Sep 03

Campbell Mithun Provides Pro Bono Advertising for Local United Way Campaign

Tagged in: News Releases
Posted by: Kristine Olson | Comment (0)

Ads urge community:  “When you can’t do, donate.”

MINNEAPOLIS – Greater Twin Cities United Way’s workplace campaign has launched with ads donated by local agency Campbell Mithun. The “When you can’t do, donate” campaign emphasizes the make-a-difference power of a donation to the United Way.  Ads feature people (real donors, by the way) who want “to do something” for others but feel ill-equipped to give hands-on help: a cook offers a burned turkey, a handyman falls off a ladder, etc.

“We wanted to capture the giving spirit of the Twin Cities community, but with a lighthearted approach appropriate for these economic times,” said executive creative director Reid Holmes.  “These are fun, self-deprecating reminders that a donation to the United Way is easy and helps the community in very specific ways.”

Campbell Mithun developed versions of the creative for billboards, radio spots, online video and digital banners.  Digital ads offer click-through-to-donate functionality, and donors can follow “yourUWdonations” via Twitter for updates about local donations in action.  Advertising placements were secured by Haworth Media and will run from the end of August into October.

This campaign marks the sixth year Campbell Mithun has provided pro bono work to support Greater Twin Cities United Way’s workplace campaign.  Chaired this year by US Bancorp CEO Richard Davis, the 2010 effort aims to raise $87 million to address the most pressing needs in the Minneapolis / St. Paul metro area. In past years, the annual drive has secured donations from approximately 120,000 donors at 1,200 different workplaces. 

About Campbell Mithun

Since its formation in 1933, Campbell Mithun has a history of philanthropy inspired by founder Ray Mithun, who served on many community boards, set up minority scholarships at the U of MN, endowed a Chair of Advertising there and is quoted as saying:  “There is no lasting success, happiness or reward unless a man is truly useful – useful to his family, to his business and to his community.”  Current agency CEO Steve Wehrenberg teaches at the U of MN and sits on Greater Twin Cities United Way’s board of directors.

Campbell Mithun has a national brand-building reputation and, with its Compass Point Media unit and BrandOptix package-design resource, continues to build client marketplace success by making Everything Talk at each (increasingly granular) point of customer contact. 

Websites:  www.cmithun.com; www.compasspoint-media.com; www.brandoptix.com

 

Sep 02

A Final Word from the 2010 Lucky 13 Interns

Tagged in: Everything Talks
Posted by: Kristine Olson | Comment (0)

 The end of summer has brought the departure of our six fantastic Lucky 13 interns.  (Sniffle.)
 In true over-achieving form, they pulled together a “goodbye” in two formats: a presentation deck (by Caroline Rudzinski)  

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and a five-minute “Third- and Final-Impressions Video.”  

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Take a quick look at either, and you’ll see why we were the lucky ones to have this crew around. 

--Kristine Olson, director of corporate communications, Lucky 13 fan

Aug 31

Local ad agency gets "Mad Men" mention

Tagged in: In the News
Posted by: Kristine Olson | Comment (0)

LINK - STAR TRIBUNE 8.31.10

Aug 25

Google to be Microsoft for Smartphones

Posted by: Chris Wexler, Media | Comment (0)


Quantcast had a very interesting recent post on their blog outlining how Apple, despite the amazing success of the iPhone 4, is losing share every month to Google’s Android smartphone operating system.

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In fact, the trend is clear.  It is just a matter of time until Android overtakes iOS (Apple’s operating system) in usage.  If the iPhone 4 can’t hold off the charging masses of the HTC Incredible, Sprint Evo 4G (also by HTC) and the Motorola Droid X is it time to panic in Cupertino?  Not quite.  Just look at recent history – in fact – look at Apple’s recent history.

Here are two companies, Google and Apple, lead by some very smart people, falling into the same patterns that we saw in the mid ‘90s with the rise of the PC.  Not that I need to remind most people, but when PCs went mainstream, Microsoft Windows won the battle.  They went with a more open infrastructure, providing a cheap, inter-operable system for any PC manufacturer to adopt.  With an aggressive pricing strategy and a developer-friendly focus, they quickly dominated the entire PC operating system market.  Today, there are around 1 billion PCs running Microsoft Windows.  It was a business success not seen since the time of the Gettys, Carnegies and Morgans.  Sound familiar?  That is Android’s business plan, only they are giving it away for free so Google can own the app store and keep the search traffic in network.

It is largely forgotten, but Apple was much more prominent than Microsoft when they started their PC ascendency.  It was said that Apple could have owned the PC.  But they chose not to.  And it looks like they are going to make that choice again with smart phones.  For all the smoke, an expansion of the iPhone to Verizon has been just that.  Smoke.  I have no doubt that Apple will expand carrier partnerships someday, but that will never be their focus.  Their focus will be crazy tight integration of software and hardware with a best in class approach to smartphones, share be damned – just like they did with PCs.  Why?  To protect margin.  Despite having a massively smaller user base than Microsoft, Apple is making a higher profit than Microsoft these days.  And organizationally were ready for the next wave in MP3s and now Phones. 

What do I take away from this?  There are always multiple ways to “win” for our clients.  Sometimes you grab the profits sitting right in front of you.  But sometimes you need to look down the path and strategically give up near term “wins” for long term brand health (and profits).  At times, business objectives need to look beyond this quarter or even year.  Think about what success looks like before you make your first move.  Until you do that you will rarely get there.

-- Chris Wexler, VP/director of digital media, smartphone addict, Compass Point Media

Aug 18

Food Carts, Pop-Tarts and New Marketing

Posted by: Lance Saunders | Comment (0)

Since moving to Minneapolis, I have come to love our independent restaurants that use local ingredients. But last month as I was walking around Portland, Oregon for the first time and looking for something to eat to avoid the dreaded-but-forthcoming focus-group sandwich (do focus-group food caterers also supply food for the nation’s prison system?), some of the best smells I have ever experienced came wafting from a posse of food carts in a parking lot close to the hotel.  With them came a lesson on having a brand “experience.”

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I asked our cabbie and local foodie Tracy about the Food Carts (yes, cabbie and local foodie – he and his wife even have a website), and he mentioned that the carts are ingrained into Portland’s food culture.  While some vendors cannot afford to run a stand-alone restaurant, many others also have traditional restaurants but use carts to reach out new people and offer new experiences. (Tracy also recommended doughnuts at Voodoo, which we wolfed down at 7 am in his cab on the way to the airport. Try the Bacon Maple Bar with a whole piece of cooked bacon on top -- as an ex-pat Canadian I am still very  partial to Tim Horton’s, but I digress…) 

In cities like New York, street food culture has become so ingrained in the food scene that they even hold annual food cart awards: the “Vendies.”  As chef Mario Batali put it, the awards are “the Oscars of street food for the real New York.” I remember every summer in Toronto making lunch pilgrimages to Little India on Gerrard Street for the roasted Indian sweet corn sold off a cart.

Now that the Minneapolis City Council has recently relaxed some of the municipal food street codes we should hopefully see more food carts here.  I was excited to read on the local food blog Heavy Table highlights about some local food-vending carts. I found most interesting, though, that like Portland, at least five of the carts mentioned -- Meritage, 128 Café, The Brothers Deli, Cruzn Café, and Sonny’s Ice Cream -- also have stand-alone restaurants to accompany their new meals on wheels.

So what does this all have to do with an agency blog beyond an excuse to talk about my love for doughnuts and good cheap eats? First, here’s a shout out to these restaurateurs and others who are out there serving up great street food; let’s support them. But secondly, these chefs and cooks know something intuitively about marketing that many CPG clients don’t:  how important it is to provide customers with new ways to experience your brand.

As Christopher Stuzman a principal analyst at Forrester Research recently argued on the World Advertising Research Center Site (WARC), winning companies today have moved beyond the tried and true marketing techniques to create genuine product experiences: ‘‘While consumers are tuning out marketing messages, they are actually seeking out more product experiences.’’  While this might sound like heresy to read on an agency blog, I agree with his comment that marketers today are relying too much on communications to build their brands.

Just recently an old brand I used to work on, Pop-Tarts, was all over the news for opening up a store in Times Square. I honestly can’t remember when one of our old Pop-Tarts :30 TV ads got any kind of coverage no matter how high our ASI/Millward Brown test  scores might have been. But here it was mentioned from coast-to-coast in the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, CNN, CBS, Howard Stern (guilty pleasure) and many other media outlets. The Pop-Tarts store is now serving customized and unique food offerings (including Pop-Tarts sushi, which is not as scary as it sounds). They have joined M&M’s and Hershey’s in providing new ways to experience the brand.

If you want to go back to the old research-testing methodologies, as wrong as they are, I would bet lunch (at any local food cart) that the day–after-recall among those visiting Pop-Tarts World is higher than that among viewers of any of their TV spots. The recall does not even measure how people talk about and see the brand as more fun, contemporary and creative. But beyond putting all of your money into pop-up stores and less in our own media department, Christopher back at Forrester argues winning brands today are also baking marketing into their product as well. From Method to Dyson’s new bladeless fans, they are building in product experiences at the design level.  For more on this subject read Alex Bogusky and John Winser’s book called “Baked In’’ -- the premise is essentially that your product, not your marketing, is your most effective tool. Put another way the message is not the product, the product is the message.

Never mind the obvious and cliché example of pointing out the product experience of Apple products; but  have you ever opened a new Apple package? The packaging is designed as well as the product. I left my Apple TV inside the package for about an hour after I opened it, as I did not want to disturb it -- it was like cutting into a beautiful cake.

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In regards to building or baking in a product experience, last week while in Toronto and shopping in a men’s store called Got Style, I was given a free Stella Artois beer-experience kit, which highlighted the special nine-step pouring ritual for having a great glass of Stella. (Yes, it is a lot more than just popping off the cap and quaffing.) Apparently Stella gave the kits to the store to give to their best customers – not me, but if you are friendly and nice sometimes you are rewarded. So guess what is chilling in my fridge? The brand with an experience -- in this case, a “pouring ritual.” As good as Stella’s TV ads are, they weren’t what won me over. (An aside: if you are ever in Toronto, pop into Got Style. It’s part men’s store and part spa/lounge with cool chairs for reading or watching sports. In other words, it’s an “experience.”)

To all the local chefs out there on the streets trying to reach new consumers and bring the mountain to Mohammed, all the best. I hope your customer lines are around the block. I especially look forward to lining up at the Smack Shack at 4th St N and 1st Ave for a lobster roll sandwich. To everyone else who’s still using the old 1960’s CPG textbook, time to write a new chapter.

-- Lance Saunders, EVP/Director of Account Planning, planner of good eats

 

Aug 16

Campbell Mithun and MRM Minneapolis Unite to Create Agency Aligned with Consumer-Engagement Needs of the Future

Posted by: Kristine Olson | Comment (0)

Campbell Mithun CEO Steve Wehrenberg names MRM managing director Rachael Marret as president 

MINNEAPOLIS – In a move that accelerates its digitally centric future, Campbell Mithun announced plans to unite with the Minneapolis office of MRM Worldwide, the leading digital agency in the Twin Cities.  The deal brings CEO Steve Wehrenberg additional assets for implementing his plan to optimize Campbell Mithun’s digital competence agency-wide and places MRM’s cutting-edge technology capabilities within deeper brand-building expertise.

“We’ve certainly been actively building our digital capabilities, but this combination instantly creates a full-service integrated offering with a deeper, more strategic digital competency than our typical competitors,” said Wehrenberg. “Rachael and her team will be incorporated not as a siloed department but infused throughout the agency.”

The new organization will retain the Campbell Mithun name as well as its Compass Point Media unit. As Campbell Mithun’s new president, Rachael Marret, a 15-year digital veteran, will oversee the integration of digital sensibilities throughout all aspects of the combined agency.

“This is a merger of equals,” said Marret.  “With our ability to create technically sophisticated, immersive consumer experiences and Campbell Mithun’s proven brand-building expertise, we’re powerfully equipped to forge the consumer-brand connections of the future.”

Digital Assets

MRM executives will play key leadership roles in bringing best-in-class expertise to Campbell Mithun’s existing digital capabilities. Lynn Cerra and Sean O’Brien will join the leadership team as director of integrated operations and director of technology and innovation, respectively.

“This team will bring to the next level our ability to deliver forward-thinking solutions that drive client business,” said Marret.  “Marketers now face an entirely new set of engagement needs; we’re placing ourselves ahead of that curve.”

The merger will deepen the combined agency’s ability to provide digital business strategy; user-experience planning; digital connections planning; systems architecture; mobile, game and other application development; agile development; social marketing and platforms; SEM/SEO; one-to-one digital communications; and performance analytics and optimization.

The Transition

Several factors will ease this transition for the two organizations.  Campbell Mithun and MRM are both owned by parent company IPG, and the sister agencies have worked together for 10+ years to serve a number of clients including General Mills, National City, H&R Block and Supervalu. 

“The merger is effective immediately, but our existing relationship and proximity gives us more time and flexibility to work out transition details and configure operations,” said Wehrenberg.

“Merging MRM Minneapolis with Campbell Mithun, provides our IPG sister agency with a stronger digital offering, said Reuben Hendell, MRM Worldwide Chief Executive Officer.  “Concurrently, MRM Worldwide will both be able to support an integrated offering for the Worldgroup’s Minneapolis-based clients and create more focused growth on its other North American offices in New York, San Francisco, Detroit, Princeton and Toronto, Canada.”

About MRM Worldwide, Minneapolis

MRM Worldwide, Minneapolis was created in 1999 resulting from a merger of two Twin Cities digital shops that grew up during the nascent years of the Web. Over the past decade, MRM has established itself as the leading, full-service digital marketing agency in the Twin Cities and has been part of the MRM Worldwide Network (www.mrmworldwide.com) -- one of the top five digital and direct agencies in the world.

About Campbell Mithun

Began in a post-depression era on the 13th floor of the Northwestern Bank building in Minneapolis, Campbell Mithun thrived due to Ray Mithun’s founding philosophy:  make “everything talk” for client brands.  The agency has built a national brand-building reputation and, with its Compass Point Media unit and BrandOptix package-design resource, continues to build client marketplace success by making Everything Talk at each (increasingly granular) point of customer contact.  

Aug 16

Rachael Marret Named Campbell Mithun President

Posted by: Kristine Olson | Comment (0)

MINNEAPOLIS – Rachael Marret, former managing director of digital agency MRM Worldwide Minneapolis, has become Campbell Mithun’s first female president after the two companies announced a merger earlier today.  A fifteen-year digital veteran, Marret will lead the charge to align the combined agency with future consumer-engagement needs.

“I’m happy to welcome Rachael to Campbell Mithun’s management team,” said agency CEO Steve Wehrenberg. “We’ve already had a very collaborative and successful partnership; going forward, we plan for her to focus on bringing our clients new solutions to drive business and build brands.”

Marret brings to the position more than 20 years of both agency and client marketing experience and, since 1995, has focused exclusively on marketing in the digital space.

“In a post-digital world, everything will be digital, social and mobile,” said Marret. “Our future is more than just deepening channel expertise; it’s about new and agile ways to create greater consumer insights, rich experiences, and ideas worth talking about.”

Under her leadership, the MRM Minneapolis office grew to being a top digital agency in the Twin Cities, serving clients such as General Mills, Nestle Purina, H&R Block, and Microsoft.  The agency has collaborated with Campbell Mithun on shared clients for the past 10+ years.

Marret herself has performed as a leader, receiving several corporate honors in recent years: She was the 2006 inaugural recipient of the MRM Worldwide “Stimati Award” and also received the H. K. McCann Award for Outstanding Leadership, the highest honor of parent-company McCann Worldgroup.

Before joining MRM Minneapolis, she served on the client side, developing eCommerce platforms and online marketing strategies for Carlson Companies; and also spent nine years playing a creative role for various agencies.

Her strengths directly support the “Everything Talks” branding philosophy articulated by Campbell Mithun’s founder Ray Mithun.  The agency has a 77-year national brand-building reputation and, with its Compass Point Media unit and BrandOptix package-design resource, continues to build client marketplace success.

Aug 11

Google and Verizon want a piece of your marketing budget...

Tagged in: Everything Talks
Posted by: Chris Wexler, Media | Comment (0)

…not directly, but they are recommending an internet regulatory scheme that amounts to that.  If you are a marketer and you haven’t read about the ongoing debate about Net Neutrality, it’s time to get acquainted with debate that is going on in D.C. right now.  The NY Times has a good primer on the issue as it stands (http://nyti.ms/bITJ52).   

The nickel tour of the debate is this:  Should internet providers (e.g. Time Warner, Comcast etc.) be allowed to charge content providers (e.g. YouTube, Pandora, etc.) for using bandwidth of their networks in addition to charging consumers (e.g. you and me) to access the internet.   Can the backbone networks charge for preferential content while relegating other content to the back of the line?  To date, the corporate allegiances in this debate have been predictable – the big cable companies say they can regulate traffic (and charge for access) however they see fit, and the web-based services say no way.  In fact, Google has led the charge of the freedom/net neutrality crowd.  Until now.

On Monday Google and Verizon announced an agreement essentially cutting up territory like they were FDR and Stalin at Malta after WWII.   The internet as we know it will remain free to all content equally (following the guidelines of Net Neutrality) but the mobile web and “new special services” such as internet-delivered TV would not be free and can be regulated by the network “owners.”  On the surface this looks like a win for the cable companies since their biggest and most moneyed adversary has essentially waved the white flag on the future.  And that is true, but Google has seceded the mobile internet, which many experts expect to be bigger than the current wired internet in terms of traffic by the end of the decade.   

In my opinion, Google has flipped Net Neutrality and essentially said that new internet technologies will be controlled by the cable companies and other access providers more than ever before, but has protected the public internet as a fig leaf covering their corporate ambitions. 

If this recommendation is accepted by the FCC, the future is a bifurcated world of a public internet that is free, relatively slow, and devoid of major investments in innovation and a series of private networks (like AT&T mobile, AT&T cable, Verizon Mobile,  Comcast Cable, etc.) that will preselect which pieces of content flow fast and seamlessly into your life.  Those private networks will have higher-income users and bring content that is pre-curated via corporate checkbooks.  Do you think NBC might have an easier time getting streams into Comcast households?  I’m guessing they will.   YouTube might pay the way for the 10% of their content that they can monetize into the private channels and mobile and leave the other User Generated Content to load slowly on the ghetto public network.

“So what?” you say.  Guess what, we as advertisers will have to be on those private networks – and all of a sudden our marketing budgets will have another mouth to feed – not just the content creators and distributors, but now the digital backbone that our brand messages have to travel across.   The privilege of access to users will have just gotten higher for every CMO.  Want to get on the iPhone?  Pay your AT&T tax.  Want to be on Hulu?  Pay your Comcast tax.  Slotting fees will move from the grocery store to phones and laptops.  And we will have no choice but to pay up.   Our marketing budgets easily get 10% less efficient if not more, just to be seen without interruption or at high quality.  And don’t think this is just an “internet” thing – TV will be delivered this way and the tax will be there also.

The ambush of Net Neutrality is a blatant grab at the budgets of those of us who fund content that is delivered digitally.  And that is all of us who do marketing.  Really.

One other thing:  this also signals that that Google is no longer as “Googley” in their view of the world.  The Paid Search market is no longer growing leaps and bounds in the US and Europe and the fact of the matter is that paid search market simply isn’t as profitable for Google in El Salvador as it is in El Segundo, CA – the US and Western Europe drives their profits.   Now that Google’s cash cow isn’t growing like it used to and they have struggled to make money with their other products (just how profitable is Google Docs?), they are turning to other tactics to protect their market position.  In the end, Google is maturing as a company and they have done the calculus that it is better for them that eventual competitors have a barrier to entry than the even playing field that Google enjoyed when they started up and competed against Alta Vista.  The cash generated by paid search today can protect YouTube, Android, and Google search from innovation not coming from Google in the future.  Google gets the fig leaf of “saving” the public internet, but the truth is that net neutrality will reign on what will essentially become a later day AOL dial-up network.  And Google is betting that the lack of Net Neutrality can be overcome with their bankroll and this will help ensure that they don’t go the way of AOL circa 1999. 

Google has famously stated that part of their mission is “don’t be evil.”  Is abandoning Net Neutrality evil?  I’m not sure, but it looks like Eric Schmidt and Google’s investors seem to have drawn that line a bit differently than Paul Bucheit and Amit Patel initially intended.  Eric Schmidt’s “Evil Scale” (http://bit.ly/cbCc1d) has tipped a bit further to the realm of traditional corporation and further from the rebel outsider position Google has fought for over the years.  This is yet another sign that Google has been forced to grow up due to their status as a public company.  It is just too bad for us as marketers, because it is our pound of flesh that they need to help protect their profits.

-- Chris Wexler, VP/director of digital media, Compass Point Media

Jul 28

Famous Footwear launches new Back-to-School advertising

Tagged in: News Releases
Posted by: Kristine Olson | Comment (0)

Latest ads in national Make Today Famous campaign feature “time-slice” technology and an interactive text-for-coupon offer

MINNEAPOLIS – Famous Footwear’s national back-to-school ads debut this week featuring a time-slice filming technique new to the mid-tier shoe-retailer category.  Developed by agency Campbell Mithun as part of the Make Today Famous campaign, the fast-paced ads capture teens in mid-air situations – garage-band jam, BMX tricks, break dancing, cheerleader jump splits -- with the most famous brands of shoes on their feet.

“Back-to-School is such a busy time for families, we wanted to depict the idea of stopping to absorb and enjoy the many great moments that make each day famous during this season,” said Will Smith, Famous Footwear’s senior vice president of marketing. “Campbell Mithun has been a terrific partner in understanding our vision and translating that through a technology that also gives viewers something exciting to watch.”

The ads aim to catch texters mid-action as well, with two of the campaign’s seven TV spots featuring a text-in offer for an additional 20 percent off the buy-one-get-one-half-off back-to-school sale.  Consumers can also opt-in via text to receive future Famous Footwear offers.

Campaign Details

Campbell Mithun filmed the nine scenes of the back-to-school spots in three days, partnering with director Nez and a film crew that used a 20-camera rig and a Canon 5D camera for the shots.  The flight of fast-paced Back-to-School ads includes general brand spots (:30, :15), text-for-coupon spots (:30, :15) and three buy-one-get-one-half-off spots (:30, two :15s).

“Everything – the choice of technique, cast and wardrobe – came together to create a spot that hopefully conveys the same inspiration consumers will get from the styles and brands they'll find at Famous Footwear,” said Robert Clifton, executive creative director at Campbell Mithun.

The national campaign runs on television for seven weeks and includes companion radio and print executions.   Other production partners include:  editor, JD Smyth / Final Cut; visual effects, The Mill; and original soundtrack, Nylon. Spark is the media agency.

Make Today Famous

Famous Footwear’s Make Today Famous campaign was created by Campbell Mithun in 2009.   The campaign features a series of vignettes showing how people can make even everyday activities “famous” in their own unique ways, influenced by the shoes on their feet. The 2010 Back-to-School executions dial up the power of these life moments and are the fourth seasonal effort under the Make Today Famous campaign umbrella.

About Famous Footwear

Famous Footwear is a leading family branded footwear destination, with 1,100 stores nationwide and e-commerce site FamousFootwear.com. The chain offers consumers more than 80 nationally recognized brands, including Nike, Skechers, Naturalizer, Puma, Steve Madden, Converse, New Balance, DC, Rocket Dog and Carlos by Carlos Santana, and features a broad assortment of toning footwear from brands like Skechers and Reebok. A proud national partner of the March of Dimes, the retailer sponsors March for Babies walk events in more than 1,000 communities nationwide. Famous Footwear is operated by the retail subsidiary of Brown Shoe Company, Inc. (NYSE:BWS), which has $2.3 billion in sales as a retailer and wholesaler of footwear. For more information, visit www.famousfootwear.com and www.brownshoe.com.

About Campbell Mithun

Minneapolis-based agency Campbell Mithun (www.cmithun.com) has 77 years of experience creating marketplace success for clients.  The agency’s “Everything Talks” integration philosophy engages client brands with consumers at each and every point of contact.

Jul 28

A “Mid-Internship” Report from the Lucky 13 Trenches

Tagged in: Everything Talks
Posted by: Natalie Gallagher | Comment (0)

From the moment we, the interns, stepped into the illustrious Campbell Mithun space, we were welcomed like true members of the team instead of mere temporary low-on-the-totem-pole peasants.  We received the full-agency tour, shook hundreds of hands, and logged onto email to find approximately 84 messages waiting.

Now, maybe those of you reading this are, by now, so used to working life that you can scarcely recall those first few weeks when you began your careers, so let me put it in perspective. For all six of us, this was a golden opportunity — one we reached for with trembling but eager hands, mere Bambis in a Tim Burton-esque universe. We were dying — dying — to start working with clients, rolling out creative, planning media flights, and mapping the digital landscape.

And almost immediately, that’s what happened. Before we had figured out how to find our cubes on our own, we found ourselves inundated with projects and client work. Kevin and Dan, our creative interns, had concepts due by the third day; Stephanie, in digital strategy, was analyzing SEO keywords and conducting social media audits; Caroline barely breathed between her account management client meetings; and Grace and I were throwing around media-speak lingo and acronyms like we’d written the dictionary. We were breathless with projects and new knowledge, like Ariel experiencing a whole new world, or Jasmine on a magic carpet ride, or Nemo on a death-defying journey back home.  (Yeah, we’re up to some pretty epic stuff.)

In between all that real-world advertising work, and all the intern meetings, and the question-asking, and the not sleeping, and the coffee-slamming, and the panic attacks, we’ve actually found time to contribute in other ways too. Like the Intern Golf Day we hosted last week to benefit United Way. Our theme was “Around the World in 6 Holes,” and for two afternoon hours, we offered some much-needed agency-wide playtime. 

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Check out the video.

All lightheartedness aside, our experience here has been incredible. In our post-work happy hours, amongst ourselves, there’s a palpable sense of “Are they really letting us do this? Do people really get paid to do this? This is the sweetest gig EVER.”

As fresh-faced rookies in the industry, we’ve had our ears and eyes wide open for gathering sage advice and learning the ropes. We’ve been standing at the bottom of the mountain staring dreamily up, seeing the possibilities. The “Lucky 13” has never seemed more appropriate name, and as we face our three remaining weeks, I feel us taking a collective breath — poised and ready for the climb.

-- Natalie Gallagher, Lucky 13 media intern, data-tracker wonder girl

 

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