Throwing Bricks.

I often say that I'm a lot of clients second call.

They don't call me first because I'm not a normal agency. Or not their normal agency. I don't have legions of texting account people setting up meetings and starting them late.

I don't do 96-page decks.
I don't sit on panels and panelificate.
I don't even have lunch with people. 

They don't call me first because I'm not the easiest person to get along with. I'm fractious, captious and obstreperous. I know that sounds like a Latin law firm, but you get the idea.

They don't call me first because they find me intimidating. Maybe because I use words like fractious, captious and obstreperous.

Mostly, they don't call me first because I'm expensive.

But people do call me.

Out of the blue.
When they're in the red.
Oe their prospects are black.

In fact in the five years since I was shit-canned from Ogilvy for being old, I've tripled my revenue while my guess is they've seen theirs reduced by two-thirds. And during those five years, I haven't made one out-bound new business call.

That's good.

I get one-half of my business through the Ogilvy diaspora. One-half are referrals from current clients. And one-half I get from my blog-posts and ads.

Yeah, I know that's three-halves. Most proper businesses run at 150-percent.

Too often, however, I do get calls that go something like this.

George,

I'm in a jam.

I had a pitch last week and the client loved the work but the work needs work and I need your help.

I don't have a brief.

And the client meeting is in two days.

And I have no money.

Let me take you through this. Though I didn't book any time with you do you have time now to follow my peregrinations as I try to talk you through a 91-page deck and try to tell you what I'm looking for?

Oh, and did I mention the work is due in two days.

I mean I really need it tomorrow.

And I have no money.

But I can't do this and I need your help. It needs your touch. It's really important.

Do you have some time?

Can we talk about this?

Did I mention it's due tomorrow and it's coming out of my pocket and I really have no money?

-- 

I read the book show above not long ago about life on the western frontier of what became the United States back in the late 1600s and early 1700s. 

It was hellish out there in the land of the silver birch and home of the beaver.

The Dutch were nearby. The French were attacking from Canada. And everyone was trying to win the manpower of the thousands of native peoples to tilt the balance of power in their favor. Behind almost every tree--and there were billions of trees--lurked existential threats. No wonder apparitions appeared and so many people started believing in witches. Shit happens when you think the end-times are coming. Shit and tomahawks.

Almost unfathomable to us in a world where waiting one-day to get something you don't need delivered right to your door all the way from China seems unendurable, was the scarcity of everything. Houses were made of wood and mud. Even chimneys were made of wood. Bricks were a luxury good. And if you read about the about of effort that went into making one-thousand bricks you'd understand why.

Bricks were fireproof, but difficult to manufacture and too heavy to transport in sufficient quantities: a single chimney, with adequate foundations, required several tons.... 

So the problem persisted: Springfield needed bricks to prevent fires and upgrade homes, but even securing an irregular supply meant reliance on other towns, whereas Pynchon’s overriding aim was independence from Connecticut and, so far as possible, New England as a whole. There was nothing else for it: Springfield would have to make its own bricks.... This solution was consistent with Pynchon’s methods to date. Whenever the town needed something the Old World took for granted, be it a barrel or a door or a horseshoe, Pynchon would persuade a tradesman to settle there...

Men already in service could be released from their indentures in exchange for a fee or favor offered to their masters. But decent brickmakers were few and far between. Brickmaking was a delicate, almost mysterious art, requiring special skill and years of experience.... 

Most people were about forty steps from even reaching the lowest tier of Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs. Today, so many of my clients--or potential clients--seem to be without bricks and without foundation.

They come to me for bricks. But they take bricks for granted. They want them to be free.

Meanwhile, over at the frighteningly prescient "Economist" magazine, we're told about 400,000 small businesses are opening a month. Sure, plenty of them are probably selling refurbished Tupperware online, or rendered second-hand pastrami fat, but many of them are credible. And they're doing something they can't quite explain. And nobody knows their name. And nobody knows they even exist.

A lot of these 400,000/month seem to call me.

That's good. I appreciate your interest.

Pony up, biyatches. Bricks ain't free.