Hasta La Creative!

FCB has named Karin Onsager-Birch as chief creative officer of the agency’s San Francisco and Los Angeles offices, collectively known as FCB West, AdAge reports. She fills a role left vacant since the departure of Eric Springer last September. The appointment follows the selection of Eric Cosper as chief creative officer of FCB Garfinkel in New York a little over a week ago.

Onsager-Birch joins FCB from Blue Hive in London, where she worked on the WPP agency’s Ford account. She arrived at Blue Hive in May of 2012, serving initially as executive creative director before being named chief creative officer last year. Prior to that, she spent 11 years with Goodby, Silverstein & Partners, arriving in 2001 as a creative director and senior art director, before becoming an associate creative director in 2004. While with GS&P, Onsager-Birch worked on accounts including Chevrolet, Hyundai, Nintendo and Hewlett Packard.

When asked of the appointment, FCB West CEO Dominic Whittles told AdAge that Onsanger-Birch was chosen because her “leadership style is substantive and direct, she’s open minded and solution-oriented, she’s clear about her point of view and very forthright,” adding that her international experience “allows her to draw on a much larger source code of information.”

Today we can confirm that Eric Springer is no longer serving as chief creative officer at FCB/West.

Springer, who like former Deutsch colleague David Povill gained attention thanks to his work on the VW Super Bowl spot from 2011, left that agency’s LA office to serve as CCO at Culver City shop Pitch back in January 2012. After spending approximately one year there, he was hired by FBC/West (then DraftFCB West) to fill the EVP/CCO role.

During the one year and nine months he spent at FCB, Springer produced work for clients like Taco Bell, Levi’s and Nabi, maker of child-friendly tablets.

We have no word on the reasons for his departure or his future plans; we only know that, in the words of an agency spokesperson, “a search for his successor is underway.”

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The newly Draft-less FCB worked with Canal+ to create a mockumentary on the famous “Wilhelm scream” entitled “The Woman Who Can’t Watch Movies.”

“The Wilhelm scream,” in case anyone needs a refresher, is the famous stock audio scream recorded by Sheb Wooley and named after the character Private Wilhelm in the 1953 western The Charge of the Feather River, although it was first used in the 1951 film Distant Drums. It saw a resurgence in popularity as a stock sound effect following its use in Star Wars and Indiana Jones. It is now so ubiquitous (it has been dubbed in over 200 films) that it has become something of an in-joke, used in recent years in films by Pixar, the Lord of the Rings triology, and countless other movies. (There are rumors that directors Steven Spielberg, George Lucas and Quentin Tarantino “maintain a bet as to who has used the “Wilhelm scream” more.”)

“The Woman Who Can’t Watch Movies” follows the (supposed) story of Sheb’s widow, Linda Dotson Wooley. Linda complains that she can’t watch movies anymore because she “just can’t bear to hear the sound of Sheb screaming out in pain over and over again.” After introducing Linda and her “condition” — a clever (although kind of sad) way to call attention to the sound effect’s ubiquity — the mockumentary introduces viewers to Canal+’s Scream Bank, “a catalog of donated screams for industry professionals to use in place of Sheb’s.” A few comically-off screams are then shown dubbed into a film, a great display of why the “Wilhelm Scream” has become such a well-worn cliche. The video is a teaser for Leave Wilhelm Alone, an upcoming documentary on the “Wilhelm scream.” Stick around for credits after the jump, and feel free to head on over to Canal+’s site and record a scream of your own. continued…

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Just two weeks ago, we were covering the first wave of Nabi spots from Draftfcb, a pair of 30-second ads that favorably compared kid-friendly Nabi tablets to Kindle devices a la Microsoft vs. Apple. Our Erik Oster found them to be informational and appealing. However, these two new spots, “Fear Not Question” and “Swagger,” drop the comparison technique for an unconvincing plea for Nabi to be a lifestyle brand.

“Fear No Question” presents the Nabi brand as classroom-friendly, going right after a parent’s sense of idealistic learning, so in turn, that parent will go right for his/her wallet. It’s a boring and safe play that may have worked out if Draftfcb hadn’t already launched the Kindle attacks that are much more memorable.

“Swagger” goes straight after the kids. Promoting Nabi headphones – think Beats for kids – the spot shows a little kid walking down a school hallway in slow-motion as he gives headnods to his friends and long stares to the girl he probably has a crush on. This is more Fubu than Fuhu. This is also just a bad commercial, corny and overdone, even for a children’s market. The tagline of “Everyone Needs a Theme Song” actually has a nice ring to it, but the visual execution is too silly. The clip almost plays like a mocking comedy skit of itself.

At 30 seconds, both ads are easy to watch and easy to forget. ”Swagger” and credits after the jump.

continued…

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Well, despite what tipsters and those we know have been saying ad nauseum over the last few days, we’ve been told by parties involved that “any suggestion” that Draftfcb’s West Coast SoCal operation is no longer working with Taco Bell “is wrong” (Seattle and SF offices are not in play here). After all, the agency did just bust out this ad campaign this week for the fast-food chain for better or worse. But anyhow, the Draft camp has updated its announce from two weeks ago regarding the revamping of its SoCal agency structure, offering the statement below:

“Last month we announced that Rahul Roy would be taking on expanded responsibilities as the managing director of our operations in southern California.  He is partnering with Eric Springer and Michael Bryce, former creative partners at Deutsch L.A. who joined the agency several months ago as chief creative officer and executive creative director respectively, to revamp our operations there.  While we will keep a small service office in Irvine, we are shifting the heart of our business to new offices in L.A. so that we can tap into a deeper talent pool for the benefit of clients like Taco Bell while attracting new business.

Our latest new hire is Sandip Vadher, who has joined the agency as SVP, group planning director; he succeeds Ken Muench. Sandip had most recently held the same role at Pitch. He has deep QSR experience, working with clients like Burger King and McDonald’s over the years.  His keen strategic thinking has also benefited clients and brands like Microsoft, Target, Coke Zero and Samsung.

While a number of our Orange County people are now assigned to work in L.A., the decision to retool our operations in southern California means that we also need to part ways with some talented people. They were informed of this decision Wednesday. We are doing all we can to provide a smooth transition to those who are affected; we deeply appreciate their contributions to our agency. In the long run, we believe these strategic shifts should fortify our business in Southern California.”

We’ve inquired about number of staff affected and headcount as a result of Draftfcb’s SoCal restructuring. We’ll keep you posted.

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