Admiring advertisements and creativity

I was on Youtube and the ad at the top of the page was for Old Spice. The Old Spice commercial that aired during the last Super Bowl was really creative. I wanted to know what other commercials they had and so I clicked on the ad. I spent about 15 minutes perusing their Web site and was very impressed with their targeted advertising and design. I wanted to know who made their Web site and their ads.

So, I googled, "Who designs advertising for Old Spice."

And what did I find?

W+K

Wieden+Kennedy, an advertising agency based in Portland, Organ, with offices around the world. Needless to say, I'm in love... with an Ad Agency.

Never thought I'd say that.

I scanned their site and found that they were the creators of several different ads that I've loved, including the Simpsons Coke commercial and the Levi's, "Go Forth" commercial.

If I don't end up designing newspapers maybe I'll go into creative advertising. I admire all they do and hope that someday I'll be able to create work that reaches that many people.

I'm not sure how I feel about the idea of selling people things, but the nice thing I admire about the Old Spice advertising is that it is so clearly targeted advertising. It plays up the farce--emphasizes the syllogistic reasoning-- with wit. It almost screams, "I'm an ad. I'm appealing to your desire to "Be a Man.'" It is so obviously targeted that it is less abhorrent.

For now I'll just continue watching advertisements, pursing different Web sites and books and continue to be inspired by the work of others. We'll see where that leads me.

http://www.wk.com/blogs