Rise Up

Thought I'd step off my political soapbox (which is gonna need some  2 X4 reinforcement as of late)  and reminisce about advertising. And in a nod to my contrarian nature, thought I'd tell a good story. Because Lord knows I have a shit ton of bad ones. 

Which sadly, I've told many times over right here on these digital pages.

This memory came to me last night while doomscrolling through the LinkedIn site. I can't get over the sorry state of our once vibrant, exciting and playful industry. I stumbled across a post from one of the founders of Goodness MFG. Let's call him Tom. I haven't secured his permission, or that of the other OGs, so I will limit myself to their first names.

Suffice it to say, all these guys are legends and cut their teeth at Crispin. When Crispin still was Crispin.

John Shirley and I had been called in for a one week freelance gig to help them with their upcoming pitch for Craftsman Tools. We were pitted against some other freelancers. This type of Round Robin competitive approach never bothered me. It was used often by Team Detroit (A JWT offshoot dedicated to Ford). With the victor handsomely paid for work that never saw the light of day.

This kind of winner take all strategy fueled my inner Lord of the Flies nature. 

Moreover, I had a special relationship with Craftsman Tools ever since my father started subscribing to the Time Life Series of Home Repair books and transformed himself from a Bronx-born Jewish CPA into a studly hand-me-that-miter-saw-and-let's-get-busy-manly-man.

Round after round of work got killed. And round after round of late nite pizzas and Budweisers were consumed in pursuit of the campaign that fit like a perfectly honed tongue and groove joint. If you've been reading these pages for any time you know I abhor the idea of staying late and working past that first Jeopardy buzzer.

But this was different.

After all, Tom and Paul and Bob, were Crispin guys. And even modestly successful Chiat guys like John and I, looked up to them. Additionally, they were low key, though energetic, and wildly engaging and enthusiastic.

Somewhere at the midpoint level, they let the other freelance teams go, and charged us with coming up with something. 

Something amazing.

After many stop and starts, we did. It's best explained by a T-Shirt we had made featuring one of the designs we had made...

The idea was to celebrate those weekend fixer-uppers, like my dad, who bought and used the bulk of Craftsman tools. And made their mechanically declined sons to learn the difference between a jigsaw and a router. 

This was one of many faux Union Labels we had mocked up. All featured the banner, "The Order of Craftsmen." Wisely working the brand name into the campaign itself. But the best thing about working was these guys was their absolute fearlessness. I've had many, too many, creative directors try to reel things in. Tone it down. Make it buyable. 

The direction here was, "This is great now make it weirder, push it out there, make us nervous."

I wish I had more remnants of all the work we pumped out in that short, intense and exhilarating point in time. Perhaps even better,  I do have memories of working hard, laughing hard and experiencing the camaraderie of working with the industry's finest.  

I hope that kind of fun still exists, but the data, the reams and reams of ad tech data, sadly suggests it does not.