Sometimes people ask me where on earth I find all the work for these posts.
To me, that’s the easy part.
And although it’s sometimes time consuming, there’s a finite amount of places I have to check out.
Like doing a big jigsaw.
The difficult bit is this bit.
What to say about it?
Sometimes I have nothing to say.
Putting ‘Check out these bangers!’ before a hundred ads seems lazy.
But what if I didn’t know the person.
Never grew up in the country the work ran.
Or wasn’t even born when it appeared.
Sometimes it’ll be all of the above.
I then try to reach out to the perfect person, maybe an old partner, boss, employee or whatever.
More often than not, they say no.
‘Brings back too many bad memories’, ‘Don’t want to go public’, ‘Can’t be arsed’.
Occasionally, as with Howard Gossage, I knew the Gossage whisperer – Steve Harrison, and just like the Man From Delmonte – he say yes.
(It ended up growing from a blog post to a book.)
Anyhow, this is another one of those yeses.
The name Bob Levenson has popped up on this site consistently, he’s referenced by the Abbott’s, Delaney’s Brignull’s and Foster’s as the writer they all looked to for guidance.
Their North Star.
No one wrote more of those great Volkswagen ads we all remember.
Their copy changed the way advertising copy was written.
One of those influenced was Tom Yobage.
He not only worked for Bob at DDB for years, he was his friend for decades.
He also worked with DDB’s most famous art directors (Helmut Krone, Roy Grace and Charlie Piccirillo) on some of their most famous accounts (VW, Polaroid, Porsche and IBM).
Before he talks Bob, here are a handful of Tom’s ads…

Bob Levenson Tribute.
I always thought Bob Levenson was Doyle Dane Bernbach’s best copywriter.  And its best creative director.
Bob could sell new work to clients better than any account executive I knew. And he could explain Doyle Dane Bernbach better than anyone.
On top of all that, it was Bob Levenson’s copy for Volkswagen that changed the way advertising is written today. 
Former copywriter Sir Alan Parker said: “It was Bob Levenson’s copy that was the most influential to all of us.”
When Dave asked if I would like to help with an interview about Bob, I remembered all the times I worked with Bob and how special he was.

The Basics.
Bob was born November 23, 1929 in New York City.
Grade School, PS 80 in the Bronx.
Bronx High School of Science, 1943-47.
New York University, 1947-50.                                                                                                  
Graduate School, New York University, 1950-54.                                                      
Majored in English.
Planned to become a teacher.

Eureka Moment.
In the late 1950s, Bob was riding the train to work in New York (sales promotion writer, Broadway Maintenance), reading a newspaper, when he first saw the El Al Airlines torn-ocean ad. It stopped him cold.  He thought “it was dazzling.”  He said to himself: “I have to work at the place that did this ad.” 
The place was Doyle Dane Bernbach.

Doyle Dane Bernbach almost didn’t hire Bob Levenson.
Bob told me it took 2 years and 3 tries to get a job at DDB.  The first two tries, he got a flat-out “No.”  The third try, he was hanging by a thread. Cay Gibson (DDB’s Sales Promotion head) liked what she saw in Bob’s work, but she had some reservations.  So, Bob said, she asked DDB’s Copy Chief Phyllis Robinson for a second opinion.
Phyllis hired many of the writers who would become DDB’s brightest stars — including Judy Protas, David Reider, Ron Rosenfeld. Phyllis looked at Bob’s work and said “Yes.”  “They hired me,” said Bob, “based on some direct mail letters I wrote – with swizzle sticks attached.”

Bob Levenson starts at DDB — St. Patrick’s Day, 1959.
Assigned to the Sales Promotion Department.  Bob’s job was to take the Volkswagen national ads that ran in Life Magazine (ads written by Julian Koenig, and later, by David Reider) and edit them or rewrite them, if necessary, to fit in the smaller sizes of the Volkswagen Dealer newspaper ads. Sometimes it was an easy edit.  Sometimes it was a complete rewrite — great training for what was to come.

The Way We Were.
To understand and appreciate how Bob’s copy changed advertising, it would be good to pause for a moment and look at how things were.
When I was a young copywriter at General Electric and at Campbell-Ewald, NY -– the account guy would tell the copywriter: “Here’s what the client wants to say.”
The copywriter would work all alone trying to come up with “the perfect headline.”  When his headline was approved, it would be taken down the hall to someone called “the layout guy.”  Writer and “layout guy” never spoke to each other. The “layout guy” would have to guess what the writer intended. He’d try to visualize the headline.  Or at least “make the ad look nice.”
Coming up with the perfect headline wasn’t rocket science.  Agencies often had rules for writers to follow.

• Always say the brand name and the product benefit.
• Wherever possible, use the words new and/or free.
• Never use a negative.
• Never set the headline in white reverse.
• Never ever use humor.

One result was the ads tended to look and sound the same.
To stand out, some ads started shouting:  New.  Amazing.  Sensational.  The Best.  The Finest. The Foremost.
Advertisers loved it.  Agencies loved it.  Billings rose every year. And agencies collected their 15% commission.
But there was a problem:  A study from Harvard said 85% of all advertising was wasted.  The advertising was there.  It ran on the air, in publications. Clients paid for it.  But people ignored it.
“The public doesn’t hate us,” Bill Bernbach told the New York Herald Tribune. “They’re bored with us.”
You can have all the right things in your ad, he said, but if your ad doesn’t make people stop, look, and listen to you — “you’ve wasted it.”
If you worked for Bill Bernbach, you often heard him say;  “Bring me something fresh, something new, something different.  Something no one has seen before.  You’re not going to be noticed unless you have a fresh original idea.”

Doyle Dane Bernbach was Different.
From the start, copywriters and art directors worked together in the same room as equal partners — the creative team.   
The goal was not “the perfect headline.”  It was a fresh, new, memorable, persuasive idea — using both copy and art to create the concept.
Most DDB headlines wouldn’t pass the “Perfect Headline” test. But each DDB headline (and sometimes no headline) worked with a visual to create a fresh, new concept that stopped you, got your attention, delivered the message.  And, as I so often heard, made you believe and buy.

The Volkswagen Campaign.
In 1959, art director Helmut Krone and copywriter Julian Koenig created a new campaign for a small, economical, reliable, durable, imported car made in Germany — the Volkswagen Beetle.
It would become the most famous, most honored advertising campaign of all time.

Volkswagen’s competition was Detroit – the Big Three.  GM. Ford. Chrysler. (Toyota, Honda, Nissan were not on the radar yet.)

The Detroit ads were almost always 4-color — usually with an illustration, not a photograph, of the car.  The car itself: a ¾ view to accent its lines.  And often sitting in front of the yacht club or the country club or the best restaurant in town. People — dressed in their finest — standing around, admiring the car and each other.

Here is a sampling of actual headlines:

“They ‘ll know you’ve arrived….”

“It rolls out the red carpet wherever you go.” 

“Exciting to look at – thrilling to drive.”

“America’s First Family of Fine Cars.”

“More than the grace of greatness.”

“A New Realm of Motoring Majesty.”

And here is some actual body copy:

*  “New muscles under the hood – with a choice of five precision-balanced new powerplants — to move you along in eager and effortless smoothness.”

*  “A stunning new mood in Highway Fashion!   Never before has such a brilliant array of fine motor cars been introduced to the American public.…”

 The “Honest Car” Strategy.
Bill Bernbach’s strategy for VW was the “Honest Car.”

• Volkswagen didn’t change the outside of the Beetle every year — a car that doesn’t change its looks from year to year holds its value better year after year.
• Volkswagen constantly changed the inside of the Beetle — to make it run better, last longer, more fun to drive.

Helmut Krone believed strategy applied to the layout and visual of an ad just as much as it applied to the headline and copy of an ad.
So Helmut designed an “Honest Car” layout.  Two-thirds picture/one-third copy.  With the headline centered in-between.  (“But raised slightly,” Helmut told me.) Black and white.  The car is the star.  Photographed on a no-seam  background. Nothing to distract from it.
For his typeface, Helmut went to the Futura family.  Honest, simple, easy to read.  Helmut believed the three blocks of copy below the visual should have about 6 to 9 lines of copy each.  Short paragraphs. Preferably ending in widows. Occasional one-word paragraphs.  All contributing to the open, airy look and feel of “Honest Car.”

Bob’s Big Break.
The Volkswagen campaign was an instant success.  But within a year, Julian Koenig left DDB to form his own agency.  He was replaced by one of DDB’s best writers, David Reider, but only for a short time.
Suddenly, the big question at Doyle Dane Bernbach was who could step into the role of copywriter on the agency’s most-famous account?  DDB had a strong bench.  Bill Bernbach considered many of his top, seasoned writers.
Bob told me it was Helmut Krone who went to Bill Bernbach and said, “I think the new guy from Sales Pro can do the job.”

Becoming the Volkswagen copywriter.
Bob got the job, moved from Sales Pro to National Advertising and for the next five years, he gave the Volkswagen ads their wit, wisdom, and humor. Always leaving the reader with a smile.  And wanting more.
Here are a few examples:

Known for their wit, wisdom, and humor, Bob’s Volkswagen concepts and copy also included common sense. 


Bob added something new to the Volkswagen campaign — warmth. The bug went beyond being just a car and became more like a member of the family.


In the late1970s, Volkswagen opened a plant in Westmoreland, Pennsylvania to build VW Rabbits.
Helmut Krone and Bob did this ad to celebrate the Americanization of Volkswagen.
Bob’s last line begins:  How wunderbar….

Bill Bernbach once told me, “You can pile enough feathers on top of each other so that they’ll eventually weigh enough to crash through the floor.”
He said some people use that approach with their advertising.  But not Doyle Dane Bernbach.  He said he wanted every DDB ad to be so strong, so clear, so concise — you got the message the first time you saw it.  And you remembered it.
This ad, by Charlie Piccirillo and Bob Levenson, does exactly that.

Like Talking to a Neighbor over the Backyard Fence.
Bob’s copy didn’t preach.  Or lecture.  It wasn’t full of puffery.  Or impossible promises.  Using wit, wisdom, warmth, simple words, simple sentences, and humor, Bob explained Volkswagen’s features — and why they were important, and how they were good.
Here’s how Bob explained Volkswagen’s technically-sophisticated 4-wheel independent torsion bar suspension system:
“Each wheel is suspended independently.  So when a bump makes one wheel bounce, the bounce doesn’t make the other wheels bump.”

Introducing The Klitchik.
The klitchik was the twist that Bob wrote at the end of his Volkswagen copy.  It often left you with a smile.
“People remembered those end lines,” Bob told me. “They got played back more than any other lines I wrote.”
Here are some examples of Bob’s ads and their klitchiks:
Klitchik: Some cars keep changing and stay the same.  Volkswagens stay the same and keep changing.

Klitchik: We don’t count on the paint to hold the VW together.  But it keeps it from falling apart.

 

Klitchik: It doesn’t go in one year and out the other.

 

Klitchik: We let other people make their cars bigger and smaller and taller and shorter.  We just go on making ours longer.

Bob Levenson’s description of his Volkswagen copy.
Helmut Krone liked Bob’s copy – both the way it read and the way it looked.  He called it “Gertrude Steiny.” Bill Bernbach described it as “factual and straightforward:  subject, verb, object.”
Bob himself described his VW copy as: “Solid facts presented in an irreverent, anti-establishment, Volkswagen-is-the-only-intelligent-purchase manner.”
And it worked.  In 1949, Volkswagen sold only 2 cars in America.  In 1960, Volkswagen sold 162,037 VWs.  In 1965, they sold 357,144 VWs.
By 1970, Volkswagen had sold more than 3½ million VWs in America.

And Bob did more…

The Mobil “We want you to live” Campaign — with Len Sirowitz.  Including:

 

El Al Israel Airlines — with Sid Myers. Including:

Sarah Lee – with Len Sirowitz.
TV campaign:  “Everybody doesn’t like something.  But nobody doesn’t like Sara Lee.”  Lyrics by Bob Levenson.  Music by Mitch (“Man of La Mancha”) Leigh.
It was so successful, Consolidated Foods (the parent company) changed its name to Sara Lee.

DDB House Advertisement – with Len Sirowitz.
Just as meaningful today as it was when it was written almost 60 years ago.

“No Such Thing as Bob Levenson Copy” — Bob Levenson.
Read the copy in the Volkswagen ads, in the Mobil ads, in the El Al ads, in “Do this or die.”  The ads were written by Bob.  But you’ll think they were written by four different people.
Bob often said there is no such thing as Bob Levenson copy. Instead, he gave each client, each campaign its own tone, its own style, its own voice.

Giants and Poets and Facts and Ideas.
Looking at the above work on Volkswagen and Mobil and El Al and Sara Lee and DDB — work done by Bob Levenson, Helmut Krone, Len Sirowitz, Sid Myers, Charlie Piccirillo — it reminds me of my favorite quote from Bill Bernbach: “The real giants have always been poets, men who jumped from facts into the realm of imagination and ideas.”

Becoming  Creative Director of Doyle Dane Bernbach.
In February, 1970, Bob was named Creative Director of Doyle Dane Bernbach. Getting that title might make some people beat their chest and shout: “Hey, look at me.”  But not Bob.  He modestly told The New York Times: “It’s like Bernbach, Gage and I were driving along in the same car and after we stopped for coffee they said, ‘Why don’t you drive a while?’  We’re all going to the same place and they can still say, ‘Hey, stupid, watch out for the truck!’”

On Being Creative Director.
“The real role of creative director,” Bob told Advertising Age in 1972, “is to look at work that’s coming through, to try to improve what needs improving, and to make sure that what doesn’t need improving doesn’t get deteriorated by all the  forces abroad that can deteriorate work, and there are plenty of those.”

The Who Does What Memo “From: N.Doyle, W.Bernbach”
On December 1, 1961, Ned Doyle and Bill Bernbach issued a joint memo detailing the “Creative and Account Group Responsibilities and Working Relationship” at DDB.
It said: “the account group is responsible for ‘what should be said,’ the creative group for ‘how to say it.’”
That meant if the work was on strategy, if it was honest and accurate, but the account group questioned the work simply because they didn’t like it — all DDB’s Creative Director had to do was say: “You’re wrong.  Go sell it.”
But Bob Levenson always did more.  He’d tell the account group why they were wrong. Why the work was right.  And if you were an account guy and listened carefully to Bob, he gave you all you needed to sell the work.  We called Bob’s instructions “Speaking Words of Wisdom.”

“Give the Client What He Wants, but Not What He Expects.”
In the old John Ford Westerns, the cavalry always rides into battle carrying a flag, banner, or guidon.  That quote above, from Bob, was my guidon.
Late one day in 1972, Bob told art director Charlie Piccirillo and me that he needed a storyboard for a 60-second Volkswagen TV commercial by 9 a.m. the following morning.  Volkswagen wanted a commercial that proved how well built the Beetle was.
I loved working with Charlie.  He made hard work fun. And the results were always rewarding.
Next morning at nine, we were in Bob’s office with our spot.
It covered all the things the client wanted. And then it ended with something no one expected.  To prove how well the Volkswagen was put together — we drove the Volkswagen into the ocean.
And it floated.
And Bob backed us.

“A big part of my job Is to make sure something that is great stays great.” — Bob Levenson, Creative Director.
Everyone I know has a favorite story about how Bob backed and saved their work. Mine is about “Perfect People’s Car” — a TV spot art director Bob Tucker and I created for the Volkswagen Squareback.The spot was based on the old, popular-at-the-time, Cold War joke where the Soviets claim to have invented everything first – the refrigerator, the telephone, the light bulb….  The real fun starts when they show their first.  It’s often clumsy, comical, over-the-top (at least as depicted in the jokes).
In our spot, a little inventor is exiled to Siberia with orders to build the Perfect People’s Car.  “After 4 five-year plans,” he stitches together the front half of a VW bug (for economy) with the back half of a VW box (for capacity) only to learn the perfect car for people already exists — the Volkswagen Squareback. The “Perfect People’s Car.”

The account group didn’t like the spot.  “It purports to Communism.” (Whatever that means.)  “It’ll remind everyone of the Cold War.”  And on and on. “We can’t show this.”
Bob told the account guys why they were wrong. Gave them reasons why it was a good spot. Then, reaching for his calendar, Bob said: “If after all this, if you still think you might have a problem selling this commercial, let me know when the client presentation is.  I’d be more than happy to rearrange my schedule and come with you to help sell this commercial.”  They got the message.
We shot the “Perfect People’s Car” commercial on a bright, warm, sunny day in Pasadena, CA — deep inside a freezing-cold, bone-chilling, frozen-food warehouse where our director — the legendary Howard Zieff — built a small snow-covered wind-swept Siberian village.  It was so cold, the lubricating oil in our camera froze.
Howard was great — he made the commercial fun to shoot and fun to see on tv.

Bob Levenson Could Sell New Creative Work Better than any Account Executive.
We had a new packaged-goods account.  We were about to present our new campaign to the man who had the final authority to say “Yes” or “No.”  We’d been told he was a “numbs and figs guy” — a big believer in pretesting, testing, retesting.
The DDB account supervisor — who totally supported our campaign — asked Bob to come to the meeting and present the work.
Bob sat at a big table directly across from the client.  He opened the meeting by saying a few words about the   product category…a few words about the new product….  and a few words about how pleased we were to be their new agency.
Next, Bob said: “These days, everybody is talking about testing — especially 24-hour recall.  Maybe they should be talking about 24-year recall.”
Then he named two old DDB classics: Volkswagen – “Snowplow.”  Polaroid – “Zoo.”
Each time, the client nodded his head; he remembered the commercials.
Then Bob said, “You get commercials like this by finding the single most important thing to say about the product, developing a strategy, and then coming up with a fresh, new, persuasive, memorable way of saying it.
“That’s what we always want to do.  And that’s what we’ve done for you.”
And then, Bob stood up, took off his jacket, picked up the storyboard, walked around the table, sat next to the client, and started going over the storyboard.  Instead of the usual presentation, where you stand, face the client, and pitch to the client — the scene looked more like two old friends, sitting together, going over a road map that’ll get you from here to where you want to be.
“Approved,” said the client.  Without any pre-testing.

Bob Levenson could explain Doyle Dane Bernbach better than anyone.
He did it in speeches, in presentations, in conversations, in meetings, in memos, in house ads…

The “Oh./Ah!” Speech.
When Bob was named Vice Chairman of the Board, Creative (1974) and later also Chairman of the International Division (1984), he traveled a lot.  Putting a Doyle Dane Bernbach shingle on a newly-acquired agency in a far-off country didn’t automatically make it a Doyle Dane Bernbach agency. Someone had to go there and instill the DDB creative principles.
But Bob was always back in New York for the annual shareholders meeting.  And people looked forward to hearing him speak.
At the annual meeting in May,1979, Bob began by reminding everyone this was Doyle Dane Bernbach’s 30^th anniversary.  Bob said the agency had become a success because of its environment, its principles, and its people — devoted, inventive, hard working.   Bob said in its offices around the world, DDB stood for great people making great advertising that produced great results.
Then Bob said: “There is nobody — no matter what his job —working in any advertising agency anywhere in the world —   who has not been touched somehow by the fact that there   is a Doyle Dane Bernbach.”
Which is why, Bob said, when he tells people anywhere in the world that he works for an advertising agency — “they say, ‘Oh.’”  But when he tells them the agency he works for is Doyle Dane Bernbach – “they say, ‘Ah!’”
“That little difference — between ‘Oh.’ and ‘Ah!’ — is what we have to show for 30 years of hard work,” said Bob.
“That little difference,” he added, “is all the difference in the world.”
When Bob was finished, everyone in the room beamed with pride.  Proud to be part of Doyle Dane Bernbach.

For me — the Ad that defined Doyle Dane Bernbach.
In the early 1980s, Gary Goldsmith was a young assistant art director at DDB.  Best of the best, recently graduated from Art Center in Pasadena.
One day Gary’s phone rang.  It was Bob Levenson, Vice Chairman of the Board, Creative.
“Gary,” said Bob, “you and I are going to do a house ad for Doyle Dane Bernbach today.”
Bob wanted to create an ad with Gary that would define Doyle Dane Bernbach and dramatize what set it apart from other agencies.
I think the ad was to run in some kind souvenir program or book where all the big conventional advertising agencies also would have house ads.
Gary’s and Bob’s ad was a spread — an all-type ad with lots of white space.
Gary put the headline on the left page.  It read: Hi
For the right page, Bob wrote 13 words of copy that spoke volumes.  It read:
If our ad looked like everyone else’s, we wouldn’t be Doyle Dane Bernbach.
Bill Bernbach’s Book.
One of the greatest things Bob did was write “Bill Bernbach’s Book:  A History of the Advertising that Changed the History of Advertising.”
There was no better person for the job.   Bob worked at DDB for 26 years.  He knew the agency inside out.  He was the closest link to Bill Bernbach. When the two of them were in the same room talking— it was hard to tell where one stopped and the other started.  Both were on the same wavelength.
In the book, Bob wrote a chapter on every major client — including Volkswagen, Polaroid, Avis, Ohrbach’s, El Al, Alka-Seltzer, Colombian Coffee, Mobil, Chivas Regal, Porsche, American Airlines. He offers insights and observations about each client/campaign — plus pictures of the print ads and TV storyboards.
I once heard someone say: “Yes, but Bill Bernbach didn’t write all those ads.”
It’s true in the strictest sense. Yet, in a real sense, he did.
He hired us. He taught us (writers and art directors) how to work together as equal partners — the creative team. He taught us how copy and art can work together to create a concept – an idea — that’s more powerful, more persuasive, more memorable than any stand-alone “perfect headline.” He demanded we create advertising that sells the most important feature of the product in a fresh, new, memorable, persuasive, honest way.
When we did it, he sold it.
I have 7 ads in Bill Bernbach’s Book. I’m sure if I had done those ads at either of the two other places where I’d worked earlier – the ads never would have gotten out of the door.
The ads got done, got approved, got sold, got produced because of Bill Bernbach.

Bill Bernbach’s Book. Published in the U.S. in 1987 by Villard Books.  Over 200 pages. With color and b&w photos of DDB ads and storyboards.  Plus the background story behind each campaign.
What Bob did writing Bill Bernbach’s Book was lift the flap and let us sneak into the tent.
Bob Levenson was my hero.

MORE BOB…