George Lois Direct

George Lois knows something about getting results.

His “I want my MTV” campaign drew thousands of phone calls and helped put the cable network on the map. And that was just one of several breakthroughs created by the art director during his 50-year career.

Lois left Doyle Dane Bernbach in 1960 at 28 to start Papert Koenig Lois because he was convinced creatives needed to be in control. That shop was the first major agency to have an art director's name on its door, and it was the first to go public.

But Lois regretted that move when his partners started playing it safe. In 1967 he went off on his own, doing groundbreaking work for everyone from Maypo to Cutty Sark. (See www.georgelois.com for samples of his work.)

In between, Lois designed memorable conceptual covers for Esquire magazine.

Lois remains active in the business at age 76. At the time of this interview in his Greenwich Village, New York apartment, he'd just finished a campaign for a new cable network for baby boomers called American Life. Among the luminaries featured in the spots is Joe Namath, who often showed up in Lois-produced commercials and ads during the 1970s.

On Nov. 6, Rizzoli will publish a new book by Lois, “Iconic America: A Roller-Coaster Ride Through the Eye-Popping Panorama of American Pop Culture.” This time he shares credit with fashion designer Tommy Hilfiger, whose career Lois kick-started with a 1986 campaign that featured posters on Manhattan telephone booths.

DIRECT: Why did you turn to direct response TV when MTV asked for your help in the early 1980s?

LOIS: MTV was nowhere after a year. It was dead. Everybody in the business thought MTV was a joke. I convinced [MTV co-founder] Bob Pittman to let me do a television commercial. Everyone said, ‘We don't have the money for that.’ I said, ‘I'll get a rock star,’ and managed to get Mick Jagger, who told viewers to call their local cable operator and say, ‘I want my MTV!’ So we ran three spots of the Jagger commercial the first night in San Francisco. And 5:30 in the morning San Francisco time, which is 8:30 in New York, the cable operator there called Pittman [and said], ‘Get that f****** commercial off the air.’ So Pittman said, ‘We'll take it off right away.’ The operator said, ‘By the way, I'll take MTV because I'm getting thousands of phone calls.’ I knew ‘I want my MTV’ was a catchy line, and it could become famous. Mick Jagger saved MTV.

DIRECT: Your Tommy Hilfiger ad listing his initials alongside those of established designers like Geoffrey Beene, Bill Blass and Calvin Klein created amazing word of mouth. Have you come up with promotional ideas for clients?

LOIS: The campaigns were always self-fulfilling prophecies. They became not only ad campaigns, but promotions. I always did promotion pieces. To me, my advertising was always guerrilla advertising. You do it, and all [of a] sudden it's all over the place. I do what I call “famous advertising” with way, way less money than anybody ever spent. I do stuff that I know is going to get hot and picked up.

DIRECT: But doesn't it have to reinforce the brand?

LOIS: Of course. I recently taught a class and [the students] were talking about how they liked that beer commercial where the girl walks by and the guy changes the drink, something like that. Everybody said, “Yeah, I love that commercial.” I asked, ‘What brand, what's the beer?’ They argued for 10 minutes, and came up with four different beers.

DIRECT: So the spot failed?

LOIS: Totally. Most advertising is invisible. They don't remember seeing print ads either. So the name of the game is to do famous advertising with a big idea.

DIRECT: Any advice for people starting out in the business?

LOIS: If you're careful, you're dead. I'm not saying be reckless. Above and beyond your talent and a big idea, there's got to be a passion and a belief that you can change the world. You've got to believe what you create can make a product successful, breakthroughs. I don't think many agencies believe that. I had this client Data General that was dead. I had people delivering pizza boxes with mainframes. That was a promotion. Its stock went up 42 points in one day.

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LARRY JAFFEE is editor in chief of Promo magazine.