Bernbach, Lois, Chiat, Wieden, Fallon (well, McElligott really, but that’s another blog) and now Bogusky, but Mary Wells seems almost unknown in this country.
In over twenty years in the business I can only recall hearing the name “Mary Wells” once: Tim Delaney mentioned her in a way that implied she may not be completely rubbish.
Quite unusual, which is probably why I remember it.
I’ve just finished reading her autobiography, ‘A BIG LIFE’.
I’d started a few years ago but stopped as her chest thumping and name dropping was so loud the neighbours were complaining.
Adjusting to the tone was made even harder this time, as I’d just read Stephen Fry’s incredibly candid autobiography – ‘MOAB IS MY WASHPOT’, ( eg. After offering up circumstances that may have lead to him stealing loose change he says “ for the moment we’ll call me a weasley little cunt and have done with it”
So from that to this: ‘Sure I had in me what it takes to lead the agency into becoming a global behemoth, but I liked doing creative work more.’
- David Brent anyone?
Or ‘There were only two talents in the agency I could completely trust – myself and Charlie’.
- There were over 500 other untrusted staff there at the time.
Or what about this one – ‘Research told us our campaign for Love Cosmetics was more recognizable than the Statue Of Liberty’
– OK, we get the picture, you’re really, really good.
But to be fair, she has a case.
In the late fifties she joined DDB and ran a group.
(In 1975 she was asked by Bill Bernbach to buy and run DDB.
It very nearly happened.)
One of her accounts was The French Tourist Board, for whom she produced this ad.
Probably the most iconic image of France.
In 1965 she leaves to run JACK TINKER AND PARTNERS.
First up is a complete overhaul of the grey, dull image of Braniff Airlines.
She does this by adding colour and glamour where it had never been before – “The end of the plain plane” as they put it.
Not only did they do the advertising, they redesigned the logos, the airport lounges, the ticket offices and they got the trendy 60s fashion designer Emilio Pucci to redesign their uniforms.
But probably the most impressive: they changed the look of the planes.
In a world when planes were silver, she had all their planes painted in seven different bright, solid colours.
They looked like they’d each been dipped in pots of paint.
There were stories of families going to the airports just to look at the coloured planes.
It was a huge news story and made Braniff hip and world famous.
Today, this is the kind of totally integrated, 360°, media-neutral thinking that all communications agencies dream of producing – yet rarely do.
Mary Wells was doing it 43 years ago.
There was also this classic Alka Seltzer ad – you could run it today
(if someone could find a copy that isn’t 10th generation.)
B&H 100s. The brief was to sell this extra length cigarette to women, because the extra length looked elegant.
They ignored this to concentrate on…extra length.
They destroyed and mutilated the product, never an easy sell, but did it in funny, ingenious and irreverent ways, making the brand seem young and cool for all those anti-establishment sixties types.
In 1966 she sets up the fastest growing agency of the seventies – WELLS RICH GREENE, with two creative partners.
(Who’d have thought a daft idea like that would work?)
LOVE COSMETICS.
Developed the whole concept.
Named it.
Got involved with choosing the fragrances.
Did the packaging.
Got Donovan to do the music for the commercial (‘Wear Your Love Like Heaven’.)
AMERICAN MOTORS’ issue was their range – it was so wide that people didn’t know what their cars were for.
The solution was to produce ads that showed side-by-side comparisons with the leading cars from each segment.
So for example, anyone could see that The Javelin was American Motors’ version of the universally known Ford Mustang, etc, etc.
Even now that would be a tough sell – to limit the size of your car to half the spread in order to show your competitor’s car on the other half. The same size.
But of course it worked.
Sounds obvious, but it’s very brave.
Mercedes would have loved to get the clarity this brought their range. (Whether they would have bought it, I don’t know.)
25/06/08
Love this door.
It’s gone straight into my Top 10 doors of all time.
It’s nice to direct people to ‘The brown door between Replay and Jane Norman on Long Acre,’ and for them to come across this. Does anyone know who it belongs to?
19/06/08
Hats off to Bill
DHM would like to take this opportunity to belatedly congratulate our friend Bill Brock on his achievement of conceiving and launching new model agency Analogue Folk…
…at the very same time as he was, apparently, taking the lead role in an award-winning foreign language film…
How did he pull it all off?
Here’s our change of address card. Being 2008, there’s no ink involved, just a few million pixels. Oh, and there’s no card either.
09/06/08
WHERE’S THE WELLS?
Bernbach, Lois, Chiat, Wieden, Fallon (well, McElligott really, but that’s another blog) and now Bogusky, but Mary Wells seems almost unknown in this country.
In over twenty years in the business I can only recall hearing the name “Mary Wells” once: Tim Delaney mentioned her in a way that implied she may not be completely rubbish.
Quite unusual, which is probably why I remember it.
I’ve just finished reading her autobiography, ‘A BIG LIFE’.
I’d started a few years ago but stopped as her chest thumping and name dropping was so loud the neighbours were complaining.
Adjusting to the tone was made even harder this time, as I’d just read Stephen Fry’s incredibly candid autobiography – ‘MOAB IS MY WASHPOT’, ( eg. After offering up circumstances that may have lead to him stealing loose change he says “ for the moment we’ll call me a weasley little cunt and have done with it”
So from that to this: ‘Sure I had in me what it takes to lead the agency into becoming a global behemoth, but I liked doing creative work more.’
- David Brent anyone?
Or ‘There were only two talents in the agency I could completely trust – myself and Charlie’.
- There were over 500 other untrusted staff there at the time.
Or what about this one – ‘Research told us our campaign for Love Cosmetics was more recognizable than the Statue Of Liberty’
– OK, we get the picture, you’re really, really good.
But to be fair, she has a case.
In the late fifties she joined DDB and ran a group.
(In 1975 she was asked by Bill Bernbach to buy and run DDB.
It very nearly happened.)
One of her accounts was The French Tourist Board, for whom she produced this ad.
Probably the most iconic image of France.
In 1965 she leaves to run JACK TINKER AND PARTNERS.
First up is a complete overhaul of the grey, dull image of Braniff Airlines.
She does this by adding colour and glamour where it had never been before – “The end of the plain plane” as they put it.
Not only did they do the advertising, they redesigned the logos, the airport lounges, the ticket offices and they got the trendy 60s fashion designer Emilio Pucci to redesign their uniforms.
But probably the most impressive: they changed the look of the planes.
In a world when planes were silver, she had all their planes painted in seven different bright, solid colours.
They looked like they’d each been dipped in pots of paint.
There were stories of families going to the airports just to look at the coloured planes.
It was a huge news story and made Braniff hip and world famous.
Today, this is the kind of totally integrated, 360°, media-neutral thinking that all communications agencies dream of producing – yet rarely do.
Mary Wells was doing it 43 years ago.
There was also this classic Alka Seltzer ad – you could run it today
(if someone could find a copy that isn’t 10th generation.)
B&H 100s. The brief was to sell this extra length cigarette to women, because the extra length looked elegant.
They ignored this to concentrate on…extra length.
They destroyed and mutilated the product, never an easy sell, but did it in funny, ingenious and irreverent ways, making the brand seem young and cool for all those anti-establishment sixties types.
In 1966 she sets up the fastest growing agency of the seventies – WELLS RICH GREENE, with two creative partners.
(Who’d have thought a daft idea like that would work?)
LOVE COSMETICS.
Developed the whole concept.
Named it.
Got involved with choosing the fragrances.
Did the packaging.
Got Donovan to do the music for the commercial (‘Wear Your Love Like Heaven’.)
AMERICAN MOTORS’ issue was their range – it was so wide that people didn’t know what their cars were for.
The solution was to produce ads that showed side-by-side comparisons with the leading cars from each segment.
So for example, anyone could see that The Javelin was American Motors’ version of the universally known Ford Mustang, etc, etc.
Even now that would be a tough sell – to limit the size of your car to half the spread in order to show your competitor’s car on the other half. The same size.
But of course it worked.
Sounds obvious, but it’s very brave.
Mercedes would have loved to get the clarity this brought their range. (Whether they would have bought it, I don’t know.)
She asks whether taking two ALKA SELTZER tablets would increase their effectiveness. Alka Seltzer change their packs to recommend two tablets to be taken, rather than one.
It’s great that the agency had opinions on something that today could be regarded as none of their business. Not only that, the client listened.
This leads to the line ‘Plop Plop Fizz Fizz Fast Fast’, later shortened to ‘Plink Plink Fizz’.
Midas Mufflers (exhausts) said they were in a category of one – that there were no other national exhaust fitting companies.
WRG found their competition to be local garages – people went there for petrol, tyres and a carwash; why not mufflers? It was very convenient.
So Midas attacked local garages head on. Said they were not well enough informed, stocked or staffed.
Only they did it in a charming way.
For UTICA BEER she put forward the idea of opening a Studio 54 style nightclub in New York.
This is around thirty years ago.
In 1975, NEW YORK CITY was declared bankrupt and its citizens were knee high in garbage due to the garbage strike.
But it was a world-beater in one area – murders. They had thousands of them; more than any other city.
In this environment, Wells Rich Greene was given the problem of trying to turn around its image to bring in some bankruptcy reducing cash.
They found that deep down, really deep down, wherever people were from, they loved New York.
Not necessarily the reality, but the spirit of it, the idea of it.
They called in Milton Glaser to design a logo/bumper sticker thing.
He produced one of the most iconic, copied logos of all time.
This:
On TV they didn’t apologise or try and reason with people, they just stated it as loud and confidently as they could.
Who doesn’t remember this?
From then on Wells Rich Greene seems to have won more and more business and fewer and fewer awards.
I don’t know if the two are related, but it’s really tricky finding their work in awards annuals or on the net after this point.
I guess like rock stars, if you die when you’re hot, your name lives on.
If you become fantastically rich but your output becomes very middle of the road, people forget your early groundbreaking stuff.
Which is a shame, because for about a decade, Mary rocked.
P.S. This is presumably a hall of fame video. If you are lactose intolerant you should skip it, it’s unbelievably cheesy.
P.P.S. The TWA President was called Bud Wiser.
Bud….Wiser. Seriously.
