Episode Transcript
Don Mock
All right. Episode 134, we’re back. Rob.
Rob Broadfoot
I put on my vest because I was chilly, but now I’m in the sun.
Don Mock
Well, the studio here, this is definitely the hottest room in our office or maybe the worst climate controlled. I don’t know if it’s hot because it’s the coldest and the hottest, right? But, and we’re both wearing puffy vest. It’s vest season, man. ‘s, we need a McSweeney ‘s article on it ‘s puffy vest,
Rob Broadfoot
Puffy jacket season?
Don Mock
absolutely. All right. Episode 134 we’re back. We were talking in the office the other day about something. I don’t even remember what we were talking about, but it had a reference to old Atlanta agencies and just how long we’ve been here, and just sort of agency life in general. And thought, Oh, that’s a podcast, you know, shared experiences or other agencies, or just the long, winding road of, you know, design firms and advertising agencies and how, you know, they evolve and change and things like that, right? And thought, it could be kind of fun to talk about our experience Atlanta specific, right? Yeah. And, you know, I think if you’re in advertising long enough, and you keep a resume or a CV, it’ll just be littered with a bunch of firms that don’t exist anymore.
Rob Broadfoot
Or they exist under different monikers or whatever,
Don Mock
yeah, well, that’s the thing, the name changes. I mean, if I made a CV for myself, I don’t know that there’d be any agencies that really still exist, maybe one or two, you know, but they’re not what they used to be. They’re totally different, that type of stuff. How about you probably, probably similar, right?
Rob Broadfoot
Yeah, it’s probably, it’s kind of the same. I mean, a couple of the big ones are still around, operating under a different name. Some of the smaller ones have come and gone. Yeah, so it’s a little bit of that, a little bit of that, but yeah. I mean, my, my, my journey was in Atlanta. Advertising was such that I and I kind of, I’m gonna just give a my own brief history. I kind of fell into it. I had to get a an internship, and I was getting a dog at the same time.
Don Mock
Wait, what are those two things?
Rob Broadfoot
I know it makes no sense in my brain. Let me explain
Don Mock
I’m getting a dog, so I need an internship. What?
Rob Broadfoot
I was a junior in college, DGA, and my parents had been all over me about getting an internship,
Don Mock
yeah, what are you gonna do all summer?
Rob Broadfoot
What are you gonna do all summer? You gotta get an internship, yeah, at the same time. And coincidentally, I also wanted to get a dog. This is gonna make sense in a few minutes.
Don Mock
Okay, hey, I’m here for it.
Rob Broadfoot
So, like I was searching around finding dogs, I wanted to get a Siberian Husky. Long story short, there was a woman named Peggy gunning Okay. Shout out, Peggy, Brighton road in your neck of the woods. And I went over and got one of her Siberian Husky puppies, and was talking to her, and she said, Oh, I run an advertising agency out of she has a carriage house. Okay. She’s like, Yeah, small little, you know, four of us back there, and yeah. And we just got to talking, and I was like, oh, that’s kind of of interest. And, yeah, communications and English. And, anyway, long story short, I ended up interning with Peggy gunning at the gunning group, the gunning group, the gunning group, okay, just kind of a small, little boutique shop that she ran out of the back of her house. And that’s kind of how I ended up in the biz. I don’t know that the gunning group is still around.
Don Mock
What did you work on? Do you remember any type of projects or clients?
Rob Broadfoot
She threw me into media planning.
Don Mock
Okay, makes sense.
Rob Broadfoot
she threw me into media planning. So I started to learn that it was, it was a lot of health care stuff, like smaller health care, mostly local clients but so I learned how to kind of do media planning there and then. So I don’t think the gunning group is still around. And then anyway, I moved on from their first internship. Was it BBDO south, which still exists?
Don Mock
Yeah, I think they dumped the South maybe BBDO atlanta
Rob Broadfoot
And also in media. But I was interning, Okay, listen to this. Why I stayed in this business? I have no idea. I was interning on the housing on the HUD account, the Housing and Urban Development media plan, government, and that was back when they had three floors. And ‘s like, oh, the media planners are on one floor, yeah? Count guys are on the, you know, second floor, and the creatives on a different And there was, I’m dating myself, but there was no Internet, there was no email. It was all government forms of in triplicate, in triplicate, yeah, the pink one, the yellow one, the white one, and different file cabinets for different I mean, it was just a lot of government paperwork. So anyway
Don Mock
oh my god, I remember working at a print shop, or, you know, when I was a teenager, yeah, printed those forms. Oh my god, the white, yellow, pink.
Rob Broadfoot
So much paper. Oh, my god, yeah, so much paper. So there’s BBDO still around, yeah? I ended up going, then my first job from that was internship, and then I went to West Wayne, okay, which is now, which is privately owned, but is now 22 squared. They’re still, so they’re still just in a different in a different form,
Don Mock
yeah, and they’ve spun out different little entities here and there and different things, yeah. And
Rob Broadfoot
have kind of evolved around and whatever else worked there for years. And then, and that’s when I was like, Oh, well, I need to go do creative like, I need to be on the creative side, sure, sure, went back to school. And then, yeah, I don’t where I’m going with this, but yeah,
Don Mock
this is kind of like a weird sort of run through your history.
Rob Broadfoot
It’s kind of a run through the history, and then it history. And then it was, I remember getting out of school and and the hot creative shop in town was a company called Huey/Paprocki
Don Mock
yeah, they were lights on fire.
Rob Broadfoot
Anybody who’s been around in Atlanta advertising for a while will know them two really good guys, Joe Paprocki and Ron Huey. Ron was the writer. Joe was the art director, small shop, and they were right in Virginia Highlands, right by neighbors. Remember, we’re neighbors?
Don Mock
Yeah, absolutely
Rob Broadfoot
They were in that little building that kind of attaches to.
Don Mock
I never worked with them at all, or did any freelance or anything, but I think you did, right? Yeah, didn’t you cross paths with those guys?
Rob Broadfoot
Well, that was the hot shop. That’s where everybody wanted to work. And so I, like everybody else, wanted to work there, met those guys, and was never a full timer there, but was just kind of a hired gun on a bunch of stuff. And worked primarily with Joe, worked as writer, and then Joe is our director.
Don Mock
What was he?. He was just doing other things.
Rob Broadfoot
He was writing on other stuff, just kind of creative directing. And got another stuff. But they were all they just, they did really great work.
Don Mock
How big did those guys get? Do you remember at all?
Rob Broadfoot
somebody ‘s gonna fact check me I want to say they were probably 12,
Don Mock
okay, like in the 20 and under range?
Rob Broadfoot
Yeah, I think they were under 20 and they were always just. I mean, they were creative, creative, creative, great work
Don Mock
dude, but they did some kick ass work. I remember they had a North Side hospital campaign around town. I loved that billboard campaign. That thing ran for a long time. Yeah, I couldn’t tell you what the tagline was, lifetime of care? Why would I remember that?
Rob Broadfoot
That’s right. I think it was a lifetime of care
Don Mock
and it was the, like, the two symbols on either end that sort of signified, you know, it was like a sippy cup on one side and like, you’re over the hill mug of coffee on the other, you know, it’s like, you know, they did that. I remember they did a bunch of stuff for the Atlanta History system. Why do I even remember this?
Rob Broadfoot
They were great ads. I mean, they were an award shop, And they were just award after award after award.
Don Mock
Yeah, print magazine, when that was the thing, Communication Arts, I feel like I couldn’t even tell you what other advertising annuals, but they had a ton of other stuff in there. So what did you, what did you work on with those guys?
Rob Broadfoot
Joe and I worked on BlueLinx, is like a ginormous logistics company, like a massive, massive, they’re headquartered here, but they’re massive. Worked on that worked on,
Don Mock
is that still a thing? Is BlueLinx still a thing?
Rob Broadfoot
Oh, yeah, yeah. they are a big global monster.
Don Mock
I wasn’t sure if they changed the name or, you know, you know, yeah. I gotta take my vest off, it gets getting hot in here.
Rob Broadfoot
Maybe one of the first ads I worked on on that it was a print ad. And somehow, I got the scoop on what the BlueLinx was paying for the print, and my jaw about hit the floor back in the glory days, yeah? Go shoot whatever you want. Yeah, go do whatever you want. So he and I worked on that. We worked on Russell Athletic campaign for those guys. What’s the? you’ve seen the work that we did, we did some real fun work for Zifty, the food delivery.
Don Mock
It was like, sundries and stuff, yeah Could you get booze back then or no?
Rob Broadfoot
I don’t think you could get booze.
Don Mock
Kozmo was the Booze one. I think Kozmo, like, K, O, z, because we had web van, yeah, we had, remember, there was no Uber Eats. ‘s no, like, no real food delivery. But like, Cosmo was, like, you could get a pack of smokes, yeah, like a bottle of Jack Daniels and, like, you know, 12 pack of hot and hot and fresh, you know, donuts, right from Krispy Kreme delivered here. I mean, you could mix and match all this crazy stuff.
Rob Broadfoot
That was the whole campaign. That campaign, I remember, was make a night of it was the, was the campaign platform that we came up with, and the tagline, make a night of it. And so for Zifty, because you could get such a random thing, we created these little visual stories. So like, one was
Don Mock
great campaign, great campaign.
Rob Broadfoot
It was, what was it? It was three items. It was a thing of fish food, the ice cream, that right, the ice cream. And then there was, why am I blanking on this?
Don Mock
I feel like there was one that had, like, Cheech & Chong.
Rob Broadfoot
yeah, it was, that’s what it was. It was Cheech & Chong, a bag of Doritos
Don Mock
and Visine, Cheech & Chong DVD, right, right, yeah.
Rob Broadfoot
Okay, maybe it was, It was Christmas, Titanic and, like, Dramamine
Don Mock
I think you’re right, it was like, it was a movie. It was like a movie, something you eat or drink and then something that tied it together.
Rob Broadfoot
It was a fun little vision, a great campaign. But Huey/Paprocki they’re not around anymore. When they went, I know, I don’t know when they went out of business, but they’ve since gone on to do different things.
Don Mock
are they still around? I never met them, so I have no idea.
Rob Broadfoot
I think they’re around. I don’t know how active or not active they are at this point. Kind of, kind of lost touch over the years. Yeah, but there. But that shop kind of came and went, which is interesting to me, how you have, like, a, you know, kind of a crazy, powerhouse, creative shop like that, that just kind of, you know, one day is gone.
Don Mock
Well, do you remember Brighthouse? was kind of like that too. Like, came up out of nowhere. Well, I shouldn’t say came up out of nowhere, but that was, Oh, we’re gonna space on it. Carly… was one of the employees,
Rob Broadfoot
Cathy Carlisi, that’s Joey ps wife.
Don Mock
That’s right, that’s right, yeah, okay
Rob Broadfoot
It was Reiman, Joey Reiman. He’s the one who started Brighthouse, and it was, and it was made as, like a think tank,
Don Mock
yeah. But no, no final, they never did final
Rob Broadfoot
all strategy and positioning and that sort of, that sort of stuff.
Don Mock
And didn’t clients get, like, a book or something. It was like, here’s your whole strategic and then go execute it with someone else things like that, yeah, but, but they were the hot thing for years and years, right? Doing a whole bunch of super awesome, cool stuff, ideation and stuff like that, you know? But then, yeah, then all of a sudden it was like, they were gone or something.
Rob Broadfoot
And they were kind of hot on the scene, because Reiman was, was pretty popular guy, yeah, and he’s, he’s written a couple of books and stuff like that. And they came on as, not a traditional agency, as, oh, we’re gonna be a think tank, kind of shop, more of a consultancy, really, I think, than, than a shop, yeah,
Don Mock
I guess we’re just always so busy head down, doing our own thing, worrying about us and this and whatever, like, this sounds weird and kind of self serving, but I don’t really pay attention to everybody else’s like, where they are, where they went, or, you know, like, sort of the age old question of, like, what happened to those guys? It’s like, I don’t have the answer to any of those questions, because I kind of don’t pay attention. That kind of sounds like im being a dick about it.
Rob Broadfoot
It seemed to me like, and maybe I’m wrong, but it seemed to me like the the the agency scene, or community, if you want to call it that is a little more fragmented because you had, you had a lot of these big shops, and then then you had this trend of small shops, just creatives popping off and starting up shops and so everything just sort of fragmented and fragmented and fragmented, yeah? So I think it’s not as tight of a community, maybe as it once was
Don Mock
But I don’t to your point about the award winning shops, though, too. There was a whole thing in the 90s, you know, late 90s, early 2000s where everyone was constantly churning into add ‘s and doing this and doing that, and I did a few I, you know, sure, I had a run in that, you know, sure. And I think kind of, before owning your own shop, you’re more in tune. I used to read Ad Week, and you’d be more in tune with, like where clients are and, you know, what shops are working on, what projects and different things like that, right? Like, you know, just to sort of be aware of the community. But now it’s like, I just more aware of clients and,
Rob Broadfoot
well, we’re busy running the business, and you’re right, your perspective changes a little bit, right? When you’re a hungry, starved, young, creative, you wanna go work at the hot shop on the cool projects and do all the things.
Don Mock
Yeah, no, that’s a good point.
Rob Broadfoot
No one ‘s looking at the at the bottom line or the business we’re not concerned with it at that point.
Don Mock
Absolutely, absolutely. So, yeah, it’s kind of, it’s kind of funny and weird. I guess when you put it that way, it makes a lot more sense and kind of just, you know, why am I so detached from the rest of the advertising community? I guess you know so or where everybody’s going with it and things like that.
Rob Broadfoot
I think it’s just smaller. You just got so many smaller shops now, yeah. And, I mean, there’s a big trend in the industry too, that big brands are now hiring shops, smaller shops like Hershey and other places like that, are hiring, yeah, 50 person shops, which is unheard of in the past, because there’s just such a wealth of talent, I think out there, it’s spread out.
Don Mock
Well, then another old school one that I did a little freelance. but I did some work with Fountainhead way back in the remember those guys? Remember our old pal Kelly, who we worked with as a client for a number of years as well? she was a copywriter over there, yeah, or maybe even ACD, I can’t remember so, but they were over on mean street. There were a bunch of, like, little agencies all down in mean Street. And I spent a couple years freelancing around town, you know, doing different things. I mean, I worked at giant shop
Rob Broadfoot
Didn’t you do some work at Fitzgerald & Company?
Don Mock
Yeah, I did a ton of work at Fitzgerald yeah.
Rob Broadfoot
I did some work over there too.
Don Mock
Fitzgerald, they had coke and Six Flags.
Rob Broadfoot
I worked on that with the crazy bald guy. Remember the
Don Mock
oh yeah, oh yeah, the crazy bald guy
Rob Broadfoot
the crazy odd guy that promoted Six flags. We did spots for for that creepy campaign. I think that campaign went two years and they went, this is too weird,
Don Mock
yeah, yeah. It was a strange one. I think Fitzgerald, like, I don’t have, you know, again, nothing bad to say about anybody. I think it was one of those. I was a tweener. I was freelancing around, doing a bunch of different things for a bunch of different agencies, but I was trying to find a full time gig where I wanted to go at that time, right? And it was like, I remember having a conversation with one of their career directors, and I’m gonna forget everybody ‘s name, so Im goint to even try. But it was like, Well, what are you are you a designer, or are you an art director? Like, which one, you know, like, you’re like, I’m looking I’m like, you know, looking at your book, and it’s like, Well, which one are you like, What? What? You know, it’s kind of like, Well, which one do you need to hire? You know, that type of thing, right? So, yeah, I did some stuff with Fitzgerald. Another, another, F agency. Oh, actually, 3 f’s because Fountainhead did a bunch of work there. I couldn’t even tell you what clients I worked on over there.
Rob Broadfoot
I never did any work.
Don Mock
They were fun. I mean, I did some, you know, you know, the old school day used to drive in, bring your own laptop, sit there and freelance all day like, jam out a bunch of ideas. Yeah. So Fountainhead did a bunch of stuff for those guys, Fitzgerald. Fitzgerald still around. Fitz go, yeah. Fitz go. I have no idea if Dave Fitzgerald is still there. I would, I would guess so. But again, I don’t have the answers to any questions. Do you remember Fletcher Martin Ewing? yeah, you know, I don’t think, I think they ended up rebranding to Fletcher.
Rob Broadfoot
they did.
Don Mock
Did they? okay, and they were like, downtown by, like, the sun in, like, the sun trust Plaza, or something like that. I don’t know. I mean, this was, again, dude, this is like, 20 years ago
Rob Broadfoot
Martin, gosh, I haven’t thought of that name in a while.
Don Mock
Yeah, again, yeah. I’d have to go back through my files to figure out what I even worked on over there. I somebody in town. I’ve been I did a bunch of Cingular Wireless work for or some other wireless company, but again, Cingular doesn’t even exist anymore. I mean, that was bought by at&t or whatever so. And then there’s a couple other guys, you know, a little little ones around town. They’re still around. Remember, Denmark? Denmark is still around. I do. I believe I remember. And then our friend Brian Jackson, I think, was over at Denmark for a little while, but that was after.
Rob Broadfoot
Wasn’t Denmark kind of a niche, though. What did Denmark.. real estate stuff?
Don Mock
I think they were real estate. It was either that or full circle productions. They were real estate or something, I think, was real estate as well. And then the old one that, like I, when I left Turner and went into design firm, land and agency land. I worked for a company called Working design, right? And that was super small firm. It was great. I was the top of the ladder, but I was the bottom of the ladder. This lovely lady, Jude Lindquist, gave me an opportunity, and I worked there for a couple of years, and but they shared space like we had. We were kind of inside Sawyer Riley Compton, remember Sawyer and those guys? Yeah, see src, and then they either were bought or merged or something with some firm out of Pittsburg, I feel like, or something after years down the line. But so they would, they would hire us a little bit here and there, but mostly it was, it was, it was kind of like I were, I didn’t work there, but it’s like, oh, I’m at the coffee machine, and you’re at the guy, you know, like that. We had our own little entrance, we had our own space, we had our own offices. We were totally different company, but we were kind of on that same floor with them, and so by osmosis, I just sort of got to see kind of what they were working on. I mean, that was a really fun shop, but I also saw them go through a bunch of different creative directors and things over the years
Rob Broadfoot
Oh yeah. That was, I remember that at West Wayne, it was like, Yeah, every two years. I mean, they got, they bring in somebody, or maybe even every year, yeah, they were always just
Don Mock
two years. Feels like an eternity.
Rob Broadfoot
The most boisterous personalities, yeah, I remember several different ones. I won’t name any names, but just obnoxious individuals.
Don Mock
Oh yeah, oh yeah. Well, I again, I won’t name any names, but it was, yeah, we brought in the new Hot Shot, who was from some other city. Oh, they won all the awards in Denver or wherever, right?
Rob Broadfoot
They’re from XYZ in New York.
Don Mock
Yeah And they’re gonna come in, they’re gonna change our culture. They’re gonna bring our creative around. We’re gonna do this, you know. And it was like, Oh, you’re like, like, almost bipolar, where it’s like, one day, Hello, how are you the nice ‘s happiest shake, you know? And then the next day, it’s like, you don’t even know who I am.
Rob Broadfoot
Or you’re like, yelling at me
Don Mock
yeah, exactly, yeah, kicking boxes and stuff in the storage room. Like, yeah, it was a fun time back then.
Rob Broadfoot
Well, that was back in the days of Martini lunches, god knows what other debauchery went on.
Don Mock
Well, I think you know, again, we’ve talked about it on other podcasts where, like, winning an award has never gotten us a single client ever. I mean, you know, there is something, advertising award shows are kind of funny and silly, just in general, right? But there was a time when it was like, and there are creative directors out there that’s like, their sole mission is just to win awards, you know what I mean? And it was like, Oh, this is the creative director that’s only going like
Rob Broadfoot
Well, that’s what gets you the job, the next job. You know, oftentimes, and I think for large, large clients, maybe they care about that stuff to some degree, but I think it’s more just about, you know, you win awards and you can attract the hot, young creative folks
Don Mock
Yeah no, there’s, there’s multiple reasons for doing it. Yeah, yeah. Which is talent acquisition is probably the number one component for sure, you know, but, but But it was funny to sort of be on the outside watching all that stuff sort of happened. To your point, about every year there’s a different sort of scenario so but, and then we both did a bunch of freelance at Gray. Remember Gray? We worked on some electrical thing
Rob Broadfoot
What was the, God, what was that whole campaign that we did that was, it wasn’t Rubbermaid
Don Mock
Well, cryovac, yeah, Sealed Air, yeah, that whole thing, which I had worked at, at other agencies, to that account, had had been through multiple different firms, I feel like, in Atlanta,
Rob Broadfoot
yeah, because we worked with Mike, Mike Lewis. Shout out, Lewis, if you ever hear this, because he was temporary creative directing in there
Don Mock
Yeah that’s right. That’s right, yeah. I mean, we were like, one step away from having Gray business cards, like on photo shoots, you know, like, you know, but I mean, that way agency life is, you have like, kind of permanent freelancers, you got full timers, you got whatever. But I remember, you know, oh, my God, we got to sit in all these Gray meetings. I was like, What in the world are we doing? What? Yeah, what is happening right now? But, I mean, that’s a giant, you know, unlike, you know, Fountainhead, or Huey/Paprocki or things like that, you know, those were giant firms, you know, like, when you’re freelancing a BBDO, there’s like, hundreds of people there, or whatever, yeah, versus the little guys, so, you know, but Gray, I can’t remember. I mean, they, they closed Atlanta years and years and years ago. I feel like,
Rob Broadfoot
Yeah, but then they became, like, Gray TV, like they, they kind of, they shifted a little bit into different things. I and I don’t know the full the trail of it, but yeah, they’ve been through a lot of mutations. Dare I say, yeah, yeah. Well, I think to kind of bring it around. Here’s the one common denominator about shops that still exist and shops that don’t, shops that are large
Don Mock
I’m interested to hear this
Rob Broadfoot
that are small, is that I would say, from my experience, and I assume the same ‘s true for you, that all of our experiences have taught us a lot, and kind of brought us to and a lot less. You know, lessons learned on what to do, what not to do, how to how to run things, how not to run things, and all those kind of good things. So there’s a lot to be a lot to be learned along the way for sure.
Don Mock
Fun times.
Rob Broadfoot
Atlanta advertising, see where we are in the next 20 years.
Don Mock
Yeah, it’s a roller coaster. Fun times.
Rob Broadfoot
All right. Well, thanks everybody for tuning in. You can find us on the socials @mocktheagency You can find us on the.com ‘s. www.mocktheagency.com That’s right. We’re all over the place. Anyway, check us out, and we will talk to you next time.
Don Mock
All right, thanks, everybody.
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