A Lesson from a Stranger. And My Father.

For the first twenty years of my advertising career, I never told anyone who my father was. 

My father, a prominent advertising person, and my mother, a prominent witch, were dead-set against me going into the ad business and did everything they could to discourage me. They did everything they could to discourage me from anything but law school.

As Maimonides once said, "that didn't work out."

In the first half of my career I kept mum about my father because I didn't want people to think I was a "Nepo-baby." That he had used his connections and lifted a finger to help me. He didn't. So I built a Maginot Line between his successful career and my career--which was a struggle to get started.

In the second half of my career I kept mum about my father because his career had blossomed so long ago it would be like a Homo Sapiens praising his Australopithecus ancestors. Or like Aaron Judge, the Yankee Slugger of today, praising Frank "Home Run" Baker, who led the American League in homers  with 11 in 1911, 10 in 1912, and a whopping 12 in 1913. By today's judgments, those numbers are almost comical. It's better off cosigning people like Baker, and maybe my father, too, to Comrade Nikita's "ash heap of history."

To say I had a fractured relationship with my father would be like saying j.d. vance has charisma issues. As the grey-eyed, owl-holding goddess Athena said to Odysseus, "Few sons are the equals of their fathers. Most fall short, all too few surpass them.” Suffice to say, I saw the fist-side of my father more than I had wished, and never quite adjusted to the taste of full-frontal linoleum. I fell short in that. And so many other ways.

Now and again, I run across an old old-timer. As opposed to me, a mere old-timer. About once a year one of these people will ask me about my dad. It's been almost a quarter of a century since he died, and he and I have found more peace than we ever before shared when he wasn't dead, drunk or en-coma-'d.

Just yesterday my scheduled Friday post was pre-empted.

From out of the blue, I got a note from ad legend Tom Yobage on LinkedIn. I had heard of Tom. In ad circles he was well-known. However, though we had 18 connections in common (a full 25% of his total connections) we had not LinkedIn. 

I dunno what prompted Tom to write to me. But he did. And I bring you his note in toto, and a lesson he learned from my father without changing a single poignant word.

Thanks, Tom.

tomyobage@xxxxxx.com <tomyobage@aol.com>	10:32 AM (6 hours ago)
to me

George –

Many years ago, when I was a young copywriter working at Doyle Dane Bernbach on the Volkswagen account, late one night my TV producer Jim de Barros and I were flying west when we met your father on the plane.

Those were the glory days in advertising.  Full 15% commissions.  We flew first class.

Your father, Jim, and I were the only ones sitting upfront.  We quickly learned we all worked in advertising.

Jim and I were heading west to meet up with DDB art director Charlie Piccirillo. We were over-the-top with enthusiasm.  We were about to shoot a network TV spot.  A full :60.  Big budget.  Famous name director.

Your father said he was Chairman of Kenyon & Eckhardt. Said he was on his way to a big Lincoln Mercury dealer meeting/convention.

“Oh, are you going to present a new campaign?” asked Jim.

“No. Something more important,” said your father.  His goal, he said, was to have the Lincoln Mercury dealers stay with their current campaign -- and not ask for a new one.

Your father said the current Lincoln Mercury campaign was a rarity.  Something really special: The client loved it. The agency was proud of it.  And it was working with car buyers.

He said conventional wisdom in Detroit was:  new model year = new advertising campaign. 

But, he said, before you throw out a campaign that’s pleasing the client, pleasing the agency, and working with consumers --- you should look very carefully at what you have that’s working so well for you before you replace it with something new, something you’re doing just for the sake of doing something new.

A few years later, I moved on from VW --- and created campaigns for cameras, copiers, breath fresheners, antiperspirants, frozen entrees, gasoline, motor oil,  airlines, typewriters, computers, and tater tots. (I stayed at Doyle Dane Bernbach forever.)

Not often, but every once in awhile, I’d hear a client say:  “Great campaign, Tommy.  What are you going to do for us next year?”

But why change a campaign that both client and agency like and that’s working?  I always thought of your father and used the arguments he outlined that night on the plane. They always made perfect sense to me. Sometimes I’d win. Sometimes I’d lose.  But I always used your father’s thinking.

That night on the plane, your father taught me one of the most important lessons in advertising.

-

Thanks, Tommy.

For teaching me something I didn't know about my father.