Crowley Webb Blog

Friends in high places.

Dave Buck turned 50 recently and we honored his birthday as only an ad agency can. At the corner of Harlem and Kensington, just up the street from Dave's house, we erected a testament to his half-century on Earth.

To see Dave's birthday billboard up close, click on the image here. We wouldn't want you to miss it.

Run, Chris, run.

Our own Chris Muldoon has quickly become one of the Buffalo area’s top competitive runners since moving here in January. This summer he competed in the JPMorgan Chase Corporate Challenge, an internationally known race he’s had his eye on since college. When we asked him at the coffee machine the next day how he’d done in the Challenge, he shrugged his shoulders and answered, “Oh, I won.” More than 11,000 people competed in the event.

The unassuming 23-year-old started running cross country and track in 7th grade. He was a team captain and made it to states four times during high school. After high school, he applied to Syracuse University’s Newhouse School of Public Communications – not only because it’s one of the nation’s premier communications programs, but also because SU offers Division I cross-country and track. In his freshman year at SU, Chris was named the cross country team’s Most Outstanding Newcomer. He finished his sophomore-year season by recording the top times by an SU runner at the BIG EAST Championship, NCAA Regional, and IC4A Championship. Not surprisingly, he was named SU track and field’s Most Valuable Male Athlete for that year. He also served as captain of the cross country team, and found time to complete a dual degree in advertising and psychology.

In addition to the Corporate Challenge, Chris has won the Depew-Lancaster Boys & Girls Club 10K and he placed 9th overall in the Buffalo Subaru 4-Mile Chase, for which he was awarded the customary pink flamingo. He’s a member of a competitive running club, the Genesee Valley Harriers. On October 28th, he and several other Harriers traveled to Boston, Mass., to run in one of the most competitive cross-country races in the eastern U.S. – the Mayor’s Cup 8K.

“Our team placed second overall,” he said the next day at work. “It was the best finish in club history.” Well, how did he do, we asked him. “Oh, I was pretty happy with my results,” he answered, telling us only after more prodding that he placed 25th out of nearly 800 runners. Then he headed out for his daily 8-10 mile run, which is part of his 70-mile-a-week training regimen (luckily, CWA is equipped with a shower).

Subtlety is key when featuring talking animals in advertisements.

by matt low

Hockey season has returned, and with it a television commercial I am rather fond of. If you live in Buffalo and watch the Sabres, you’ve undoubtedly seen the Labatt spot with the fish phoning the guy at work and chastising him for being at the office on a Saturday. If you’re unfamiliar, check it out.

I smile every time the fish in a calm, quiet tone says, “You’re at work? It’s Saturday. We’ve been waiting for you since sunrise.” He (the fish) seems rational about the situation, until the man explains he has a bunch of work that needs attention. The fish then announces to his captured friend, “He’s not coming!” followed by the whiny “Real good, Steve. Real good.” It’s all about understated delivery.

Then there’s this commercial’s stepbrother featuring a deer harassing a man in a hardware store. All nuance is lost, as the deer immediately abuses the man verbally with a venomous tongue. He goes as far as to curse the man as he walks off camera. You’d think that would be amusing – a deer swearing at a man for not visiting his family in the forest – but it just comes off mean spirited.

My hope is that the third installment of the series will feature a bird rather than a bear.

VH1’s mind is apparently in the gutter.

The blog for VH1’s show Best Week Ever picked up a television spot we created for our client Think Financial. Check it out and make your own anatomical judgment.

You’re invited to commit petty larceny.

by matt low

Last night during game one of the World Series, Taco Bell introduced their brilliant new cross-promotion, “Steal A Base, Steal A Taco.” The premise being, if a player steals a base during the game, America (or you) is invited to steal a taco from Taco Bell.

You’re obviously not encouraged to literally “steal” the taco. They aren’t asking you to walk to your neighborhood restaurant with a weapon or some other tool of persuasion and demand a taco. It’s just a name for a deal in which they’ll give you seventy-nine cents of “beef” and flour tortilla if something happens in the baseball game that tends not to happen every game (most certainly not in a 13-1 blowout).

While watching the game, my thoughts drifted not to those people who were hoping a base would be stolen so they might receive a free taco, but to those who are such slaves to the notion of getting free stuff they were actually hoping a base wouldn’t be stolen lest they be forced to travel to a Taco Bell and actually consume the most dismal item on a mostly unnerving menu.

My guess is these people won’t be watching game two.

A regal question.

by Dave Buck

With all apologies to the fine folks at Shea's Buffalo Theater, does anyone else think it's funny to see Lou Diamond Phillips as King Arthur?

Customers do grow on trees.

by Karen Grobe

Today’s businesspeople are exposed to an increasing number of messages every day – so even business-to-business advertisers have to think of new and innovative ways to make their communications stand out. Take, for example, a recent direct mail piece designed by Crowley Webb and Associates for Praxis Communications.

Praxis, a patient recruitment firm in Nashville, TN, works with pharmaceutical companies to recruit participants for drug trials. Essentially, Praxis helps the companies fill their studies with the right people. Crowley Webb’s concept was rooted in the idea that recruiting patients for pharmaceutical studies is not easy. The direct mail piece was an actual 6-foot-tall fichus tree, with cutout people hanging from its branches, that was delivered to prospects’ offices. The message on the cutouts read, “In the real world, patients don’t grow on trees. But luckily there’s Praxis.” This piece employed a fresh take on a familiar adage, and combined a strong message with a unique execution to make a lasting impression.

A live tree as a direct mail piece? Now that’s thinking outside the box.

Generation Y.

by Cindy Hennessey

I went to my son’s high school open house. He's taking a marketing class, and I sat in on the presentation his teacher gave. The teacher, let’s call him Mr. M., was describing some of the projects he would be giving his students throughout the year. He rarely gave homework, he explained, opting instead to have students do hands-on projects during class. (I had just read a marketing plan my son and his team had written for a new product they’d created: an energy drink called VelociTea.)

Oh, and there was no textbook for the class, Mr. M. added, because Generation Y doesn’t take the time to read. (The term Generation Y, by the way, first appeared in an August 1993 Advertising Age editorial to describe those born between 1985 and 1995. Today it includes anyone born between 1976 and 2000.)

I thought about my 16-year-old and 13-year-old at home. True, they rarely sat down with a book or newspaper. Yet they constantly amazed me with their knowledge of the world and of how things work. They’re my kids, so I don’t look at them in terms of demographics or statistics. But I started wondering about what type of consumers and – if they become entrepreneurs, which is likely given the shrinking opportunities in corporate America – what type of marketers they’ll eventually be.

So I did a little online research about my kids’ generation, and here’s what I found out:

• At 70 million strong, Generation Y is the biggest demographic group to hit the American scene since the Baby Boomers. In the next decade, Gen Y will represent 41% of the U.S. population.

• Every generation is shaped by cultural and political events of its time. This group has been weaned on some rather nasty and transformative national traumas – including the O.J. and Monica scandals, the 1999 Columbine school shootings, and a presidential election that failed to pick a winner. And all this before September 11.

• In a 2000 survey of Gen Y buying habits, Cone/Roper found that 91% of teens valued companies and products that support good causes, and 89% of teens would be likely to switch brands to one associated with a good cause. In anecdotal follow-ups, Cone/Roper found comments like this from a 16-year-old in Charlotte, N.C., to be typical: “The idea that an airplane crashed into a 110-story tower and thousands of people were pretty much executed, that makes you set aside all the materialistic things and all the little selfish ‘whatevers’.” She said it made her want to “give back.” John Burnett, professor of marketing at the University of Denver’s Daniels College of Business, put it this way: “They are far more socially conscious than any generation since World War II.”

• Gen Y is also remarkably diverse – and noticeably tolerant. About one-third is minorities, primarily African-Americans and Hispanics. One in four lives in a single-parent home. Every high school student seems to know someone who’s gay. And none of these scenarios is a big deal.

• At the same time, traditional values and parental approval are important, more so than for Generation X before them.

• The most common characteristic of Gen Y-ers is that their awareness level is very high. Given their hours spent in front of TVs and computers, they’ve grown up on slick ads and commercial messages. As a result, they don’t trust advertising.

My son and I had a conversation recently about global warming. When I asked him about purchasing a laptop, he had definite and informed opinions about which one was best – and it wasn’t the most expensive one. My daughter shops at a consignment shop geared to teens, because she thinks it’s ridiculous (for me) to spend $60 on a new pair of jeans. My son’s marketing class is scheduled to go on a field trip to one of Buffalo’s largest malls. Mr. M. says they will come away with valuable knowledge about how stores market their wares, even down to the distinct and deliberate aromas that waft through each store as people shop.

I wonder how that knowledge will be applied?

JCPenney promotes fantasy football for some reason.

by matt low

While perusing a sports website the other day, my eyes fell upon a banner ad that I just couldn’t ignore. It featured a classically creepy-looking mannequin seated at a dinner table with a human female. The headline read, “Free up your schedule with a stand-in.” The advertiser was the JCPenney Men’s Store. I was immediately skeptical of the video I was prompted to watch by a “Watch the video” command in the corner of the banner ad due to the fact that the only link between the merchant and this obviously fake service they were endorsing is that they have mannequins in their physical stores. However, the look on the mannequin’s face got the better of me and I obeyed the banner ad’s direction.

At the campaign site, I was treated to a video of a woman in a restaurant having her wine glass filled. But the filling doesn’t stop. The wine goes all over the table, creating a terrible mess. It is revealed that the pourer was the mannequin featured in the banner ad – no surprises there. Then came the payoff. “It’s fantasy football. Real life can wait.”

Okay, fine, I get it.

This woman’s husband is so into fantasy football, he has secretly replaced himself at a dinner date with his wife in mid-wine pour (mannequin can’t pick up wine bottles) with a mannequin. But what does JCPenney have to do with fantasy football? Luckily, this was just one video in a series, so maybe collectively they made sense.

Wrong.

Each video (there are actually seven of these things, with more on the way) opens with a headline. One is actually directly related to fantasy football, though there was still no clue as to how JCPenney is. Others, such as, “Walking the dog a drag? Get a stand-in.” and “Sometimes parenting stinks. Get a stand-in.” manage to confuse the issue even further. So, wait, am I getting a stand-in because I don’t like doing certain chores around the house, like walking the dog or changing a diaper, or am I getting a stand-in because I need more time to dedicate to fantasy football? And what does JCPenney have to do with fantasy football again?

My head hurts.

I would be remiss if I didn’t mention the single most bizarre ad in this campaign. It features a headline at the open that reads, “The honeymoon is so over. Get a stand-in.” We then see our friend in bed reading a book about marriage (upside down!) next to an aggravated human female.

What?

To put it mildly, this effort is a mess from top to bottom. The only redeeming quality is the sometimes amusing sight of a mannequin performing daily tasks (in one episode, he gets burned by a backyard grill – funny!). That is, if the campaign can be redeemed at all. And as I’m still unsure as to the point of the whole thing, does it even deserve redemption?

Find out for yourself at http://www.jcpbrands.com/fantasyfootball/index.html?vid=7&cm_mmc=Event-_-MensContinuity-_-ESPN_HP_1015-_-728x90. (That kind of says it all.)

October 12, 2007

by Pete Reiling

It is not uncommon for people from Buffalo to ask themselves why they live where they do. I myself have often wondered how the first Europeans who settled here rationalized the decision to stay put after their first brutal winter.

And all the winters after that. And the other catastrophes, large and small. The city's history is laden with disappointments and difficulties - some economic, some meteorological, some related to professional sporting teams.

One year ago today, a freak storm dumped a freak amount of snow on Buffalo's trees, still fully leaved. The resulting weight brought countless branches to the ground and left the trees, one of our unambiguously beautiful treasures, damaged and changed forever.

But, for the most part, they're still here. Their survival and resilience is perhaps too easy a metaphor for this odd city and its people, but there it is. And here we are.

Revering Sasquatch.

by matt low

Two knuckleheads driving down a forest road happen upon a large humanoid. Yep – it’s Bigfoot. Do they flee for their lives and report the sighting at the nearest ranger station? No. They offer the beast a ride. Now, you’ve undoubtedly played the “Hey, come to the car – ha, we just pulled away from you! Okay, come to the car for real this time – ha, we just pulled away from you!” joke on a younger sibling. However, you’ve most likely never played it with Sasquatch. Playing the game with Sasquatch – as our two friends discover – ends with you being ripped from the car through the windshield and hurled over a cliff.

If you’ve seen this TV spot, you’re probably thinking, “Hey, I’ve seen that TV spot.” If you haven’t, you owe it to yourself to head over to www.messinwithsasquatch.com. There, you’ll discover the spots actually have an advertiser – Jack Link’s Beef Jerky. You’ll also be able to watch the entire ad campaign and even mess with Sasquatch yourself (a virtual version which cannot harm you).

What I admire about this campaign – aside from the physical violence – is the brilliance of the advertiser to realize they sell a product that is pretty much the same as their competition. Beef jerky is beef jerky is beef jerky. This realization freed them up to create a TV campaign with the sole purpose of being memorable and creating a buzz.

But will it move their product?

Well, the next time you’re in a gas station and decide you want to shell out six dollars or so for four ounces of dehydrated meat, and choose Jack Link’s because you remember those silly TV commercials where Bigfoot beats some goofball senseless for pulling a prank on him, the answer will be obvious.