Can't be fixed

I'll be the first to admit that when I got into the ad business I didn't know a thing. Not a thing. And this despite an expensive four years at Syracuse University. Which by the way is one of the most respected (expensive) communications schools in the country. 

I have no idea why. 

My biggest academic deficiency was in TV production. Again, this is odd since the school, even in the late 70's, was chock full of the coolest state of the art production equipment. I wasn't interested in camera lenses, audiotape or monstrous lighting packages. I just wanted to write funny shit.

Turns out  transforming funny shit on typewriter paper (god I'm old) into funny shit on videotape is an art, and science, unto its own. Hence my ignorant blathering to clients and car dealers, "Ah, we can shoot this for under 100k."

After much scolding from the producers at Chiat/Day (the best production team in the business) I learned very quickly that when it came to numbers, production and the realities of business, I needed to keep my tenderfoot mouth shut.

If you were to look back on the Chiat reels you'd know why. Everything they did, especially TV spots, was top notch. Perhaps that's what gave birth to the creedo...

"They gave us a budget and we proudly exceeded it."

That was at the beginning of my career. 

It was completely different at the end of my career, where my my last employer would produce a TV spot for under 23 bucks. With a kid out of high school who pinched a high powered portable light from his dad's garage. Another youngster with a lavalier mic that he got from the Pomona Public library and an amateur cinematographer with a second hand iPhone 14.

Welcome to the Bronze Age of TV production.

Having watched their stock fall faster than DJT MAGA Media Worldwide -- or whatever that dunce calls it -- my last employer switched gears. They're now back in the helpful hands of a big time ad agency. Putting out big high production value TV spots as well as a considerable spend on outdoor boards, not one of which is memorable. 

They even got themselves a big time celebrity who is arguably on the downslope of his long career.

And it still sucks.

Proof positive that good advertising is often a magical mix of professional production as well as proprietary thinking. They're still haven't figured out the last part.