Hasta La Creative!

From Apple and TBWA/Media Arts Lab comes the spiritual sequel to last month’s “Photos Every Day” spot for the iPhone.

“Music Every Day” uses the exact same formula as its predecessor, with similarly excellent execution. We’ve come a long way from Apple’s original iPod commercials. No longer do we have silhouetted dancers projected against green screens with a loud, indie-rock soundtrack. Instead, just like “Photos Every Day,” we have a simple concept that, more than anything, humanizes iPhone users. What are these people listening to? It doesn’t matter; the important thing is that they’re enjoying it. We see them smile, nodding their heads along to a beat, something that we see occur is real life every single day.

Again, it ends with a single-sentence VO: More people listen to music on the iPhone than any other phone. The entire concept seems obvious, but sometimes it’s the obvious that needs to be said. Credits after the jump.

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One of the oldest agencies in America, Young & Rubicam turns a whopping 90 years old tomorrow, and they’re throwing a party.

Now, a 90th trip around the sun can’t be taken lightly. I mean think of all the thousands of people whose hard work kept Y&R going through the Great Depression, World War II, and a third event of equal or greater importance! So, as any great agency in a similar position would, Y&R is celebrating nine decades with a hashtag, #advertisingis. It’s a pretty big deal.

Those who tweet their opinion about what #advertisingis (Bread? Love? Incest? Spite?) tomorrow between the hours of 2-3:30 pm ET will see their tweets appear on a large interactive digital billboard in Times Square. It’s supposed to be a big billboard, probably almost as big as the giant American Eagle billboard, but not quite. Still, pretty big one would assume. Add your Twitter avatar to Y&R’s birthday mosaic, and watch the hashtag event of tomorrow live here.

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San Francisco shop Heat, who you may know best for their high-profile work on a bevy of EA Sports video game franchises, just launched a brand new agency website that reveals a new logo, in which the “e” in “Heat” is backwards because that’s how you know someone is hip to 2013, yo. But, you gotta keep dat ish lowercase, because you don’t want to end up like KoRn with a backwards capital “R” or you’ll look super 90s. You don’t want that.

Having worked in an agency during a full site redesign, I know the hard work and excitement that goes into the endeavor. Many times, almost every creative in the agency contributes to the finished product, which you’ll talk about at length to your friends in the weeks leading up to the launch. “Just wait until our new site launches,” you’ll say, eyes wide with excitement and wonder. “It looks amazing.” It’s hard to blame you for being so giddy, as it feels as though your employer’s site is representative of your own job. The cooler it looks, the more it validates you. “I work at ‘x’ agency,” you imagine saying to a hot young thing at a bar. Oh, what’s that? Bam, show them that sexy new site on your phone (it better be responsive), and explain how cool your job is.

Of course, the problem is, no one outside of your agency gives the slightest shit what your site looks like. Now, this SHOULD NOT make you feel you bad about being emotionally invested in a redesign. After all, even though your friends don’t care, it doesn’t mean that potential new business won’t. So go ahead, be like Heat. Hire a weird second-line style band confused if they should be from New Orleans or Germany to dance around your office for a little while. Film yourself looking at your new sign, backwards “e” and all. Get stoked and know that, for the record, I think your new (responsive!) site looks pretty frickin’ cool. So cool, in fact, that I’m going to link it again right here. Congrats!

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It seems like we’ve been hearing about cuts at TBWA\Media Arts Lab (although relatively minor) pretty much every week this month but all tips up until now have proven to be fairly inaccurate . Now, though, we’ve received word from sources that TBWA’s Apple-focused, L.A.-based unit did let go of some staffers last week (the \MAL camp, like always, is keeping quiet). From what we’re hearing, approximately a dozen or so \MAL folks have been cut based on skill sets needed for the business at present.

On the flipside, though, Media Arts Lab, which also has office space in London, Tokyo, Shanghai, Seoul and Sydney, did make some creative hires in recent weeks including former B-Reel creative directors Hector Muelas and Ricardo Viramontes, who now serve as GCDs at the former agency.

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Details are vague and no timetable has been set, but sources in the know confirm that Huge founding partner Gene Liebel, who’s been with the Brooklyn-based, IPG-owned digital agency for well over a dozen years, is moving on. From what we’ve been told by sources, Huge, which would not comment on the matter, is currently in a “transition phase” with Liebel, who moved up to chief strategy officer at the agency in fall 2010 (at the same time that fellow founding partner Aaron Shapiro was promoted to CEO).

We’ve been told that Liebel’s impending departure, which will just leave Shapiro as the last remaining Huge founding partner, is an amicable one. We’re hoping to fill in the blanks on his next move within the next couple of weeks. We’ll keep you posted.

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Well, you asked for it, and we’re giving it to you. To follow up on our Porsche review post from yesterday, we’ve heard from very reliable sources that the pitch for the automaker’s North American creative account is indeed down to two: Chicago-based incumbent Cramer-Krasselt and, you guessed it, Minneapolis-based Olson. Consider us surprised as we thought everyone’s darling agency Droga5 would be in the mix, but not so. Anyhow, we’re hearing Porsche’s decision is imminent and that the brand is getting more digitally focused in terms of its creative efforts. The other two finalists as mentioned before were CP+B Miami and McKinney. We’ll keep you posted.

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Yes, Carlos Ricque, VP/executive creative director at Moxie Interactive who worked out of the Zenith Media agency’s New York office, is indeed calling it quits. The agency elaborates, saying, “After three great years at Moxie in both Atlanta and New York, Carlos Ricque has decided to leave the Moxie New York office to pursue his video content creation dreams. He leaves on great terms with the agency.  The creative EVP has said that Carlos is one of the good guys in Creative.  Where Carlos goes, good work always follows.  He will be missed.”

It’s not such a stretch for Ricque to head into content creation as the creative has also moonlighted as a screenwriter over the years and won Best Picture back in 2005 at the roving 48 Hour Film Project. On the ad side, meanwhile, prior to Moxie, Ricque spent well over four years at Atlanta-based Fitzgerald+CO, where he last served as co-chief creative officer. During his career, Ricque has also served as a senior copywriter at BBDO and an ACD at what is now 22squared.

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We weren’t planning to end consecutive days like this, but yes, we’ve received confirmation that it’s now McKinney that has had to cut staff, specifically in its Durham, NC hub (the agency, which of course was acquired by Cheil Worldwide last year, also has an office in New York). We’ve been told that 30 people in all were affected across the Durham office and that the reductions were made as “an effort to align resources with current client need, including continued recruiting to fill a number of key positions.”

McKinney’s current client roster includes Sherwin-Williams and Mizuno (we’ve been told that McKinney’s “Mezamashii Run Project” for the latter brand is in fact the most Effie-winning campaign of the year so, uh, there’s that). No word yet on where this move leaves headcount at in McKinney’s NC office, but we’re checking.

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We’ve received confirmation that Minneapolis-based digital agency space150, which also counts offices in New York and Los Angeles, reduced some of its workforce last week. From what we’ve been told, 10 staffers across a few “key departments” (we’re hearing creative, media and account) were affected. According to a spokesperson, the reason for the move was “both to realign our business with current and forecasted projects, and refocus resources in areas that better serve the needs of our clients.”

The Twin Cities shop has worked with notable brands over the years including Target, Buffalo Wild Wings, Dairy Queen, American Eagle Outfitters and was most recently named digital agency for record for electricity/natural gas provider, Xcel Energy. Following the reduction, we’ve been told that space150 staff count is now at 100.

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.

PORTLAND—Agencies with digital capabilities are a dime a dozen today. On the other hand, an agency with digital DNA that also creates compelling retail experiences, new products/companies and traditional advertising, is rare indeed. Ergo, I feel like I may be in the presence of an albino gorilla here at Struck’s Old Town offices.

John Gross, Strategist/Account Director, says, “We do killer websites, but we get that digital is storytelling.” And therein lies the Salt Lake City-based shop’s magic formula. Struck has an awesome toolbox, but the leaders of the shop know that tools, regardless of their power and shiny attractiveness, are just tools. The real work is using the tools to build something wonderful.

Another of Stuck’s defining characteristics is its habit of taking on challenger brands like Asics and Jack in the Box; in fact, the agency considers itself to be a challenger brand.

I ask if being an agency from Salt Lake City is a perception challenge that needs to be overcome, even though the agency’s record of winning big accounts out of market is well established. Struck CEO, Daniel Conner, sees Salt Lake as a strategic advantage, if anything, and recounts a story about how executives from Lennar were wowed by the agency’s “second to none” thinking (which led to Struck being named AOR by the home builder).

Matt Anderson, Creative Director in the Portland office says, “To be a great agency, you have to solves your cleints’ really messy problems.” He counts Jack in the Box as a good example. The brand has been running its iconic Jack character TV campaign for 18 years, but there was no reflection of the brand’s attitude in digital. Struck has successfully changed the score by bringing an irreverent and mobile-first approach to this QSR.

Struck believes in being “greater than.” Conner says it’s not just about messaging, it’s about creating better experiences. Generally speaking we all want greatness out of everything we do, he says. “At Struck we believe we can make it a bit better than everyone else, for our clients and ourselves. It was an internal mantra and a common cause we rallied around,” says Conner, “but we didn’t quite understand what it was until we gave it a brand.”

Pauline Ploquin, Chief Operating Officer at Struck, provides some context for the mantra with a story about how Struck went above and beyond to build its hospitality client The Grand America Hotel two new retail stores, a toy store and a bakery, from the ground up. “We came in as a marketing partner,” says Ploquin. But when Struck saw that the hotel needed a stronger retail strategy, the results led the agency to cross over into product development. Ploquin adds that the toy store they created, JouJou, may expand into a retail chain.

Gross says, “We’re not afraid to take a stand and push clients outside their comfort zone. In digital, safe equals boring.”

Anderson says, “The reason we work at Struck and not in some basement at McCann, or somewhere else, is because we want to do things that matter to our clients.” He adds, “We have never been in a position where we felt free to do something that didn’t count. Everyday is a street fight. We’re just always fighting for our lives.”

Anderson brings the agency’s “greater than” philosophy full circle. He says, it’s a way to keep ourselves honest. We ask “Is this great enough? Because if it’s not, sooner or later we’ll turn into one of those small regional agencies that does ads for oil changes.”

I have to say Struck’s insistence on always being “greater than” has delivered impressive results. While working on a project for Gatorade, for instance, the Struck team realized that the shortcomings in Radian6′s social listening tool could be overcome through better visualizations. So Struck made its own product, called NUVI, which is now a stand alone business with 25 clients already on board, including Berkshire Hathaway’s Business Wire and other agencies like Fallon and TBWA\Chiat\Day.

Conner says there’s a technology boom happening in Utah, a.k.a. the Silicon Slopes. “Struck as a digital creative agency is riding that wave. In fact, we helped generate a lot of this wave. A lot of our designers and developers have roots in this world.”

“Great ideas don’t just live on Madison Avenue anymore,” says Conner. “In order to execute these ideas, you need to be where the talent is, and there’s a ton of development talent in Utah. Same with Portland, the talent’s here.”

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