11/03/2024 08:46:41 PM 
Tonight The ADC in NYC hosted a meeting of great creative minds, as Jeff Goodby played the part of Charlie Rose, in reality more Dave Letterman, to interview the illustrious duo Dan Wieden and Dave Kennedy.
The event was held to celebrate W&K's induction into the Hall of Fame at The Art Director's Club.
There was a packed house of eager students, young creatives and seasoned vets, some of who looked like they'd probably done time at Wieden.
Goodby kept the tone light and conversational and didn't even mention Google or Facebook, let alone Twitter.
Jeff let Dan and Dave talk and tell tales about their humble origins as a creative team at McCann in Portland. A place where their boss took on all the juicy TV assignments and left them with print for Georgia Pacific.
They talked about managing by allowing failure and learning from it. They also appeared to take pleasure in management by ignorance, the idea that not knowing and not playing by the rules was a really good thing.
They didn't claim to know anything about management theory and Dan said he's never even read a management book. They expressed some regret for actually having an HR Dept and claimed they wouldn't really still be in business without the acumen of Dave Luhr.
There was a lot of talk about the importance of independence. Where it matters according to Wieden was that you can fire clients who are burning up your people and not letting you do any good work. Starbucks was the one client that W&K had to give up after 4 years for that very reason, they gave up multiple millions in revenue, but still did it.
Dan seemed most illuminated when talking about his Caldera project which is all about getting kids from diverse backgrounds out into the woods of Oregon, where they get the chance to be creative. His inspiration was an ad industry that takes so much from the urban culture and gives very little back and the fact that around 30% of American students drop out between Middle and High School.
While the duo ducked questions about digital and the possible demise of print, it certainly appears the agency isn't about standing still. Wieden talked very briefly about a new division dedicated to thinking about the new world of sustainability and the development of business ideas.
When asked for advice for juniors starting in the business, Dan and Jeff echoed the same sentiment- show the real you and be funny in the process.
Finally and as expected, Dan was asked about the origins of the Nike line "Just Do It". He was looking at some ideas for Nike's first TV campaign and while the individual spots were good, there was nothing to tie them together. While this was going on, he was thinking about the line Gary Gillmore uttered when he was facing a firing squad in Utah, which was "Let's do it". The thought that this phrase could be uttered in a situation of such extreme adversity, spoke volumes.
Overall, a really good event and the chance to here the stories from a couple of legends.
Posted by Ed Cotton
It appears you don't have Flash installed.