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10 ANNUAL
INDUSTRY
TH
SALUTE
Agency Award: Grey Group
Advertiser Award: Colgate-Palmolive Company
Media Award: Disney/ABC Television Group
Lifetime Achievement Award: Irwin Gotlieb, GroupM
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Honors Night
The AEF salutes the advertising
industry and its leaders
HONORS NIGHT
June 8, 2010
en years ago, the Advertising Educational Foundation was
seeking a way to recognize its most important partners
and to call attention to its mission: to enrich the
understanding of advertising’s role in society, culture,
history and the economy.
T
“We wanted a way to both celebrate an
extraordinary organization that did not enjoy as
high a level of visibility as some of the more
traditional industry organizations and a way to
raise some funds, while having a little fun,” says
AEF board member Nancy Rabstejnek Nichols,
svp of external affairs at Weber Shandwick.
What the night has evolved into has surprised
even her. “It’s become a real insider event,” says
Nichols, who was part of the original group that
conceived of Honors Night when she worked at
True North Communications. “People enjoy
coming back each year and celebrating the AEF
as well as being with old friends and making
some new ones.”
Those colleagues will join together again on
June 8 at the 10th annual Honors Night at the
University Club in New York City to honor one
ad agency, one advertiser, one media company
and one individual who has made a major
contribution to the mission of the AEF.
Past honorees include The Coca-Cola
Company, JWT, The Gannett Company, Time Inc.,
Kellogg’s, Unilever, American Airlines, The New
York Times Company and Young & Rubicam.
This year, the honorees will be Grey Group,
Colgate-Palmolive and the Disney/ABC
Television Group.
The night also includes a Lifetime
Achievement Award, which is given to a leader
who has not only exemplified the mission of the
AEF but who has helped take the industry to
another level.
Past honorees include Shelly Lazarus of
Standing room only at the Honors Night cocktail party in 2009
University Club
1 West 54th St., New York City
(Business attire)
For tables, tickets or additional
information, contact
Terry Cooper at
(212) 997-0100, ext. 238
tcooper@projectsplusinc.com
Ogilvy & Mather and Keith Reinhard of DDB
Communications Worldwide. This year, the AEF
is bestowing the award on Irwin Gotlieb, global
CEO of GroupM.
Honors Night is the AEF’s chief fundraiser for
the year. Proceeds support the growth and
maintenance of www.aef.com and the
development of an upcoming online archive and
exhibit called “Race, Ethnicity and Advertising in
America, 1890-2000.”
The growing tradition and success of Honors
Night is a testament not only to the success of
the advertising industry but to the AEF and its
mission. ■
For more information, see www.aef.com.
Honors Night has
become a real
insider event. People
enjoy coming back
each year and
celebrating the AEF
as well as being with
old friends and making
some new ones.
‘
PHOTO: maryannerussell.com
‘
—Nancy Rabstejnek Nichols,
Weber Shandwick
AEF 2
Thanks to the AEF and our clients
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Advocating Advertising
The AEF’s annual Honors Night is
just one part of its expansive mission
ho can escape advertising? Whether online or on
television, at the movie theater or at the doctor’s office,
in magazines or in elevators, advertising comprises a
huge chunk of what we see, hear and read every day.
Yet the more ubiquitous that advertising becomes, the less people
seem to understand about the professionals and the industry behind it.
W
Photo: maryannerussell.com
Paula Alex
The AEF educates students, professors and
others in the U.S. and around the world about
advertising and encourages discourse about its
role in society, history, culture and business.
“There’s a mystery about advertising, but I
think there’s also a fascination about it,” says
Paula Alex, CEO of the AEF. “Almost everyone
thinks they know how it happens and what it’s
all about, but then they are surprised to learn
that it takes a lot of talent to create an
advertisement, that it is a responsible industry
and that it requires much hard work.”
The AEF was founded in 1983 as a permanent
public relations campaign aimed at countering
negative representation of the advertising
industry. But it soon morphed into something
more sophisticated and expansive: a one-of-akind nonprofit organization that would host
exchange programs and develop curricula
highlighting the historical contributions—
flattering and otherwise—of advertising to
American history and culture.
Over the past 27 years, the AEF has become
an invaluable part of the advertising ecosystem.
In fact, it derives most of its funding from
agencies, advertisers and media companies, the
AEF board and friends, as well as its one major
annual fundraiser, Honors Night. Agencies and
advertisers alike value the AEF for giving them
a direct line to students and professors at top
academic institutions as they search for the
next great generation of ad executives.
Back to school
Achieving that means placing advertising
executives inside schools and universities to
talk about their work. To that end, the AEF
operates the Inside Advertising Speakers
Program, which every year sends top-level
speakers from agencies like JWT, Ogilvy &
Mather, McCann Erickson and Leo Burnett to
Harvard, Columbia, Duke and other schools.
Now in its 25th year, the Speakers Program
gives students the opportunity to spend a full
day with an dvertising executive, asking
questions, hearing stories and generally
learning about the business.
‘
I think it’s the responsibility of everybody
in our profession to elevate the industry…
so that we all understand the benefits of an
advertising and marketing career.
‘
This is why the Advertising Educational
Foundation exists. It’s the mission of the AEF to
not only dispel myths and misconceptions
about the advertising industry but also to shine
a light on the good work that advertisers do.
“Let’s be honest: Back in the heyday—let’s
call it the ’60s and ’70s—the advertising
community had far more intrigue and influence,”
says Bob Liodice, president and CEO of the
Association of National Advertisers. “It was
viewed as an industry that was important and
fun and as having the ability to truly influence
the way decisions are made in corporate
America.”
But in the past 30 years, the reputation of
the advertising industry has taken a hit, says
Liodice. In terms of respectability, ad
executives now rank “just between lawyers and
used car salesmen,” he says, referring to a
recent Yankelovich Report, an annual ranking of
consumer attitudes toward career options.
“I think it’s the responsibility of everybody in
our profession to elevate the industry…so that
we all understand the benefits of an advertising
and marketing career,” Liodice adds.
—Bob Liodice, Association of National Advertisers
AEF 4
6782_Layout_100507_Final_Layout 1 5/10/10 5:40 PM Page 1
Congratulations!
Canon U.S.A., Inc. Camera Group wishes to
congratulate GREY Group for winning the
Advertising Educational Foundation’s Agency
Award. A partner with GREY Group since 1976,
Canon U.S.A., Inc. Camera Group is delighted
to acknowledge this well-deserved honor.
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about the future of the
industry and where they
think it’s going. We’ve asked
some very top people to
contribute to this.”
The flip side of the
Speakers Program is the
unique AEF’s Visiting
Professor Program, which
brings college professors
into an advertising agency
for two full weeks, giving
them an opportunity to
immerse themselves in the
The AEF Speakers Program brings together agency executives
day-to-day workings of an
and college students. Above: John Adams of The Martin Agency agency.
at Duke University
Grey Group is a longtime
As an addendum to the Speakers Program,
participant in the Visiting Professor Program,
the AEF is now launching the online Inside
not just because of what it does for the
Advertising Forum, which will feature 1,000professors, but because it benefits his agency,
word articles or short videos from cutting-edge
says CEO Jim Heekin.
practitioners providing insight into what
“Every year, we have one of their visiting
they do.
professors come in and spend a couple weeks
“We thought it would be nice to have
with us,” he says. “We really try to integrate
something a little more current,” says Alex, “so
them into some kind of specific project so they
we’re going to do this with account planners,
get the sense of what we actually do, so they
digital executives and others who can talk
can see it’s not just voodoo and black magic.
“The other side of that is I find it very helpful
to pick their brain about how the industry is
perceived within academia and how kids have
contact with the industry and are perceiving it.”
Industry in motion
Of course, professors can only do so much
without proper resources, which is why the AEF
also produces a number of academic texts. The
Advertising & Society Review is a peerreviewed journal that considers advertising
from a balanced perspective. It includes articles
by some of the most influential liberal arts and
social science academicians practicing today.
Launched in 2000, the A&SR is published four
times a year by the Johns Hopkins University
Press Project MUSE and is read by some of the
most influential professors in the U.S. and
around the world.
But advertising is an industry in motion,
so the AEF is taking advantage of new
technologies to create a textbook that never
stops evolving. “ADText: An Online Curriculum”
is a 20-unit living textbook about
communications, marketing and advertising.
ADText includes video, audio, rich graphics and
other dynamic content that students can use to
Congratulations Grey Group!
Thank you for helping us make the future a healthier one.
The Future group proudly salutes The Grey group for winning the AEF’s AGENCY AWARD.
AEF 6
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learn about the history and future of
advertising.
For the past several years, AEF has also been
working alongside the curator of AfricanAmerican History and Culture at the
Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of
American History to compile an online archive
and exhibit called “Race, Ethnicity and
Advertising in America, 1890-2000.” The
purpose of the archive, which will make 500 to
700 examples of advertising available for
browsing online, is to show the advertising
industry’s evolving treatment of race and
ethnicity, both in its product and its practices.
“Particularly up through the 1940s
and ’50s, some of those images are
rather hard to look at,” says Alex.
“Things have gotten a lot better since
then, but we believe that things can be
even better. So one of the objectives of
this project is not only to end up with an
outstanding archive and an exhibit
online, but also to provide industry
guidelines so client companies and
agencies can do even better portrayals
when advertising to these diverse
groups.”
Because diversity is vital to the
advertising industry, in March the AEF
held its second annual Symposium on
The AEF recently held its first advertising summit on
Diversity: Advertising and the AsianAsian-American advertising. From left: Jon Yokogawa
American Community. The event, hosted
(interTrend Communications), Nita Song (IW Group),
by Leo Burnett in Chicago, gathered
Janice Spector (AEF consultant) and Lisa Destefanotogether leading academics and
Orebaugh (JCPenney)
The AEF “textbook” at www.adtextonline.org
marketing executives to raise awareness and
understanding of the largely untapped
opportunity the Asian-American community
represents.
“I really feel proud about being able to say
that we have stayed on mission, and that has
been our guide over the years,” says Alex. “But
while our mission hasn’t changed, we are taking
on an ever broader range of challenges, and
that’s really important to us.”
In other words, the AEF finds itself
constantly evolving in order to survive, much
like the industry it exists to support. ■
When you have a vision and invest in the future,
you can achieve your dreams.
Congratulations Colgate-Palmolive
for being honored as the
AEF Advertiser of the Year.
AEF 7
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PHOTO: Ben Baker/Redux
LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENT AWARD
Irwin
Gotlieb
A digital pioneer who made
media investment an art
Irwin Gotlieb has never written a jingle, coined a famous slogan or
relied on “the big creative idea” to further his career. Yet he is the
living embodiment of one of the AEF’s core principles: There’s more
to Madison Avenue than what audiences see on Mad Men.
AEF 8
Thank you, Irwin,
for all you make possible.
AT&T congratulates AEF Lifetime
Achievement Award winner Irwin Gotlieb.
©2010 AT&T Intellectual Property. Service provided by AT&T Mobility. All rights reserved. AT&T, the AT&T logo, and all other AT&T marks contained herein are trademarks of AT&T Intellectual Property and/or
AT&T affiliated companies. All other marks contained herein are the property of their respective owners. Subsidiaries and affiliates of AT&T Inc. provide products and services under the AT&T brand.
Saved at
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LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENT
T
By separating the media department from
the creative side, Irwin changed the way
advertising is bought and sold. Today, media
agencies like those under GroupM—
Mediacom, MEC, Maxus and Mindshare—
often challenge the “creatives” for creative
bragging rights.
“I think people throw around the word
visionary liberally, but Irwin truly qualifies
for that distinction,” says John Partilla, evp,
president of global media sales for Clear
Channel Communications and chair of the
AEF board. “He’s been a leader in the media
sector for his entire career.”
Gotlieb joined Mindshare Worldwide in
September 1999 as chairman and CEO. He
launched MindShare North America by
consolidating the media resources of JWT
the development of insights and the discipline
in tactical planning.”
As one of the industry’s leading advocates,
Gotlieb places a high value on the work being
done by the AEF. Like any chief executive, he
is keenly aware of the role that education
plays in recruiting the next generation of
leaders.
“We are a business that is reliant on a
constant flow of fresh young talent, and I
don’t think that the educational system has
done a particularly good job of preparing
people for our business,” says Gotlieb, who
left high school early to take an entry-level
job at an ad agency. “Any group with a mission
that attempts to improve the curriculum for
students entering our business—advertising
generally and media in particular—is
‘
oday, as global CEO of GroupM, an
umbrella unit that houses all of the
WPP Group’s media operations,
Gotlieb is widely recognized as
one of the most influential and
powerful executives in advertising. Most
recently, AdweekMedia named him media
agency executive of the decade. The
sometimes-called “king of advertising” was
also named one of the media industry’s top 25
most influential leaders by TV Week magazine
in 2007, the same year he was inducted into
Broadcasting & Cable’s Hall of Fame.
A soft-spoken technophile, he wrote some
of the first software to help advertisers buy
commercial time on TV. He is known to have
wired his house so he could turn lights on and
off with his cell phone.
‘
He is always so far ahead of the curve that it is astonishing.
He almost performs against type in that way.
—Gord McLean, Young & Rubicam Brands
“When you meet him, he seems like the
least likely guy to be one of the true digital
pioneers in the industry, but that’s what he is,”
says Gord McLean, global managing partner
of Young & Rubicam Brands, a sister WPP
company. “He is always so far ahead of the
curve that it is astonishing. He almost
performs against type in that way.”
The AEF is honoring Gotlieb, 60, with its
Lifetime Achievement Award for moving the
advertising industry forward, particularly on
the media side of the business. As president
and CEO of MediaVest Worldwide in the
1990s, Gotlieb was one of the foremost
figures of the unbundling movement.
“He was arguably the first to really take
the media department and make it an
independent entity when he established
TeleVest in 1993,” says Marc Goldstein, a
former North American CEO of GroupM who
first met Gotlieb at Benton & Bowles, where
they both worked in the late 1970s. “He’s
always shown that kind of leadership, not just
for an agency, but for the entire industry.”
TeleVest/MediaVest eventually merged
with the unbundled media resources of
DMB&B (which itself had evolved out of
Benton & Bowles) to become MediaVest
Worldwide.
and Ogilvy, thus creating a global entity. In
April 2003, WPP established GroupM and
Gotlieb moved into his current role.
In the 21st century, Gotlieb once again
stands at the forefront of a revolution, taking
the guesswork out of media buying by
providing advertisers with the data they need
to pinpoint consumers with unprecedented
efficiency and accuracy. Through GroupM,
Gotlieb was an early investor in Invidi
Technologies, a company that offers
advanced addressable TV advertising. He was
also one of the prime advocates of making
commercial ratings the prevailing currency
for pricing and buying TV time.
As TV went digital and DVRs became
commonplace earlier this decade, Gotlieb was
among the first to recognize that the number
of people watching a commercial no longer
necessarily correlated to the popularity of the
show—and insisted that TV executives adapt
their business to this new reality.
“There is this misapprehension that
creativity is just about writing copy and
producing a commercial,” says Gotlieb, who
taught himself to code software years before
desktop computers were common. “It is about
mining the data, the creativity you bring to the
analytics, the interpretation of the analytics,
AEF 10
something that I view as very helpful.”
Although Gotlieb is not a member of the
AEF, CEO Paula Alex says the group was
compelled to honor him with its Lifetime
Achievement Award based on his
accomplishments and what he represents.
Gotlieb, she says, is the kind of executive
who furthers the AEF’s mission, whether or
not he chooses to participate in its programs.
“He has really brought in some new
innovations and certainly has done a
remarkable job not only for GroupM and WPP,
but in the area of advancing media generally,”
Alex says.
Nonetheless, the mission of the AEF is of
particular importance to Gotlieb as a media
executive, a role that is rarely seen in
mainstream culture. He is thankful for any
organization that expands the public’s
perception of what Madison Avenue is doing.
“People have this oversimplified concept of
what we do, and sometimes we contribute to
compounding it because there are agencies
that talk about how important ‘the big idea’ is,”
he says. “But ‘the big idea’ doesn’t happen in a
vacuum. It starts with the interpretation of
analytics and insight.”
Pausing, Gotlieb adds: “At least it should
be.” ■
trendspotter.
genius.
king.
macy’s salutes irwin gotlieb,
cEO of Global Group M,
and this year’s winner of the
aef lifetime achievement award.
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AGENCY AWARD
Grey Group
Helping shape the next generation
inety-three years after its launch,
Grey Group continues to represent
the best of advertising, with a
trophy case full of accolades and a
client roster of corporate icons like Procter &
Gamble and the NFL. Now, as the agency
prepares to turn 100 later this decade, it is
being honored as one of the AEF’s most loyal
and supportive agency partners.
“Grey has supported this organization from
the beginning, and it is appropriate that we, at
long last, are getting around to honoring
them,” says Paula Alex, CEO of the AEF. “When
we first got going in the 1980s, it was these
big agencies that made it possible for us to
go out and educate professors and students
about our industry.”
As annual participants in the AEF’s Visiting
Professor Program and its Inside Advertising
Speakers Program, Grey Group has educated
countless college students and professors on
what life is like inside a large advertising
agency. Grey has also taken an active role in
AEF’s recent diversity initiatives, helping recruit
the next generation of advertising superstars
wherever they may be found.
“Thanks to the AEF, I’ve been on campuses
quite a bit talking to kids about advertising,”
says Jim Heekin, chairman and CEO of Grey
Group. “And I think it’s terribly helpful to have an
open dialogue about the very positive ends to
which advertising is used in society today. I
think opening the eyes of professors and
students to that, particularly at the small liberal
arts colleges that the AEF targets, is extremely
important.”
Heekin, who will be accepting the award on
behalf of the agency, joined the company in
2005. In 2007, he rose to his current role as CEO
and chairman of Grey Group, which includes
multidisciplinary offerings such as G2, Wing and
Alliance and sister companies such as GHG and
Mediacom. Overall, Heekin presides over 432
offices in 96 countries with 10,000 employees.
A former CEO of Euro RSCG Worldwide,
McCann Erickson WorldGroup and McCann
Erickson Worldwide and head of JWT Network,
Heekin is no stranger to the contribution the
Grey Group’s new
headquarters office,
completed in December
2009, “symbolizes the
ascending Grey brand,”
according to CEO Jim
Heekin. Below: the famous
E*Trade “baby” campaign
N
advertising industry has made to both
corporate and pop culture in America.
No wonder, given his pedigree: Heekin’s
father was James Robson Heekin Jr., who
in 1965 rose to be president of Ogilvy &
Mather in the U.S. at the age of just 39.
Heekin’s son, Jim, is a creative director in
New York.
For Heekin, the AEF provides an opportunity
to pass on to students the same appreciation
for advertising that his father instilled in him.
“Young people today who are artistically
oriented or fascinated by pop culture are
always surprised to discover the role that
advertising plays in society,” he says. “It’s been a
less-understood profession, but one that has a
tremendous amount to contribute in terms of
influence and opportunity.”
Grey itself continues to be a big part of that
influence. This year, it was the only advertising
agency included among Fast Company’s “50
Most Innovative Companies.” Last year, it won
18 Lions at the Cannes Advertising Festival and
had its best year ever at the London
International Awards, the CLIOS and The One
Show and reeled in record new business.
AEF 12
But of course, in advertising, no
award speaks louder than the work. In recent
years, Grey’s work for E*Trade has stood out as
a creative high point in TV advertising,
particularly during the Super Bowl. The spots,
which center on a day-trading baby who offers
investment advice, have given the client a
unique voice and brand identity.
“Under Grey’s creative leadership, we’ve
developed an iconic campaign with a winning
formula,” says Nick Utton, CMO of E*Trade. “The
ads are entertaining and memorable, and they
communicate a strong, relevant message to
investors. The E*Trade baby has been welcomed
into popular culture—while bringing tangible
returns to the company.”
The agency also crafted a new mission and
slogan for itself in 2009, summing up its nearly
century-long contribution to the advertising
industry and the business world in general:
“Famously effective since 1917.” ■
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MEDIA AWARD
Disney/ABC Television Group
Singled out for innovation and flexibility
ew media companies today are as large
as the Disney/ABC Television Group: In
addition to its flagship ABC television
network, the company encompasses
the Disney Channel, ABC Family, ESPN,
SOAPNet, ABC News, ABC.com, the Radio
Disney Network, book publisher Hyperion and
more—generating $36.1 billion in revenue in
fiscal year 2009.
F
Capital Cities Communications. The Walt Disney
Company acquired the network in the 1990s
and it remains a solid partner of the AEF to
this day.
“By working with colleges, university
professors and different communications
programs, the AEF is really ensuring the future
of advertising, and I think it’s also ensuring that
innovation in advertising continues,” says Anne
A recent scene from ABC’s Lost
Moreover, Disney/ABC has proved in recent
years that even a company of its size can be
nimble. It has adapted to the new realities of
content delivery, a fact that observers say
makes it a valuable partner to advertisers in a
rapidly evolving landscape.
“There’s a recognition there that the model
has changed,” says Rob Master, North American
media director at Unilever. “And whether that
means partnering with Apple or working
together on their Web sites or bringing
alternative approaches, they are working with
various advertising partners to bring that stuff
to life.”
The ABC television network began
supporting the AEF around the time of its
inception in the early 1980s and continued to do
so over the next decade as it was taken over by
Sweeney, co-chair of Disney Media Networks
and president of Disney/ABC.
Innovation can be found in the DNA of ABC.
The network began broadcasting in 1948 at the
dawn of the television era and is responsible for
some of the most beloved shows of all time:
sitcoms like Happy Days and The Brady Bunch,
dramas such as thirtysomething and The
Wonder Years and sports mainstays like
Monday Night Football and the Wide World of
Sports. Today, it produces ratings juggernauts
like Dancing With the Stars and Lost.
But perhaps the most important contribution
to advertising that a company like Disney/ABC
can make in today’s environment is the ability to
adapt. In 2005, Disney/ABC sent shock waves
through the industry when it became the first
network to offer its shows for download
AEF 14
through iTunes—without commercials.
Many advertisers phoned Sweeney that day.
The message? “We understand why we’re not
with you in the iTunes store because it’s
electronic sell-through, but make us a promise
that whatever you do next, you’ll take us with
you,” Sweeney says they told her. “What we did
next was ABC.com.”
When preparing to make its series available
on ABC.com, Sweeney invited 10 of
Disney/ABC’s affiliates and 10
advertisers to take part in a 60-day test
to see how they could best incorporate
advertising. That kind of inclusiveness
earned the company the respect of
nervous marketers, not to mention a
valuable new revenue stream.
“We take for granted that today you
can watch whatever show you want on the
Internet, but I think you can point to ABC
as the ones to really recognize that they
needed to work with advertisers to make
that happen,” says Master, of Unilever.
More recently, Disney/ABC has
earned the respect of media buyers for
continuing to innovate during tough
economic times. “Even throughout what
was arguably the worst recession in 20
years, they continued their commitment
to high-quality product, spending money
not just on script development but pilot
development,” says Elizabeth Herbst-Brady,
president of the Interpublic Group’s Magna.
“They’ve also continued to invest in a media lab
that is focusing on understanding consumer
behavior. As an advertiser, you want your
partners to be informed and forward-thinking
like that.”
Sweeney says much the same when speaking
of the AEF, particularly as she looks to the
next generation of media executives the
organization is helping to educate.
“These millennials coming into careers in TV
and advertising really come in with a different
perspective,” says Sweeney, “and the beauty of
the AEF being in the academic setting is that it
really helps kids understand what their options
and opportunities are and how exciting
advertising is as a career choice for them.” ■
THE BEST IDEAS FROM THE BEST PEOPLE
©/® The J.M. Smucker Company
Congratulations for winning
the 2010 AEF Agency Award.
Your friends at
The J.M. Smucker Company.
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SPECIAL ADVERTISING SECTION TO ADWEEK, BRANDWEEK AND MEDIAWEEK
ADVERTISER AWARD
Colgate-Palmolive
Global yet a part of Americana
olgate-Palmolive is one of the most
recognizable consumer packagedgoods brands in America. It is also one
of the Advertising Educational
Foundation’s longest corporate supporters.
In 1986, three years after the AEF was
founded and long before it would become a
viable force in the advertising industry, Reuben
Mark, then the CEO of Colgate-Palmolive,
pledged his company’s support to the
organization. The impetus was a visit from Ed
Ney, then CEO of Young & Rubicam, and Jock
Elliott, who had recently retired from Ogilvy &
Mather with the title of chairman emeritus.
Having learned from the two legendary
admen about the mission and aspirations of the
AEF, Mark directed his executive vice president
Silas Ford to send a letter pledging $75,000. It
was a significant contribution for a fledgling
nonprofit and the beginning of a relationship
that continues to this day.
C
“Colgate has been there right from the
beginning—they were one of the ones that gave
seed money,” says Gord McLean, global
managing partner of Young & Rubicam Brands,
which oversees Colgate-Palmolive’s longtime ad
agency, Young & Rubicam, and a member of the
AEF board. “Colgate prides itself on being an
active participant in this area and has always
been a significant contributor.”
Colgate-Palmolive is no stranger to humble
beginnings. William Colgate founded the
company as a soap and candle manufacturer in
New York City in 1806. “William Colgate &
Company” would be nearly 70 years old before
introducing its first toothpaste, which
eventually became one of the best-selling
toothpaste brands in the world.
Today, Colgate-Palmolive is a $15.3 billion
company that sells products in more than 200
countries around the world. Those products
include its namesake toothpaste and dish soap
PHOTO: Bloomberg via Getty Images
AEF 16
brands, but also household cleaners (Ajax,
Murphy Oil Soap), antiperspirants and
deodorants (Mennen Speed Stick and Tom’s of
Maine), body washes (Irish Spring and Protex)
and pet foods and medications (Hill’s Science
Diet and Hill’s Prescription Diet lines).
Colgate-Palmolive has produced some of the
advertising industry’s most iconic campaigns
and slogans—who can forget the way that
pocket knife sliced open a bar of Irish Spring?
(“Fresh and clean as a whistle!”)
It has also made its mark on Madison Avenue
by being a uniquely loyal client. The company
has used Y&R to create its advertising since
1984, and in 1996 consolidated its worldwide
account with the WPP Group agency. In an
industry that sees clients sometimes change ad
agencies more often than they change taglines,
Colgate-Palmolive stands out for its dedication
to its agency relationship.
“They genuinely respect their agencies as
true partners, and in fact, it has been a
remarkable partnership,” says McLean. “The
other thing is that they are genuinely pioneers
when it comes to integrated marketing. They
live and breathe it, and I think that’s also made
them very valuable in terms of their partnership
with AEF.”
Most recently, Colgate-Palmolive has helped
support the AEF’s upcoming online archive and
exhibit called “Race, Ethnicity and Advertising in
America, 1890-2000.” Produced in partnership
with the Smithsonian Institution’s National
Museum of American History, the archive will
present hundreds of examples of how American
advertising has dealt with race and ethnicity.
“They have displayed some of their very early
ads,” says Paula Alex, CEO of the AEF. Revisiting
earlier mind-sets is not always easy for a
corporation that’s been around as long as
Colgate-Palmolive, but Alex lauded the
company for its participation, saying that “they
have clearly come a long way.”
She also noted that, despite being a truly
global organization—Colgate-Palmolive today
earns 75 percent of its revenue from outside
the U.S.—the company remains a uniquely
American brand. “It’s almost like apple pie,” she
says. “It’s part of America and Americana. They
are the gold standard.” ■
FAMOUSLY EFFECTIVE
SINCE 1917.
GLORIOUSLY SO IN 2009.
Congratulations
for winning the 10th Annual AEF Agency Award.
THE NATIONAL FOOTBALL LEAGUE
5/7/10
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SCENES FROM
HONORS NIGHT
2009
Advertising industry leaders gather each year
at the AEF Honors Night to pay tribute to the
winners and to help support the organization’s
mission. The event helps fund AEF projects
such as the upcoming launch of the online
archive on race and ethnicity.
>
>
Tony Suarez, Hiroko Hatanaka, Veronica Vela,
Daisy Expósito-Ulla and Louis Maldonado
Paul Kurnit, Douglass Alligood
Owen Dougherty, Burt Manning
>
ALL PHOTOS: maryannerussell.com
AEF 18
Congratulations to our dear friend
Irwin Gotlieb
on receiving the
LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENT AWARD
from the
ADVERTISING EDUCATIONAL FOUNDATION
and also to
Anne Sweeney
and
The Disney/ABC Television Group
on receiving the
AEF MEDIA AWARD
Colgate-Palmolive
on receiving the
AEF ADVERTISER AWARD
Grey Group
on receiving the
AEF AGENCY AWARD
Michael Kassan
Chairman & CEO
Wenda Harris Millard
President & COO
MEDIALINK LLC
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>
Paula Alex, Advertising
Educational Foundation, with
the 2009 honorees: Joseph
Tripodi, The Coca-Cola
Company; Shelly Lazarus,
Ogilvy & Mather Worldwide;
Frank Bennack, Hearst
Corporation; and Michael Roth,
Interpublic Group
>
Nancy Rabstejnek Nichols
Tim Armstrong presents the Media Award
to Hearst Corporation
Erin Clift, Linda Sawyer and
Steph Redish Hoffman
>
Colgate-Palmolive salutes the Advertising Education Federation
and congratulates all the award winners
www.colgate.com
AEF 20
ALL PHOTOS: maryannerussell.com
>
SPECIAL ADVERTISING SECTION TO ADWEEK, BRANDWEEK AND MEDIAWEEK
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5/6/10
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In the world of
some things are truly black and white.
Consistent. Outstanding. Work.
Congratulations
on being recognized as the
Advertising Educational Foundation
2010 Honor Recipient
of the
Agency Award.
From your friends at