Hasta La Creative!

Goodby, Silverstein & Partners named Julia Mee as the agency’s first chief marketing officer. In the role, Mee will be tasked with overseeing all marketing for the agency, strategically communicating its value to clients, prospective clients and employees.

“Julia has been one of our best clients, and in each of her jobs, she’s advocated for us better than we’ve advocated for ourselves,” GS&P partner and president Derek Robson, who was promoted to his current role in August, said in a statement. “Julia brings clarity about the changing landscape of our industry and a perspective to the company that we’ve never had. All of that experience adds up to an exceptional leader who will no doubt contribute immensely to the future growth of GS&P.”

Mee joins GS&P from Cisco Systems, where she has spent nearly four and a half years serving as senior director, global advertising, media and sponsorships. While with Cisco, she worked with GS&P, as she did in client-side positions at Yahoo! and HP, including collaborating with the agency on Cisco’s “Internet of Everything” campaign. Before arriving at Cisco she spent a little over a year at Yahoo! as vice president, global advertising and media. That followed around nine years at HP, where she worked her way up from a role as corporate advertising manager upon arrival in 1996 to senior director, global advertising and sponsorships, a position she held for two years before leaving HP.

“For 15 years at three different companies, GS&P was my trusted agency partner,” Mee said. “They listened closely, dug into the business, gathered deep customer insights and provided strategic thinking that went far beyond what many expect from an ‘advertising agency.’ We built global campaigns together that made significant contributions to the business, and, along the way, they made me and my teams look really good. Now it’s my turn to help contribute to their business. I’m honored to join their ranks.”

Mee’s arrival follows a string of new business wins for GS&P this year, including StubHub, mobile social gaming company GREE (creators of League of War) and the Golden State Warriors. At the time of Robson’s promotion in August, GS&P also named 20-year agency vet Margaret Johnson as its first chief creative officer.

In Goody, Silverstein & Partners newest spot for Adobe, a fictional basketball player named Anton Miller is about to sign a billion dollar contract with fictional professional basketball team the Cincinnati Sabers. The team’s executives and lawyers meet Miller and company in a conference room as Miller waits for them to provide a seemingly endless array of signatures before it’s his turn to sign.

While he’s waiting, he receives, and accepts, an offer from an opposing team. Bad news for Cincinnati. The spot concludes with the line “How’s your customer experience? We can help.”

The spot manages to promote the Adobe Sign feature, as well as Adobe’s customer service offerings in general with the exaggerated illustration of manual signatures gone wrong. Coming on the heels of April’s “Snake Bite,” it’s the latest in the series of reliably clever efforts from Goody, Silverstein & Partners for the brand, injecting humor into a category where you wouldn’t expect it. While “Billion Dollar Contract” may not live up to some of its predecessors it’s still a welcome addition to the campaign, and is about as entertaining as a spot for an e-signature platform gets. The spot will make its broadcast debut on TNT during the network’s launch of the NBA season, which begins October 25.

Credits:
Client: Adobe
Chief Marketing Officer: Ann Lewnes
VP, Experience Marketing Group: Alex Amado
Executive Creative Director: Steve Gustafson
Sr. Creative Director for Video: Dan Cowles
Director of Advertising and Production: Joel Giullian
Title of Creative Work: “Billion Dollar Player”
Live Date: 9/12/16
Agency: Goodby, Silverstein & Partners
Co-Chairmen: Rich Silverstein and Jeff Goodby
Chief Creative Officer: Margaret Johnson
Creative Director: Will Elliott
Creative Director: Patrick Knowlton
Creative Director: Roger Baran
Creative Director: Sam Luchini
Art Director: Jasper Yu
Art Director: Stefan Copiz
Copywriter: Alex Maleski
Director of Content Production: Tod Puckett
Senior Producer: Benton Roman
Production Coordinator: Rachel Newman
Managing Partner: Brian McPherson
Account Director: Theo Abel
Account Manager: Chelsea Bruzzone
Assistant Account Manager: Zack Piánko
Director of Brand Strategy: Bonnie Wan
Brand Strategist: Etienne Ma
Brand Strategist: Andrew Mak
Director of Communication Strategy: Christine Chen
Communication Strategy Deputy Director: Dong Kim
Senior Communication Strategist: Caitlin Neelon
Communication Strategist: Natalie Williamson
Junior Communication Strategist: Chloe Bosmeny
Business Affairs Manager: Heidi Killeen
Director of Music: Todd Porter
Reset (Production)
Director: Adam Hashemi
Managing Director: Dave Morrison
Executive Producer: Jeff McDougall
Bidding Producer: Jenn Ingalls
Head of Production: JP Columbo
Producer: Michelle Currinder
Rock Paper Scissors (Editor)
Producer: Charlyn Derrick
Editor: Olivier Bugge Coutte
Barking Owl (Music)
Sound Designer – Michael Anastasi
Mixer – Patrick Navarre
Music – Barking Owl
Creative Director – Kelly Bayett
The Mill (Post FX)
Senior Producer: Will Unterreiner
2D Lead: Tara Demarco

San Francisco agency Goodby Silverstein & Partners restructured its agency leadership with Margaret Johnson becoming the first chief creative officer in the agency’s 33 year history.

Managing partner Derek Robson will also become president, effective immediately. Beyond these two promotions, director of account management Brian McPherson and director of new business Leslie Barrett will serve as managing partners with director of brand strategy Bonnie Wan and director of communication strategy Christine Chen also taking on partnership roles.

Don’t worry, founding co-chairmen Jeff Goodby and Rich Silverstein aren’t going anywhere: they will continue to take an active role in organizational efforts.

“We are reinventing our company every day, and these are the people who will formulate the big changes, come up with the big ideas that will keep us not just relevant but game-changing,” Goodby said in a statement. “Our new president, chief creative officer, and new partners will make a difference immediately—and down the line, five and ten years from now.”

Johnson joined GS&P some twenty years ago, following three years as an art director with The Richards Group. She went on to be named an executive creative director and, in 2012, the agency’s first female partner. While with GS&P she has worked with clients including Nike, Nintendo and Frito-Lay and presently works on Sonic, Nest, TD Ameritrade, Häagen-Dazs and Foster Farms. 

“Margaret has grown up at GS&P and has the DNA of the agency in her blood,” Silverstein told Adweek, adding, “She’s fearless and has led us with innovative creative thinking that taps into culture. She’s earned the admiration of our people and our clients, and there is no one else we would want to carry forth our legacy.”

Robson joined GS&P in 2005 following 13 years as a managing director with BBH, and later became a managing partner with the agency. Prior to that he served  in account planner positions with OgilvyOne and Ogilvy & Mather. In his new role he will serve as strategic leader while collaborating with other agency partners.

McPherson has been with GS&P for twenty years and currently leads the Frito-Lay, Adobe and Princess Cruises accounts. Barrett has spent nearly 17 years with the agency, recently leading new business efforts that led GS&P to add StubHub, the Golden State Warriors and GREE to its client roster while expanding its work on Comcast and Frito-Lay.

Wan and Chen will lead communications moving forward, with Wan on the brand side and Chen promoting the agency’s campaigns and “maintain[ing] rigor around how GS&P diagnoses business problems and approaches work.”

Eric Kallman was set to become the future co-leader of GS&P creative upon his ECD promotion last year, but he left to launch his own unit Erich & Kallman after approximately six months. That shop’s first work for Chick-Fil-A debuted last month.

Japan-based mobile social gaming company GREE International–the company behind titles such as Knights & Dragons, Modern War and League of War: Mercenaries–appointed Goodby, Silverstein & Partners as its first agency of record.

GREE International may not be a familiar name to many, and there is no estimate for the company’s ad budget, but it’s apparently a fairly large account. A representative claimed “the company’s goals are very aggressive,” and the company competes with other game makers such as Clash of Clans (which spends around $48 million on measured media annually), Mobile Strike ($55.6 million) and Game of War ($84 million) for context.

“The mobile gaming market is changing dramatically and while expertise in digital marketing remains critically important, building brand and establishing a strong franchise with consumers has become equally important. GS&P clearly excels in this area across the categories they’ve worked in including a deep history in the gaming industry with premiere companies,” said GREE International vice president of marketing Shawn Conly in a statement. “We reviewed five leading creative agencies in our selection process, and GS&P’s level of strategic thinking, truly creative problem solving, deep resources, and demonstration of partnership were key deciding factors in selecting them as our agency of record.”

“We look forward to working in the gaming space with GREE International to build the brand in innovative ways,” added GS&P partner, executive creative director Margaret Johnson.  “As a brand, GREE International offers a myriad of creative possibilities, particularly in the social space.”

The appointment follows a string of recent account wins for GS&P, including StubHub and the Golden State Warriors. The win also came before today’s announcement that the shop’s creative department had hired a dozen new members.

Goodby Silverstein & Partners launched a new campaign for Adobe entitled “Make a Masterpiece.”

For the campaign, the agency worked with four digital artists, who recreated lost, damaged or stolen artistic masterpieces using Adobe Stock footage. Indian artist Ankur Patar tackled Rembrandt van Rijn‘s “The Storm on the Sea of Galilee”; U.S. artist Mike Campau took on Karl Friedrich Schinkel‘s “Cathedral Towering Over a Town”; Ecuadorian artist Karla Cordova was tasked with recreating Frida Kahlo‘s “The Wounded Table” and French artist Jean-Charles Debroize wrestled with Caravaggio‘s “Saint Matthew and the Angel.”

In the below spot, Patar outlines his creative process, which included using some 236 stock images, including inserting his own image into the piece. It’s a pretty fascinating look at what such digital artists can do with Adobe Stock, as Patar explains how he takes some features from a shot of one person and combines them with another to create the image he wants. “This is a dream project for me, and I hope it inspires other artists with the possibilities of Adobe Stock,” he comments.

While only Patar’s project is featured in the spot, details of the other “Make a Masterpiece” works can be found on the campaign website, including time-lapse videos of their creation and artist bios. 

“No one can truly replace these lost paintings. But by faithfully re-creating them with Adobe Stock, we can remember them again and reshape what the world thinks about stock photography in the process,” GS&P associate partner and creative director Will Elliott told Adweek.

Credits:
Client: Adobe Systems
Title of Creative Work: Make a Masterpiece

Ad Agency: Goodby, Silverstein & Partners

Creative
Co-Chairmen: Rich Silverstein and Jeff Goodby
Executive Creative Director: Margaret Johnson
Creative Director: Will Elliott
Creative Director: Patrick Knowlton
Art Director: Bennett Austin
Copywriter: Jordan Dodson

Production
Director of Graphic Services: Jim King

Account Services
Managing Partner: Robert Riccardi
Account Director: Theo Abel
Account Manager: Molly Navalinski
Assistant Account Manager: Aliza Niewood

Brand and Communication Strategy
Director of Brand Strategy: Bonnie Wan
Brand Strategist: Etienne Ma
Communication Strategy Deputy Director: Dong Kim
Senior Communication Strategist: Caitlin Neelon
Communication Strategist: Natalie Williamson
Jr. Communication Strategist: Chloe Bosmeny
Research & Analytics Director: Cassi Husain

Business Affairs
Business Affairs Manager: Heidi Killeen 

The first campaign for Grandma’s cookies from Goodby, Silverstein & Partners wrestles with a timeless question: “Are you my grandma?” 

This twisted take on the kids’ classic Are You My Mother? combines the delightful naiveté of the 1960 P.D. Eastman book with a deepening sense of confusion. It seems the nostalgia sparked by the smell of a cookie can quickly lead even straight-laced adults astray. 

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Sonic is pretty serious about playing with its food.

A new campaign from Goodby, Silverstein & Partners transforms actors’ mouths into zany little characters using face paint, à la makeup artist Lauren Jenkinson‘s renditions of classic cartoon characters.

The illustrations are great more or less across the board, even if some of the writing and delivery—the self-destructive robot, the melodramatic doctor, the angst-ridden teenager—might try a little too hard to be funny.

The better monologues turn the corner on relatable bits of truth—like a Southern belle who scrambles to save face after it turns out she’s not so refined after all—or on straight-up charming silliness—like a hammy yeti, idiotic octopus or behind-the-times groundhog.

The best moments, though, come from the more subtle facial cues, like when a chin twitch becomes a boxer pumping his pecs, or a soul patch finds new life as chest hair (in what might be the most perfect equivalence ever).

Then again, that all might just be a matter of taste—promoting the fast-food chain’s various drink flavors is, after all, kind of the point. But seriously, just try to keep your brain from imploding when Abraham Lincoln cracks a pun about a Leonardo DiCaprio movie.

CREDITS
Client: Sonic
Campaign “Sipsters”
Agency: Goodby Silverstein & Partners

Creative
Executive Creative Director/Partner: Margaret Johnson
ACD/Writer: Jon Wolanske
ACD/Art Director/Designer: Kevin Koller
Copywriter: Justin Ralph

Account Services & Strategy
Group Account Director: Leslie Barrett
Account Director: Jenna Duboe
Assistant Account Manager: Olivia Mullen
Business Affairs Managers: Chrissy Shearer, Jane Regan
Senior Communication Strategist: John-James Richardson

Production
Director of Broadcast Production: Tod Puckett
Broadcast Producer: Melissa Nagy
Production Company: eLevel Films (Goodby Silverstein & Partners)
Director: Claude Shade/Jon Wolanske
Director of Photography: Brett Simms
Executive Producer: PJ Koll
Line Producer: Genevieve Giraudo
Production Manager: Haley Klarfield
Make-up Artists: Sarah Coy, Victor Cembelin, Sophie Smith and Monica Bishop

Postproduction
eLevel Films (Goodby Silverstein & Partners)
Editor: Quinn Motika
Executive Producer: PJ Koll
Post Producer: Samantha Liss
Telecine: Nathan Shipley
Online: Kyle Westbrook
Audio Mix/Sound Design: Nic DeMatteo, Jody Scott, Jon Shamieh
Music: APM Music
End Title Design: Kevin Koller

One day, all the world’s persistent infrastructure problems will be obsolete, says Cisco. Indeed, you’ll only be able to see them in museums.

That’s the theme of “Building Tomorrow Today,” a new Cisco campaign by Goodby, Silverstein & Partners that begins today with “The Last Traffic Jam,” a striking 30-second spot that shows a traffic jam—now a remnant of the past—as an art piece in a gallery.

Future ads will depict other “last” scenarios, including the last long checkout line and the last product recall, as frozen moments from the past that are now displayed in an art gallery.

GSP creative directors Justin Moore and Nick Klinkert spoke to AdFreak about the “The Last Traffic Jam”:

AdFreak: This is a clever idea. How did you arrive at this concept of a Museum of Lasts?
Moore: “People talk a lot about ‘firsts’ in tech. So we loved the idea that ‘lasts’ can represent a more interesting view of the future—a way of showing how the Internet of everything can have a real, positive impact on people’s lives. After we got to the idea of ‘lasts,’ the museum concept felt like a pretty short leap.”

Klinkert: “Research found that business and technology leaders feel more and more responsibility to solve exceedingly complex problems in the world, with the help of technology. The ultimate goal is to confine these problems that affect us all to the past. The team quite quickly became interested in a place where all these problems could live—’the museum of lasts.’ “

Where did you film this, and what were the production challenges?
Klinkert: “We shot these in Zaragoza, Spain. They built these massive, beautiful buildings for the water expo in 2008, and they gave us the scale and the look that we were after. The ‘art installations’ are actually real people standing very still (and treated in post) to replicate hyperrealistic statues of people.”

Can you tell me about the visual look?
Moore: We wanted to make the point that technology is ultimately about people. So we spent a lot of time looking at the work of artists like Ron Mueck and researching how modern museums create exhibitions.

Klinkert: Visually, we were interested and inspired by the amazing, hyperreal sculptures of Sam Jinks and Ron Mueck, and the way large-scale installations in museums work these days. A lot of them have an interactive component to them, a lot of them are playing with relative size, and they are very fascinating to look at.

Did you storyboard exactly how the tableaux would look, almost like doing little paintings?
Klinkert: We had a pretty clear idea of how it would look at first, but a lot of exploration went into the final execution of it. The traffic jam is obviously a universal problem that affects a lot of people. We wanted to illustrate the frustration, impatience and the boredom of the people in the traffic jam. We toyed around with a lot of other ideas, but at the end of the day we wanted it to look as if an artist picked up a chunk of congested freeway in a major metropolitan city and put it in an elegant museum space.

Why the British voiceover?
Moore: We’re just looking for something fresh and interesting. We tried lots of voices. But something about the English accent seemed to suit the cadence of the words.

How does this evolve the Cisco campaign from last year’s work?
Moore: Strategically, we’ve got a sharper point of view on what Cisco’s vision is for the future, and how it relates to what they’re doing right now. Creatively, the campaign’s just getting better and better.

Klinkert: It’s really a creative expression of what they are doing right now, Cisco is helping to make the Internet of everything possible. And with that, hopefully we can see the last traffic jam or the last product recall in the not-too distant future.

There was major media hubbub earlier this year about the death of the “Got milk?” campaign. But while it’s no longer being used nationally by the Milk Processor Education Program (MilkPEP), it’s still very much alive in California, where it originated with the California Milk Processor Board.

And now, Goodby, Silverstein & Partners, which created the legendary tagline back in 1993, is launching new “Got milk?” work in an unusual partnership with Grupo Gallegos, which created the “Toma leche” campaign—and acknowledging that milk sales have been in decline for years.

“Milk is losing relevance, and sales have been in decline as family life and diets have changed,” GSP says. To reestablish milk as the right choice for families, the two agencies have partnered on a campaign “that highlights how a person’s future self is determined by the nutritional choices he or she makes today—starting, of course, with milk.”

The agencies are approaching California as one whole market to deliver bilingual work that appeals to all consumers, regardless of ethnicity. The campaign launched Wednesday with two spots, each airing in English and Spanish, that couldn’t be more different.

“Champion,” directed by Dummy’s Harold Einstein, is an amusingly quirky set piece that takes place in a grocery store. “Brave,” meanwhile, directed by Anonymous Content’s Armando Bo, presents a much more emotional appeal by showing a firefighter rescuing a family.

“It’s time to start addressing the California market on the basis of things we all share,” GSP chairman Jeff Goodby said in a statement. “California consumers are extremely diverse, but when it comes to wanting what’s best for our children and their future, we are one united front. This campaign embraces every parent’s personal desire, which is preparing our children for a successful and healthy future.” Credits below.

CREDITS
Client: California Milk Processor Board
Campaign: Milk Fuels a Better Future
Spots: “Champion,” “Brave”

Agencies: Grupo Gallegos; Goodby, Silverstein & Partners

Executive Creative Director: Jeff Goodby
Chief Strategy Officer: Andrew Delbridge
Chief Creative Officer: Marty Orzio

Creative Directors: Eric Kallman, Kate Catalinac
Associate Creative Directors: Saul Escobar, Curro Chozas
Copywriter: Simon Bruyn
Art Director: Andrew Livingston

—Spot: “Champion”
Head of Broadcast Production: Tod Puckett
Senior Broadcast Producer: Leila Seghrouchni

Production Company: Dummy
Director: Harold Einstein
Director of Photography: Jonathan Freeman
Executive Producer, Line Producer: Eric Liney

Editing Company: Arcade Edit
Editor: Dave Anderson
Assistant Editor: Mark Popham
Producer: Fanny Cruz
Executive Producer: Sila Soyer
Managing Partner: Damian Stevens

Visual Effects, Final Conform: The Mill
Executive Producer: Jo Arghiris
Senior Executive Producer: Sue Troyan
Producer: Adam Reeb
Shoot Supervisor, 3-D Lead Artist: Tara DeMarco
2-D Artists: Timothy Crabtree, Jake Albers
3-D Artists: Lu Meng-Yang, Mike Di Nocco, Matt Neapolitan
Colorist: Greg Reese
Art Department: Jeff Langlois, Ashley Forbito

Music: Butter
Composer: Josh Canevari
Executive Producer: Ian Jeffreys
Senior Producer: Annick Mayer

Sound Design, Effects, Mix: Barking Owl
Sound Designer: Michael Anastasi
Mixer: Brock Babcock
Producer: Whitney Fromholtz
Executive Producer: Kelly Bayett

—Spot: “Brave”
Head of Production: Carlos Barciela
Producer: Valeria Maldini

Production Company: Anonymous Content
Director: Armando Bo
Editing: Luna Post
Editor: Pablo Piriz
Telecine: The Mill

Music:
Original Music Composition: Elias Arts 
Executive Creative Director: Brent Nichols
Creative Director: Dave Gold
Executive Producer: Ann Haugen
Producer: Katie Overcash

Sound Design: TruLove Post
Sound Designer: Gonzalo Ugarteche

Visual Effects: The Mill
Senior Executive Producer: Sue Troyan
Executive Producer: Enca Kaul
Producer: Adam Reeb
Production Coordinator: Kris Drenzek
Shoot Supervisor, 2-D Lead: Bill Higgins
2-D Artists: Steve Cokonis, Robert Murdock, Patrick Munoz, Jale Parsons
3-D Artists: Phil Mayer, Jason Jansky
Colorist: Adam Scott
Art Support: Jeff Langlois, Ashley Forbito

Creative editorial company Final Cut added Oscar-nominated editor Crispin Struthers, best known for his work with director David O. Russell, to its roster.

Struthers–who received Academy Award nominations for his editing work on Russell’s last two films “The Silver Linings Playbook” and “American Hustle”–will join the facility in its Los Angeles office to do creative work for clients.

Beyond his film pedigree, Struthers has a history in advertising: he began his career in the TBWA\Chiat\Day editorial department.

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