W+K Planning Vet Burg Splits for New Portland-Based Gig

daveburgAfter spending nearly the last five years at W+K, where he most recently served as strategic planning director on P&G corporate, Dave Burg has left the agency’s HQ to join up with fellow Portland operation, Roundhouse. Burg has now assumed the role of head of planning at Roundhouse, a creative agency that works with clients including Microsoft (on Xbox, primarily), Red Bull and Adidas.

During his time at W+K, meanwhile, Burg not only led strategy on P&G projects (“Proud Sponsor of Moms” campaign, for example) but worked on Dodge and Target and served as planning director on Coca-Cola including past Super Bowl efforts like the polar bear work during the last Giants-Patriots battle. Prior to W+K, Burg spent four years at Leo Burnett Chicago as a senior brand strategist, leading day-to-day duties on the McDonald’s national account. No word yet on if there are plans to replace him at W+K, but we’re checking. Update: W+K is “reallocating resources internally” following Burg’s departure.

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P&G Returns to Celebrate Olympic Moms, Trip Babies, Push Children

Is there anything more heartwarming than watching children of all ages fall over repeatedly?

From Proctor & Gamble and W+K comes “Pick Them Back Up,” a new spot that’s part of the “Thank You, Mom” campaign running during the length of the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia. If you’ll recall, P&G and Wieden have been leaders in mom joy, child guilt and intermittent bouts of crying since a 2010 Mother’s Day campaign, which set the stage for the very viral 2012 London Olympics spot “Best Job.” Since the initial broadcast of “Best Job,” most of the world has been stuck in a routine of enthusiastic weeping followed by hugging their mom until it hurts.

Adding a little humor to the affair (this is, if you’re a sociopath like me), “Pick Them Back Up” sees attractive young mothers repeatedly watch their children fall down before picking them up, thus transforming them into successful Olympic athletes. For those mothers whose children didn’t grow up to be competitive in winter sports on an international scale, well, your time was better spent leaving your kid on the ice and just working on you for a while.

Of course, this spot also begs the question, how did they film so many babies falling over? Were they stunt babies, or did they trip them with invisible wires or something? In any case, after seeing this on TV, your mother’s gaze will slowly drift over to the photo she has of you as a baby on her nightstand, and she’ll sigh a million disappointed sighs because you were once so cute and loving and now you apparently don’t “have the time” to give her a call once in a while. She’s right, you know, because you just watched this and it caused you do to nothing. Credits, and one in a series of new athlete-specific video, follow after the jump.

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