Ads that attempt to get into the head of the spread bettor. These are folk for whom happiness is a tight spread; but who are very unhappy being talked down to. So the press ads and digitals here are doing an awareness job, letting potential customers know we're the platform that speaks to them on their go-for-it level.
A one-off for a one-of-a-kind. The exclusive cocktail bar at the May Fair Hotel, London.
The idea started with a press and poster campaign, and ended up in a 30-acre field passed by thousands of rail commuters every day. The campaign also extended to the Cardguide. Back before Facebook and Twitter this was the social media. You grabbed a Beck's postcard from the stand in your favorite bar or restaurant, scrawled a message, and posted it off to your friends – or passed it to the nice young lady at the table in the corner.
Double Page Spreads for that stalwart of trade publications, The Grocer.
A modelmaker put together the enamel signs and the country's finest illustrators and photographers did the rest.
All in all, quality tins that picked up a few silver and golds, too.
I was quite chuffed with these. Simple messages for sufferers of a simply horrible affliction; hay fever. Though unlike the noses of the target audience, these never ran.
I've been lucky enough to work for a bunch of financial clients over the years. (A bunch? What is the collective term for financial clients – a ledger, maybe?) Anyroad, this is just some of the work I've done. Some is B2B, some B2C. Sadly, 'The stuff of low interest' work for Charcol Mortgages never ran in the end. I'll be adding MPUs for Equiniti soon and yes, the Jupiter stuff does look a bit dated now – but then so do I.
Some criticise Heathrow for merely being a shopping mall with runways. Not true. Here's some 48-sheet cross-tracks and roadsides helping the airport get the message across about its primary function – to help passengers get to where they want to be. On the way not in the way.
Heathrow or Gatwick for expansion? Politicians keep kicking the issue into the long grass – meanwhile, the business growth goes via Frankfurt, Schiphol or Charles de Gaulle. This campaign focuses on everyday British businesses who believe only Heathrow can deliver what they need for growth. Before I wrote the copy, I interviewed the folk in the ads. For extra online content, we then built small-budget films around the interviews and photo shoot. Production company, Kalectiv, then made them look big-budget. The headline on the Louis Barnet ad was written by the brilliant Adrian Kemsley.
The ad at the bottom never ran in the press, but the client loved it enough to have it printed and hung large in the office.
My first ad and still one of my favourites. We were spotty little students at the time, but TBWA creative directors Neil and Gas still gave us the agency's plum brief. Granada studios up north still have the beautifully made model.
Sometimes a client comes along who just wants a good, old-fashioned trade press campaign. RS Components stocks one the largest selections of electrical wizardry on the planet. They're quirky, geeky geniuses with geeky, quirky genius customers – hence the style of the headlines and copy. The images were table top shots of tiny, tiny components, some no bigger than a few millimetres across. And all beautifully photographed by geeky genius photographer, David Oxberry.
Ads and webpages for Volvo Rents in the US. A fabulous, straight-talking client – so I wrote the headlines and copy in the same straight-talking style.
It's good to have a bit of crafting on your web copy. If the grammar and spelling on, say, a car manufacturer's website is poor, it kind of kills your confidence in the car. (Little alliterative flourish, there).
As for brochures, there's a theory that "nobody reads brochure copy, but it's nice to know it's there." Which is fine, but I always imagine someone stuck on the 18.52 between Berkhamstead and Tring with nothing to read, when suddenly they remember; in their bag is your brochure...
Here are a few examples of web pages and brochures I have either written in entirety, or contributed pages to.
