100 Days of Leo Burnett, the Midwestern Master of Mascots DAY 30
Here’s today’s Leo:
“When a man knows deep in his bones what is right, and keeps acting on it, he avoids the trap of compromise — he remains incorruptible.” — Leo Burnett
In The Art of Writing Advertising | Conversations with Masters of the Craft, AdAge Interviewer Denis Higgins talks to Leo Burnett:
Q: During that time, in those early days of writing advertising, you worked — from what you said — mainly on so-called hard goods or automotive accounts. Now, after all your years of experience, do you think it’s more difficult to write copy for one product over another? Like an automobile over a refrigerator, say?
A: No, I don’t think it makes very much difference. I think if you find the right appeal in a product — one that you can focus on — you can develop it on any product. I know in the experience of our own agency, some of our best successes have been in industries that I knew nothing about, or our agency didn’t know anything about until we started with them. We knew nothing about the railroad business until we got the Santa Fe account. We knew nothing about the petroleum business until we got Pure Oil. We knew nothing about the shoe business and so we got the Brown Shoe Co. account. We knew nothing about the food business until at Erwin Wasey I started learning about the food business, about the Green Giant Co. — and was responsible for all the Green Giant advertising, practically from the time it started. We redesigned the giant as he is today and we’ve had the account since the very beginning.
