Elite Appliance

This award winning spot is a good example of the value of being honest with your client. While we were in the “pitch” phase of developing what we might create for them, the owner of the business looked at me very seriously and asked me if I would watch something with him. He took me to a computer and told me that another company had just made a commercial for them and he wanted me to watch it and give my honest, unvarnished feedback. Mind you, we had no contract signed yet and what I would do next could seal the deal OR have us shown the door. So, I watched it and it was not good, average for a cheap cable spot. But I don’t believe in negative selling and the owner could see me dragging my feet. So he asked me again and emphasized to not filter ANYTHING. “Just tell me the truth.” I took a deep breath and took him through the spot beat by beat and I tore it to shreds. Every technical error, every aesthetic misstep. He listened in silence. I ended the dissection with my biggest takeaway, which was that the spot did not communicate ANY of the aspects of his business that made it different from his competition. I then told him specifically what Castaway would do differently. There was a long silence and then he said “give me a pen” and he signed the contract. He told me HATED the other spot and that the biggest problem he had with the other production company was that they did not listen when he told them what was important to him and when questioned, they “blew a lot of smoke”. I assured him that I would always listen to him, but he might regret always getting the unvarnished truth from me. Anyway, he LOVED this spot and the other spots in the campaign and we loved that the campaign won a Telly. And that’s the truth.