Brush With Greatness

Legitimately Impressive Credential

Maybe I would be wowed by Central Coast's Chris Shaw's having worked on campaigns for "breakfast cereal" and "sports drinks" if he would quit being cute and tell me what they actually are.

Insufferable Executive

Chris might win this award on the sole basis of having made his job title "Chief Visionary." But over at The Monogram Group, there's Jackie Short, who responds to the stress of rehearsing a pitch by announcing that she intends to stay only for twelve more minutes, no matter what. "I'm just, like, five minutes away from a temper tantrum, and we all can see that coming," she warns. I really would have thought that someone old enough to wear nothing but turtlenecks with Chico's "statement necklaces" over them would also be old enough not to threaten her professional colleagues with a meltdown, but apparently not. Jackie later demonstrates that, despite being in her fifties, she has her finger on the pulse of the youth by telling us what totally happening abbreviations like "WTF" stand for. "You've probably never seen the grumpy cat." - Jackie. (Note: that actually is a direct quote.)

Self-Consciously Quirky Office

The Monogram Group welcomes visitors with an Einstein quote painted on the wall; we also see employees taking meetings lying on the floor like they're in a rumpus room (above), and making a point next to a foosball table and a large inflatable banana.

The Fear?

Monogram was on the rocks in 2010 until Scott Markman kept it afloat with his own savings, so winning this face-off could translate to some security for himself and his staff.

What The Client Says It Wants

President/CEO David Sabin bought The Fuller Brush Company -- one of America's oldest brands -- just six months ago, and is looking to introduce it to a younger demographic. ("I still have my brush from fifty years ago," says Jackie, nailing it.) Sabin says that he doesn't want Fuller Brush to be a forgotten dinosaur like Kodak (sure) or Polaroid (...I think that one still has some name recognition value, at least, but okay). To that end, he's looking for the prospective agencies to "create a social digital media campaign that will target the younger audience and still maintain our current customer." Creative Director Megan Curameng says some baloney about how Fuller Brush dovetails nicely with the current vogue for Mad Men and the like. "You want to be retro and relevant?" asks Chris. They do.

Cringily Unearned Moment Of Self-Congratulation

OH NO, IT FINALLY HAPPENED. Both agencies not only independently came up with the SAME tagline, BUT (unlike last week), they're both going to run with it! The tagline: "Live Fuller." "It's way too early to say I love that, but I love that," says Chris, while Scott enthuses, "'Live Fuller' isn't just a tagline, it's a philosophy." I mean, I reject any "philosophy" that's grammatically incorrect. But that's me.

The...Uh, Pitch

Monogram is up first, and starts with Jackie offering some pointless generalities about how Gen-Xers and millennials shop. "They pride themselves -- and I resent this -- on shopping smarter than their parents," Jackie cracks of Gen-Xers, just really hammering home how old she is in relation to the audience Fuller Brush wants to capture. Once she's done with her nonsense about comparison shopping and brand loyalty (neither of which belongs to any generation, nor will they ever), Monogram introduces the character the team has created as an avatar for the company: Fuller B. Rushman. He kind of has the look of the old Fuller Brush Man, but he's totally now, man!

"Our model is wearing a tattoo!" He will be the face of "Live Fuller" (which phrase Monogram already unveiled when Fuller Brush made its totally spontaneous visit to the office), and might even tweet! Live Fuller is the business, Monogram declares: "It's an anthem, it's a mantra, it's a call to action."

Central Coast Chris is gambling by having Jason Brooks, one of the agency's "visualizers" (what?), participate in the pitch; normally Jason doesn't meet with clients because he has terrible stage fright. But when Fuller Brush came to the Central Coast office and Chris refused to give any kind of a preview as to what the agency planned to do for the brand, Jason saved the whole thing from going off the rails by showing Sabin the sketches he'd made when Fuller Brush gave them the brief, which Sabin really liked -- so as a reward, Jason's been called up to the Big Show.

As Chris yammers on (his whole thing is "storytelling") (by which I mean "pretension"), Jason unzips his portfolio and lays out some more finished sketches he's drawn to highlight the "heritage" of the Fuller Brush brand. This segues into a thirty-second sort-of-animated spot with narration about keeping things nice over Jason's illustrations of people and the nice things they have. The spot ends with "Live Fuller" -- at which all the Fuller Brush executives exchange a look, and Megan tells us in an interview how extraordinary it is for two agencies to come in with exactly the same tagline. There's the usual vague "social" blather about encouraging people to share their Fuller Brush stories, and the usual no strategy for how or why that would happen. Caitlin Keller, another Fuller Brush VP, asks whether Central Coast considered doing something with the Fuller Brush Man -- joking that it seems like he's sitting right next to her, gesturing toward Jason in his suit. The CC crew laughs and Chris is like, I don't know, maybe? (He obviously never thought of it.) Chris tells us in an interview, "I will be shocked if we don't win, because this idea is too good." WELL, THAT COULD BE TRUE AND YOU STILL MIGHT LOSE, BRO, BUT I LOVE YOUR CONFIDENCE.

The Winner

When both agencies are called back in, the Fuller Brushites have the pleasure of telling them that they both came up with the same tagline, and all the creatives are shocked -- shocked! -- to be confronted by evidence that they're not actually as creative as they thought they were. In the end, the judgment is that the better execution of the tagline came from The Monogram Group, not because they thought Fuller B. Rushman was so awesome (Megan and Caitlin agree that the character would need work), but because of Jackie's supposedly great research about how brand-loyal millennials are or whatever the fuck. Chris says he'll be bummed to see that tagline on ads he didn't make (good news, Chris: this is all pretend and you're never going to see Fuller Brush ads at all!), but that he wouldn't do anything differently. And then Jason tells us how proud he is of himself for proving that he could do a pitch, and cries.

And just when you're starting to get emotionally attached to the Jesse Pinkman of The Pitch, we cut back to The Monogram Group. Will Jackie smoke a cigar of celebration? "You bet your ass I will." Shut up, Jackie.