Hasta La Creative!

After a decade in the city, The Martin Agency hired Amber Guild to serve as the first managing director for its New York office, Adweek reports. Guild began the position last week, reporting directly to The Martin Agency CEO Matt Williams.

The office’s client roster includes Kayak (for which it won creative duties back in February), Sunglass Hut and Optimum.

“Martin New York has grown dramatically in the past couple of years, but we’ve been eager to find just the right person to help lead that office to an even higher level, and Amber is that person,” Williams said in a statement. “She will bring her extensive expertise and be a great partner to executive creative director James Robinson and director of brand strategy John Gibson as they grow and shape Martin New York.”

Guild joined The Martin Agency form brand consultancy Collins, where she served as president since December of 2014. Prior to Collins she spent five years at full-service agency T3, rising to managing director of the agency’s New York office after joining as a group account director in September of 2009. Before that she spent two years as a senior account director with Swift Integrated Marketing, following a year as an account director with Y&R. She has also held account management positions at Saatchi & Saatchi and Ogilvy & Mather.

“I’ve had a crush on Martin since my early days as an account executive,” Guild told Adweek. “When I was growing up in account management, my job was to become a trusted adviser to our clients by understanding their business, building and creating affinity for their brand, and creating an environment for my team that inspired great, effective work,” she said. “If anything, as I’ve become more senior, I put even more attention to building environments and cultures that allow for people from different backgrounds (diversity!) to thrive—it’s not just the right thing to do, it’s business critical.”

“It’s important to point out that Martin New York has already been here for several years and has steadily grown since it first opened its doors,” she added. “We live in one of the most diverse cities in the world—a city I was born and raised in—and our opportunity is to make sure our talent and our work reflect the creativity, diversity and complexity of the world we live in.”

Guild’s arrival follows the office expanding its creative team with a series of new hires at the beginning of the year, about a month ahead of the Kayak win. The office added executive creative director James Robinson in March of 2015.

Do you like puns related to actor/rapper Ice-T? Well, The Martin Agency and Geico have just the spot for you.

The Martin Agency’s latest spot the “It’s Not Surprising” campaign for Geico it launched with “Marco Polo” this summer sees Ice-T helping out some kids with their lemonade stand. This leads to some confusion when passers-by keep asking “Is that Ice-T?” to which the young entrepreneurs reply “No, it’s lemonade.” The spot concludes with the line, “Ice-T at a lemonade stand? Surprising,” and contrasting that with how unsurprising it is to save money by switching to Geico.

An annoyed Ice T eventually chiming in with indignation is definitely the highlight of the effort, and helps elevate what otherwise may have been a fairly stale joke above its “Marco Polo” predecessor. The campaign remains a one-trick pony but then that’s sort of The Martin Agency’s whole approach for the client, allowing the agency to riff on a single joke that viewers come to expect and anticipate. For now, “It’s Not Surprising” still seems to have some life in it, but it doesn’t seem like it will take very long for the premise to run thin.

In addition to the broadcast spot, there’s also a “The Art of the Squeeze with Ice T,” featuring about four times as much Ice T, as well as a “Behind the Scenes” video.

Credits:
Agency: The Martin Agency
Chief Creative Officer: Joe Alexander
Group Creative Director: Steve Bassett
Group Creative Director: Wade Alger
Creative Director: Sean Riley
Art Director: Jesse Mitchell
Senior Copywriter: Ken Marcus
Copywriter: Ryan Durr
Executive Producer: Brett Alexander
Broadcast Producer: Brian Camp
Associate Broadcast Producer: Coleman Sweeney
Junior Broadcast Producer: Sara Montgomery
Account Director: Ben Creasey
Account Supervisor: Allison Hensley
Account Executive: Jon Glomb
Account Coordinator: Allie Waller
Business Affairs Supervisor: Suzanne Wieringo
Financial Account Supervisor: Monica Cox
Senior Production Business Manager: Amy Trenz
Project Manager: Karen McEwen
Production Company: RadicalMedia
Director: Steve Miller
Executive Producer: Gregg Carlesimo
Head of Production: Frank Dituri
Editorial Company: Running With Scissors
Editor: Drew Neuhart
Executive Producer: Brian Creech
Producer: Katherine Brackman
Color: Drew Neuhart
Stock Music: Lulatone

They’re tiny hard candies that may be small enough to fit between your thumb and forefinger, but they’re still packed with adventure, says a fun new campaign from The Martin Agency.

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Scottsdale, Arizona-based agency Santy appointed Ken Spera as chief creative officer and will relocate from Detroit to join the agency. He replaces Bret Koehler, who will move into a position overseeing a new Los Angeles-based service division at Santy to be announced later this summer.

Spera joins Santy after nearly sixteen years at Doner, where he served as senior vice president, creative director. While with Doner he worked with clients including Progressive Insurance, Serta International, Mazda North America, Bush Beans, JBL, Fiat, The UPS Store and Minute Maid. Before that, Spera gained notoriety for creating the long-running GEICO Gecco mascot while with The Martin Agency after being part of the two-man team that won the account. He spent ten years with that shop, rising to the role of senior art director and working with clients like before leaving to join Doner. While there he worked with clients including Mercedes Benz, Saab, Bank One, Sprint and Blue Cross Blue Shield in addition to GEICO.

Spera was inducted into the Advertising Icon Hall of Fame in 2003 and given a place on the Madison Avenue Walk of Fame the following year. 

“There are a lot of incredibly creative minds out there, but Ken Spera is the whole package, and that’s a rarity,” said Santy president Dan Santy. “He’s creativity on steroids, has a trophy case that may not fit in his new office, and he’s humble. That’s the stuff that inspires employees and takes brands to new levels.”

“My timing may be off making a move to Arizona in the mid-summer, but it’s certainly spot on with Santy. There’s an energy there that I’ve seen before, and I’m excited to take it to new creative levels,” Spera added.

Spera’s departure is the third recent high-profile change atop Doner’s creative department. Just yesterday, the agency hired Eric Weisberg of JWT to serve as global CCO and promoted Rob Strasberg to creative chairman.

Is Geico’s “It’s What You Do” campaign on life support? Not yet, but it’s been hospitalized with a severe case of the non-sequiturs.

I’m not a huge fan of the insurance company’s “It’s What You Do” ads from The Martin Agency—there’s just not that much tension in the idea that getting Geico insurance is a given, and the other givens in the spots often feel too random.

This one, at least, provokes a chuckle with the appearance by a certain Hasbro game. Great pacing and direction, and the mini punch line is funny enough. The ad has almost 2.5 million YouTube views, though the vast majority of those came from its prime placement in the YouTube masthead last Saturday.

As for the campaign as whole, well, the patient is certainly on the table…

CREDITS
Client: Geico
Vice President, Marketing: Ted Ward
Director, Marketing: Bill Brower
Senior Manager, Marketing: Melissa Halicy
Marketing Supervisor: Mike Grant
Marketing Buyer: Tom Perlozzo
Marketing Buyer: Brighid Griffin
Marketing Buyer: Katherine Kalec
Marketing Specialist: Julia Nass

Agency: The Martin Agency, Richmond, Va.
Chief Creative Officer: Joe Alexander
Group Creative Director: Wade Alger
Group Creative Director: Steve Bassett
Creative Director: Sean Riley
Senior Copywriter: Ken Marcus
Executive Producer: Brett Alexander
Senior Broadcast Producer: Heather Tanton
Junior Broadcast Producer: Coleman Sweeney
Group Account Director: Brad Higdon
Account Executive: Allison Hensley
Account Supervisor: Josh Lybarger
Business Affairs Supervisor: Suzanne Wieringo
Financial Account Supervisor: Monica Cox
Senior Production Business Manager: Amy Trenz
Senior Project Manager: Jason Ray

Production Company: Hungry Man
Director: Wayne McClammy
Managing Partner/Executive Producer: Kevin Byrne
Executive Producer/Head of Sales: Dan Duffy
Executive Producer: Mino Jarjoura
Executive Producer: Nancy Hacohen
Producer: Dave Bernstein
Production Supervisor: Shelly Silverman

Editorial Company: Rock Paper Scissors
Editor: Christjan Jordan
Assistant Editor: Pieter Viljoen
Executive Producer: Angela Dorian
Producer: Jared Thomas

Telecine: MPC
Colorist: Ricky Gausis

Animation/VFX: MPC
Executive Producer: Elexis Stearn
Senior Producer: Juliet Tierney
Junior Producer: Nicole Saccardi
Creative Director: Paul O’Shea
CG Supervisor: Zach Tucker
Flame Lead: Blake Huber
Nuke Artist: James Steller
Flame Artist: Ben Persons

Music Company: HUM
Executive Creative Director: Jeff Koz
Sound Designer: Dan Hart
Music/Composer: Haim Mazar
Creative Director: Scott Glenn
Executive Producer: Debbi Landon
Producer: Caroline O’Sullivan

Audio Post Company: Rainmaker Studios
Engineer/Mixer: Jeff McManus

The Martin Agency announced the promotion of agency veteran Andy Azula to the role of executive creative director. In the new role, Azula will report directly to chief creative officer Joe Alexander and will be responsible for crafting the agency’s creative vision and contributing to new business.

Azula originally joined The Martin Agency as a creative director in 2004. During his eleven years with the agency he has led creative on accounts including Microsoft, UPS, Pizza Hut, Experian, Exxon, Kraft and Manpower Group. While working on UPS, he became part of a campaign, as “Whiteboard Guy,” appearing in over 50 ads.

Prior to joining The Martin Agency, Azula served as a senior vice president and group creative director with McCann San Francisco. Before making the jump to this role, he served as a senior art director with Goodby, Silverstein & Partners, beginning in 1999. Prior to that, he spent five years with Fallon as an art director following two years in the same role with Loeffler Ketchum Mountjoy.

As the world oohs and ahhs over Charlotte Elizabeth Diana, Oreo is here to remind you that all babies are special, whether or not they’re born into royalty. A nice message from The Martin Agency to the one demographic that can’t even chew solid food.