After I left my first ad agency job, I wrote the usual novice copywriter projects (data sheets, brochures, trade ads, press releases, etc) for a lighting controls company.
I got tired of looking at their ugly, essentially hand-drawn logo, so one day I renovated it in what I’ll now call “Early Digital Ugly” style.
It was not a pretty thing.
Just yesterday, the art director who worked on their packaging over two decades ago sent me an email about electricians installing lighting controls in his office — which turned out to be our former client’s.
Amazingly, they still use the exact same data/installation sheet template he designed 25 years ago, and perversely, the boxes and sheets also featured the exact — and still awful — logo I’d created.
I’m proud of a lot of the concepts and copy I’ve written, but copywriters know their work typically lives a pretty short life (a couple years or less).
That the worst piece of crap I ever did — a logo no less — has now endured for decades suggests something unpleasant — like the existence of an ironic god.
Everybody has a few creative/copywriting skeletons in their closet, but I thought this one was buried decades ago.
Any similar projects from my readers’ past ever pop up years after the crime?
Keep writing with the knowledge it might be around forever, Tom Chandler.
This is something that I definitely think all writers can completely understand. I have drastically improved upon my skills in everything from writing to design from the beginning of my career until now–sometimes it is a blessing that our work can be short lived. Good post.
Nicole recently posted..The Power of Social Media Networking
Hey Tom,
I still cringe everytime someone says “fershizzle”. I don’t know where I got it from, but after it took off I was like, “this is what I’m going to be remembered for?” The worst was when Snoop Dogg used it in that commercial. Ugh. (Though I hear he made it work…)
Other than that, I haven’t had too much creep back up on me (knock on digitial wood). There was one incident years ago when a client came back to me — apologetically — and said that although he loved my writing, he just didn’t like this particular piece of work. I re-read it and realized that yes, it was a piece of… work that never should have seen the light of day. It got re-written (and then subsquently died as you ssy two-three years later…)
~Graham
Graham Strong recently posted..The 401 Blues (Not a Rant) – Day 344
I feel exactly the same way whenever I hear “Where’s the beef” or see the Energizer Bunny…
You can’t mention the awfulness of the logo in the first act without showing a picture of it in the third…
Paul Lagasse recently posted..the week in tweets: 2011-08-15
If only I could; I don’t have any files from that era, and the AD didn’t send a scan.
I’d say it’s a shame, but then, I don’t publish a lot of the headlines I wrote back then either…