Category Archive

Say the words “save water” to somebody in Missouri right now, and they’re likely to (a) laugh cynically, (b) look pityingly at you as though knowing you’d recently been struck, quite hard, in the head, or (c) skip straight to punching you in the face, which would then lead right back to (b).

Missouri’s record rainfall has flooded basements, breached levees, inundated entire towns and promoted a summer chock full of mold and mosquitoes (the Summer of Ugh?). One recent report we heard was that the water table around Springfield had risen seventy feet. That’s two-thirds of a giant man!

But things are considerably different (say, drier) out Colorado way. Water conservation is, of course, a massive issue for the Western States, and over the years Denver ad shop extraordinaire Sukle has done some stellar work for Denver Water. Their latest effort (via the Denver Egotist) is no exception. We love the simplicity of the idea, the ingenious mix of media and message, and the fact that now our tomatoes can feel the thrill of running the rapids before they hit the shopping bag.

So the question is, if advertising can help save water where it’s really needed, can advertising get rid of water where it’s not? Some sort of pipeline to the West made entirely out of snappy headlines and big ideas?

Update:  Even more great water-saving stuff from Sukle.

There’s an interesting dust-up online over one man’s quest to get his way in a D.C. coffee shop. In a rage-filled nutshell (which does contain a lot…and I mean A LOT…of swearing):

•  Man wants iced espresso but doesn’t get it and so vents his spleen both in the shop and eventually into the blogosphere.

•  Coffee shop owner responds in kind with salty talk we’ve never seen in an official company letter. We are, to be honest, kind of impressed with that.

•  Links on the original blog post to Jack Nicholson and Lily Tomlin freakouts (the former, scripted; the latter, not so much) offer even more angertainment.

Nourish the Thought recently posted an interesting piece about the lowly potato. And we only say “lowly” because, come on, they grow underground. And they’re covered in dirt.

And we’re better than them.

But apparently, with the cost of several staple crops heading skyward, the FDA and the UN are both pushing 2008 as the Year of the Potato. Potatoes can be grown on less land than many other food crops. They require less water and grow more quickly. And they provide key nutrients like complex carbohydrates, fiber, amino acids, vitamin C and a good deal of potassium. (We’re saying all this like we know what we’re talking about…surprisingly not true. Maybe it’s best if you visit the above links and read it from the smart people.)

Many thanks to Playskool for Mr. Potato Head, which made the above picture possible (is it a little disconcerting that they intentionally misspell the word “school”? It is, isn‘t it?)

It’s not the destination, those wise souls say; it’s the journey. But in the case of Travelocity’s Australian offshoot Zuji, it’s not even the journey. The really important thing is that which leads you to said journey. In short, it’s the beans. The incredibly cheap beans.

Zuji has taken a fantastic approach to building their brand in the land where beer does flow and men chunder. Forget the siren song of exotic destinations. Forget ease of use or convenience or travel guarantees. Zuji and their agencies The Hallway/Happy Soldiers figured out that what people could really use is a little help saving up to get away. Which, come to think of it, is kind of the same strategy Teri Garr came up with in “Mr. Mom” for the tuna fish client. And if it’s good enough for Teri, it’s good enough for us.

The basic idea is this. Zuji actually made a line of canned beans and offered them for sale at just ten cents a can. On the label (and in supporting advertising) you got the story that Zuji is helping you save cash to fund your holiday. More details here, if you’re interested. Or there’s the supporting video Zuji put out that says it all quite nicely, including their plan to offer up other cheap basics like toothpaste and toilet paper. It’s all wrapped up with a simple, smart line: Helping holidays happen.

Nicely done.

We proudly announce the promotion of Chris Rock to Associate Creative Director here at Marlin. He has since gone through the four documented stages of promotional acceptance. First, anger (for some reason). Second, shock. Third, glee and a general sense of wellbeing. Fourth, contemplative of the rapidly expanding future. Congratulations, Chris.

The bandwidth here at Marlin is taking a massive hit as several of our nerdier nerds tune in to live streams of the Apple WWDC08 in San Francisco. As I write, I can hear my audio of Steve Jobs being echoed across the way by someone else’s audio of Steve Jobs, filling the halls of Marlin with a techwonk bastardization of Lou Gehrig.

Director Jay Baker was nice enough to send us a time-lapse he made on one day of our Brashears tv shoot a few months ago. Witness the amount of work it took to make a horrible couch look good on film. WITNESS IT.

And if you can tell what the guy on the couch is doing in the last few frames, we’ll give you a dollar.*

* We won’t give you a dollar.

To be honest, we haven’t figured out yet exactly how the game should work. But here’s what we have figured out through countless hours of methodical research.

1. Yngwie Malmsteen, 80s hair-rock badass and pioneer of the neoclassical/eurometal/ three-headed-dragon-defeating guitar movement, hasn’t changed his wardrobe essentials since 1984.
2. Evidence of this can be found in the Tour Photos section of Yngwie’s site, with pics as recent as 2008. Yes, there are a lot.
   
3. The Open-To-The-Navel Puffy Shirt and Way-Too-Tight Black Leather Pants combination is extremely potent, musically and most likely otherwise. A wardrobe malfunction on this guy could wipe out the entire front row.

So…how to make a game out of this?

You could go the easy route, head to the site with your friends and simply take a drink every time you see Yngwie wearing what we like to call his Fingertap Armor. (Not recommended for liability reasons.)

Or you can take the long hard slog approach: Scour the site looking for the one or two times Yngwie is caught sans uniform. It’s like Where’s Waldo with a lot more sweat and hair (and sweat).

Either way, enjoy the Malmsteen.

“I think computer viruses should count as life. I think it says something about human nature that the only form of life we have created so far is purely destructive. We’ve created life in our own image.” —Stephen Hawking

Earth Day, today, is usually an opportunity for the following fun time happy parade of:

• Companies latching onto Earth Day (or say, Earth Week, like this blog!) and telling us just how darn much they care about our planet
• Website after website bombarding us with so many “Here’s How You Can Save The Entire Planet With A Seemingly Insignificant Action!” tip lists that we become paralyzed into doing absolutely nothing (Green Sex? Are you kidding me?!)
• And well-intentioned organizations telling us just how destructive mankind is

There’s not much that can be done about that first point, aside from companies like Green Seal keeping marketing monkeys like ourselves somewhere near the truth. It’s the other two that can really start getting you down.

We are drowning in green data. And if a near-infinite amount of Green Commandments (even Moses got it down to ten) it isn’t enough to immobilize you, a great deal of those imperatives are contradictory. Witness the current version of the chicken-or-the-egg question that came out of Home Depot’s Eco Options: which is less destructive to the environment, the plastic paintbrush because it doesn’t use wood, or the wooden paintbrush because it doesn’t use plastic? Sounds like a riddle you’d ask a giant killer robot to short circuit its logic board.

Or maybe that’s just us.

That’s probably just us.

Out of this year’s eco cacophony, we came across one article that truly did give us hope, that helped us find a little meaning and comfort in the duality of freakin’ everything. It was in this week’s Sunday Times Magazine, an article by Michael Pollan entitled, simply, Why Bother? Rather than step on any more of Mr. Pollan’s insights, we’ll let you read the article yourself.

And when you’re done reading it, we invite you to finish our little post with another thought from one of our planet’s brainest brains.

“We are just an advanced breed of monkeys on a minor planet of a very average star. But we can understand the Universe. That makes us something very special.”
— also Stephen Hawking

Hands down the tastiest of the many Marlin entities, FoodIQ, recently launched their very own food blog, Nourish The Thought. (We’ll go ahead and coin the new mash-up term “Fblog!” Say it with your friends! Exclamation points!!) The FoodIQ blog is already chock full of commentary on food and culture and food culture. Good stuff.Case in point, this post on the potential for good and/or evil in the inventive new fast food packaging, Col-Pop from South Korea’s BBQ Chicken.

The basic idea is that you stick chicken nuggets or other similarly poppable morsels into a little plastic holder that is then stuck into the top of a drink cup. There’s even a straw so you can slurp while you munch. (Hey BBQ Chicken. Free name idea to replace the Khmer Rouge-sounding Col-Pop. Ready? Slurp-n-Munch! Or how about the Slurpinmunchinator? The kids will love it!) The result is hot fried lovin’ up top and cool refreshment down below. It’s McD.L.T. Mach Two.

So is it a brilliant packaging solution for today’s hectic lifestyle or the end of civilization as we know it? Do we need to eat nuggets from our cupholders? For that matter, do we need to eat nuggets?We’ll just have to wait and see. And while we wait, why not enjoy the on-the-go convenience of Col-Pop? Mmm…so mobile!

Thanks to Nourish the Thought for the heads-up on the possible impending packaging-induced apocalypse.

Our new tv campaign for Brashears Furniture is finally on the air, and in an orgy of self-adulation, we’d like to invite you to watch our commercials right here online.

Many thanks to Jay Baker (of Ferguson + Katzman) for his ability to make bad furniture look so good you want to buy it drink after drink and just, you know, talk all night long.

Also to Craig Kauffman for directing the showroom shots and Jeff Hagerman for the edit (both from AVP, right here in town).

Also to Soundscapes for the great VO characters. And finally to our client, without whom our checks would bounce like some kind of super bouncing ball type thing (you might call it a “super ball”).

Except to say this: God bless you, Brian Collins, and your pissy sign-making abilities.

Welch’s has decided to tap into one more sense with their newest advertisement. The new ‘TASTY fact’ ads will feature a huge bottle of the juice and contain a strip that peels off the back with text that reads: “For a TASTY fact, remove & LICK.”

Sure, if it’s published in a magazine it’s fine, but when we say it in an alley we’re perverts.

We’re all for innovative ways of getting customers interested in a product and we’ve been trying to corner the market on consumers who are willing to lick the inside of a magazine for years, but what if this trend catches on? It’s only a matter of time until we open a magazine to find a tasty ad for engine oil. Or maybe paint. Or kitty litter.

Those are probably enough examples.

Some say that in stimulating this untapped sense, this ad may be trying too hard. We say it’s not trying hard enough. We at Marlin have begun development on an ad that will stimulate all five senses. It will look beautiful, smell like flowers and have the sounds of nature to relax the consumer; then–BAM!–it slaps them in the head with our branded product. Of course, you’ll be able to taste the page as well. It will taste like ink and paper but we’ll just make sure it’s an ad for Office Depot or something. And the best part is that consumers have the product’s name embedded in their foreheads for days. Ad victims will be walking around town and everyone they meet will be reminded that they need paper, pens or toner.

The ads are definitely going to stick out in the minds of consumers. You’ll get your chance in February’s issue of People Magazine to decide whether that’s a good or bad thing.

Are we a wee bit excited? Does a bear wear a funny hat in the woods?

We just got our official version of Final Cut Studio 2 for the office. Let the jump cuts and spinny titles begin!

While video is something Marlin has gleefully done for our clients again and again — a fact that actually prompted the aforementioned purchase — until now we’ve either used outside resources exclusively or simply “found a way to do it.” (Oh sweet quotation marks, how do you manage to imply so much?) We’re now starting to change that admirably scrappy but ultimately pain-in-the-ass approach. Purchasing Final Cut is a first step.

A first step that apparently weighs twelve hundred pounds. Seriously, the box for this thing seems like it’s made out of physics-defying, denser-than-the-sun matter. (Buy Final Cut today and we’ll throw in a neutron star absolutely FREE!) Quentin’s arms were shaking when we took the above photo. We had two Hungarian weightlifters as spotters. On each side. (Ok, enough.)

So yes, we’re excited to have it. We’re also happy to have the skills to know which buttons to push. Quentin Brown, design intern extraordinaire pictured above, has extensive, hands-on training from his days at Drury University, and has proven himself more than worthy to JKL even the orneriest footage. Most other Marlinites have firsthand experience producing tv commercials, corporate videos, even PBS documentaries. So hopefully this little experiment will look more like a professional extension of our branding skills and less like that bunch of monkeys throwing stuff at the obelisk in 2001.

See, it’s supposed to sound like “Ho Ho Ho.” Sort of.

In the midst of our current end-of-the-year work tornado, we took a few hours/days to pull together this year’s holiday card. Designed by Desirae Struthers, written by Chris Rock and enabled by Mindy Armstrong and Susan Wood, as well as a little help from pretty much the entire agency, the card is a boxful o’ holiday fun. Each card is actually a compilation of many separate elements. A gift that keeps on giving, so to speak.

So we collated. And we collated. And then we collated. Cabot, in particular, collated like some sort of super-collating Roomba at full speed. Isn’t the word collate fun?

Yes. Yes, it is.

Many thanks to all who pitched in, paper cuts be damned, especially Don and Sherry, without whom these things would never have made it out.

Thanks to Deb and Judith for treating us all to a healthy dose of the little known seasonal fete of Mattoberfest.

While its origins are shrouded in the fog of time, Mattoberfest is rumored to have begun sometime in the Middle Ages as a celebration of the pagan god of bratwurst and Miller Lite, Mått. Unwashed Middle Ageans would don their finest animal skins, sing rollicking Bavarian Beer Hall songs (or, to be technically correct, pre-Bavarian Beer Hall songs) and generally have as good of a time as they could, given that their life expectancy was roughly equal to that of a modern loaf of wheat bread.

It is simply our good fortune that this ancient rite falls near the birthday of Marlin Creative Director, Matt Rose, so that we may partake of its brat-laden goodness.

On an unrelated note, do you hear what we hear?

(If the lower part of you is a-shakin’, you do.)

This is a little tardy (because we’re still freakin’ busy), but just over a week ago The Marlin Network held its quarterly meeting. Unlike the term “quarterly meeting,” it was actually fun. We met for breakfast at The Moxie, Springfield’s only indie movie house, and quite the little startup by a couple of MU alumns.

What was for breakfast, you ask? Your choice of falafel or rye bread with some cheese on it, Dane-style, which I guess is called Smørrebrød. Why was it that, you ask? Read on!

We had a quickie update on what all the different cogs o’ Marlin are currently up to, met a few new people, then enjoyed two fantastic short films.

The first was “West Bank Story,” a fantastic send-up of West Side Story a la the Gaza Strip. It’s the Kosher King versus the Hummus Hut, and there’s even a dancing menora. And that’s why we had falafel staring at us at 8:30 in the morning.

The second was a sweet little animated short that won an Academy Award, “The Danish Poet.” Thus, the Smørrebrød.

Marlin meetings are always events. This one was no exception. Gotta run.

Where everything is a car wreck. Chipotle outdoor board + tv news crew + busy intersection = almost interesting video. Bonus — reporter’s crass first thought: “Did you get that?!”

Right here.

The upside of chaos? A nice, evenly distributed coating of salad dressing.

In today’s Extremely Tasty Partnering news, Starbucks and Hershey’s are teaming up to create a “range of Starbucks-branded upmarket treats.” First out this fall will apparently be hot chocolate.

Delicious, yes. But even better, Starbucks reportedly will also be applying their sustainable approach to sourcing, working with Hershey’s to develop “cocoa sourcing guidelines aimed at improving labor standards, making farming practices ecologically sustainable and boosting income for farmers.”

The School Nutrition Association’s Annual National Conference continues in Chicago today. Pinnacle Foods—representing some of the most well-known U.S. consumer brands like Aunt Jemima, Vlasic and Lender’s in foodservice and, of course, one of our clients—is doing a little something different at this year’s show. Pinnacle will be serving up the winning recipes from its Aunt Jemima Morning Stars recipe contest. Prepared by Chef Rob Corliss, the winning recipes all feature an Aunt Jemima® breakfast favorite like French Toast Sticks, Whole Grain Pancakes or Waffles, and were created by school foodservice operators specifically for school foodservice. Check back for actual photos of actual recipes being prepared by an actual chef.

Incidentally, the keynote speakers at this year’s ANC seem like a wildly mixed bunch: energetic life coach (is there any other kind?) Keith Harrell; “Body by Jake” Jake Steinfeld (check out this link…you actually can build your own Body By Jake); Marta Sahagún de Fox, wife of Mexico’s former President Vicente Fox Quesada; and Walter Scheib, chef to America’s President and the First Family for the past 11 years. (What does W. like for lunchies?)