Semester 2: The Creative Revolution

This lecture was about the creative revolution in advertising which took place in New York between 1954 and 1964.  The leading man in this revolution between design and meaning was Bill Bernbach. Bernbach was an advertising executive, a founding member of Doyle Dane Bernbach and advertising creative legend during the height of his success. Born in 1911 in New York Bernbach graduate from New York university with a degree in literature and began to make his way into his career in advertising. Even now a legend back then Bernbach had trouble getting his foot in the door and actually began his career in the mail room writing ads for his employers. However Bernbach eventually persuaded an employer that he had some talent and was promoted to the advertising department. In 1949 Bernbach co founded Doyle Dane Bernbach and soon the creative revolution would begin.
Bernbach wanted to change what was going on at the time in most ad agency's by adding personality, humour and a creative touch to a campaign. The most memorable example of this revolution is VW Beetle 'Think Small' campaign. Radically different from ad's at the time which consisted of a squared up image, a headline line describing the picture, 3 columns of text below and a large logo, the VW ad although similar in layout was in fact very different. The image used was very small, black and white, and left a lot of white space. The strap line 'Think small' was very different to the gimmicky, or most of the time obvious description of other ads. Bernbach focused on what made the Beetle different from the other cars at the time and used this to promote the VW and almost ridicule the big American cars at the time which most people couldn't realistically afford. Through all of these decisions not only did Bernbach manage to sell a German car soon after the war but began the creative revolution in advertising which would change the world forever.

Looking at the creative revolution taught me that you should take risks with your work, just because no one else has done or is doing it doesn't mean that you can't. If everyone is doing the same thing it doesn't mean it's the right thing. You should have bravery to do things that you think are good even if it's not the norm at the time.