Video Highlights From Advertising Week

Martha Stewart Reflects on the Business Impact of Prison Time

Published: September 28, 2007

NEW YORK (AdAge.com) -- The fourth annual Advertising Week is in full swing, pulling thousands of executives from agencies and marketing companies into sessions that stretch from one end of Manhattan to the to the other. Here are some video highlights of those events.

Ad Age Videography by Steve Raddock

MARTHA STEWART REFLECTS ON BUSINESS IMPACT OF PRISON TIME

NEW YORK (AdAge.com) -- Looking back on the impact of her trial and prison time on her company's operations, Martha Stewart told an Advertising Week session on Thursday that "its no fun to be building so rapidly and beautifully and then have a halt to that growth." She referred to her court battle and five months in the federal prison at Alderson, W.Va., as "the legal chaos" that "affected my company when it really should have only affected me."

GREY'S NEW MOHAWKS AND TATTOOS

Grey New York is reorganizing itself as a "tradigital" agency, its president Steve Hardwick told the Advertising Week creative agency CEO Summit at the New York Times on Thursday. He said the term refers to combining traditional and new media techniques at the agency's core. "We're bringing in all kinds of kids with mohawks and tattoos," he said. Also on the panel were Hamish McLennan of Y&R and Mark Kingdon of the Organic agency.

LINDA KAPLAN THALER SINGS "SHAVING SUCKS" SONG

NEW YORK (AdAge.com) -- One of the more lighthearted of Advertising Week's many sessions was Wednesday's "Want to Start an Agency?" panel in which Linda Kaplan Thaler performed the "Shaving Sucks" song that her agency used in the pitch that won the Panasonic Personal Shaver account. Also appearing on the panel are Richard Kirshenbaum of Kirshenbaum Bond & Partners and John McGarry of McGarry Bowen.

FUTURE VISIONS OF MEDIA AGENCY CEOS

"We're going into a consumer time of the likes we've never seen before. I want to make sure that as we leap into the future and take down silos that we don't bundle to the past, but rather we bundle to the future," said Starcom MediaVest CEO Laura Desmond at the Media Agency CEO Summit. Also appearing are Nick Brien of Universal McCann, Charlie Rutman of MPG, Matt Seiler of PHD North America and Scott Neslund of MindShare North America.

WHY MARKETERS MUST OWN A PASSION

"In the past, an agency like MediaVest was in the message delivery business but that's all changed. We're now in the message propagation business," MediaVest President-Connections Research Jim Kite told the "Passionistas: The New Empowered Consumer" session at Advertising Week. He suggested that marketers must "own a passion and make it a great reason for consumers to actively engage."

HOLLYWOOD'S BIG MISTAKE WITH AD AGENCIES

Hollywood is missing the boat by not taking advantage of the skill sets, knowledge and consumer insights that advertising and media agencies bring to the table, 2 Degrees Ventures' CEO Mitch Kanner told Tuesday's "Grandmasters" panel at Advertising Week. Other panelists were Michael Kassan of Media Link, Cleve Langton of DDB Worldwide and Jerry Shereshewsky of Grandparents.com.

MANAGING THE CHAOS OF CONSUMER CONTROL

While chaos has enveloped a market whose traditional rules have been overturned by the new media power of consumers, ad agencies are more important than ever before. That was the consensus of this debate involving R/GA CEO Bob Greenberg, Lowe New York's Mark Wnek, Frito Lay's Ann Mukherjee and Unilever's Babs Rangaiah.

LIVING THE BRAND: THE ICONS PANEL

The role of brand icons was celebrated at a Monday Advertising Week panel featuring the Maytag repairman, Serta's mattress sheep, Travelocity's gnome, Chick-fil-A's "Eat-More-Chickin" cows and the Vlasic stork. Clay Jackson, the new Maytag repairman, explained how his previous experience as a real-estate agent now helped him win the trust of consumers.

PANELISTS CLASH AT MIXX CONFERENCE

The IAB Mixx Conference session "New Strategy" on Monday pulled no punches. "Everything we're doing is messy," said Ogilvy North America President Carla Hendra. Carat Americas CEO David Verklin said digital will "have to be the core" of future marketing strategies. But Publicis Groupe Media Chief Innovation Officer Rishad Tobaccowala argued that "you can do some amazing things without a single digital thing" being involved.

BUYING COCA-COLA'S PROMOTIONAL PRODUCTS

Speaking at the Promotional Products Association International session of Advertising Week, Mark Harris, Coca-Cola's strategic procurement manager, explains how the beverage giant assesses the ROI associated with the enormous amount of promotional products it buys to use in its marketing campaigns. Mr. Harris oversees the acquisition of all promotional products for all Coke operations.