The inter-office envelope: where did it go?

I worked at BBDO / New York as an account manager and rose through the ranks for 12 years from 1977 to 1989. Many of my views on marketing developed during that time, although I don’t think all television commercials need a production budget of more than a million dollars.

In hindsight, where all the troubles of yesteryear fade into obscurity, BBDO was a great place with lots of fantastic and talented people. When I look back, I know I was lucky to have spent so many years there. There were so many interesting and smart people at BBDO, even the ones I didn’t like were characters. Among the people for whom he was particularly fond were two companions: David Parker and Fred Moore. They shared the same sickly, they spoke strangely, I thought. At the very least, they are clearly not “New Yawkers”, that’s because they grew up in the South, David was from North Carolina and Freddie was from Tennessee. They were both really brilliant young AE assistants, who have moved on to more important things.

I’ve been lucky enough to reconnect recently with Fred Moore, who still talks funny, but since he’s now the CEO of a great agency in Richmond, VA called Big River, I don’t think his speech will be a problem any longer. .

Most importantly, Fred has never gotten his due from being the “father of social media” because in the 80’s Fred was an AE assistant dreaming up new ways to communicate with many people with a single press of a button. key along with a “social” envelope between offices. while at the same time his fellow volunteer, Al Gore, was inventing the Internet.

Today’s Strumming is Fred’s story about the origins of social media from his blog, Fred Moore or Less. This is the inter-office envelope that has traveled a lot. Good story, well told.

Remember the classic inter-office envelope?

Those nasty, dirty yellow reusable envelopes that sealed “important” documents via messy but sturdy string wrapped snugly around a cardboard disc.

Those old wrinkled envelopes were really the forerunners of social media, right? In my opinion, they were early holdovers of LinkedIn, before LinkedIn was great.

They used to carry the old inter-office memo. A well crafted and typed position paper using proper English and a bit of jargon or certainly no shortcuts (like LOL, BTW, etc). They were well-crafted viewpoints focused on business, procedure, or other important elements. These memos were key. If the right person sees them, at the right time, they could change careers.

Bosses and other managers would receive these business memos, write a few words in the corner, and return the memo to the sender or forward it to them.

Social networks, right? Circulating your point of view among others was good, then as it is today.

But, as we all know, social media can also have its ‘dark side’ and sometimes be … well … cruel.

This was certainly true during these days of “social media” evolution. Let me explain.

While at BBDO in New York and working on the Pepsi account, I had an extremely revealing “social media” event that has impacted me forever.

I was the very short man on the Pepsi totem pole. Account executive assistant.

But boy, was it a blast. In fact, we were in the middle of filming Michael Jackson’s “Choosing a New Generation” campaign (No. I know what you’re thinking. It wasn’t me who set Michael on fire!)

Anyway. One of my highest jobs for the Pepsi account was to make sure talent (supporting actors and actresses) were paid and the customer was billed for all these talent charges.

Remember the “concert scene” from the Michael Jackson commercials? We are talking about hundreds of talents ‘on camera’. That means many, many payments to fake “fans” whose face can appear for, say, half a second. I had to deal with all those payments. Complicated, a nightmare and expensive process for our client.

I had a brief idea of ​​how to make this process a little better and cheaper for our client.

So, I wrote a one-page inter-office memo describing my idea of ​​”how to make talent pay more efficient.” Upon completion, I grabbed one of those ugly yellow envelopes ubiquitous between offices from my secretary Catherine Edwards desk (this really dates the origins of social media, as this was during the day that even a humble assistant account executive like myself had a secretary) Then I sent the nasty yellow envelope with my only pager to my boss, Stuart Marvin (later to be the head of advertising and marketing for The Sporting News)

That was it … right?

Oh no, the power of the early stages of “social media”, little to my knowledge, was coming into force.

Fast forward, two weeks later.

I receive in the mail between offices, a nasty yellow envelope between offices. The content to my surprise? – my one-page interoffice note … with various scribbles and annotations on the edges of my text.

Woof. My note had actually circulated.

And, even more easily than a modern text string, I could see where my thoughts had been, how they impacted the thought, and what people’s real feelings were.

Obviously, my suggestion had been important and provoked important business reflections.

So, I started tracing the steps while reading the squiggles around the edges.

Stuart Marvin, my original recipient, sent it with a note to his boss, Jeff Mordos (now COO of All Omnicom) with a note that said something like “Example of how we are always saving the customer money.” .

Mordos, in a note below, sent it to Bill Katz (later president and CEO of BBDO) saying “When are we going to have our next Pepsi team building meeting?”

I guess the appearance of my point of view served as a reminder to Katz that she needed to follow up with something for her boss Richard Burnette (BBDO management rep for the Pepsi account … no idea where it finally ended up ). Katz’s quick scribble said “We need to unite on that topic we reviewed on the plane.”

Not exactly the feedback I was looking for, but … heh … my grade is moving up the ranks!

Then Burnette obviously made a really bold move and released my inter-office memo with the doodles rising out of the inter-office surroundings and sent it with his note to Pepsi’s headquarters in Purchase, New York. Obviously, Dick had seen a promising woman in the Pepsi organization, Brenda Barnes (Pepsi product manager and later Sara Lee CEO) and he didn’t want to miss any opportunity to impress her. His note: “Thanks for a great session. A little example of how everyone on our team is thinking about improving Pepsi marketing. Dick.”

I continue the saga of the memorandum between offices on the go.

Oh my God….

Mrs. Barnes sends MY memo to larger than life Alan Pottasch, the undisputed father of the Pepsi brand! My heart flutters.

It gets better.

Pottasch actually sends MY memo to the CEO of Pepsi, the guy on the cover of Fortune magazine, author of the best-selling business book The Other Buy Blinked, and at least temporary winner of “the queue wars” … nothing less than … Roger Enrico !! ! Pottasch note? No idea, also this day I can not distinguish his handwriting. But hey, does that really matter right now? We have broken the glass ceiling and we are flat in the management stratosphere.

And wait. Did Roger really write something?!?! Oh my God.

As I hold MY memo in my hand closer. I see it in the upper right corner of MY memo.

Yes. Yes. Roger the Man actually wrote something.

I squint to read his quick, CEO “I have no time to waste time” almost indecipherable handwriting. After a few moments, I can clearly see what this great man wrote. I see how you summed up this two-week conversation between, what would turn out to be, the true leaders of this nation’s advertising and marketing industry, in a way that only top management can. To break. Get to the point.

My friend Roger had scribbled:

“Who the hell is Fred Moore?”

A little squashed … I must admit. But now I look back with perspective.

Yes, social media can be an energizing or demoralizing experience. But, at least I was there in the beginning.