Advertising holding companies and Sears.

There's a review in today's "Business Week" of a book called "Denial: Why Business Leaders Fail to Look Facts in the Face—and What to Do About It," which primarily focuses on the demise of Sears, once the largest retailer in the world. You can read the whole review here: http://www.businessweek.com/managing/content/feb2010/ca20100225_569590.htm

Reading the review, it struck me how similarly Sears and advertising holding companies behave. Here's a for instance: in 1967, the CEO of Sears, Gordon Metcalf decreed "Being the largest retailer in the world, we thought we should have the largest headquarters in the world." Sears then built the 110-story Sears Tower. Six years later in 1973, Sears' Chairman Arthur Wood decorated his opulent office with works by Degas and Monet. I'm thinking of the enormous offices--the entire holding companies floors--of people who don't make ads.

Starting 1974--36 years ago!--Sears' sales started to decline. Rather than focus on their core business, retailing, Sears bought real estate company Coldwell-Banker and financial broker Dean Witter. Here's the line that nails it for me: "Why the company's CEOs thought they would do better managing businesses in industries they did not understand than they would in general merchandise retailing remains one of life's mysteries." I'm thinking of holding companies buying auto-racing teams, sports marketers, talent agencies, etc.

This is really simple. If you're in the ad business, make ads, sell ads, distribute ads. That's the business you're in. But I've yet to see a holding company have this as their mission statement: "We make ads that make money for the companies who run them."

Sunday haiku.

Come Sunday, fourish,
I wish someone invented,
Weekend savings time.

Courtesy of Bob and Ray.

Some advertising slogans by the great comedians.

* The Monongahela Metal Foundry ("Casting steel ingots with the housewife in mind")
* Einbinder Flypaper ("The brand you've gradually grown to trust over the course of three generations")
* The United States Post Office ("Makers and distributors of stamps")
* The Croftweiler Industrial Cartel ("Makers of all sorts of stuff, made out of everything")
* Cool Canadian Air ("Packed fresh every day in the Hudson Bay and shipped to your door")
* Grime ("The magic shortening that spreads like lard")
* The United States Mint ("One of the nation's leading producers of genuine U.S. currency")
* Fanucchi ("With or without nuts, the greatest name in fudge")
* Kretchford Braid and Tassel ("Next time you think of braid or tassel, rush into your neighborhood store and shout, 'Kretchford'!")

Another reason I am thankful for advertising.

I have two lamps on either side of my bed that needed rewiring. It took me an hour and 33 minutes to do a job that would probably take someone with skills 20 minutes.

Nontent.

Not long ago I invented the word nontent for "content" that is neither interesting nor well-produced.

Today I had a discussion with a Fortune 500 client about their You Tube channel. I noticed that this company with $10 billion in sales has a You Tube channel with 72 followers. Ad Aged which has no real axe to grind and really is about my need to write every day, has 56 followers.

Not sure what the point is. But there's one in there somewhere.

Two minutes with upper management.

Courtesy of the Ad Contrarian.

Small clients run small ads.

That's all for now.

The phrase that says it all.

"Vision without resources is a hallucination.
Resources without vision is a waste of time."

My friend RR called the above to my attention.

Will Madison Avenue become Tokyo?

"Toyota had lost sight of quality in its quest for quantity." --Akio Toyoda

Eventually nearly every business faces a quandary. How do we do what's made us successful more often and in more places so we can make more money? For a while, you resolve to hire the best people. You inculcate them in your culture. You rally them and they perform. It works. You get bigger and better.

But then, inevitably, the talent pool runs dry. So, because your shareholders and country homes are clamoring for more cash, you begin to lower your standard. You accept lesser people. You chasten your ambition. You segregate. You say things like "we have accounts that win us awards and other accounts that make us rich."

You continue to grow. You continue to acquire accounts that make you richer. You take your eye off the awards accounts because of the massive amounts of revenue coming from the rich accounts.

The downward continues. Your level of talent begins to match the quality of your accounts.

And all of a sudden, you wake up one morning and you suck.

The writer stumbles.

Last night, late, I stumbled upon an important essay, "10 Tricks to Good Writing" by the brilliant and prolific author, Elmore Leonard. You can read the whole thing here: http://www.nytimes.com/2001/07/16/books/16LEON.html?pagewanted=1 but, Leonard, being a good writer sums up his entire essay in just a few words.

"My most important rule is one that sums up the 10.
If it sounds like writing, I rewrite it."

While Leonard's rules are specifically about writing, everyone of them can be brought back to advertising. People in advertising most often are comfortable making ads that "sound like ads." It's comfortable. It's something you've seen before. It's comforting. It's what you expect.

That's advertising at its very second best.