Jean Renoir.

As I have noted previously in this Ad Aged, Jean Renoir probably has more "great" movies to his credit than nearly any other film maker ever. "Grand Illusion," "La Bête Humaine," "Rules of the Game." Today I watched "Boudu Saved from Drowning" which he filmed in 1932. If you have 85 minutes and a Netflix account, or a decent video store nearby, you really ought to see it. It will both hand you a laugh and make you think.

The clip I've pasted here is pretty good, not funny but wonderful. And remarkably "modern" considering it's pushing 80.

Having beers with the holding companies.

As a creative guy or more accurately a creative guy who is these days regarded as highly paid, I thought it made sense to get together over beers with the head of an advertising agency holding company and a senior account guy and figure out how to iron-out our difficulties.

I decided to have a Brooklyn Lager, partly an homage to a creative guy, Milton Glaser, who designed the logo, partly because it's a micro-brew without the pretense and partly because I happen to like it.

The account guy stammered for a minute, assured me that he'd charge it all on his card, and then looked around to see what beer others were ordering.

The holding company guy eschewed beer and ordered a $600 1996 Mouton Rothschild (Pauillac) and billed it to the agency.

I started the proceedings, once again, hoping to smooth our differences.

CREATIVE: I don't think you all give creative the respect it deserves.
ACCOUNT: Creative ideas can come from anywhere.
HOLDING CO: Is this billable?
CREATIVE: I've always felt that agencies make a product--that product is a creative idea that helps a client's business.
ACCOUNT: Well, the new model is a paradigm of convergence in the modalities of media shift to Twitter.
HOLDING CO: I couldn't agree more.
CREATIVE: It seems we have more people running around preparing decks for meetings than we have actually thinking of ideas for the client.
ACCOUNT: We have four FTEs in creative on our biggest account and once you've exceeded your hours we have to pull the plug.
HOLDING CO: Listen, I have a plane to catch.

With that the holding company guy and the account guy pushed back their chairs and left.

I was stuck with the check.

The 90-10 rule.

America, economists and financiers tell us, is in a post-industrial age. We are no longer the envy of the world because of factories like Willow Run and no longer can we out-produce the rest of the world combined. No, when we want a plastic tomato that walks or even a dreidel for Chanukah, we have to send to China to supply our wants.

Now, there are those that say we live in a service economy and the service factor of the products that are sold here are more important than ever. That is, if you buy a computer or an automobile, chances are your ability to get service for that product is a factor in your decision. So, if service is so important to our economy, why does it suck so bad.

Here's why, in a word, software. Or more accurately those managers who believe that software or science or technology can answer all our service needs. These are the people who create phone trees, mechanized voices and who construct service models that ask for your 16-digit account number 12 times in a single call. These are the cost-cutters who seem to assure the line at the counter is always eight deep and hell will freeze over before you can find knowledgeable help at a chain store.

I have a simple rule, I call it the 90-10 rule. 90% of all customer problems probably can be solved by software. 90% of the books you're looking for at Barnes & Nobel can probably be found via an in-store computer. But 10% of problems need a person's-involvement. A person to say "how can I help you?" A person who is empowered and not following a script that makes them essentially software-based protoplasm. A person who can say "thank you" with conviction.

My sense is that if a FedEx or a Home Despot or even a car company announced that they followed the 90-10 rule, customers would flock to them.

But I am crazy and no one listens to me.

Thinking about money.

Maybe it's endemic to my generation--a generation raised by parents of the Great Depression (the first one) but I spend a good amount of time thinking about money. There's nothing wrong with money--money isn't the root of all evil, the reckless pursuit of money is. Nevertheless, of late, maybe because the economy is so gloomy and my kids are so expensive I've been thinking about it a lot.

Just today I came upon this article from last Sunday's Wall Street Journal: "Cash-Strapped California's IOUs: Just the Latest Sub for Dollars" As neo-fascist as the Journal is, you have to give them credit--they can really write. http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124846739587579877.html

The article talks about substitutes for cash through the ages. Municipalities and businesses issuing IOUs on lumber, old tires and clam shells. But my favorite of all was from Minneapolis which gave out "sauerkraut notes" instead of cash.

I know the job market sucks right now and beggars can't be choosers but I draw the line at sauerkraut.

Only in America.

I will be the first to admit, I am educated, perhaps over-educated and more than a bit of a book snob. Nevertheless, I'll stop on occasion at the air-craft carrier-sized Barnes & Noble in my neighborhood. For one thing, it's the only place in the area that sells DVDs (and now the Criterion Collection is marked down 50%) and for another, they do have a lot of books and being around books is better than a poke in the eye regardless of how disorganized they are and how ill-informed their sales staff is.

However the sign that I just saw pushed me over the edge.
It read: "NEW HISTORY."

Science over creativity. Again.

In Sunday's New York Times there was a fairly large article called "Lab Watches Web Surfers to See Which Ads Work".
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/27/technology/27disney.html?pagewanted=1&ref=media It's a story of a Disney-owned research center that tracks eye movement, uses heart-rate monitors, skin temperatures and, via probes attached to facial muscles, facial expressions. All of it is an attempt (once again) to sciencify how people respond to ads so networks or networks of networks, like Disney, can wrest more of the web's advertising dollars for their coffers. It is estimated by eMarketer that web advertising revenue will grow from $25 billion this year to $37 billion in 2013.

Oy vey iz mir, as my Puerto Rican friends like to say. This is yet another attempt to learn the rules that will causally lead to marketing or programming success. No such rules exist, they never have and they never will. My belief is that research such as this is a lot like bug spray or a flu shot. It will work for a while and under certain conditions, but eventually adjustments are made that render the formula ineffective. That's just life, ok?

Since Gilgamesh which was written around 4,200 years ago, or the Iliad which was written about 2,800 years ago, the central precepts of communication have not changed. They won't change any time soon.

So wire us up. Watch us watching things. And draw your expensive conclusions. It's as easy to ignore science as it is to ignore a boring ad.

Classics.

Yesterday my wife went to a discount store downtown and bought herself a collection of outfits the likes of which Zsa Zsa Gabor would envy. While she was there, she also bought me a pair of boxer shorts.

Of course like nearly everything you buy these days, these shorts have a label on the outside--I suppose for your reading pleasure. That label reads in all caps "CLASSIC UNDERWEAR."

Now, I'll admit, the shorts are darn nice, roomy in the "seat" and large enough upfront for my not inconsiderable manhood. But CLASSIC is a term I've always reserved for Shakespeare, or the Parthenon, or Michelangelo, or even, the Honeymooners.

I understand that underwear advertising probably necessitates a bit of hype, but I prefer my underwear understated.

Dumb ad (strategy) of the day.

Now that The Tour de France is over, it's time for some news about The Tour de France. It seems that Lance Armstrong has signed with a new team for next year's race--Team Radio Shack. A full-page ad in The New York Times heralds this occasion.

I'll be the first to admit there's a lot about the world I don't understand. String Theory. Things being too big to fail (I'm 6'2" and 200 lbs. and I've never had a problem failing.) And sports sponsorship.

What will Radio Shack gain from giving a couple million simoleons to Armstrong? Here's a chain named after a nearly obsolete technology and a sort of rickety, sub-standard structure. Will Armstrong's glow change my perception of the store? Will I be any more inclined to buy small robotic bugs for $9.95? Likewise, do I feel any better about the rapacious robbers at Citibank because their logo and name is emblazoned on a ball-park built by tax-payer dollars? Did I believe for a second that Tiger Woods drove a Buick except for the Buick-inspired mammon he received?

No, I don't think so. Sports sponsorship is yet another brain-child of some MBA as a way of reaching people through their "affinities." I suppose it's way more effective than actually providing value.

It was hot today in New York.

It was so hot today in New York, my cab driver was steaming vegetables in his turban and I was sweating like a Priest at a Little League game. As a consequence I got a hankering for some soft-serve ice cream. I noticed a brand called "Frogurt" and the slogan "the first name in frozen yogurt." It just made me wonder what frozen yogurt's last name is.

Late breaking hotdog news and a metaphor.

I just came across this in The New York Times. It seems that the Oscar Meyer Weiner mobile has crashed into a house in Racine, Wisconsin. I suppose if you have the appetite for it, you can read the whole thing here: http://wheels.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/07/25/a-busy-time-on-the-wienermobile-beat/?hp

Now I've always been a Hebrew National man myself. However, I won't bring religion into it. It does seem to be an apt metaphor for brands that work hard to create an image and then do something ruinous to that image. Like crash into your house.