Group Creative Head
GSD&M

Reading “Hey Whipple, Squeeze This”definitely took away many of my fears when I was an aspiring art director dreaming of a jig in adworld. It actually made the whole idea plausible, all I have to do ( I thought) is put my feet on top of my desk and do little scribbles on my pad. When the shit hits the fan, I’ll just take out my copy of Hey Whipple and the answer will be there. While my career hasn’t exactly been like that, I have to admit I still keep my copy close by, just in case.

Well, if you haven’t read the book, you’re missing out on probably one of the few must have’ advertising books in recent years. But let’s forget about the read for a minute and take a peek in the mind of the man behind Whipple, Luke Sullivan.

Mr. Sullivan will be in Toronto on March 5th to give a speech at the Radio Marketing Bureau’s, Crystal Awards, which ihaveanidea is supporting. So buy your ticket now and get a glimpse at the man behind the legend. In the meantime we ask Luke

ihaveanidea: What happened at West Wayne? You were the Chief Creative Officer there, but left after a relatively short period of time to become a Group Creative Director at GSD&M. Did you want to lose the headaches of being responsible for a whole creative department? The prestige of working for a highly acclaimed agency? An armadillo fetish?

Sullivan: Some day, over a fake beer, I’ll tell you the story about my 4-year stint in Atlanta. But not here. As for GSDM, I love it. I am no longer completely responsible for the entire output of a $420-million dollar agency. And yet, as a Group CD here at GSDM, the clients I am charged with actually supercede that number. Even with all that, there is a certain weight off my shoulders, not having to worry anymore about every little thing in the entire agency. I can concentrate on my clients and on the work for them. Also, it is interesting to be working for such a large agency ($1.2 billion) in such a small town, Austin, Texas (under a million). I loved living in Minneapolis, then I loved it in New York City, then Richmond, then Minneapolis again, and now I find myself here in Texas. I didn’t plan this. Any of it. Just sort of went where I went. And I’ve loved every bit of it along the way. As the saying goes, “If you want to make God laugh, tell him your plans.”

“

“Look at the index of the One Show. It’s rare to see any agencies name followed by 20 lines of page numbers. It’s a new world, and it’s a flat one again.”

ihaveanidea: Who is Jerry Della Femina and what does he mean to you?

Sullivan: Jerry Della Femina hired me in the fall of 1983 at what was then one of the best agencies in the business: Della Femina, Travisano & Partners. When I used to listen to the receptionists answer the phone there, I thought, “Wow, their lips must get tired by noon.”It didn’t get better for them because they were bought and sold a number of times and become Messner Vetere Berger McNamee Schmetterer/Euro RSCG. Ouch. These poor people answering the phones; I trust they’re paid well. Anyway, as for Mr. Della Femina, I owe him like I owe anybody who’s ever taken a chance by hiring me. So another nod of thanks to him, to Tom McElligott, Mike Hughes, Pat Fallon, and now to Roy Spence here at GSDM.

ihaveanidea: The bulk of your career seems to have taken place in an area even colder than Toronto: Minnesota. While it physically may be America’s hinterlands, in the advertising world, a lot of stuff has come from here, through Fallon etc… What do you feel has made Minneapolis stand out from their counterparts on the east and west coasts?

Sullivan: The “rise of the regional agencies”was the big story in all the trade pubs back in about 1980 to ‘85. And quite a dated one now. But until that ‘80 or so, New York dominated the advertising world in America, in terms of both dollars and awards. There was no other place. When Tom McElligott first hired me in January of 1979, there was no “Minneapolis”yet. At the time, he too was looking at New York as the Oz of advertising: he admired, as did I, the hot agencies — Ally & Gargano and Scali McCabe Sloves. He studied all their work and made his students do the same. But slowly (and largely due to his influence) the regional agencies of America “got it.”The light when on all over America and you saw small agencies everywhere figuring out how to play the same game Ally and Scali and DDB had figured out — that the work is what matters. And damn the research and damn the charts. In Minneapolis, there was Fallon McElligott Rice, Carmichael Lynch, Martin Williams and a few others. In Richmond there was The Martin Agency. In San Francisco, there was Hal Riney and then their offshoot, Goodby Berlin Silverstein. In New England, there were a number of good agencies. They all happened about the same time, the early to mid-80s. Since that “regional revolution,”the cosmology of the advertising heavens has changed forever and there is no “New York Mecca”anymore. Look at the index of the One Show. It’s rare to see any agencies name followed by 20 lines of page numbers. It’s a new world, and it’s a flat one again.

“As the saying goes, “If you want to make God laugh, tell him your plans.”"

ihaveanidea: The Ikea lamp You’re Crazy vs. Cog. If you were the almighty Ad God at Cannes, which one would have won?

Sullivan: I guess “Cog,”and only because of the talk-value of that creative. I first heard about it on the web. Someone sent me an mpeg and I just about dropped my coffee when I saw it. At first I was certain it was all computer-generated. Only later did I hear it was all captured in-camera which only doubled my admiration (though I wonder if consumers would’ve cared had they known maybe they would). The spot ended up in the consumer press here in America, yet never aired in the States (so I’m told) and that’s some powerful word-of-mouth stuff. As great as “Lamp”is, I don’t think it had that kind of avalanche behind it pushing it through the populace.

ihaveanidea: In an industry filled with writers who secretly dream of writing the next great Nobel prize novel, there is a very limited selection of great books. Whipple quickly became one of the must-haves because it was so well written and true. Do you think creatives could be pumping out more advertising books? How’s the publishing process? It must be very frustrating and scary.

Sullivan: I wrote Whipple when I was at Fallon. I had been saving speeches and articles for a few years in a file. Gradually I started adding other people’s advice, insights, and articles and the file eventually grew unruly and bad-tempered. (It would no longer fit in my file case and I didn’t want to buy a new one; woulda thrown off the design of my office. I’m serious.) Then one day I had to give a speech at the Portfolio Center in Atlanta and raided that file for all it was worth. I handed out the notes of the speech and later learned the notes were turning up as screen savers in agencies here and there. In addition to being flattered, I began thinking there was a market for a decent book on advertising. Most books (at least at the time) were pretty bad. All you had to do was look at the examples of “good advertising”these books contained and you could tell the authors weren’t practitioners of the craft, at least the craft I practice. So I just started writing. I didn’t have a publisher nor any hope that such a book would be welcome on the shelves of bookstores. But that was beside the point; I had to write this book mostly get it out of my system. After I had finished, I showed the first manuscript around to about 40 people I admired, just folks in the business: creatives, account folks, directors. Every one of them was kind enough to read the entire thing and give criticism. I am still in debt to those people. After that, it was just a matter of getting it into the hands of the right publisher. Not knowing the first thing about the process, I just wandered over to the Barnes & Noble in downtown Minneapolis and bought some books on book proposals for publishers and other how-to manuals. I followed what they said to do and that was pretty much it. It’s been a fun thing. It’s made money, but not John Grisham money. First-time authors rarely make money. It’s more of a love and pride thing.

“With satellite radio coming along, “drive time”may become an anachronism, a curious phrase like “rotograveur”"

ihaveanidea: Where is the radio advertising industry going? Any ideas what’s in store for it in the next 10 years?

Sullivan: Good question. Who knows? With satellite radio coming along, “drive time”may become an anachronism, a curious phrase like “rotograveur.”Consumers are becoming so empowered by technology there are fewer and fewer media that supported purely by advertising. But that technology costs money, for the hardware or for subscription fees. If TiVO (or even TV for that matter) is any model, the technology will be adopted early on by a core group of advocates. Then as word-of-mouth goes through the main population and the costs go down, penetration’s gonna skyrocket and you’ll see massive change. Is that news? I don’t think so. The question is really not change, but how fast it will come and I think we’ll be surprised by its speed. So, if we’re smart, we’ll start thinking now. It’s summer. Build barns.

ihaveanidea: Which advertising nation, apart from the US do you admire the most? How come?

Sullivan: Great Britain. While the hot spots seem to be in South America, I still admire Britain’s mix of visual and copy. Many of the hot global shops are getting purely visual in their solutions. Don’t get me wrong, I’m a pushover for branding with visuals. Still, as an old hack, I love to see the occasional kick-ass headline, my latest favorite being for The Economist: “Lose the ability to slip out of meetings unnoticed.”Oh my, that’s so good, it just makes me hurt. Literally, I ache.

Interview by:
Ignacio Oreamuno
ignacio@ihaveanidea.org
President
ihaveanidea