that gossipy ranting degrades us all. A few moths ago, I wrote of an epiphany I had in college, whereby I forsook critical writing forever (“Nobody likes a critic, March 18th). No, I reasoned, best to leave that sort of thing to Perez Hilton and his ilk.

But my vow of celibacy must be broken. A celebrity has given me cause. He is not terribly controversial, nor is he a bad guy; yet, somehow, this man, by his very ubiquity, is annoying the crap out of me. I can no longer restrain pen and tongue.

The object of my disaffection is Peter Wentz, the lyricist and bassist for Chicago-based rock band Fall Out Boy. He irritates me the way Shemp Howard did as a Stooge. Shemp managed to look and behave stupid in a way that was NEVER funny. And his partners put up with it. Those episodes sucked. I would yell at the TV: You’re not as (fill in the blank) as you think you are: funny, cool, talented, handsome, etc… Clearly, Shemp had few of these aspirations but Wentz has them all, and more. He portrays himself as an in-demand rock star or worse yet an independent artist.

And the mass media indulges this pop culture blip like he was all that. Every magazine in my house has pictures of this marginally talented goofball parading in and out of nightclubs, and not just on the gossip page but EVERYWHERE. His clothes. His house. His hair…

Oh my God, his hair. Like the aforementioned Shemp, the stuff on his head looks ridiculous. Not fun, not cool, not pretty, it only draws more attention to his strange looking face. And it makes me want to punch him. He has a ‘punch me’ face.

And then he marries and knocks up that booby nose-job who fake sung on Saturday Night Live. There are pages of wedding photos in all of my wife’s sugary airplane magazines. I stare at them in disbelief. Two mooks joined in holy matrimony. Now it’s their hair, their faces. Not just him anymore. My inexplicable disdain is multiplying. Exponentially.

Am I secretly envious of his hair (I have none), his girl, or his fame? Who knows? These things cannot be analyzed too deeply. Or can they? Details magazine has a piece this month that attempts to uncover “that guy.” Funny reading unless you see yourself in the descriptions.

I’ll stop. I am degrading myself. But tell me, Gentle Reader: am I alone in this? Is Peter Wentz not “that guy” for anyone else?

I want to give props to a campaign idea that knocked me out. Not so much because of the executions (although they’re fine), but for its line. Yes, this copywriter went gaga over a sentence. It happens. I felt that way about “Curiously Strong Mints” or “Nothing runs like a Deere.”

The current object of my affection is for Secret antiperspirant. The line: Secret. Because you’re hot.

Get it? Women perspire…because they’re hot. And they’re beautiful, sexy, desirable…Hot. That’s good copy, my friends: simple, direct, and original.

Hamstrung by a difficult category, the campaign probably won’t win many creative prizes. But it’s powerful advertising. As a writer, I know how excited I would have been creating and, for that matter, presenting this idea. As a creative director I would have had a hard time concentrating on anything else.

Executed properly, that sentence -nay, that declaration- could transform Secret from a tier two deodorant to a pop culture must have. Done right “Because you’re hot” is the elusive and proverbial BIG IDEA. That’s what clients pay us to create: sentences like that. If you’re a copywriter and think otherwise I want to hear why.

I love it when advertising copy has this kind of power. Lots of clever lines get written, read and forgotten. Few become transcendent. Those lines tend to be more smart than clever. You don’t even have to like the product or the advertising to appreciate them. I worked on the original “Not your father’s Oldsmobile” campaign. That line was a perfect example. “Because you’re hot” might be another.

The Race Cards. Can you spot the ad?

What to make of the new Six Flags campaign? You don’t need to go far to get an opinion. Go online or ask anyone who’s seen it. It’s polarizing work.

The ads feature a rowdy young Asian, who loudly interrupts uber-lame scenes yelling “One flag! No Fun!” At subsequent images of an exciting park ride, he returns, exhorting: “Six flags! More Fun!” Each spot is more or less the same. Crap activity gets a low flag. Park rides get six. It’s not a bad idea. Using the park icon as a rating system for summer fun (or lack thereof) is solid. And if not for the blatant stereotyping (Chinese? Japanese? Korean?), I’d give the concept four or five flags.

But there’s the matter of the screaming Asian. On a base level, he’s what makes the spots stand out. But like Al Jolson, belting out tunes in black face, the man feels drawn from something pernicious -World War II propaganda. He’s Charlie. Or the Chinese Dry Cleaner. Would these spots deliver without the exaggerated caricature? I’m sure the agency looked at countless guys. And I’m sure he was the funniest. Regardless, using him in that way was, in my opinion, wrong.

But am I wrong? When Krusty the Clown resorts to aping a Chinese waiter to get laughs, is that permissible use of the stereotype? In this case, it’s satire. Krusty is a desperate buffoon. The audience (us and his) loves to hate him. Like Archie Bunker, this lovable loser teaches us a lesson about the human condition and our character defects. Or not. Sometimes I just think Krusty is one hilarious bastard. Going full circle, how come Jolson got no leeway here? Is it because he was advocating racism with his performance?

In any event, it’s pretty clear advertising does not have the same freedom to offend as entertainment. Since we are not choosing to watch the Six Flags commercial, we are offended to have this material thrust into our living rooms.

Remember the hullabaloo over the maybe homophobic Snickers commercial aired during the Super Bowl? If that bit played on a Fox sitcom it probably wouldn’t have gotten a laugh. As a TV commercial, on the big stage, it became a cause celebre.

Finally, even the creators of content operate and are judged by different standards. Would the “Funny Asian Guy” draw as much negative publicity (in our industry, anyway) if he were a Crispin Porter creation? The Burger King creeps a lot of people out and baiting stereotypes is just one of the reasons why. “Wake up with the King” was a campaign that clearly pushed homophobia buttons in young men. But instead of wanting him off the air ASAP, we accept the Burger King as a perverted, sadistic weirdo.

So why not the Funny Asian Guy? Maybe it’s all too subjective to have a legitimate debate. Of hard-core pornography, Potter Stewart shunned an actual definition: “I know it when I see it,” he famously said.

I kind of feel that way about the Funny Asian Guy.

The view from the dock. And what was under it. Plus, no ads!

My family spent the 4th of July at our in cottage in Bailey’s Harbor, Wisconsin: Sun screen and Deep Woods Off. Peppermint ice cream at the Yum Yum Tree. A parade up Highway 57. The giant bass under the pier. Fireworks. A terrified dog under the bed. You get the picture. Americana is alive and well, in case anyone was wondering.

Although we have a beat up VHS, one of the things we don’t get up north is a TV reception. Or the Internet. I wondered how the Cubs and Sox were doing but not enough to pine. If my wife missed What Not To Wear or The Wives Of Orange County she wasn’t letting on. The kids ate breakfast just fine without Sponge Bob and, frankly, so did I. And what about my nightly surfing of advertising sites and assorted blogs?

None of it was missed.

And something else: Advertising. Without TV, Internet or decent radio reception suddenly we were thrust in a world without sponsors. Door County is fairly strict about outdoor advertising, so the only billboards encountered tended to be for local wineries or cherry picking. And while the odd hand-painted anti-abortion boards gave pause, it was a small price to pay for all that unadulterated scenery! (Those of you who know me know how much I adore the medium of outdoor. As a copywriter nothing delivers like a brilliant headline.) But on this small Wisconsin peninsula I’m delighted to see none, good or bad.

I’m happy to report being away from it all still means what it used to. Granted, we were only gone a few days. I’m sure Technology Jones would have crashed my serenity party sooner or later. The myriad stars in the sky were ever so beautiful but the blogosphere beckons like a drug!

Yet the ads –dumb ones, lion winners, and every integrated who-ha in between; I seriously doubted I’d ever miss those. But then I realized it’s advertising that got me the cottage in Door County. Commercial enterprise (in all its crassness) is what allows the American experience to flourish in the first place.

My brother, Daniel lives and works in China, at a marketing services agency called DMG.  He cannot receive this blog (and countless other pieces of information) because of the communist regime overlording the country. I’m going to reflect on that this 4th of July. I would hope all of us do: the haters, the lovers, the scandalous, the pious, the good, the bad and the very, very ugly. Despite its battered reputation, and myriad problems, this country let’s us do our thing. And that is cause for celebration. Happy Birthday, America!

My next ripe post will be on Monday. For now, it’s fishing and firworks up north in Wisconsin.

God bless.

“Nice Altoids, Boys!”

In a honor of Gay Pride week I’d like to give the gay community a shout-out for their uncanny ability at predicting and/or creating trends. No group of people I know are as adept at predicting the future for fashion, neighborhoods and brands as this stylish minority.

Background: I grew up in the Lake View neighborhood in Chicago. During the 70’s New Town (as it was called) was vastly different from the bustling and trendy neighborhood it is now. Latin street gangs patrolled and regularly fought over turf in the blocks north and south of Wrigley field. The only time it was truly safe to traverse these troubled blocks was during home games for the then lowly Chicago Cubs.

Enter the first gay pioneers. Attracted to the housing stock and cheap rents, they saw something in the rows of battered two-flats and graffiti-ridden apartment buildings. Maybe it was the proximity to our lakefront or perhaps it was the closest to Lincoln Park their “kind” was allowed. Regardless, they arrived replete with big ideas and Donna Summer blaring on the radio. Window treatments went up. Gentry-fication erupted and never stopped.

I won’t comment on what kind of impact all this had on my adolescence. Watching two men go at it on a dumpster was quite a ’slap to the cerebellum.’ More pleasant was the change to my scruffy, downright dangerous neighborhood. Within ten years Lakeview became one of Chicago’s darling neighborhoods -our little village. Without the collective intuition of my gay brethren none of this would have happened. Chicago owes them a debt of gratitude.

And so do many other phenomena, including the rise of numerous commercial brands. Absolut vodka comes to mind. This bit player became a huge phenomenon in American culture because of two things: a killer print campaign and the passionate following of gay consumers. They embraced the simple, clear bottle and the series of arty posters from TBWA, making both icons. For better or worse, disco music was gay music. John Travolta merely finished what countless other young men started. The same can be said for health and fitness. Working out was gay religion. Arnold’s movie, Pumping Iron, came out in 1977. The rest is history. And so on and so forth…

Indeed, watching the gay parade last week was like watching popular culture marching forward, the festive floats sponsored by countless forward thinking brands, and supported by a coterie of ambitious politicians. They weren’t there for the free condoms. They wanted support from the gay community. Same as all the sponsors.