It's going to be a great year for the advertising industry in Colorado.
Why?
Because the most awarded, most creative, most undecipherable shop in the world is opening a branch here.
Yes, the folks who brought us the creepy king and roq coq and the weird Volkswagon ads and the gap's campaigns are of the mindset that Boulder, Colorado is a great place to attract talent. Crispin Porter + Bogusky is going to open a shop in Boulder, and all four of the agency's partners are going to buy homes in Boulder and work both here and in Miami. (Undoubtedly, the presence of the commander of cool in Boulder just adds to the area's cache.)
Cathey Finlon, CEO of McClain Finlon Advertising in Denver, considers Crispin Porter+Bogusky one of the most prominent firms on the national advertising scene and believes its presence will help boost the local advertising industry's prominence.
"Our advertising market has been one where it has great potential to grow into something," she said. "Where industries come together in a cluster, all things rise."
But author Douglas Rushkoff (who brought us Frontline's Merchants of Cool) has written a book, "Get Back Into the Box," where he takes aim at a couple of Cripsin Porter's clients, namely Volkswagen and the Gap, arguing that these brands have gone so far outside the box that they've completely forgotten their core brand identity.
Volkswagen's appeal has always been the good, solid, dependable car for a reasonable price. So what's up with the new ad showing the guy crossing the border into Mexico, and the border agents are taking his car apart piece by piece because it's got all these hidden compartments? Exactly which target market wants hidden compartments in their car?
Or the Gap. The Gap used to be the good, solid, dependable and cheap jeans maker. Then they raised their prices and tried to get hip. No one wears Gap jeans anymore. So what's their strategy? We're going to do some guerilla marketing showing soccer moms and Hell's Angels coming together with sledge hammers to demolish our stores. That was over a year ago and I just now walked into one of the new "redesigned" Gap stores. Didn't notice much of a change.
Don't get me wrong. The world needs the Crispin Porters of the world to push us outside the box so that we can know what the boundaries are; the same way Milton asks, how do we know virtue if we don't know temptation?
Liz
Did you see Marc Babej's blogged interview with Rushkoff:
http://being-reasonable.com/index.php/weblog/comments/interview_douglas_rushkoff_author_get_back_in_the_box_part_one/
I got quite freaked whan I looked around at work after reading this ...
Posted by: Ric | January 11, 2006 at 06:29 AM
Hmmm - seems to have got truncated - I'll try one more time
http://being-reasonable.com/index.php/weblog/permalink/interview_douglas_rushkoff_author_get_back_in_the_box_part_one/
Posted by: Ric | January 11, 2006 at 06:32 AM
I think you need to check your facts....CPB has only recently become VW's AOR. You're probably not familiar with this term, as you clearly do not know what is going on in the advertising industry, so I will clarify, AOR is Agency of Record. CPB is not responsible for any of the award winning work that catapulted VW to the forefront of automotive marketing....that honor belongs to Arnold. Arnold has been VW's agency for the past 10 years and has only recently parted ways with VW. Before you start evaluating other people's work, make sure you know what you're talking about and site your sources accurately, otherwise you will continue to look like a fool and completely negate anything and everything you publish.
Posted by: Lauren | February 12, 2006 at 02:48 PM